LISTEN TO THE PLUGGED IN SHOW, EPISODE 257
It’s October. And October at the multiplex means one thing: horror flicks.
From funny frighteners such as Beetlejuice Beetlejuice to gory splatterfests such as Terrifier 3, you can’t throw a tombstone without hitting a scary movie. Luckily, if those sorts of films aren’t your thing, it’s pretty easy to avoid them. I mean, it’s not like you’ll see the poster for Smile 2 and imagine it’s fit for the whole family.
But what about those unexpected cinematic scares? When you and your family turn on, say, The Wizard of Oz and discover that your 5-year-old is terrified of those flying monkeys?
As much as we do our best to protect our kids from disturbing or alarming movies and TV shows, sometimes we’re caught off guard. A scary scene can lurk even in great family flicks. Every child has their own sensitivities—and sometimes they revolve around something you never saw coming. (Longtime listeners know I had a fear of mirrors for ever-so-long.) So how do you help your kids navigate those surprising frights?
Our team of experts—Adam Holz, Kennedy Unthank and I—has you covered. We’ll confess our own childhood scares and give some sage advice on how to make sure your kids aren’t sleeping with the lights on ‘til they’re 18 years old.
And speaking of surprises, we’ll point the adults in our audience to a hard-but-powerful film: Exhibiting Forgiveness is a poignant father-and-son story that reminds us how incredibly difficult forgiveness can be—and how important it is. Adam and I will walk through this harsh yet thought-provoking film in our second segment.
We also introduce you to a shiny new game!
So sit down (or stand up, or drive, or do whatever you do when you listen to podcasts) and spend some time with us. Then, make like a flying monkey and let your own thoughts soar. Tell us about unexpected movie scares you weathered as a kid. Tell us about your own experiences with forgiveness—and how hard it can sometimes be.
Let us know on Facebook and Instagram. Write to us at team@thepluggedinshow.com. Leave us a voicemail on our Plugged In Show homepage, or just comment down below. We’d love to hear from you.
And be sure to set aside some time on your calendar next week for the next episode of The Plugged In Show.
6 Responses
That’s a really good point since I tend to be rather strict on how ‘intense’ I expect scary moments in children’s films to be. I thought the sacrifice scene in the first Disney Narnia movie was excessive for a PG-rated film. PG-13 superhero movies don’t tend to be directly marketed toward children, but I’m going to somewhat include them here since I frequently see parents bring their young children. I enjoyed the first “Shazam” but thought it was more intense than is usually the norm for these films, and I still remember seeing one little child in the audience afterward who looked like they had either been crying or were about to. Does “Short Circuit” count as a family film? I thought its profanities and one scene that nearly became a domestic disturbance (which would definitely have scared me if I had seen that as a child) significantly compromised that. Also I sent you an email a few weeks ago about laudable Christ-like/social themes in Transformers One and wanted to make sure you saw it, thanks
Hey, Erik–thanks for this. Did you send the email to team@thepluggedinshow.com? I don’t think I’ve seen it, so let me double-check. Feel free to email me directly at paul.asay@fotf.org, if you’d like.
Thanks so much! I’d sent it to letters at pluggedin dot com but will resend it.
You can’t eliminate fear completely, nor should you. There’s at least one Bible verse that says fear is helpful in some instances. Proverbs 14:16 in the King James Bible states “A wise man feareth, and departeth from evil: but the fool rageth, and is confident.”
There are things in this world that you should be afraid of. Actor Paul Walker was quoted as saying “I’m not afraid of anything. That’s just the way I am.” If he had been afraid of something, I am convinced he would still be alive right now.
Walker wasn’t driving the vehicle when he and the driver died.
Yes, but Paul Walker knew that Roger Rodas drove like a maniac. And if Paul Walker had the same level of fear most of us have, he never would have gotten in the car with Roger Rodas. Our jail cells, hospital beds and cemeteries are filled with people who weren’t afraid of things that they should have been afraid of.
On November 27, 2013, Disney released the animated movie Frozen, which had a song with the line “People make bad choices when they’re mad or scared or stressed.” Three days later, Paul Walker was dead. Maybe God let Paul Walker die to try to counteract the message in Frozen that fear always leads to people making bad choices.