There were a few scenes that were too scary for little Nathan that would cause me to leave the room, like the guy that got his heart ripped out in Temple of Doom, or the Rancor pit in Jabba’s Palace. When Luke Skywalker and that poor Gamorrean Guard got dropped down that hole I was out of there. I would wait for the all clear from my parents and then go enjoy the rest of Return of the Jedi.
Nighttimes became torturous. As I laid in bed, I’d look first at my bedroom window, then at the window down the hall, waiting to see the giant bat scratching at the window or the claw-like fingers forcing the window open, followed by a lithe figure slithering its way into the house.
The way my parents tell it, that Sunday evening they found me, obligatorily sitting on the floor with the other kids, facing away from the TV, huddled up in a ball, and crying quietly. Something about the film had petrified me.
I try to turn on the lights before I walk into a dark hallway or room. I check behind the shower curtain every single time I walk into a bathroom. And I get jittery when there’s not another human being in the house with me, especially overnight.
Where is that dirt coming from? I remember wondering. Then, Why is dirt falling from the ceiling? And then, That’s not dirt—it’s moving!!!
Gurumapa loves to eat children, but is “easily reasoned with,” which I would call a glaring weakness.
It didn’t take long for the panic to set in.
Is that plane outside flying really low? Oh God, it probably doesn’t have pilots because they’ve been raptured and the plane is gonna crash!
Did you watch the movie in the afternoon or evening? It doesn’t matter. You have to go to bed eventually.
The police bushwhacked their way to us after triangulating my dad’s cell signal (it was 2008).
