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Photo courtesy of Warner Bros.

Horror has always excited me.  As a kid, I hated the idea of scary movies, but I would always catch myself staring at the screen if my parents were watching one while I was present. The one thing that relentlessly bothered me was the children. Back then, the kids in horror movies bothered me because they never seemed to react to dire situations in a realistic way. Now? Now, I can 100% say without question that children are the best and worst thing to ever happen to the horror genre.

Children in horror isn’t a new idea, several classics have incorporated the younger generations into their movies, games, or books. Not every story is better with them though, some are worse.

Starting off with number 5: The Shining. The Shining is one of the many horror classics that feature a main character with a child. The child, Danny, plays a very important role in the movie, as well as its sequel, Doctor Sleep. Danny is warned not to go into room 237, but his curiosity gets the best of him when he finds the room door open. Inside the room is a dead woman’s ghost, who tries to strangle Danny. He didn’t specifically get anyone hurt or killed besides himself, so he’s the least annoying on the list.

Ever wonder if you could go without speaking for the rest of your life? At number 4 is Beau from A Quiet Place, who couldn’t stay quiet and paid the price.

The first scene shows a family scavenging for medicine in the empty town. A mom, dad, two sons and a daughter. Beau is the youngest brother at only four years old, and his sister is deaf, which is really important for the movie. Beau approaches his family before leaving the store with a plane toy. His father tells him that he can’t keep it because it’s too loud, and takes the batteries out of it, leaving it there. The daughter, Regan, gives him the toy back and says not to tell. The kid grabs the batteries, too, and inserts them into the toy. On the way back home, Beau plays with the toy. The loud sounds draw the attention of a nearby monster, resulting in Beau’s death. The kid was warned about the toy, and his selfishness and refusal to listen got him killed.

At number 3, we have another Stephen King story, and my personal favorite horror movie, IT. There are a lot of kids in IT, but we need to specifically look at Georgie, Bill’s younger brother. The movie begins with little Georgie trying to get Bill to play outside in the rain with him, but Bill is too sick to go. Bill makes a paper boat for Georgie to play with and sends him on his way. Georgie, while not paying attention, whacks his head on a sign, knocking him down on his back. Georgie ends up losing his boat down a sewer drain, and finds a clown when he tries to retrieve it. The clown is Pennywise, and he is an alien that eats kids. Of course, Georgie doesn’t know that, and when Pennywise offers him the boat back, Pennywise bites his arm off. If that wasn’t gory enough, as Georgie crawls away, the clown pulls him back into the sewer.

In all honesty, if Georgie hadn’t trusted the weird sewer clown, then the rest of the story would’ve been completely different. I’m sure that Georgie had to be really dumb and naïve to start the movie, but it could’ve been done better.

We all love our mother but, at number 2 are two little girls that bring a whole new level to that love in the horror movie Mama. Lily and Victoria were both left abandoned after their father murdered his wife and left them in the woods. The two girls are eventually found by their uncle, but are basically feral; unable to speak and climbing around on the floor. The movie then explains that the girls were taken care of by an insane asylum patient’s ghost, and are still watched over by her. In the end, the girls are kidnapped by the woman again, and taken to the cliff that she once committed suicide on. Their uncle and his girlfriend show up and try to talk the girls off of the cliff. Victoria listens and goes with them but Lily refuses to leave her “Mama” and ends up bursting into moths as they fall. Lily is the main girl I want to focus on, I mean, she commits suicide to be with a woman of no relation to her. I’m not even counting the numerous times in the movie she’s just hanging out in cardboard boxes and jump scaring her uncle’s girlfriend.

Another Stephen King novel turned into a movie, Cujo is number 1 on this list, and thankfully the last. Tad Trenton is the main character’s kid, and the most annoying kid in a horror movie I have ever seen. The story reveals that Tad’s mother is having an affair, and Tad is deathly afraid of everything. Once Tad’s father learns of the affair, he has to leave on a business trip. Tad’s mom takes Tad with her to get the car fixed only to be attacked by Cujo, the once loving dog that is now corrupted with rabies. The mother ends up getting bit and several days pass without food or water for her and her kid, during which Tad is screaming and crying. I get it’s a scary situation but this kid doesn’t stop until he starts hyperventilating. The kid doesn’t end up killing any one or causing anyone harm but he does ruin this movie for me.