Horror has the tendency of popping up when you least expect it. Case in point: Rugrat’s Season 03 episode “In the Dreamtime.”

In the Dreamtime revolves around our favorite ginger-haired scaredy cat Chuckie Finster. He has been having a hard time telling the difference between his dreams and reality. What transpires next are several short dream sequences that keeps audiences guessing on what is real and what is a dream.

For example, there is a moment in the episode where Chuckie is explaining the dream world to the other Rugrats. Tommy takes inspiration from Chuckie’s dreams and decides to lead the gang of ankle-biters upstairs into Grandpa Pickles’ bedroom. The adventure starts off normal enough, but it doesn’t take long for the world to warp. The staircase grows longer and longer and the babies soon find themselves in outer space. Chuckie’s attempt to join the fun leaves him falling into nothingness. He wakes up with a scream and realizes that it was just another dream.

In the end, Chuckie realizes that dreams are just that – dreams. They cannot hurt him. His father Chas ends up comforting Chuckie before putting him down for the night. However, in a surprise twist, we follow Chas into the kitchen where he encounters a deformed, clown-faced Stu. He wakes up with a shout as the episode ends. This leaves audiences wondering whether it was really Chuckie’s dreams we’ve been watching or Chas’s. Either way, it ends on a creepy note.

The episode obviously takes a lot of its inspiration from horror. The idea of being unable to tell the difference between the Real World and the Dream World is probably one of the oldest tropes of the genre. We’ve seen it in such movies as Phantasm, Donnie Darko, episodes of the Twilight Zone, and the granddaddy of them all: Nightmare on Elm Street.

To add to the horror, we then have the scene where Chuckie decides to talk to the neighbor’s bulldog. Now this is not a sweet pupper like Tommy’s dog Spike. No. This is an angry, frothing at the mouth, raging bulldog that wants nothing more than to tear Chuckie apart. Luckily, Tommy is able to distract the dog with a stick before Chuckie gets hurt. Still, that does not negate the fact that we just watched a baby nearly get mauled by the neighbor’s dog!

Then you have the sudden, and rather horrific transformations of Tommy and Stu’s faces. These transformations, being so quick and random, reminds me a lot of Large Marge from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. For those of you who don’t know – Large Marge was a truck driver that Pee Wee Herman hitches a ride with while looking for his stolen bike. She tells Pee Wee about a terrible accident of which she was a witness too. When she describes the dead person’s face, her own suddenly twists and contorts; much to the shock of Pee Wee and the audience.

Clown-Face Stu and Clown-Face Tommy follow the same idea. Both keeping their faces normal, or hidden, before the big reveal. Combine that with their suddenly squeaky and high-pitched voices (‘When I Talked. Like. THIS!”) and you got yourself one memorable episode.

And memorable it is. In the Dreamtime is one of the most talked about and referenced episodes of the Rugrats. People, to this day, still consider In the Dreamtime to be one of their earliest experiences of ‘nightmare fuel’ with many fans still considering it to be one of the creepiest episodes of this long-running franchise.

And I agree.

At the time of this post, In the Dreamtime is currently available to stream on Paramount +.