Scary Jack in the Box



A jack-in-the-box is often a staple of childhood playtime and entertainment. Most times, it can be a fun toy for children to play with, but occasionally, it can also be a form of Nightmare Fuel for some. Either way, you can expect to see jack-in-the-boxes pop up in media.

May overlap with: Jump Scare, Surprise Jump, Monster Clown

Advertising

 * Double subverted with the Farmers' Insurance commercial featuring a giant Jack-In-The-Box that fills the entire front of a classroom. The professor demonstrates how accidents could be "a little scary" by turning the crank, with the onlooking agents presumably thinking a giant clown will pop out and destroy the room. However, on the "POP" note nothing happens... until about five seconds later when a space capsule falls through the ceiling and crushes the Jack-In-The-Box.

Anime and Manga

 * In Yu-Gi-Oh!, Maximilian Pegasus summons his Bikuri Box, a cackling, vaguely clownlike/GrimReaper-ish monster jack in the box, to deliver the deathblow to Seto Kaiba's Saagi the Dark Clown. Oh, did I mention that Bikuri Box stores a big scythe in his mouth?

Comic Books

 * Used frequently by The Joker in all of his incarnations, particularly during the Silver Age of Comic Books.

Film

 * Toy Story had Hand-In-The-Box, a Frankenstein-looking hand attached to the spring of a jack-in-the-box, yet actually turned out to be good and helpful, along with the other mutant toys.
 * Averted with the jack-in-the-box who shows up in Toy Story 3 (the one who constantly yells "New toys!").
 * Harry Potter's first encounter with a Boggart in film three.
 * In Elf, Buddy is the jack-in-the-box tester and every time one "pops", it freaks him out. Later in the film, he has a nightmare about the cackling jack-in-a-box.
 * Averted with Zebedee from The Magic Roundabout, who's a jack-in-the-box figure without a box. Played straight with his Evil Counterpart, Zeebad.
 * A jack-in-the-box also shows up in The Great Mouse Detective (pictured above), though it's not really doing anything, but it does look a little bit scary.
 * A scary jack-in-the-box appeared in Poltergeist.
 * The "Heffalumps and Woozles" number from Winnie the Pooh featured "Heffalumps-in-a-Boxes."
 * Muffy was handed a deliberately scary one in April Fools Day when she was a child.
 * The Big Bad in the "The Steadfast Tin Soldier" segment of Disney's Fantasia 2000 is a Jack-In-The-Box (in the original story, it was a goblin living in a snuffbox).

Literature

 * The jack-in-the-box in Neil Gaiman's horror story "Dont Ask Jack" (which was apparently inspired by an actual jack-in-the-box someone gave him).
 * If I recall correctly, the group of evil toys in Dean Koontz's Oddkins includes a jack-in-the-box.
 * In Jack Yeovil's Drachenfels, one character is murdered and set like this -- his bones are removed and the rest of the body is folded in a box with a spring, then sent to a famous spoiled actress.

Newspaper Comics

 * Cul De Sac had a school jack-in-the-box which, when opened, shot a clown into the ceiling. The class then spent the rest of the day hiding from it under a table.

Live Action TV

 * The Twilight Zone TOS episode "It's a Good Life". Anthony the Reality Warper changes a man into a grotesque Jack-in-the-Box.

Tabletop Games

 * In Wizardry 8 "Jack in the Box" is a buildable gadget that acts like a weak fear spell. Or you can put in the same box a demon doll instead and make insanity-inducing variant.

Video Games

 * The short game Jack in the Dark (a promotional game for Alone in The Dark 2) is set in a toy shop and has an evil jack-in-the-box (who has the appearance of the main game's Big Bad) for a villain. The jack-in-the-box turns the toys evil, using them to kidnap Santa.
 * Mad Jack of Donkey Kong 64 is an enormous jack-in-the-box that tries to squash Tiny Kong flat.
 * In American McGee's Alice, one of the weapons is a jack in the box that breathes fire.
 * In King's Quest VII, this is one of the ways Rosella can die. In the tree house in Ooga Booga land, there's a jack in the box that will kill you if you open it.
 * The Joker is the most prominent villain in Batman: Vengeance, so obviously he has these in his arsenal. Unique in that they follow you if you get too close, and they seem to breathe fire.

Web Comics

 * Girl Genius has a really big one, in the castle of the maddest mad scientists around. In the nursery.

Western Animation
"''"The jack-in-boxes will always pop at every regal command.""
 * Averted with Charlie-In-The-Box from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
 * Also averted in the special Santa Claus is Comin' to Town with the song "First Toymaker to the King."


 * In one episode of Batman the Brave And The Bold, The Joker freaks out Guy Gardner during a forced death-race using a jack-in-the-box (with his own face, naturally), causing Gardner to lose his concentration and de-materialize his energy-car.
 * Darkwing Duck features the ghost clown Paddywhack who lives inside a jack-in-the-box.
 * The Nightmare Before Christmas, naturally.

Real Life

 * Walgreen's has intentionally-scary ones in its stores during Halloween. Turn the crank, and "Pop Goes The Weasel" plays, only for a Monster Clown to pop out and gives an electronically-rendered Evil Laugh.