Judging from EW staffers recollections, watching your first scary movie is an unforgettable experience.

We culled some horrible (and some delightful!)

horror film memories by posing the question.

STEPHEN KING’S IT, Tim Curry, 1990

Credit: Everett Collection

Now answer for yourself below!

As you’ve got the option to imagine, it was a pretty harrowing introduction to the genre.

I was too young for it.

No list of creeptastic clowns is complete without this dancing nightmare, so let’s just get him out of the way. He was everything from a

Everett Collection

Imayhave blacked out around the Achilles heel scene.

Rebecca DetkenI was around 10 years old attending a slumber party when the birthday girls mom poppedCarrieinto the VCR.

I didnt know what to make of it:Why is that clown in the sewer?

JAWS (1975)

‘Jaws’ (1975).Everett Collection

Still not a huge fan of clowns.

Dana SchwartzMy dad showed usCarriewhen we were kids.

He thought it would be a fun scary movie to watch as a family.

Charles Durning in When A Stranger Calls

He forgot it begins with a soft-core shower scene.

Watching that with my family traumatized me more than any scares.

It was billed as a comedy so my dad decided to rent it for us to watch together.

Scream, Drew Barrymore | SCREAM ‘‘Why do you want to know my name?’’ ‘‘Because I want to know who I’m looking at.’’ In the first few minutes of this

Everett Collection

I was in kindergarten.

Chris NashawatyJawscame out on my sixth birthday.

Again, I was six!

Catherine Zeta Jones And Liam Neeson In ‘The Haunting’

DreamWorks/Getty Images

I dont think I had the courage to get in a bath or even a shower that whole summer.

I even thought a Great White could come up through the toilet.

Despite all of that, or maybe because of it, Jaws is my favorite movie.

…And Other Watery Graves

Daniel SniersonGhost Story.

Slightly scarier than another movie I saw around that time:On Golden Pond.

James KimThe Ring, when I was in elementary school!

Michele RomeroWhen I was in second grade my divorced dad took me and my sister to seeThe Poseidon Adventure.

Technically this is a disaster movie where a cruise ship capsizes after it is hit by a tsunami.

I left the theater saying bon voyage to a carefree childhood as 70s film culture permeated my daily life.

Bathroom Crises

Lacey BanisNightmare on Elm Street.

I was in 6th grade.

I refused to use the bathroom at night for weeks.

Piya Sinha-RoyMine wasGhostbusters(1984), which I saw around 1988, when I was 3 years old.

It was right at the part when a panicked Carol Kane opens the front door to flee and BAM!

there was Charles Durnings creepy face waiting for her on the other side.

In fact, this is the first thing I can ever remember writing: an entertainment recap.

Nick RomanoTechnically, my first scary movie experience was Neil JordansInterview With the Vampire.

I was five or six and my sister was watching an episode ofRicki Lake.

Since then Ive had persistent night terrors involving vamps, which made theTwilightcraze mildly traumatizing.

It just made it worse.

Brittany KaplanMy parents let me seeSixth Sensewith some friends.

Anthologies

Jillian SederholmCats Eye.

I spent the next several years being terrified that a knife-toting troll was crawling into my bed at night.

And I never watched anything scary again until I sawPsychoin college.

Robyn RossLittle Monsterscomes to mind!

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