All 5 Twisted Childhood Universe Horror Movies, Ranked From Worst To Best

In recent years, there's been a growing subculture of extremely low-budget horror movies born out of beloved childhood characters entering into the public domain. For example, the rights to "Steamboat Willie" expired on January 1, 2024, and the trailer for "The Mouse Trap" dropped on the internet exactly one day later. Independent filmmakers having access to intellectual property long guarded by companies like Disney is a welcome rebuke to the copyright system ... in concept. Unfortunately, a good number of these projects are more interested in cashing in on the notoriety than making a movie they believe in.

The announcement of 2023's "Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey" initially seemed like a one-off slasher made to capitalize on A.A. Milne's 1926 novel going into the public domain at the start of 2022. But once promotional material made its way online, it generated more chatter than British filmmaker Rhys Frake-Waterfield ever anticipated. In addition to "Blood and Honey" garnering a theatrical rollout, its surprise success inspired Frake-Waterfield and his producing partner Scott Jeffrey Chambers to develop further horror films within the aptly-named Twisted Childhood Universe (TCU) under their company Jagged Edge Productions.

There are currently five films in the TCU, all of which center around bloody perversions of characters that have often held a family friendly image. They're even building to an "Avengers" level crossover with the upcoming "Poohniverse: Monsters Assembled." With the TCU's latest in theaters now ("Pinocchio: Unstrung"), let's rank every entry in the series thus far.

Director Rhys Frake-Waterfield had to tiptoe around explicit Disney copyrights to make a Winnie-the-Pooh horror movie, only lifting elements from the A.A. Milne book. We learn through a roughly sketched animated prologue that Pooh (Craig David Dowsett) and his friends aren't anthropomorphic stuffed animals, but strange crossbreeds that Christopher Robin discovered in the Hundred Acre Wood as a child (Frederick Dallaway). After leaving for college, Christopher (Nikolai Leon) returns five years later with his fiancée Mary (Paula Coiz), only to discover that Pooh and Piglet (Chris Cordell) have become adept killers who have turned on humanity.

"Blood and Honey" sports a frustrating lack of imagination in spite of the premise of "Winnie-the-Pooh" characters as slasher villains. It comes across as one of those terrible "Wrong Turn" sequels with the titular killer resembling a lumberjack who happens to be wearing a Pooh mask rather than being a deformed beast. While Frake-Waterfield litters the film with kills, they take place in dimly-lit environments where you can hardly see what's actually happening. Calling the vacationing university students characters is a stretch even by slasher movie standards.

On top of all that, "Blood and Honey" isn't that much fun. It opts for a overly disturbing mean streak against a series of young women that makes Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) seem jovial by comparison. Some credit has to be given for Pooh killing a guy by slapping him across the face.

The inciting incident of Felix Salten's 1923 novel "Bambi, a Life in the Woods" and its iconic 1942 animated adaptation is the titular young fawn losing his mother to a hunter. Dan Allen's "Bambi: The Reckoning" starts off similarly, but deviates with an older Bambi losing his doe-mate by way of a truck carrying toxic chemicals from a pharmaceutical company. Drinking some contaminated water nearby mutates him into a raging deer bent on revenge. Around the same time, a woman named Xana (Roxanne McKee) is transporting her technology-obsessed kid Benji (Tom Mulheron) to see his father (Alex Cooke), unaware that the killer deer will turn their plans literally upside down.

For starters, the biggest achievement of "Bambi: The Reckoning" is the titular monster himself. He actually looks quite good for a mutant CG deer with his large stature and extended jaw of razor sharp teeth. Unfortunately, the film shares a lot of the same issues as "Blood and Honey" in that it's often difficult to see what's going on and there's surprisingly little humor.

Aside from a very funny running gag of cute mutant bunnies tearing people up like the Compsognathuses in "The Lost World: Jurassic Park," this is mostly a somber experience. It accentuates the longstanding effects of environmental decay by paralleling the downfall of Bambi's family with the uninteresting human family. "Bambi: The Reckoning" closes on a surprisingly downbeat note that, while poignant, feels at odds with its very silly premise.

When Scott Jeffrey Chambers' "Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare" had to ditch its Neverland setting due to budgetary restrictions, it became a more grounded take on the boy who never grew up. Here, Peter (Martin Portlock) is a former circus mime who abducts children with the intent on "bringing them to Neverland." Wendy Darling (Megan Placito) panics when her younger brother Michael (Peter DeSouza-Feighoney) goes missing. From Michael's perspective, "Neverland" is an abandoned manor where children are chained up before being slaughtering in a secret room.

Chambers deserves some brownie points for attempting to extend beyond an ordinary slasher flick into psychological horror territory, even if it doesn't always work. There's certainly a lot of blood though, which shines through in the practical makeup department. Portlock gives more to this performance than is needed, relishing in the character's malicious nature. His Peter Pan falls somewhere in the vicinity of the Grabber ("The Black Phone") meets Pennywise ("It") by preying on childhood innocence.

"Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare" nearly hurdles too close to the sun with Tinker Bell (Kit Green) who's depicted as a transgender woman that Peter kidnapped as a child, yet kept alive for the past 15 years. She's his oblivious right hand who spends her days injecting herself with syringes full of "pixie dust." Thankfully, Chambers not only cast a trans actor to play her, but goes to great lengths to show that she was a girl prior to her abduction. 

Director Rhys Frake-Waterfield could have done the same thing all over again after the success of The first "Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey." But to his credit, he took that film's widespread negative reception in stride and bettered his craft. In addition to bringing on "Summer of 84" screenwriter Matt Leslie to pen the script for "Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2," he also starts off with a clean slate by retconning that first film's events as fictional. 

An air of doubt hangs over the reputation of Christopher Robin (Scott Jeffrey Chambers) with the town of Ashdown blaming him for the Hundred Acre Massacre. Pooh (Ryan Oliva) and Piglet (Eddy MacKenzie), however, are still out there killing people. But instead of staying within their forest domain, the pair are convinced by Owl (Marcus Massey) to expand their carnage along with newcomer Tigger (Lewis Santer). As the bodies pile up, Christopher Robin learns a terrible truth that reshapes his connection to Pooh, and actually builds upon the whole crossbreed thing.

"Blood and Honey 2" takes inspiration from "Terrifier 2" by doubling down on the gore, presenting the killers with detailed costumes, and giving us characters to root for. Chambers' recasting in the role makes Christopher Robin feel like a lived-in person. The film acts as a violent throwback slasher that doesn't forget to have fun with its kills, which really shows in a show-stopping sequence that turns an abandoned warehouse rave into a multi-level slaughterhouse.

The highs and lows of the TCU have been worth it to get to "Pinocchio: Unstrung." Following his parents' death, 14 year-old James (Cameron Bell) is left in the custody of his grandfather Geppetto (Richard Brake). One day, the toymaker introduces him to a sentient wooden puppet named Pinocchio (Jude-Evan Lloyd), whom he created to be James' new companion following the death of his friend. Wanting to be a real boy and protect James from bullies, Pinocchio goes on a killing spree, encouraged by a malicious version of the Cricket (Robert Englund).

"Pinocchio: Unstrung" takes a cue from the underrated "Child's Play" remake by having the titular killer start off innocent before going on his murderous fling. Newcomer Lloyd brings a gleefully demented tenor to Pinocchio that warms you to him almost immediately. "A Nightmare on Elm Street" fans will be happy to hear Englund bring that Freddy Krueger energy to Cricket even though he's not in it for very long.

Writer-director Rhys Frake-Waterfield shows considerable improvement, keeping things lean, mean, and very funny. From the opening titles to the nasty gore, there's an emphasis on practical effects such as the Wood Mother (Emma Tate), a mossy Jim Henson-inspired spin on the Blue Fairy. Pinocchio himself is an astounding animatronic puppet from VFX legend Todd Masters that conveys a myriad of emotions. If this is an indicator of the TCU's future, then there are no strings to hold these movies down.