Mombi – Return To Oz

Holy hell, where do I even begin with this gem. This was one fucked up film from beginning to end set in the OZ universe. However, if you’ve actually read any Baum’s books in the original series, the tales are pretty dark and twisted. Thus this film being the closest to the actual writings in the books and making way not for one, but two characters on this list! That’s damn impressive Disney.

The headless witch dubbed as Princess Mombi, stole the heads from some of the most beautiful women that dwelled within the Emerald City and claimed them as her own. Using them as sort of an accessory to her daily wardrobe, switching heads on a religious basis was a pretty horrifying concept for any child to see in an OZ film. But hey, you have to also admit it was pretty damn cool too. Especially when the wench ran around headless chasing a young Fairuza Balk. Maybe that’s where that scene with the headless nun in Exorcist III derived from? Ok, probably not but the scene does ring some tubular bells for me.

 

 

 

The Wheelers- Return to Oz

As stated previously, Return to Oz is so fucked up that two of the film’s characters get a spot on this list, with he second being the Mombi’s Wheeler Gang. To be perfectly candid, I’m not sure who was more terrifying, the servant or the master. If we’re just talking one, Mombi easily wins as in the film we see a lone Wheeler sink to a pathetic status when confronted by the ‘Royal Army of Oz’ and Dorothy. However, the Wheelers travel in numbers, and as a whole they are piss your pants terrifying.

The Horned King- The Black Cauldron

Ok, let’s talk about one of the darkest, and coolest damn villains Disney ever made- The Black Cauldron.  This guy and the film, gets almost no recognition throughout the Disney community and seems like the movie time just forgot. Why is this movie so damn great? NO SINGING. That’s right, Disney made an animated picture with ZERO musical interruptions, and the movie all around is just dark as hell. I mean, just look at this guy!

The Horned King is about as evil and sinister as a villain can get, which is most likely why this movie didn’t favor so well with the children, and thus resulting in a box office flop. It also garnered a PG rating due to its dark content revolving around his majesty, the Horned King and his army of the dead. The King’s dead army is certainly reminiscent to Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness visually, but the kicker here is, Disney’s army of the dead is actually way more horrifying if you can believe that! He’s also voiced by the late, great John Hurt, so that alone makes the character all around bad-ass.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moH836kyAqw

Judge Doom- Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Judge Doom from Who Framed Roger Rabbit? is everything nightmares are made of. A clever man-toon in disguise throughout the majority of the film, gave me the skeevies from the moment he stepped on-screen. The guy’s first five minutes in the movie involved him demonstrating how to kill a ‘toon’ efficiently and that one scene alone with this poor little cartoon shoe screaming in agony as it get’s executed, is enough to make even the toughest adult squirm a tad.

That aside, the real fucked up scenes come towards the end when Doom reveals to actually be a ‘toon’ himself. After the Judge is flattened by a steamroller, the compressed Doom acrobats himself up, and manically introduces his true form to Eddie. With his red, putrid eyes bulging, the insane freeway loving Judge, proudly proclaims he killed Eddie’s brother. His eyes then turn into a spinning red and white ferris wheel of nightmares as he wields a hand-saw extended from his body towards Eddie. And that my friends, is when Christopher Lloyd shed that lovable Doc Brown image for good, while making kids all over crap their pants upon a first viewing.

Welp. There you have my opinion on the most fucked up, scariest character’s in children’s movies. Now let’s hear from you. Who would you add to this list? Is there someone not mentioned here that made your mind silently scream with terror? Also, if you dug this little piece, you might also enjoy the sister article here on iHorror examining the scariest family films from our childhoods. 

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