Listen, I think most of us have a movie from our childhood that traumatized us, even if it wasn’t actually scary. For me, it was The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. For Josh Hutcherson, it was The Wizard of Oz. He recently gave a good explanation about why the great musical “tormented” him too, by recalling a recurring nightmare he had about it during SanDiego Comic-Con’s Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 panel.
As we wait for Five Nights at Freddy’s 2’s release on the 2025 movie schedule, the cast traveled to San Diego to tease what’s to come. The topic of other scary movies also came up. So, while I’m sure FNAF has scared many, the film’s star, Hutcherson, opened up about the movie that “tormented” him the most as a youngster, saying this during a panel CinemaBlend attended:
A movie that tormented me, not a horror film, I don’t think, but it scared me to death, was The Wizard of Oz. I don’t know why. When I was a kid, I would have recurring nightmares of the wicked witch just floating outside my bedroom window looking at me and smiling.
I feel this! Hearing the Wicked Witch of the West yell, “I’ll get you, my pretty,” is scary stuff. It’s potentially nightmare-inducing, for sure, and Josh Hutcherson just proved that.
Now, personally, I’ve rewatched The Wizard of Oz many times, and it’s never terrified me. However, I get the point The Hunger Games actor is making here. There are some things we can’t shake as kids that truly stick with us. In fact, I'm sure some of Hutcherson's movies have traumatized many kids -- Hunger Games and Bridge to Terabithia, I'm looking at you specifically. Yeah, that's right, I still remember what happened in both those movies, and I still feel very emotional about it.
Meanwhile, for him, this feeling for pain, horror and/or dread came from that wicked witch. It’s wild that it caused a recurring nightmare, too. If I were him, that’d only amplify the fear. It seems like it has stuck with him as well, as the performer explained:
Literally now, to this day, as a grown-up, I guess I’ll call myself, I still get freaked out if I see the OG Wicked Witch of the West.
Well, if this fear still haunts him to this day, I’m now very curious to hear Josh Hutchson’s thoughts on the Wicked movies. Like, is he going to see Wicked: For Good when it’s released in theaters this November? Can he find a way to move past his fear by learning more about Elphaba’s backstory? These are important questions I need answers to.
However, at the moment, we don’t have those answers. We do know some fun new information about Hutcherson’s upcoming film, though! Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 dropped a trailer that gave us a look at new animatronics, and we learned more about Skeet Ulrich’s role in the movie.
We also know that the upcoming horror flick will hit theaters on December 5, which is notably after the November 21 release of Wicked: For Good. So, maybe we can follow up with Josh Hutcherson later this year to see how the musicals have impacted his long-time fear of The Wizard of Oz.
