The only thing scarier than a horror film is an existence of a child character in it, who is either possessed, the devil incarnate, a ghost or pure evil itself. I mean, nobody wants to see a cute kid turn out to be the spawn of Lucifer himself!
Or maybe some people do, and maybe I just don’t have the stomach for it. On that note, let’s take a look at some of the creepiest kids from horror films who gave us all major chills.
1. Regan in The Exorcist
Any film that includes exorcism is the absolute worse, plus a lot of them are based on true stories, which leaves me baffled as to why people enjoy them in the first place. Then, to make it worse, add a child into the mix; Regan from The Exorcist was so, so freaky every time they showed her in her possessed avatar!
2. Esther in Orphan
You know what is terrifying? Seeing a thirty-three-year-old psycho, who looks like an eight-year-old, being adopted by an adult couple, only to see her hit on her adoptive dad and seek out vengeance when he refuses her advances! That is exactly what Esther does in Orphan. Plus she has a history of leaving a trail of destruction behind her, ruining several of her adoptive parents and families.
3. Dalton in Insidious
Although Dalton himself does nothing harmful to the people around him, the scenes showing him being possessed by a demon aren’t easy to watch. The film has quite a nice plot though.
4. Damien in The Omen
They just had to choose a cute kid for this one huh? Damien is exchanged at birth, with a child who died. The couple who raise him later realise he is the Antichrist and is basically evil incarnate. Creepy no?
Also Read: Hollywood Horror Movies List
5. Claudia in Interview With The Vampire
Claudia is a vampire who was turned against her will, and because she was turned into a vampire as a child, she will remain so physically, no matter how much she grows mentally. Frustrated with her fate, she becomes increasingly insecure, and paranoid. So much so, she kills people in confusion and provokes one of her adult companions to turn another human into a vampire too. Yup, she’s a little maniac alright.
6. Charlie Graham in Hereditary
Charlie is revealed to be the actual bad guy in Hereditary, after quite the dose of suspense and speculation about who demon-king Paimon is. And I have to say, Milly Shapiro (Charlie) did a really good job at enacting the little bits of foreshadowing here and there. She creeped us out alright.
7. Bughuul’s ‘children’ in Sinister
Just a bunch of kids being possessed and controlled by a demon named Bughuul. He drives children to kill their families and then moves onto other families to take a new pick. Collecting child after child to make an army of children to murder people – good stuff huh?
8. Samara Yamamura in The Ring
Just leave it to the Japanese to make an absolutely terrifying storyline with an evil child in it! The Ring is an adaptation of a Japanese novel that has a child as the antagonist. Samara Yamamura’s ghost haunts a videotape, wherein anyone who watches the video, dies in seven days. The disturbing scenes of Samara with her long stringy hair in the haunted video are nightmare giving!
9. Brandon Breyer in Brightburn
Brandon is like the evil version of Clark Kent. He is an alien who crash-lands on earth as a baby. The couple who decide to raise him, slowly realise that their son has some dark tendencies (read being a creepy stalker and murderer) and it is later revealed that Brandon belongs to an evil alien race that seeks other more peaceful races to destroy them. In short, Brandon had been sent to earth to destroy earth.
10. Toshio Saeki in The Grudge
Toshio Saeki is a child who dies at a young age and then proceeds to haunt the people that come in contact with a curse that spreads every time someone enters the house he and his mother died in. It may not sound too bad, but whenever there are scenes of the kid sitting in the corner of a room making creepy noises, oh boy, you’ll wish you never pressed that play button!
11. Grady Twins in The Shining
This film is such a classic, probably because of how well it left people with nightmares. The Grady Twins are two cute looking sisters who are murdered by their father, while he is possessed by a ghost. The creepy part is when the two girls repeatedly say ‘come play with us.’
12. Cole Sear from The Sixth Sense
It’s just very uncomfortable to see a little boy constantly say ‘I see dead people.’ I know I wouldn’t be okay being around a kid who would say that! Cole Sear is a nine-year-old who can see, well, ghosts! Although he doesn’t do anything evil per say, just his being aware of the spirits around him is spooky AF!
Which of these kids creeped you out to the max?