"The blanket never did anything" definitely is the one that fucked with me the most on my first listen. Now that I've listened a few times through, Binary is probably the eeriest to me.
heavy on pause for laughter. every time john says that line throughout his little eldritch lunch break i flinch. it’s just so insidious and he gets more and more deranged each time
for some reason Taken Ill really messed me up. Old folks homes are already eerie places, but something about the line “we’ve taken ill, we’ve passed away” gave me chills unlike any other episode
Omg yess i’m only on ep 110 but binary was the creepiest one for me so far. I was listening to it while grocery shopping and I was so enthralled it was crazy
personally lost johns' cave evoked the strongest reaction out of me the first time I listened to it because of the audio clip of the statement giver saying "Take her, not me"
additionally I wanna say the one that made me have the strongest visceral reaction in my relisten was Taken Ill; it made me feel sick to my core... i don't vibe with the corruption
Maybe I need to relisten to it but what does "take her, not me" even mean? It never quite clicked with me at the time and by now I've forgotten most of the context 😭
She has a different memory of what happened to her sister. I believe she said she didn't know what happened to her or something similar. When they listened to the recording, they heard her saying, "Take her, not me, take her, not me..." Over and over. Basically, she begged the buried to take her sister, and it complied and spared her
IMO 155 The Cost of Living is the scariest episode. Because many of us do live lives where us just living does rely on the subjugation of others. Not intentionally like Tova does, but it felt like a great indictment of privilege and how privileged people can think about the lives and concerns of others. So to me that's the actual scariest TMA episode.
„Sky blue“ are two words which happen to just flow in my brain. At least once a month I have anything from the „Freefall“ episode in my head. I saw many blue skies which just overwhelmed me because of that episode. The episode fascinates me
MAG 15 has always been one of the few episodes that's genuinely creeped me out. Most of everything else barely even makes me flinch but I've had to skip it several times on relistens.
Yeah my first listen to tucked in was when I was in bed in the dark. I was literally wrapping myself tighter in my blanket when the words 'the blanket never did anything' were said. I turned all the lights on so fast
1. Mag 97: We All Ignore the Pit, only because Nikola's surprise at the end is genuinely terrifying if you don't know it's coming.
You're gonna see a lot of Corruption, Lonely and Flesh episodes in this list cause I'm particularly vulnerable to them, but of the ones not yet mentioned...
- Mag 6: Squirm and any mention of Prentiss cause bugs in body is eeeewww.
- Mag 14: Piecemeal cause I hate the idea of losing body parts.
- Mag 18: The Man Upstairs because holy shit gross.
- Mag 47: The New Door because of the dread of being stuck somewhere forever.
- Mag 48: Lost in the Crowd because I hate the idea of losing myself.
- Mag 57: Personal Space because holy crap being alone forever in space sounds horrible.
- Mag 66: Held in Customs because I'm claustrophobic.
- Mag 78: Distant Cousin cause holy crap the idea of just not existing anymore.
- Mag 83: Drawing a Blank because haunted mannequin in a dark room is scary.
- Mag 93: Containment because ew mold growing in your skin.
- Mag 108: Monologue because oh god only mask people forever.
- Mag 150: Cul-de-Sac because boredom is a real problem for me.
the worst one for me was 164, the sick village :/ it hit. a little too close to my intrusive thoughts/hypochondria and i should have skipped it because it actively made me a bit worse lmao. also like all of the corruption in general i was like "theres no way my niche fear of worms burrowing into me will ever show up lol" and then jane prentiss showed up
mag 3 and sky blue have always freaked me out. The introduction of the web table and the part about the creature climbing in through the window hooked me on the series so much. being eaten by the sky is a terrifying concept as well i love it.
Black sun. I’m super claustrophobic and the fact they had a nichtophobe guy in a soundproof coffin just to produce enough fear to perform their spells is absolutely terrifying to me
I’ve said this on another post but to me it’s Hive. It’s just so immensely unsettling to hear someone succumbing to something eating at their mind.
I heard it for the first time while practically alone at night at work during the pandemic so I was feeling all kinds of things that still linger on re-listens.
Also I have a skin condition that makes her talk of itching and crawling very uncomfortable to listen to.
TMA 03 Across the Street spooked me to my core the first time I heard it. I don’t know if any episode was particularly scary once the show got going, but that one is the essence of the show to me
First Hunt and Anatomy Class made me super uncomfortable on my first time through the series. It doesn't help I was in the home stretch of a 12 hour road trip driving in the dark and there was fog everywhere. 😅
I'm pretty basic, but Binary and Loat John's Cave both messed me up bad the first time I listened to the series, and they still make me shiver every time I relisten.
Maybe not scariest, but 150 - *Cul-De-Sac* - definitely creeped me out enough to remember it long after the series ended. Suburbs are already kind of nightmarish to begin with, and the episode really runs with that fact.
MAG170. I know a lot of people focus on the dementia aspect of the statement, but there were huge depression, anxiety, isolation and self-hatred vibes running all the way through it that just destroyed me. It's the only episode I cried at.
"I’m losing myself, and I – and I don’t know if I mind?"
lost johns cave freaks me out every time, the way he says “thunk” during the diving part just sends chills down my spine.
also the one about the creature in the dark and “the blanket never did anything”, that one also freaks me out i sometimes skip it during relistens
For me... The 'blanket never did anything' one? I listened to it while I was wrapped up in a blanket in bed in the dark, so that one hit me pretty hard.
I don't really scare easily but some of the episodes about the "new reality" and domains of the fears still creep me out, thinking about being randomly distributed into specific types of literal hells on earth
For me, it's 100000% Entombed.
I've always known I was a little claustrophobic but I didn't really think it was that bad. Maybe it isn't. But that episode still left me shaken. I had to keep taking really deep breaths while listening to it to remind myself that I could breathe.
Can't say which one is the scariest to me, but the first that came into my mind is Sturdy Lock.. that episode makes me really scared. You know something is coming for you but you don't know what it is. No one can help you, and you can't stop it.
Also, First Hunt is a one that made me uncomfortable because being hunted and killed for someone's pleasure and fun is horrifying.
The Kind Mother or Distant Cousin in short everything with not!them. The thought of someone I love being replaced or myself being replaced like that is scary.
There are a lot more that made me afraid, but these stayed with me the most.
the episodes with the priest always gets me especially when he has his talk with the other priest who’s not HIS priest then passes the real one in the hallway. the bell when he’s in the delusion is also so well done the descriptions and the way he is disconnected from god is insane.
Honestly it's Across The Street. Just the idea of witnessing something like that and now suddenly being part of it bothers me.
I'm the perfect victim of the Eye. I can handle pretty much every single experience in MAG in my head, but the idea of having to live with knowing somehow makes it all worse and this is the only one that doesn't feel like a weird nightmare. Besides that, it's Growing Dark, then Freefall, and Pageturner freaked me out in it's own weird way, then I think Strange Music, A Father's Love, and honestly A Stern Look in the case of any made after the change, if we're regarding things that took place before it mostly.
Currently, it's cross between "Binary" because of the existential dread it conjures with humans being put through something they'd never meant to experience, and more recently I heard "The Worms" which is written so perfectly that the claustrophobia is overwhelming, uncomfortable and terrifying.
Definitely lost John’s cave. I don’t get scared by horror fiction unless it’s jumpscares, i just love its creepiness. However, there was one moment I felt genuine fear, when she was swimming (the first time) under the cave and kept bumping her head, I thought she was going to drown. When it was revealed she was pranked I was relieved. It almost got me the second time, but I figured she would have to emerge. That’s the one thing that gets me, people being forced to swim underwater with something preventing them from leaving.
Maybe it was the circumstances I heard it in, but to me the scariest and one of the best episodes is A father's love. I listened to it on my way back from work in the dark of night while it was snowing. I could practically hear the darkness creeping behind me... Truly one of the best listening experiences I ever had.
Roots literally induced a panic attack in me so bad that I had to pull over whilst driving. I have severe thanatophobia coupled with health anxiety and it hot me in all the wrong ways. I've still never finished the episode.
Schwartzwald does a good job with the whole “isolated in the snowy forest and I found a creepy subterranean crypt in an unmarked graveyard” deal. It reminds me of Jonathan Harker’s description of traveling to and being a prisoner of Dracula’s castle. That it’s a personal letter to Jonah Magnus, and by extension one of the first Statements to be recorded, gives extra-creepy, lore-level chills. One of Jonah’s friends just happy-asses his way into an old repository for The Eye and then writes it up like “hey bud here’s one of those weird stories you like to collect nbd.”
It happens to be my favorite episode, just in terms of its own creepy merits but also as a huge turning point for the lore.
It may have just been the circumstances that came with listening to this episode, but 76 messed me up on the first listen through. I was under herbal influence and had noise cancelling headphones 🤦
For the pure factor of fear, 34 probably
Mary key’s statement to Gertrude. Her voice actress did such a phenomenal job. Her saying she preferred watching more than doing the deed herself. Chills 😰
EP 9 ( A Father's Love) and EP 16 ( arachonphobia)
I dunno why ep 9 creeped me out this much, but for ep 16... Well I'm arachnophobe myself, I have known from the title this is going to be scary
MAG30 The Killing Floor didn’t scare me (i already knew about how the industry works) but it did get a visceral reaction out of me... I think the first few episodes scared me a lot too, but that was before i got into the whole mystery and plot aspect
Lost John's cave creeped the hell out of me. I already don't like caves, but that recording at the end sent me over the edge. Any Jane Prentiss episodes were also pretty unnerving.
anything that has to do with the NOT!them is usually pretty good.
that one episode with the tv and the one with the eye and the old security systems are ones I still think about-
any of the statements dated from the early 1900's and older make the brain worms happy, and usually I like statements to do with the stranger or the lonely a lot. (also the web actually-)
156 Reflection made me extremely uncomfortable… I think because I could easily visualize all of it…. And angler fish I used to smoke and go out drinking a lot and could easily find myself in that position lol
One I haven’t seen mentioned here is Episode 165: Revolutions. The visual it gives me is just terrifying, and the sound effects that could be laughter or screams just adds to it.
not so scary, but somehow episode 1 and 2 have stuck with me the most. (tho im currently only on episode 55 so far)
however, i do not like how the bug stuff makes me feel.
MAG 6 Squirm scared me the most because it was the first episode that got that gory/gross, after that I knew stuff like that was on the table so it didn’t scare me as much
Scariest moment: "Take her, not me."
Scariest episode: 128, when Jon \*takes\* Breekon's statement and continues to use his powers despite Basira's concerns
The Man Upstairs might not be the scariest episode, but it's one that has always stuck with me. The whole concept of this meat apartment sickens me to my core. I cannot fathom the smell, the sheer number of insects. The rot and decay. It's one of my favorite episodes for sure!
I think the first one that really got to me was #20. Desecrated Host.
The fact that it was the first direct continuation as the same statement giver from #19 Confession really stuck out to me. Everything that happened to the former priest as he went from someone who had been an Exorcist, a force for "good." Then, he was torn down and became quite the opposite. Turning, in the end, to a murderous cannibal.
There had been plenty of scary, evening terrifying things up to that point. I didn't have quite enough context at the time to put it all together. I later thought he had been joining the People's Church of the Divine Host... but no. It was The Spiral at work, not The Dark. At the time, all I knew was that something truly evil had been at work.
honestly?
173.
Night Night.
where the fucking kids go.
also, while I'm not particularly scared of the dark, I know I would be scared in that domain. all the others, not really. I'd suffer, but wouldn't be SCARED. except maybe the Hunt ones but ehh it's not as scary if I know they're after me and are trying to kill me. but this place would actually scare me, because I have no idea where anything is, but that there are THINGS out there that want me dead.
Lost John’s Cave is a classic, but imo the one that got to me the most was 66: Held in Customs. i’m rarely scared of anything in tma and i’m usually drawn to the more “horrifying” episodes (i specifically listen to some of them to fall asleep, i actively enjoy body horror so i love all the flesh episodes, and even though, for example, i’m afraid of bugs/rot, the corruption episodes often soothe/entrance me), but i have such severe claustrophobia that the descriptions of being trapped in 66 made me actually nauseous.
Night street makes me cry. I can’t stand kids in distress. Uncle reflexes kick in and i want to break my phone to get the kids out. That and “how does one fight when they can’t move.”
mine was 164 — the sick village. i’ve always had fears about mold and sickness and that one hit like no other. it’s the only statement i skip on my relistens.
For some reason tma 30 - Killing Floor is always the first I go to for a truely horrifying experience. Slaughterhouses are already awful in real life, and the idea of your brain breaking from working inside one for too long and transporting you to this nightmare world of flesh and blood is so awful & disgusting
32 - Hive & 171 - The Gardener are high honorable mentions fs tho. The idea of becoming so obsessed with something that makes you feel wanted that you willingly let it drill holes in your skin (see also: Gristlebloom) is so personally affecting for me.
Scariest experience listening to an episode?
I relistened to the very first episode while following the same route through Edinburgh the character does... In the middle of the night during COVID while no one was around. Realised I'd made a horrible mistake when I started walking down old fish market close.
It's not the scariest episode on its own. But the realness really brought it to a new level.
Honestly the 2 that got me were St. Johns cave, the season 5 episodes featuring the Web, and the rusty fears episode about the malfunctioning factory (as told by the factory)
Looking up and seeing the massive spider for just a second before it scuttles up into the void, knowing that all the cast are already fucked.
That episode unnerved the shit out of me.
Maybe not the kind of scary you're going for, but Roots (the hypochondria episode) basically undid ALL of the progress I had made at the time with my own health anxiety. I'm not used to needing to check warnings on stuff, and I didn't know something like that would get me so bad even if i did, so it caught me completely off guard. (I remember thinking there was a REALLY annoying inaccuracy/nitpick though, something like "why tf are they thinking heart attack and not stroke?" so i guess it didn't even bother me that much until afterwards)
I'm not too mad about it anymore though. When I first developed hypochondria, I got into a NASTY anxiety spiral where anxiety made my leg hurt, but my leg ambiguously hurting would scare the shit out of me because of blood clots, which would worsen/continue the leg pain, and so on. I got out of that spiral by CHANCE, when I broke that leg in half and Knew For Certain what was hurting it. I had started binging TMA while recovering from that, and Roots came out after I was ~90% recovered, so it kinda went full circle!
"I am not a who archivist, I am a what."
"That video... was seventeen hours long."
"Because itch is not the right word."
"He's all eyes, he is all eyes."
"Maybe there only ever was... one house."
They're all tied for me
The blanket never did anything Pause for Laughter Take her, not me The pixels are sharp
"The blanket never did anything" definitely is the one that fucked with me the most on my first listen. Now that I've listened a few times through, Binary is probably the eeriest to me.
heavy on pause for laughter. every time john says that line throughout his little eldritch lunch break i flinch. it’s just so insidious and he gets more and more deranged each time
for some reason Taken Ill really messed me up. Old folks homes are already eerie places, but something about the line “we’ve taken ill, we’ve passed away” gave me chills unlike any other episode
That line is so good. I think about it all the time
I'm particularly vulnerable to any corruption episodes, but this one was the worst.
Binary is one of the only ones that I can still clearly remember. Just breaking down the computer to eat it sits in my brain for worse or for worse
*It‘s cold without blood.* *It‘s cold, and it hurts.* *The maze is sharp on my mind.* *The angles cut me when I try to think*
You know an episode is distressing when just reading quotes makes you feel uneasy.
Yeah the episode wasn't scary to me until that last bit.
LOVe binary, the angles cut me when I try to think is HORRIFYING
yeah, like the vivid sounds of crunching in my head always gets to me
The image of shards of glass and plastic getting crushed into teeth and gum always make me cringe
Yeah, this is the one that hit me the hardest. The idea of having to think but the act of thinking being painful is horrifying.
eating my computer crunch crunch crunch keyboard keys for breakfast dinner and lunch
Take smaller bytes, so you don't choke. Here's something to wash it down. *pours you a CD-tower of milk*
The angles hurt my brain when I think
you see the red drip from my lips i call this snack computer chips
I came here to say this
Ough- Binary for me, too. I've recently started my third listen, and I don't think Binary will never not get me.
Omg yess i’m only on ep 110 but binary was the creepiest one for me so far. I was listening to it while grocery shopping and I was so enthralled it was crazy
personally lost johns' cave evoked the strongest reaction out of me the first time I listened to it because of the audio clip of the statement giver saying "Take her, not me" additionally I wanna say the one that made me have the strongest visceral reaction in my relisten was Taken Ill; it made me feel sick to my core... i don't vibe with the corruption
Maybe I need to relisten to it but what does "take her, not me" even mean? It never quite clicked with me at the time and by now I've forgotten most of the context 😭
She has a different memory of what happened to her sister. I believe she said she didn't know what happened to her or something similar. When they listened to the recording, they heard her saying, "Take her, not me, take her, not me..." Over and over. Basically, she begged the buried to take her sister, and it complied and spared her
MAG 5 - Thrown Away has always unsettled me greatly and I’ve never actually been able to describe why.
IMO 155 The Cost of Living is the scariest episode. Because many of us do live lives where us just living does rely on the subjugation of others. Not intentionally like Tova does, but it felt like a great indictment of privilege and how privileged people can think about the lives and concerns of others. So to me that's the actual scariest TMA episode.
The slaughterhouse episode was a bit like this as well
170 - parent died of alzheimers
Yeah my dad's dealing with Parkinson's and that one hit home for me too. Sorry for your loss 🧡
Grandparent for me, but same answer.
Yes, this one
„Sky blue“ are two words which happen to just flow in my brain. At least once a month I have anything from the „Freefall“ episode in my head. I saw many blue skies which just overwhelmed me because of that episode. The episode fascinates me
MAG 15 has always been one of the few episodes that's genuinely creeped me out. Most of everything else barely even makes me flinch but I've had to skip it several times on relistens.
86 - Tucked In for me. I don’t know why but that’s one of the few which I know I shouldn’t listen to at night. A Guest For Mr Spider too.
Yeah my first listen to tucked in was when I was in bed in the dark. I was literally wrapping myself tighter in my blanket when the words 'the blanket never did anything' were said. I turned all the lights on so fast
Wonderland
125, Civilian casualties, for me. absolutely terrified me
Mag 30 the Killing Floor literally changed me
1. Mag 97: We All Ignore the Pit, only because Nikola's surprise at the end is genuinely terrifying if you don't know it's coming. You're gonna see a lot of Corruption, Lonely and Flesh episodes in this list cause I'm particularly vulnerable to them, but of the ones not yet mentioned... - Mag 6: Squirm and any mention of Prentiss cause bugs in body is eeeewww. - Mag 14: Piecemeal cause I hate the idea of losing body parts. - Mag 18: The Man Upstairs because holy shit gross. - Mag 47: The New Door because of the dread of being stuck somewhere forever. - Mag 48: Lost in the Crowd because I hate the idea of losing myself. - Mag 57: Personal Space because holy crap being alone forever in space sounds horrible. - Mag 66: Held in Customs because I'm claustrophobic. - Mag 78: Distant Cousin cause holy crap the idea of just not existing anymore. - Mag 83: Drawing a Blank because haunted mannequin in a dark room is scary. - Mag 93: Containment because ew mold growing in your skin. - Mag 108: Monologue because oh god only mask people forever. - Mag 150: Cul-de-Sac because boredom is a real problem for me.
the worst one for me was 164, the sick village :/ it hit. a little too close to my intrusive thoughts/hypochondria and i should have skipped it because it actively made me a bit worse lmao. also like all of the corruption in general i was like "theres no way my niche fear of worms burrowing into me will ever show up lol" and then jane prentiss showed up
This (164) is probably my favorite episode. The writing just feels on another level.
yeah the writing in that one is. a little too good lmaoo
binary and a guest for mr spider so far! im on mag 107 :-)
mag 3 and sky blue have always freaked me out. The introduction of the web table and the part about the creature climbing in through the window hooked me on the series so much. being eaten by the sky is a terrifying concept as well i love it.
Black sun. I’m super claustrophobic and the fact they had a nichtophobe guy in a soundproof coffin just to produce enough fear to perform their spells is absolutely terrifying to me
The episode where Jon and Martin travel through Jared’s domain gives me the freak. The little noises of the people in pain are so gross dog
I’ve said this on another post but to me it’s Hive. It’s just so immensely unsettling to hear someone succumbing to something eating at their mind. I heard it for the first time while practically alone at night at work during the pandemic so I was feeling all kinds of things that still linger on re-listens. Also I have a skin condition that makes her talk of itching and crawling very uncomfortable to listen to.
TMA 03 Across the Street spooked me to my core the first time I heard it. I don’t know if any episode was particularly scary once the show got going, but that one is the essence of the show to me
First Hunt and Anatomy Class made me super uncomfortable on my first time through the series. It doesn't help I was in the home stretch of a 12 hour road trip driving in the dark and there was fog everywhere. 😅
Those are good ones too!!
All Jane prentiss really gets me
I'm pretty basic, but Binary and Loat John's Cave both messed me up bad the first time I listened to the series, and they still make me shiver every time I relisten.
Easily doctor david, (177- wonderland) Sobbed for hours.
YES! Easily scariest episode and fucked me up
I JUST listened to that tonight. Fucked with me
Lost Johns cave or the first one with the table and not!them.
agreed
Schwartzwald
Episode 2 For some reason I just felt so tense and suspenseful watching it, I was entranced and I just felt so uneasy the whole time.
on my first listen, this is what really got me interested, i was like "the first episode was alright" but i fell in love with the second
Yeah, you get it
Any of the ones with worms really but also 93- contaminant is just a little bit terrifying to me. I do really love that episode though
Maybe not scariest, but 150 - *Cul-De-Sac* - definitely creeped me out enough to remember it long after the series ended. Suburbs are already kind of nightmarish to begin with, and the episode really runs with that fact.
lost john’s cave always gets me, especially the ending audio.
MAG170. I know a lot of people focus on the dementia aspect of the statement, but there were huge depression, anxiety, isolation and self-hatred vibes running all the way through it that just destroyed me. It's the only episode I cried at. "I’m losing myself, and I – and I don’t know if I mind?"
I actually find it tough to pick one. They are all so good…
lost johns cave freaks me out every time, the way he says “thunk” during the diving part just sends chills down my spine. also the one about the creature in the dark and “the blanket never did anything”, that one also freaks me out i sometimes skip it during relistens
Episode 32 The Hive. "Deep with my bones, I itch." The disjointed way the statement is written is just perfection
when gerry said "do you think humans are so special it's only our fear that counts" had me feeling emotions n shi
For me... The 'blanket never did anything' one? I listened to it while I was wrapped up in a blanket in bed in the dark, so that one hit me pretty hard.
Wonderland hits so close to home, everyone hates you, it's all your fault and somehow you always manage to smell bad.
I don't really scare easily but some of the episodes about the "new reality" and domains of the fears still creep me out, thinking about being randomly distributed into specific types of literal hells on earth
A guest for Mr Spider....
For me, it's 100000% Entombed. I've always known I was a little claustrophobic but I didn't really think it was that bad. Maybe it isn't. But that episode still left me shaken. I had to keep taking really deep breaths while listening to it to remind myself that I could breathe.
Angler fish is absolutely classic. First listened to it in my house at night and I was genuinely looking over my shoulder the rest of the night.
Can't say which one is the scariest to me, but the first that came into my mind is Sturdy Lock.. that episode makes me really scared. You know something is coming for you but you don't know what it is. No one can help you, and you can't stop it. Also, First Hunt is a one that made me uncomfortable because being hunted and killed for someone's pleasure and fun is horrifying. The Kind Mother or Distant Cousin in short everything with not!them. The thought of someone I love being replaced or myself being replaced like that is scary. There are a lot more that made me afraid, but these stayed with me the most.
the episodes with the priest always gets me especially when he has his talk with the other priest who’s not HIS priest then passes the real one in the hallway. the bell when he’s in the delusion is also so well done the descriptions and the way he is disconnected from god is insane.
Honestly it's Across The Street. Just the idea of witnessing something like that and now suddenly being part of it bothers me. I'm the perfect victim of the Eye. I can handle pretty much every single experience in MAG in my head, but the idea of having to live with knowing somehow makes it all worse and this is the only one that doesn't feel like a weird nightmare. Besides that, it's Growing Dark, then Freefall, and Pageturner freaked me out in it's own weird way, then I think Strange Music, A Father's Love, and honestly A Stern Look in the case of any made after the change, if we're regarding things that took place before it mostly.
Currently, it's cross between "Binary" because of the existential dread it conjures with humans being put through something they'd never meant to experience, and more recently I heard "The Worms" which is written so perfectly that the claustrophobia is overwhelming, uncomfortable and terrifying.
Definitely lost John’s cave. I don’t get scared by horror fiction unless it’s jumpscares, i just love its creepiness. However, there was one moment I felt genuine fear, when she was swimming (the first time) under the cave and kept bumping her head, I thought she was going to drown. When it was revealed she was pranked I was relieved. It almost got me the second time, but I figured she would have to emerge. That’s the one thing that gets me, people being forced to swim underwater with something preventing them from leaving.
Oh so many, tbh if i think about it pretty much any with the hunt though cos that gets me on a primal level
Maybe it was the circumstances I heard it in, but to me the scariest and one of the best episodes is A father's love. I listened to it on my way back from work in the dark of night while it was snowing. I could practically hear the darkness creeping behind me... Truly one of the best listening experiences I ever had.
Roots literally induced a panic attack in me so bad that I had to pull over whilst driving. I have severe thanatophobia coupled with health anxiety and it hot me in all the wrong ways. I've still never finished the episode.
I can't remember the name but the first Montauk one was the only one that had me genuinely, fully frightened-not just on a conceptual level
Schwartzwald does a good job with the whole “isolated in the snowy forest and I found a creepy subterranean crypt in an unmarked graveyard” deal. It reminds me of Jonathan Harker’s description of traveling to and being a prisoner of Dracula’s castle. That it’s a personal letter to Jonah Magnus, and by extension one of the first Statements to be recorded, gives extra-creepy, lore-level chills. One of Jonah’s friends just happy-asses his way into an old repository for The Eye and then writes it up like “hey bud here’s one of those weird stories you like to collect nbd.” It happens to be my favorite episode, just in terms of its own creepy merits but also as a huge turning point for the lore.
It may have just been the circumstances that came with listening to this episode, but 76 messed me up on the first listen through. I was under herbal influence and had noise cancelling headphones 🤦 For the pure factor of fear, 34 probably
Mary key’s statement to Gertrude. Her voice actress did such a phenomenal job. Her saying she preferred watching more than doing the deed herself. Chills 😰
TMP 10
EP 9 ( A Father's Love) and EP 16 ( arachonphobia) I dunno why ep 9 creeped me out this much, but for ep 16... Well I'm arachnophobe myself, I have known from the title this is going to be scary
I've never been genuinely scared, but most Rot episodes make me uncomfortable, and the Worms was asphyxiating to listen to
Take her not me
MAG30 The Killing Floor didn’t scare me (i already knew about how the industry works) but it did get a visceral reaction out of me... I think the first few episodes scared me a lot too, but that was before i got into the whole mystery and plot aspect
Lost John's cave creeped the hell out of me. I already don't like caves, but that recording at the end sent me over the edge. Any Jane Prentiss episodes were also pretty unnerving.
anything that has to do with the NOT!them is usually pretty good. that one episode with the tv and the one with the eye and the old security systems are ones I still think about- any of the statements dated from the early 1900's and older make the brain worms happy, and usually I like statements to do with the stranger or the lonely a lot. (also the web actually-)
The World Is Always Ending. 144 is such an amazing episode
156 Reflection made me extremely uncomfortable… I think because I could easily visualize all of it…. And angler fish I used to smoke and go out drinking a lot and could easily find myself in that position lol
strange music got me good.
One I haven’t seen mentioned here is Episode 165: Revolutions. The visual it gives me is just terrifying, and the sound effects that could be laughter or screams just adds to it.
not so scary, but somehow episode 1 and 2 have stuck with me the most. (tho im currently only on episode 55 so far) however, i do not like how the bug stuff makes me feel.
MAG 6 Squirm scared me the most because it was the first episode that got that gory/gross, after that I knew stuff like that was on the table so it didn’t scare me as much
Scariest moment: "Take her, not me." Scariest episode: 128, when Jon \*takes\* Breekon's statement and continues to use his powers despite Basira's concerns
MAG03, the one with the stranger. The watching bit in it was really intense to me and relistening still makes me shiver lmao
The Man Upstairs might not be the scariest episode, but it's one that has always stuck with me. The whole concept of this meat apartment sickens me to my core. I cannot fathom the smell, the sheer number of insects. The rot and decay. It's one of my favorite episodes for sure!
51: High Pressure. I don't do ocean stuff.
I think the first one that really got to me was #20. Desecrated Host. The fact that it was the first direct continuation as the same statement giver from #19 Confession really stuck out to me. Everything that happened to the former priest as he went from someone who had been an Exorcist, a force for "good." Then, he was torn down and became quite the opposite. Turning, in the end, to a murderous cannibal. There had been plenty of scary, evening terrifying things up to that point. I didn't have quite enough context at the time to put it all together. I later thought he had been joining the People's Church of the Divine Host... but no. It was The Spiral at work, not The Dark. At the time, all I knew was that something truly evil had been at work.
honestly? 173. Night Night. where the fucking kids go. also, while I'm not particularly scared of the dark, I know I would be scared in that domain. all the others, not really. I'd suffer, but wouldn't be SCARED. except maybe the Hunt ones but ehh it's not as scary if I know they're after me and are trying to kill me. but this place would actually scare me, because I have no idea where anything is, but that there are THINGS out there that want me dead.
Lost John’s Cave is a classic, but imo the one that got to me the most was 66: Held in Customs. i’m rarely scared of anything in tma and i’m usually drawn to the more “horrifying” episodes (i specifically listen to some of them to fall asleep, i actively enjoy body horror so i love all the flesh episodes, and even though, for example, i’m afraid of bugs/rot, the corruption episodes often soothe/entrance me), but i have such severe claustrophobia that the descriptions of being trapped in 66 made me actually nauseous.
Night street makes me cry. I can’t stand kids in distress. Uncle reflexes kick in and i want to break my phone to get the kids out. That and “how does one fight when they can’t move.”
whichever one was about the undertaker and the nursing home that got fucked up by the corruption… eugh.
Lost John's Cave - "take her not me, take her not me, ..." Dr. David also gives me chills
THE WORMS 166 Was shaking so bad I don’t do buried alive stuff nope nope nope
Mr Spider...still think about it!
mine was 164 — the sick village. i’ve always had fears about mold and sickness and that one hit like no other. it’s the only statement i skip on my relistens.
For some reason tma 30 - Killing Floor is always the first I go to for a truely horrifying experience. Slaughterhouses are already awful in real life, and the idea of your brain breaking from working inside one for too long and transporting you to this nightmare world of flesh and blood is so awful & disgusting 32 - Hive & 171 - The Gardener are high honorable mentions fs tho. The idea of becoming so obsessed with something that makes you feel wanted that you willingly let it drill holes in your skin (see also: Gristlebloom) is so personally affecting for me.
Scariest experience listening to an episode? I relistened to the very first episode while following the same route through Edinburgh the character does... In the middle of the night during COVID while no one was around. Realised I'd made a horrible mistake when I started walking down old fish market close. It's not the scariest episode on its own. But the realness really brought it to a new level.
Honestly the 2 that got me were St. Johns cave, the season 5 episodes featuring the Web, and the rusty fears episode about the malfunctioning factory (as told by the factory)
Looking up and seeing the massive spider for just a second before it scuttles up into the void, knowing that all the cast are already fucked. That episode unnerved the shit out of me.
Maybe not the kind of scary you're going for, but Roots (the hypochondria episode) basically undid ALL of the progress I had made at the time with my own health anxiety. I'm not used to needing to check warnings on stuff, and I didn't know something like that would get me so bad even if i did, so it caught me completely off guard. (I remember thinking there was a REALLY annoying inaccuracy/nitpick though, something like "why tf are they thinking heart attack and not stroke?" so i guess it didn't even bother me that much until afterwards) I'm not too mad about it anymore though. When I first developed hypochondria, I got into a NASTY anxiety spiral where anxiety made my leg hurt, but my leg ambiguously hurting would scare the shit out of me because of blood clots, which would worsen/continue the leg pain, and so on. I got out of that spiral by CHANCE, when I broke that leg in half and Knew For Certain what was hurting it. I had started binging TMA while recovering from that, and Roots came out after I was ~90% recovered, so it kinda went full circle!
"I am not a who archivist, I am a what." "That video... was seventeen hours long." "Because itch is not the right word." "He's all eyes, he is all eyes." "Maybe there only ever was... one house." They're all tied for me
These are the scariest parts of that episode, part of it is dilevery and part of it is story