To still be unnerved by tv programmes from childhood? (Light hearted)

[Ujjayi]

For years I have had a vague recollection of a chilling ghost story about a young girl transported back to Victorian times when she looks in a mirror. I have just remembered it was called "Come Back Lucy" & searched online for details... And I am freaked out all over again, despite being 43!

I love a good ghost story but I can't believe that was considered ok for me to watch. I must have only been 7 or 8 when it was shown.

Does anyone else recall it?

Also scared witless of what I think was The Singing Ringing Tree - the weird dwarf making thorn hedges spring up everywhere.

SalopianGirl THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!!! It absolutely was the Bells of Astercote!!!! I spent a fruitless 15 mins googling Children of Winter, definitely not that. But a quick google of Astercote turned up trumps.

That's been bothering me for years. And had I but known it was from a book written by one of my favourite author's Penelope Lively I would have sought it out long ago, didn't even know she'd written a children's book.

Lizardc the thing with the chalice, having read a synopsis of the book, is that the chalice protects the modern day village from the plague but it goes missing and the two children have to find it, meanwhile people are getting ill all around them.

So glad I am not alone in my spooky rememberings...

Oh, see you were both way ahead of me!

I remember Chocky from being really little, spooked the hell out of me, as did the opening sequence from Tales of The Unexpected. Just hearing the tune now freaks me out.

This thread reminds me of this thread which I read a short while ago.

Yes, I'd come to say Astercote as well. I loved the book, but that tv adaptation scared the living daylights out of me.

Mixed up in it, though, is a memory of a bit of tv which I'm sure I should never have seen, and isn't children's tv at all, but I think I must have accidentally seen it at around he same time as I saw Astercote and the two have got connected. I remember a boy, standing at a new grave looking at the earth, which all of a sudden starts to shift and a hand with pointing finger emerges and points at the boy. I am SURE this must be something I glimpsed on a visit downstairs after I should have been in bed because really, that's not going to happen on children's TV. Is it?

I even reread the book recently to check there is not such a scene and of course there isn't, but my memory is still convinced it's from Astercote.

I loved Moondial and Green Knowe though.

Noseybonk: there are no words.

Penelope Lively wrote a few children's books, I think.

Chocky and greenhowe and triffids!! Aaaargh!

Archer's Goon was really good, surreal and disturbing. So pleased I'm not the only one to remember this. Also the wordy one with the boy from space who learned English from an inside out tesco carrier bag?

Astercote! And Children of the Dog Star! I had completely forgotten.

I remember being freaked out by lots of these, but also by the skull (?) in the TV version of Carrie's War, which I was terrified of for a long time. And Dramarama seemed to be always terrifying. I remember one awful one with a railway - and maybe some soldiers? - lots of mist. I was so frightened I could hardly speak. What was it with TV and terrifying children in the 70s/80s??!

Penelope Lively also wrote the Ghost of Thomas Kempe which was brilliant. So brilliant that I bought a copy for my year 6 class (along with all my other childhood faves but that's a whole other thread)

The very thought of watching Moondial makes me feel queasy. I've cued it up on you tube several times but can't bring myself to watch it. I am lame.

Aghhh! The opening sequence of Tales of the Unexpected, utterly terrifying!

Mr Noseybonk has terrified me since being very small, and only now after reading this thread, do I know what programme he was on! Too scared to watch any clips of him tonight, and I'm 37!

I loved The Boy from Space. I think it was part of a weekly serial that we watched in school called Words and Pictures/ Look and Read (?).They followed TBFS with Dark Towers, which was brill.
I found The Tripods creepy, it was the jerky walking.

Whenever Chorlton & the Wheelies is shown on one of those flashback type programmes I feel really anxious & still can't watch, it terrified me as a small child (I am now 41!)

The public information film about playing near water still haunts me, some children playing near the water, a splash, some screams and all you see is some clothing floating on the surface. Nightmares for a long time.

I used to go to my friend's house after school on the pretext of doing homework to read her copy of Misty, as my mother had decreed it was too disturbing for me. In hindsight, she was right, I had terrible nightmares from some of those stories!

When I was about 6 I watched Jason and the Argonauts, and the bit where Talos comes to life terrified me. I can't bear it even now, that bit where they're inside the base of the statue and you can hear the creaky noises but not know what it is, then they come out and IT TURNS ITS HEAD AND LOOKS AT THEM!!!

Scariest film evah.

Massive creepy build up to the moment at 3.03:

I didn't like Captain Scarlett because his face looked so angry/furious/murderous and I thought he was going to come and get me !

Compared to the, good guys that the, 'Thunderbirds' were.

Dr Who 1970's early 1980's was good. The Daleks used to panic me a bit but when someone pointed out they could not manage a flight of stairs that broke the spell and I wasn't scared of them anymore !

I loved Copme Back Lucy - no one seemed to remember it and I was so happy finding it on Youtube.

We bought the boxset of The Children of the Stones as DH hadn't seen it. Great viewing one Saturday evening. Story is excellent.

Moondial was very atmospheric. And I had nightmares over the film The Amazing Mister Blunden. It is so sad and actually quite horrific to think about.

I was terrified of the characters in Pipkins as a child. Couldn't watch it even now!

The Box of Delights was great - some scary scenes in it but also beautiful CHristmassy scenes. Oh children's drama was fantastic in the 70s and 80s. Far more original.

Remembered another Dramarama episode! Some lads cover themselves in glowing paint to scare people into thinking they had seen a ghost of a dead drummer boy but the lads see the actual ghost instead.

Easy, Worzel Gummidge. Also the opening sequence for the Box of Delights is creepy but sooooo brilliant;

QueenofThornsI have been trying to remember the name of that show for years. Peacock cries still give me the wiggins.

I've just looked at Children of the Stones on you tube and had to put it off! Jeezo, no wonder it has stayed with me all these years!

I'd forgotten about Lizzie Dripping, I loved that.

I've held on to a few books from my childhood and these include The Owl Service, Marianne Dreams and The Green Knowe series. Must have like to be scared as a child.

Does anyone remember The Haunting of Cassie Palmer on TV in the late 70's or early 80's?

Not a childrens' programme but an episode of the usually harmless Bergerac , Christmas 1986 I think, scared me witless. Ghost story with creepy children singing and even Bergerac couldn't solve the mystery.

The Amazing Mr Blunden (I think that's what it was called): a movie though not a TV show, there was no TV when I was growing up in South Africa. Gave me chills.

Marianne Dreams also. Still scares me.