Beasts

All of these were entertaining to some degree; 'Baby' was genuinely scary, with a creepy build-up and a final scene that made me make an incoherent noise of terror. I remember kids at school who were somehow allowed to watch that one coming in traumatized the next day, huddling together wide-eyed in a sort of support group. I quite understand now: it almost did for me as a grown man.

I vaguely remember the "Baby" episode of Beasts, which someone describes really above. But it is the opening "Special Offer" episode that stuck in my mind more, mostly because the setting was so mundane.

Like most throwaway 70s telly, I only saw it once, but I vividly remember Pauline Quirke playing a checkout girl in a supermarket who became obsessed with the store's cartoon mascot (a rabbit, I think) called Brightway Billy. She started hallucinating about seeing the rabbit in the shop. I was 12 when it was shown and it totally creeped me out, and created an atmosphere of insanity and hysteria in a very bland setting. At school the next day, every was imitating Pauline Quirke's moon face calling out for "Billy!".

My abiding memory is of some chap incarcerated in his living room, ringing into some radio show and having something nasty getting nearer and nearer...and nearer. You never saw anything, but then again you never had to.

Even the word 'beasts' takes us all back there doesn't it? I try and be objective. I saw this in late 1976, and never since. I was 9 years old, hardly capable of critical reasoning. Yet, across the gulf of time, images and thought processes immeasurably superior to adulthood come back to you.

I'd like to watch it now, provided it don't ruin it.

There have been many moments on television considered the scariest but i remember vividly an episode from this series entitled BABY. Like many other reviewers here it scared me half to death as a boy, so it was with much trepidation that and interest i began watching a copy of the series ....believe me that episode has lost non of its power. Obvious;y some of the effects have dated but its such a frightening story and so well told that it still sends a shiver down the spine. I never watched any other episodes so cannot comment on how they came across at the time but having watched them now they stand up very well indeed.

They are a little on the 'wordy' side and are very studio bound, the lack of budget allows the stories to breath (sometimes a bit too much on BUDDY BOY), relying more on actors than flashy MTV editing styles. Stand outs be During Barty's Party (relying on 2 actors and a sound effect) and Baby (that thing!!!).

I saw During Barty's Party when it was first shown on British TV in 1976; I was twelve and it was a special treat from my grandparents, whose house I was staying at. I had nightmares for weeks! This is a wonderfully crafted story: two actors and the suggestion of a terrible, unseen threat worked together in scaring the undergarments off this viewer! Some of the images, notably the last one, have stayed with me for 30 years. Do NOT watch this alone.

Without giving too much away: as the story unfolds, everything works by suggestion. Washed-out, bleak 70's British TV production values help in establishing the normality that horror needs as a baseline for all the nastiness to happen against. And the ending is truly haunting.