NPE Proposal: Mr. Crocket

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Every ounce of protein needs "iron" to ensure good health. Yum.

“	Mr. Crocket: But that wasn't the end of my story. I made a deal to send bad parents' souls to hell in exchange for a world of my own. And now I bring good children, worthy children to my paradise to play forever. And I will protect you... and I'll make you happy in all the ways you ever desired. No pain, no anger, no yelling, no spanking, no, no, no, no, no veggies, or time-out, or bedtime! [All starts chanting "No bedtime" and laughing] Summer: You're snatchin' kids over bedtime. That's insane!	„
	~ Mother knows best in a nutshell, and for all in his best intentions of trying to grant children better lives, the last few statements were childishly unsubtle.

2 weeks is officially up (and extra few days late due to real-life stuff like catching up with college assignments) and almost time for Happy Hammyween! (A phrase I used, like a large ham halloween thingy... I have no f-cking clue either lol).

Anyways, me and a acquaintance of mine first reserved this work on the other wiki website, believing he was potentially a full-blown Pure Evil considering the first time we watched the trailer. Though after having to see it in person first, this ended up being the exact opposite, nevertheless it was still a unique addition to modern-day horror movie villains after John Carver of Thanksgiving and the Armitage Family from Get Out. That said, I'd hope this cozy-sounding, TV show host becomes the next Freddy Krueger, or at least, an Anti-Freddy Krueger.

Now, we came around quickly discussing the majestics of the character and as the conclusion come about, we'd made a decision afterwards. I'd like to introduce you lot to the "wholesome", terrifying children's TV show host with the most, Mr. Crocket!

What's the Work?

Mr. Crocket is the 2024 Hulu original horror film directed by Brandon Espy and based on the episode premiered on the horror anthology series, Bite Size Halloween.

The story follows a grieving mother named Summer whose trying her best to raise her son, Major, after the passing of his father. However, with recent events involving a demonic entertainer crawling upon the houses of dysfunctional families where it met with deadbeat, abusive parents murdered and their children abducted by a children's TV show host, who else could it be none other than the vicious, upbeat Mr. Crocket joining in on the fun and begins taking Major away from Summer. Determined to bring her son back home, she needs to get help from a traumatized, homeless woman who shares the same grief of loss and a young man who has a deep connection with Mr. Crocket in the past.

Who is He? What has He Done?

Emanuel Crocket, properly known by his TV show stage name, Mr. Crocket, is the demonic former star host of the children's television show, "Mr. Crocket's World", who goes about punishing uncaring, irresponsible, and abusive parents and abducting their children into his dimension where he could play and learn with them. His recent victim being Major, son of Summer, and eventually becoming a frightening adversary.

As a child, Crocket was physically abused by his father on a daily basis and to get revenge, he began eating as much as he could until at his teens, he orchestrates his father's death by bashing him in the head and soon feigned the whole thing to look like an accident, leaving his childhood home and ensuring no tracks lead back to him. Soon as Mr. Crocket eventually took on making his children's television show a reality after past hardships of making it a hit, during one of his performances on set, he witnessed a sad boy named Anthony Williams and "kidnapped" him to his home in a misguided attempt to ensure the boy's loved and happy. Unfortunately, authorities were alerted of Anthony's disappearance and the moment they arrived in Crocket's house, Mr. Crocket himself went onto viciously attacking and brutally stabbing two police officers to death during the ambush. Crocket ended up dead when a third officer immediately shoots under cautiousness when Anthony ran out of the closet, prompting Crocket to sacrifice his life for him and his soul residing in hell.

Eventually making a deal with whoever was likely his benefactor and sorts, Crocket was given his own pocket dimension based on his own TV show but on a more demonic, twisted setting with his companions from said show also appearing more grotesque-looking than their family-friendly counterparts who served as his allies, in exchange, he offered to condemn the souls of uncaring, irresponsible, and abusive parents to hell. His spree began on punishing and killing the parents of Mary Johnson, later abducting her into his dimension was one of the first few children brainwashed into being here.

Later in the present, he targeted a young boy named Darren Harper to "rescue", who was being strictly force-fed by his stepfather Kevin, by having Kevin force-fed a plate of disgusting slob and worms, not until he resorts to gutting his stomach open and shoving the gross dish inside, then proceeds to shove uncooked chicken and then a running, heating iron just to double the pain. After abducting Darren to his realm, the events left Rhonda, Darren's mother, traumatized and on the hunt to rescue her son, not without receiving dreams from Crocket where he psychologically tormented her into giving up, furthering her despair. While targeting Major Beverly, the son of Summer Beverly, following the passing of his father, Mr. Crocket soon picked up the tearing pleads of a young Carey when she got aggressively scolded by her junkie father, Bill. Crocket soon puts Bill in a frozen trance and makes himself shoot up an expanding bubble onto his mouth through his own gun, exploding his head as a result and later taking Carey to his pocket dimension, to which Rhonda was too late to save.

After Major and Summer had an argument, Mr. Crocket soon crawls out from the TV when Summer smashed it down when it played his VHS tape eerily and as soon as he deflected Summer's bat directed at him, he used his Magical Marker to teleport to Major's room and thus sent him to his pocket dimension where he then brainwashed him like the rest of the children into staying here. Throughout Summer's means to save her son, she found herself first taunted by Crocket in the real world, warning her to back off and threatening to condemn both her and her husband Jerrel's souls to hell as arranged, then later in her dreams, Crocket disguised himself as Jerrel and psychologically taunted how Major's abduction was her fault, not before ripping the disguised face off himself just to further mock her.

As Summer and Eddie Briggs - claimed to be a father with a missing daughter - got help from Rhonda, who now holds a unique ability to channeling airwaves, they manage to locate Crocket's next target. Meanwhile, Crocket killed yet again, another uncaring parent, who only tried to get his daughter, Kelli, to bed, not until the father was met with his arms ripped apart and his upper-face part of his head blown bloodied from what appeared to be a spelling game Crocket was trying to "teach" him. As the trio made it into the house, Crocket eventually picked up their presence and tries to kill Summer and Eddie, not until he's met with Rhonda assaulting him with a chair, giving the two a chance to enter the pocket dimension. Rhonda, unfortunately, is met with being fatally stabbed in the chest as Crocket goes after them.

Once they arrived, Crocket wastes no time having the demonic Boogalo Blue track down Summer and have her restrained by the Chair. He later brings the brainwashed children in and read them a storybook regarding his entire life and how he came to be, which later Summer calls him out for one of his "best intentions" of bringing children here was over bedtime, one of which he got them to sing-along about. When Eddie came out of hiding and revealed himself as "Anthony Williams", Mr. Crocket at first glance recognized him until mere seconds later, concluded Anthony as an 'imposter' who had nothing better to do with his life and later has him brutally mauled by the demonic Boogalo Blue.

On a whim, Crocket goes about from twisting Summer's chance to reaching out to Major, only to manipulate the boy into staying by his side, and later playing a twisted game of "hide and seek", which Summer is forced to run from the brainwashed children who became feral and the demonic Squawky Bird. Crocket eventually finds Summer and has her cornered by the brainwashed children, which he then manipulates Major into killing her with a dagger knife whilst teaching him "what it means to grow up sometimes". Unfortunately, Summer manages to reach out to her son through blowing the very whistle he used to play around with, getting him to snap from the trance and sneakily snatching up Crocket's Magical Marker from his pockets, pretending to kill Summer by using the marker to interpret the knife. Soon as Crocket was caught off guard and realizes the situation, he goes into a furious breakdown, trying to kill Summer before she slashes him with his own Magical Marker.

Escaping with the children, Crocket tries to hold onto Major once he and Summer leaves, promising them that he'll always come back wherever Major goes. Once Major and Darren are reunited with their mothers while the three girls were assigned for adoption, Crocket wasn't entirely finished for good as he somehow was able to influence Major into enacting violent impulses against the school faculty and spreading fear among students, and the only thing indicating his return... was when Major found the Magical Marker on his color marker set.

Heinous Standards

Easily sets it. For baseline when it comes to horror films, he has over seven kills with hefty brutality and kidnapped five (arguably six) children, brainwashing them into being with him into his dimension, and rather cruel psychological torment over Summer and Rhonda. To anyone asking, how graphically brutal are those kills? Let's see; bashed his own father in the head and made it seem like an accident to evade the police and aggressively stabbed two officers to death, wouldn't exactly be enough but it's his onscreen kills in the present is what solidifies it.

Mr. Crocket's insane brutality teaches children a number of things about violence. Certainly makes Biggie Bear look pale.

Kevin, Darren's strict stepfather, found himself having his stomach gutted open and then tortured by having various disgusting objects shoved into said open stomach to death, hell, Crocket even used a goddamn heating iron to solidify his first onscreen kill. Then there's having Carey's father, Bill, killed by exploding his head using an expanding bubble after putting him in a frozen trance and making him do it, which is enforced suicide. The third victim was Kelli's father, who was likely tortured and mutilated by having his arms ripped apart and his upper-face part of his head blown when playing a word game. Lastly, there's Anthony Williams (Eddie Briggs), the very child Crocket kidnapped, where he was cruelly feasted and torn by a monstrous Boogalo Blue when Crocket refused to recognize Anthony as an adult, showing how far and vile Crocket can get, something Summer called him out for.

Speaking of her, there comes personal villainy with her and Rhonda Harper, which involved kidnapping their sons and currently influencing Major into freeing him while making him go violent against other adults. His psychological torment in the mothers' dreams is also a very, very cruel touch. For Summer, it was to disguise himself as her dead husband Jerrel and immediately go about berating all the blame of Major's kidnapping all to her, not before ripping the Jerrel face apart just to further add insult to injury, as well as psychologically and emotionally, right to her face. For Rhonda, we may not have seen what her constant dreams from Crocket were like but it's made clear Crocket tormented her into backing out and telling her to give up. Rhonda's case is especially personal since she is ultimately traumatized by these events, as well as Summer.

With resources of being an demonic figure with a pocket dimension, nonsensical powers, and his Magical Marker, I'd say he's done enough with the baseline requirements and his personal, brutal niches.

Mitigating Factors

Let's get this one out of the way immediately. Mr. Crocket comes to suit himself with beliefs of "fairness", one of his "lessons" and wanting to ensure the children will be given better living conditions and happiness as a parent himself, you could say it's a mixture of a Well-Intentioned Extremist with honorable aspects. However, majority of that completely falls short on his end. When it comes to "teaching" the bad parents his personal lessons taught from his TV show, such as "eating healthy" and "sharing is caring", most of it comes off as taunting and blowing raspberries at the parents than actually being committed to what he's trying to "teach" - which his way of teaching was to brutally torture them until they die or give them graphic deaths that sees their souls condemned to hell.

What also doesn't help is that Crocket comes off as hypocritical, as mentioned with his "you got to eat right" song encouraging children to eat vegetables, Crocket himself gave Darren a large portion of cotton candy when the kid barely finished his plate of mashed peas once and this was when his stepfather, Kevin, tried to force-feed him. Granted, Crocket on his end likely did it to cheer the boy up, but it doesn't negate the slightest hypocrisy of what his lessons were directed to concur with his teachings, let alone how twisted they tend to come around as. And despite his best intentions to give children better love and affection, Summer even points out that while Crocket is sufficient when it comes to children being harshly and verbally abused, abducting children over bedtime is too far-fetch to make his intentions sound sincere, let alone petty.

Another point that stands is that the only reason Summer yelled at Major was because he acted out and destroyed not just their family photo but also his father's trophy over watching Mr. Crocket's World, and Summer was trying her best to raise Major as she could. Which ultimately goes against the pattern of Crocket hunting down "bad parents", and although Crocket did consider giving Summer a chance to reach out to Major, it also goes down the drain when Crocket goes onto manipulating Major into staying with him as his "father", which indefinitely goes against giving Summer a chance from earlier. That said, for all of what Crocket wanted what was best for children, his perspective was to snatch them over not just giving them better living conditions but to spoil them rotten and ensure they don't have to do as much as they are told over by their parents, regardless of how harsh they can be, still tried their best to raise them.

Then there's his relationship with his demonic companions based on his TV show, Boogaloo Blue, Squawky Bird, Tickles the Clock, and... a chair? Anyways, the relationship between him and all four of them is more of being mutual "master and pet companions" working side by side in indulging sadistic shtick than it is more leaned on genuinely being close. Nothing further indicates that between Crocket and his TV show characters have something altruistic relations, especially since he was there to come out the moment Summer killed Squawky Bird and didn't have much of a reaction when it happened, and the way he treats Boogaloo is more of that of a pet monster than actually showing further affection. He even told him not to play with his food in front of the children. So yeah, I don't see this also being as mitigating as how his care for children is the total opposite.

Preventions

Freudian Excuse?

Another relatable topic and issues addressed in regards to dysfunctional family homes.

He pretty much has a very solid reason as to why he became the insane, unhinged "bad parent hunter" he is today. His experiences stem from having an abusive childhood himself, you see, his father wasn't the best man around and oftentimes beat Crocket physically for no other reason at all. It's to the point he spent years eating as much as he could find until he was older enough to handle his old man and get back at him for years of abuse, which he killed him and feigned his death to look like an accident.

Even as an adult, in one of his memories shown onscreen, Crocket struggled with production quality when first making "Mr. Crocket's World" and beginning his career. His staff crew left him and suffered a severe mental breakdown that sees him performing self-harm on his left hand that puppeteer his first companion, "Benny the Bison". These experiences ultimately shaped Crocket's mindset and his disdain for not just irresponsible, uncaring, and abusive parents in general, but also grown-up as a whole, believing only he could grant children the best kind of affection and love their own parents couldn't bother to offer at hand, that and his legitimate desire to start a family. Rhonda, who happened to have gained her airwave channeling abilities, was able to seen Crocket's presence and confirmed that there is a hint of "anger and sadness" he couldn't control, further cementing that for all of Crocket's twisted and deranged shenanigans, he is a tragic figure whose actions crawled from a bad childhood.

Despite all of this, the narrative doesn't go all out to paint Crocket in a sympathetic light too much and no matter how bad his past was, he's still treated as a deranged serial killer whose actions and intentions of caring for children don't go out on being leniently overlooked and even when he staged his father's death to look accidental, the animation narrative goes out to portray Crocket in a much sinister presence up-close to his facial expression. So we can get where Crocket is coming from but what he can't actually get is how justified his killings were despite what he thought was best for the children he abducted.

Redeeming Qualities?

He has tremendous care for children as a whole. Crocket makes it clear that he believed elsewhere he had a calling to be a protector and father-figure to all children, wishing for only the best kind of love he could shower before them and ensure they don't have to worry over getting into trouble and abuse with their real parents, whether they were abusive, too harsh, or tried their best despite their disputes.

This is best showcased from giving Darren a large piece of cotton candy to cheer him up while dealing with his stepfather and sacrificing his life for Anthony when he was a child during the shootout, this can also extend to Major, as he treats him like a son he never had and acted as his father-figure. While yes, he did brainwash the children into staying in his dimension and make believe the demonic atmosphere as a friendly one, but he never once tried to hurt, abuse, or put them in harm's way regardless and actually treated them very well despite what he's doing to them. He even attempted to reward them an endless bowl of ice cream to whoever finds Summer first and begin the kill. As his theme song suggests, "he'll be there to protect them in a heartbeat".

It can also be combined with his genuine desire to start a family of his own, showing a hint of longing for familial affection, even if it ends up being twisted. However, in spite of his care for children around the world, aside from the many times I say it's twisted, I believe such care is limited considering he had Anthony Williams brutally maimed and killed by Boogalo Blue, but this is only because he became an adult, one of which Crocket barely recognized and shunned the idea that "adult" Anthony is the "child" Anthony he remembered. So Crocket is more leaned to caring about the images of children than them actually growing up, let alone one who "had nothing to do with their lives", and this is coming from the fact that he was teaching Major the "harshest, toughest things about growing up sometimes", his way was to kill their own parents.

Nevertheless, even if killing Anthony is a subversion, the care for "child" Anthony is still there. It's just Crocket is solely bounded to care for children and their innocence rather than seeing them grow up much. But you gotta admit, at least Crocket's committed to his calling as their "protector".

Insanity?

...quite the understatement, I'm not gonna lie. Mr. Crocket doesn't seem right in the mind due to all the unhinged behavior he expresses onscreen, followed by the tone sounding too mentally ill, and don't get me started with all the graphic brutality when it comes to "teaching" bad and irresponsible parents a lesson or two.

“	Mr. Crocket: Anthony? Come here. Get closer. Anthony: It's me. It's me. Mr. Crocket: Ugh! Uh, no, no, no, no. Anthony: Why? What are you t- Mr. Crocket: Who are you? Anthony: I'm Anthony. The boy from the story book, do you remember? Mr. Crocket: Anthony? No, no, no, no, no, no. Anthony is an innocent young boy. You are an old, bitter, insane man who has done nothing with his life! You don't belong here.	„
	~ That's one way to put "I have no son" to the next level of a warped worldview.

What exemplifies the issues on Crocket's mentality is due to his negative experiences from his childhood and how it shaped the psychotic "protector of all children" he is today. His hatred for grown-ups was so bad that in one second, he believed before his eyes that he saw Anthony as an adult, but quickly dismisses him as someone who barely had anything to do with his life and doesn't seem to recognize or acknowledge him, only believing the Anthony he saved was the "child" while the Anthony - as an adult - before him is someone else. It goes to further demonstrate just how insane his worldview between children and adults deteriorate that he cannot acknowledge the difference on how all grown up Anthony turned out. There's also his severed breakdown during his first time performing live on television, literally talking to himself by his left hand in the form of "Benny the Bison" calling him a loser and proceeds to harm himself, thinking he's bashing Benny with a hammer. Which altogether firmly clears up that Crocket is in no mental shape.

Although Crocket is entirely out of his mind when it comes to his unhinged brutality against parents and adults in general, Crocket is able to maintain some form of charisma and profession during his "lessons", as he is capable of being somewhat reasonable into giving parents like Summer a "second chance" in reaching out to her son, even if said chance was anything but a "hope spot" at best and is rather manipulative, talking Major out into staying with him as the ideal "father-figure" for the boy just to brainwash him back into his clutches. He's also rather prestige on how he finds his next targets and to whoever he chooses his VHS tape to be delivered to, let alone being able to make a deal with Hell elsewhere to be granted his pocket dimension. So Crocket isn't too unstable to not have a piece of sanity left in him and is responsible for his brutal actions despite his insane demeanor.

Final Verdict

This is a simple yes to Anti-Freddy Krueger, and once more, a Happy Hammyween, folks!