You can’t get much more unobjectionable than Winnie the Pooh. He’s an adorable little stuffed bear who goes on adventures. It’s the sort of property that would be created by someone desperately trying to restore their image.
Yet, despite all of that, when you really dig into his stuffing, there are a few things that have never quite sat right with me. All of them part and parcel with natural Pooh canon. In other words, this isn’t going to be in the vein of the stunt horror trailers that feel like a Banksy-level breakdown of what’s scary to people. “What if the cute thing… was bad?” Whoa, don’t flip my whole world upside-down without prior warning, Stephen King 2.0!
But there are definitely five things that I prefer not to think about when it comes to Winnie’s world…
He Keeps Tearing Open
Disney
One of Winnie’s most frequent bothers is his unrelenting propensity to rip open. It’s all very cute in the context of stuffed animals, with his fluffy little behind being too much for his stitches to bear. But even knowing that no viscera will come flowing out of the tear in his patchwork perineum, it’s still kind of gross. How many properties have a recurring instance of “his stitches tear open, and he desperately gathers his insides” that aren’t torture porn films toeing the NC-17 line? It’s like something from one of the Terrifier movies, not a children’s book.
Keep it together, man! You’re quite literally falling apart in front of us.
Him Being A Stuffed Animal Soaked in Honey
Disney
So, let’s say that, to clear the previous hurdle, I’m all in on believing that he is, in fact, a stuffed animal. That would mean that all the textures and chemical interactions that come with it would also be true. Which means that Winnie the Pooh, the walking, talking stuffed animal, would be absolutely soaked in honey. First of all, imagine the flies. He would basically be an upholstered, ursine Candyman.
Even without the bugs, the weight and feel of a honey-soaked stuffed animal is absolutely horrifying to think about holding. It’s like the milk-soaked Webkins meme, except stickier.
That Episode Where His Butt Becomes A Creature
Disney
My mom probably thought leaving me watching Winnie the Pooh ensured absolutely zero chance of her coming back to me sobbing and trying to force myself behind the couch. She was clearly not aware (an ignorance I wish I still possessed) of the fact that he was about to get stuck in a door and promptly be turned into some sort of horrible elder god.
It’s my sincere belief that the creature from the legitimate horror movie The Ritual is inspired by someone who was equally as haunted by this weird deer/ass creature.
Eeyore’s Whole Deal
Disney
Moving away from Pooh and into the secondary cast, we get Eeyore. His deal is that he is a donkey with major depressive disorder. The guy makes Droopy Dog seem like Chris Pratt. Do you know what he says right before the screencap above? “Not much of a house. Just right for not much of a donkey.”
Good lord, man. Can’t somebody knit this guy some Lexapro? If one of my friends texted me any of the things that Eeyore says, I’d probably call in a 5150 hold on them. Then I’d be over at his house checking the drawers for seam rippers.
Tigger
Disney
The character’s fine, but it would be great if we could give him a new name that isn’t half a syllable away from a racial slur. I’d just love to be able to discuss Winnie the Pooh out loud without someone at the next table thinking I’m planning to storm the Capitol.
