Reddit reviews Spooky Pookie (Little Pookie)

My oldest is three years old, and I've found that books are a great gateway to the horror media we all know and love. It started the October after he turned one, when we found "Slide and Find Spooky" at a library book sale. It was a big hit and we've since amassed a pretty good collection of similarly themed board books

Where is Baby's Pumpkin?

Eek! Halloween!

Spooky Pookie

Little Boo

Llama Llama Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween, Curious George

and picture books

Go Away, Big Green Monster!

Happy Halloween, Little Critter!

Clifford's Halloween

Berenstain Bears Trick or Treat

Berenstain Bears Go on a Ghost Walk

Bonaparte Falls Apart

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This past fall we started watching some horror-themed television and movies. Good intros were

Curious George: A Halloween Boo Fest

Hotel Transylvania

Coco

Scared Shrekless

The Nightmare Before Christmas

and especially the late sixties and late seventies iterations of Scooby-Doo. More recently we've gotten into Mystery Incorporated! (which is a treasure trove of horror references for grown-up fans, from Hellraiser's Lament Configuration and Eaten Alive's Starlight Hotel to Vincent Price and Jason Voorhees). Other kid-friendly movies that went over well have included

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

Bride of Frankenstein

The Monster Squad

Beetlejuice

and, oddly enough, Starman

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Obviously, every kid is gonna have their own preferences and move at their own speed. I've been lucky that mine gets a real kick out of "spooky" things, likes to pretend we're ghosts or monsters as we play chase, etc. One benefit of enjoying this stuff together is that we can talk about how monsters are for fun and not real, and we've watched makeup tutorials on YouTube to see how artists help actors pretend to be monsters. We have yet to go through waking up from a nightmare about any of this, and I think the conversations we've had about the imaginary nature of these things have really helped with that.