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Toasted Pixel Presents: The Horror Film History of Unhelpful Children Who Know All About the Monsters Killing People But Just Draw Useless Pictures Instead of Telling Anybody

If you're encountering unspeakable evil you don't understand or recognize, and that evil is killing off everyone you know, one thing is for sure. Little children around you know EXACTLY what's doing all the killing. Furthermore, when you ask them for information that can save your life, they'll draw you pictures they know you can't understand about a few circles. Then they watch you get killed. Below are three of the top films in the children-who-get-adults-murdered-through-ambiguous-drawings genre. Perhaps you'll learn something about youth, and how it's wasted on the living. Warning: there are some spoilers involved.

"If you disapprove this harshly about the cartoons I watch, you're reeeeeaaaally not gonna be happy with me by the end of this movie." Movie: The Ring (2002) The Premise: If your son has a psychic connection to a demonic girl ghost who's out to kill you (and you thus realize that your son knows the ghost's plans and origins), begging him for helpful information will result in his blithely telling you piecemeal details about the ghost's former bedroom before he gets bored and wanders off to watch Teletubbies. Oh, and you won't press him for details, either, since you realize he's got a busy day of watching Sesame Street and you dying. The Pictures: Since he knows the demonic ghost's plan, the boy draws pictures of his relatives who are going to get killed by her. This may have been helpful if he actually showed anyone these pictures. However, it turns out he just likes drawing his relatives getting killed. The Result: The boy's actually not evil in this movie, just astoundingly unhelpful. And at the end of the movie, he actually yells at his mother for being ignorant of the demon's plan. This boy needs a good case of discipline by gun.

Movie: They (2002) The Premise: "They" (it's never explained what "They" are, although they frown and slouch a lot) come from your closet to harass you when you're a child, poking your legs and pulling your hair. Then they leave you alone. Years later, they come and harass you some more as a young adult. Then they leave you alone again. A little after that, they come and nab you after a little more harassing, and take you to another dimension. Then they leave you alone again. Wait, what the hell? Can you imagine having to be the guy pitching this *@$#&@! to the producers? The Pictures: One of the harassed, now a young adult, meets a young girl who is also going through this interdimensional class action suit. The little girl seems pretty in the know about the monsters, so the adult asks the child, "Who comes for you?" The child responds, "They," while drawing pictures. Now, you'd think that when a woman tries to help you, at a time when monsters from your closet are coming for you, she MAY just be worth your attention. However, apparently, those darn kids just can't inhale enough of those wax and sharpie fumes, and someone trying to help save them just isn't worth the time. The Result: Nothing. This movie is literally just a premise. I don't like Wes Craven now.

The elements on this poster sum up everthing that happens in every scene of this film. Movie: Hide and Seek (2005) The Premise: Little girls are perfectly content watching their family members and friends getting killed, so long as they get to play fun games like hide and seek with the killer (we're not kidding, that's the premise). In other words, kids are fucking evil little shits. The Pictures: Dakota Fanning draws tons of pictures of herself gleefully holding hands with the killer who murdered members of her family, her cat, and several small towns worth of people. Her father, Robert DeNiro, a psychologist, responds to these pictures and cold blooded murders by giving eyebrow-furrowing Robert DeNiro frowns for the entire film (see poster for reference). This furthers the plot not at all, and you may find yourself wondering where it's going, most of the time. Come to think of it, that's pretty bad. This movie kind of sucks. The Result: Just who the hell wrote this thinking it'd be plausible? I'll repeat the premise again. Little girls are perfectly content watching their family members and friends getting killed, so long as they get to play fun games like hide and seek with the killer. Is this script based off of Paris Hilton's more shallow evil double or something? At one point, a policeman comes into DeNiro's house. Fanning draws a picture she says is "you dying" to the policeman before the killer whacks him with a shovel. If you knew a killer was about to kill someone, would your reaction be to DO something about it? Or pull out crayons and think, "I MUST capture this moment on canvas!" Ah, only those lovable scamps could get away with that!

Imagine if we all could get away with crap like that. Imagine if a prosecutor in court asks you if you paid the killer, and you respond by handing him a magic marker drawing of Jimmy Fallon. The Jennifer Connelly movie Dark Water comes out in three weeks (July 8th). It involves a mysterious killing force and children. For the sake of cinema, let us hope they have no access to Crayola products.