By Zach on December 20, 2010 
With the holidays rapidly approaching, it’s time to sit back, pour yourself a glass of 30 proof Nog, and refelct on the toys that made your childhood just a little more filled with terror. With that in mind I submit my top 5 toys that came straight form the mouth of madness with the express purpose of keeping me up at night. Here we Go:
5. Slap Braclets
So, apparently some toy company really wanted us to get used to associating pain with high fashion. If you’ve seen some of the piercings I’ve seen over the years, I think you’ll agree that it worked. Yet as we take time to remember all of those who had their wrists slashed to ribbons at the hands of these sadistic creations, I must acknowledge the fact their would be some useful situations for these devices. Certainly, we could have saved one brave hiker 127 Hours of struggle. You could easily amputate a limb with one of these things, and it would’ve made a lucrative commercial tie in to the Danny Boyle movie.
4. Board Games
Trying to decide which one of these things is the creepiest is like trying to pick your favorite child, they’re all just equally disturbing. So before we channel the forces of darkness that tell us to racially profile drifters before eviscerating them, maybe we could consider a better way of bringing people together for friendly competition. MMA seems pretty stable.
3. Battle Trolls
….wha…why?
2. The Pet Rock
Not so much frightened by the Pet Rock itself, more by the person willing to purchase one. It’s short trip for that guy from “Pet Rock” to Pet “series of missing women across three states”.
And finally, the single most horrific thing to ever issue from a toy store:
1. TEDDY RUXPIN
Clive Barker, Guillermo Del Toro, Stephen King, and Stephanie Myer could work for a hundred lifetimes and not come close to dreaming up anything as horrific as this. For those who thankfully missed out, allow me to fill you in. Teddy is a creature sent straight from a dimension of nightmares and shadows (Fun Fact: it’s the same place where we train all CTA employees). Teddy comes with a video and a cassette that is placed in his body. He then proceeds to talk to you, with his eerie monotone and the deadest eyes you’ve ever seen. Teddy is responsible for many sleepless nights in my youth. My parents were thankfully not sadistic enough to buy one of these for me. However, one day I was unfortunate enough to run across the path of one at a friends house. We sat and watched the video cassette with Teddy seated between us. At a certain point in the video Teddy let out a laugh that will haunt me forever. Needless to say I didn’t see much of that friend after that day, come to think of it I didn’t see much of my innocence after that day too. It was kind of like my own, personal, far less meaningful version of Stand By Me.
So boys and girls, as the holidays draw ever closer, and thoughts of the perfect gift for the special child in your life spin in your head like sugar plums on angel dust, take the time to closely consider what you’re buying. Unless you’re looking for a gift for the child you’re keeping trapped in an abandoned well somewhere in the farmlands of Southern Illinois. In which case, you’re welcome?
