Since the early 2020s, society’s disinterest in generic screams and thrills has become increasingly apparent. As a result, horror film studios have begun implementing unsettling elements into their movies, such as characteristics from children’s stories.
Children’s media such as “Winnie the Pooh” or “Peter Pan” have played a crucial role in the development of children. Therefore, the general audience is inherently bound to have a sense of attachment towards such media, and children’s book-based horror movies are able to gain their appeal by targeting the sense of comfort and attachment that individuals have for these stories.
Children’s stories have always contained unsettling aspects, which possessed many uncanny similarities to horror. In the Brothers Grimm fairy tale “Rumpelstiltskin,” a titular creature by the name of Rumpledkiltskin demands a woman’s firstborn child in exchange for weaving her gold from straw. The stories invoke the fear of losing one’s child among readers, which may not relate to young children but definitely strikes a chord with parents.
With this in mind, an early version of the concept of a children’s book-based horror movie was made into reality in the 1995 film “Rumpleskilton.” The film revolved around a widowed mother sacrificing the soul of her infant son in order to reunite with her police officer husband. Though this film was one of the first screenplays to incorporate the two unique genres of horror and children’s fairy tale, it performed poorly at the box office, discouraging potential films of the same nature.
The concept was only revived in the 2020s with the establishment of innovative film studios such as Jagged Edge Productions, ITN Studios and Altitude Film Distribution. Said innovative film studios aspired to create a cinematic universe by the name of the “Poohniverse,” which incorporated all the studios’ children’s book-based horror movies. These projects include but are not limited to “Pooh: Blood and Honey,” “Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare” and the upcoming “Bambi: The Reckoning.” Although these films haven’t seen much box office success, they have a steady approval rating, encouraging these film studios to continue making films within this genre.
Critics have taken notice of these films’ lack of success and attack these films on the basis that the children’s book horror genre only exists for the purpose of being different and provides no actual artistic merit to the field of moviemaking. However, this narrative is counteracted by the general populace’s appreciation for the genre, which inadvertently led to a massive spike in the approval ratings of children’s book horror.
These studios’ sudden interest in children’s book-based horror may seem strange, but there’s a good reason for it. Much of our beloved childhood media is copyrighted under the property of major production companies, such as Disney. Copyright law prohibits anyone from making media using those companies’ characters. However, copyright laws only last until 70 years after the author’s death. Due to this limitation, characters such as Winnie the Pooh and Peter Pan fell into the public domain in the 2020s, allowing companies such as Jagged Edge Productions to take advantage of public media and create a trend that has gradually increased in popularity.
Though the genre of children’s book horror is scarce and only starting to develop, adventurous ventures into the field allow the industry to expand. With growing approval and appreciation of these films, experimental studios are only encouraged to create more movies that uncomfortably relate the audience to their childhood pleasures.
