EP 13: The Boogeyman Explained: Origins, Variants & Cultural Role

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Episode overview

This summary distills a lively conversation from the Wondering Monsters Podcast that traces the boogeyman from medieval language roots to present-day pop culture. The hosts examine how a single, ambiguous figure—often used by caregivers as a behavioral deterrent—splits into many regional variants with distinct behaviors and backstories. :contentReference[oaicite:0]{index=0}

Historical roots and etymology

The term commonly appears in English as boogeyman and stretches back to the 15th century. It is linguistically related to older words like bugbear, where bug could mean goblin or scare-figure. The idea predates modern homes: early uses tied the figure to broader fears of the dark, predators in the woods, and the unknown dangers of travel and night-time vulnerability.

Because the boogeyman concept is so old, it often absorbs local fears and imagery—resulting in versions that either abduct children, eat them, or both. Those two outcomes—abduction and consumption—are recurring themes across cultures and centuries.

Key regional variants and motifs

Krampus and the sack man (Central & Eastern Europe)

Krampus, associated with December 5th (Krampusnacht), is a horned, demonic companion to Saint Nicholas in Alpine folklore. He punishes or carries away bad children in a sack—the sack man motif recurs in several European and Hispanic traditions.

El Coco / El Cucuy (Iberia & Latin America)

El Coco is a shapeshifting, often faceless figure used to scare children into obedience. Like many boogeyman variants, El Coco emphasizes the threat of nighttime mischief and the need to respect household or communal rules.

Pugot / Pugot Mamu (Philippines)

Southeast Asian versions include headless entities (the Filipino pugot and related figures) that can be terrifyingly literal—headless creatures that consume victims, sometimes through the neck cavity in folkloric description.

Bloody Bones and Rawhead (England & the American South)

English traditions produce names like Bloody Bones and Tommy Rawhead—skeleton or skinned-head figures retained in regional American lore. These figures often appear with vivid, gruesome details (dancing skeletons, iron teeth) that amplify childhood fear.

Other motifs

Other recurring elements include mimicry (entities that imitate a baby's cry to lure victims), the seven o'clock man who targets those awake after a curfew, and the figure that punishes children for not eating (an Italian Luomo Nero variant used at the dinner table).

Function: social control, boundary enforcement, and primal fear

One central theme in the episode is the boogeyman's social role: a behavioral tool. Parents historically used the figure to keep children indoors, obeying curfews or eating meals—boogeyman stories operate as a kind of folkloric policy.

Beyond rule-enforcement, the boogeyman exploits primal fears: darkness, liminal spaces (closets, under beds, campfire edges), and the anxiety of being taken from the community. These combine into a powerful, low-detail threat—its ambiguity does the terrifying work.

Modern cultural echoes

Contemporary horror and media recycle boogeyman traits: Freddy Krueger's dream-invasion is a modern, cinematic evolution of fear while asleep. Ghostbusters (cartoon and film) treats the boogeyman as a closet-traversing urban ghost; Stephen King and recent films have reimagined the boogeyman in psychological/horror terms.

These modern forms preserve the core ideas—the loss of adult credibility when children report the threat; the tension between childhood belief and adult disbelief; and the way folklore adapts to new cultural tech (movies, TV, viral myths).

Themes & takeaways

• Ambiguity fuels fear: The less you can describe a monster, the more your imagination fills in the gaps.
• Boogeyman = boundary enforcer: Across cultures the figure functions to regulate behavior—curfews, manners, and safety rules.
• Regional variation: Climate, local predators, and cultural priorities shape how the boogeyman appears (sacks, horns, headlessness, mimicry).
• Persistence through adaptation: The boogeyman survives because it easily maps onto new anxieties—technology, surveillance, and shifting family dynamics.

Want the full episode?

This summary is a compact guide to the full conversation on the Wondering Monsters Podcast. Listen to the episode for the hosts' anecdotes, regional deep dives, and the playful debate about whether the boogeyman is weaponizable or simply folklore's oldest curfew-enforcer.

Links from the Show

• Is Bloody Mary Real?
• What are Liminal Spaces and Why Do They Feel So Weird?
• The Night Hag: Folklore, Fear, and Sleep Paralysis
• Unlocking Dream Potential: What's Possible and What's Not
• Is Mind Control Real?
• The Legend of the Headless Horseman and Sleepy Hollow

Watch & Listen to the Full Episode

Enjoy where the conversations of silly meet strange at the Wondering Monsters Podcast.

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Licensing Information

• Title: Entry of the Gladiators
• Composer: Julius Fučík
• Library of Congress (Public Domain)
• Podcast theme song version edited/arranged/mixed by Dan Swift

Unless indicated, images appear in their original form.

Images were generated using AI from MyNinja.ai, NightCafe, lenso.ai, Gemini, or ChatGPT

Transcription

*Transcription was automatically generated and may contain errors.

(Music)

Baba: So I'm actually a little underslept today. This is becoming a theme for me.

Danny C: Bad dream last night?

Baba: I have a side gig with the boogeyman. (Laughing) figured if you can't beat him, join him. And I certainly can't beat him. Or anybody. I joined them all. Yeah. Boogeyman's a funny one though. I like him. Well, I don't know if I like him. Maybe I'll wait until the monster rating. Boogeyman is long established. phrase boogeyman, the link, that construction goes back to, I prefer boogeyman, because it, I don't know. It just sounds better to me. But the boogeyman is, the phrase goes back to like the 15th century, which, how many phrases stay around? You know? Do you talk about being, what do they call it? Cabbaged? I'm cabbaged. That means you're tired, I think. Don't use that anymore. If I call somebody a whipper snapper. That's, when you're right, yeah. The knees, the beat. Those things don't stay around. They sound strange when you say them, right? But like, there aren't any updates on the boogeyman, unless it's any of the various forms that the boogeyman takes. So 15th century, we've been saying boogeyman for that long. And before that, it might have been, it might have been boogeyman, because of the plague, and the guy's driving the buggies. The boogeyman's coming to get you.

WDG: It's also, he's made of bugs.

Baba: Yeah, there are associations with bugs. Although it goes back, so it goes also to the bugbear. The bugbear, so bug is like a word for goblin. It's also for a scarecrow. kind of got this ambiguous, I think it's just like, Like shape shifting. Something that scares you, you know? Ah, goblin, scarecrow, bug.

WDG: So something really weird, like right? Obviously there's bugbears and dudges and dragons and stuff like that. It's mostly a UK saying, right? It's mostly from that. When bugbears, like the idea of the bear, that point, it was mostly hunted to extinction. Before the popularity of using the term bugbear, they like, there were no bears anymore in the UK. They were basically wiped out. Like somewhere between like, I think like 500 to 1000 common era, somewhere around there. have still existed in things, but mostly they were like agriculture and other things and just hunting them. And so like, it's almost like bears themselves are like sort of, not like they wouldn't experience, if they would left the UK to go over to like other parts of Europe where there's still bears. Like it sucks over here. Yeah, but the idea is almost like bears were like, you know, like just these scary now creatures, aren't there anymore, but they were, and they're like, and they were, they could eat you, you know, it's like, or something. (Laughs)

Baba: Yeah, Well, think about elusive creatures that like for us in the civilized world, obviously think about like the possum. possums are freaky. I like them. I think they're really cool, but they're freaky. Like when you see them, it's like, because like, well, you don't usually see them, and they don't usually see you, because you operate at different times. And so like, all the more something, you know, that, you know, that's large and can kill you, because like, usually possums aren't larger than They'll save that future cryptid stories. bearer possum.

WDG: the boogeyman, right? Yeah. Let's just do his base level thing, right? He's in the darkness, he's in your closet, he's under your bed, snatches you, if you up or something, or you get out of bed. Or if you're a bad kid. It's a pretty ambiguous, what it is.

Baba: Yeah, there seems to be lots of crossovers with other, what I'll call, supernatural behavior, or mechanisms, they include Claus, Krampus, the devil, boogeyman, things, and various forms of the boogeyman.

WDG: I don't wanna get into this just yet, maybe, but for our segment that I started establishing in the Headless Horseman, Ghost Rules, Ghost Rules. Ghost Rules, yeah. Ghost Rules, Ghost Rules. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, boogeyman Santa Krampus a little bit, and Santa operate on Ghost Rules, they don't really have a lot of them, they're just kinda like, well, we can go into your house when we want, we can do what we like, we can grab you in the dark if we feel like it, but it's not really certain, but there's no way to be like, well, here's the ritual I can do to get out of it, or here's the, maybe the dark or night is really the, it's only like, you gotta beat them out to the sunrise or something,

Baba: depends on what the boogeyman is on how you avoid boogeyman encounters. Sometimes you don't be a bad kid, and that's gonna, the standards are gonna vary from house to house. (Laughing) So you might be better off with someone else's boogeyman, if there are multiples, or do they have to like check, maybe they don't, maybe they don't. Okay, so there is the, which one is it? The Tata Duende, or Dueno Del Monte is a form of the boogeyman, I forgot to put proper attribution, I wanna say it's Brazil, but I don't think it is, it's, but anyway, it is a--

Danny C: Someone who's watching that, throw a comment, fact check that for us.

Baba: Please, please, it is clearly, this is clearly a Spanish name, but he doesn't have thumbs, he just has his fingers, and so he's very curious about children with thumbs, and so one of the ways that you can escape them is I don't know, I don't have any thumbs, I'm all fingers, the thumb is also a finger, as we know from bronze thumb, bronze finger, but yeah, you can hide your thumbs. Now, there are certain boogeymen, or if on the grand, we'll have to go back and put an umbrella over these, they fall in the grand shape of boogeymen, okay, boogeymen either eat you or abduct you or one and then the other, and in that case, they won't eat you and then abduct you, they'll either abduct you, then eat you, or just abduct you. Yeah, you'll just go missing, like you. Or just eat you, or just eat you. Yeah, and so you've got, there's one called the seven o'clock man, sorry, francophones, I'm doing it again, bono.

WDG: Yeah, better kidding aside.

Baba: I love you all though, even though I always mess up the French accent, the seven o'clock man might have also been named, or there might be like a little crossover with a bone setter, which was an old term just to refer to sort of a traveling healer. Okay, but this is in Quebec, our Canadian friends, and I should pronounce things correctly because I do have Canadian friends, or I did before now. So, they get eaten. They don't get eaten, well, sorry, the Canadian friends might have got, I hope not. That guy, the seven o'clock man, only steals you if you're awake. If you're asleep, you're safe, which is different from like a modern version of this, which is guess like Freddy Krueger of the Nightmare on Elm Street world, is kind of something of a modern boogeyman. He kind of invades dreams, which is not necessarily part of the full on boogeyman story. So, let me back up. So, the boogeyman, it's a shape-shifting thing. big things, it's got claws and sharp teeth, sometimes also carrying a sack. So, it's called the sack man, or the bag man. Not to be confused as the person that hands over the money for, you know, like I'm the bag man. I just cheer and drop off the money, you know. So, the bag man, the sack man, is, reminds me, and as may remind you, of Krampus, it turns out, is like set, as early as the 17th century, and may be pre-Christian in origin. So, it might go back to like early Common Era, or even before the Common Era. they don't really know. But it's largely Eastern European. Krampus gets subtracted out from our Christmas lore. We'll have to talk about that when we talk about it. When we talk about Christmas, it's common. Spooky season has begun. That Krampus carries away bad children in a sack, and is normally comes, the tradition is, the eve before St. Nicholas Day. So, December 5th is Krampus, Krampus night. And yes, there's a phrase for that. I'll leave it alone, because I forgot to write it down, and I'll do as poorly on German. But Krampus comes on the 5th. Now, since Santa comes on the 24th into the 25th, I think Krampus is seen as coming along at the same time. But it's stealing bad kids in a sack. Maybe they get eaten. And so a lot of the European stuff winds up in certain parts of South America. Well, it was also the sack man. I believe the sack man was also popular in Spain. So there's this kind of like Eastern Europe, and then it kind of like swoops down. And then you wind up with the sack man. And so in a lot of versions of the boogeyman in South America, wind up being sack people, just carrying bags and things. And it's like, well, does it come from the same thing? Or do Krampus and the sack man come from the same thing? So

WDG: okay, it's like darkness, right? Like almost like in a weird sense, right? Like the boogeyman is like, it's like a threshold. He literally is like on a threshold, right? Don't crawl, like he comes through beds, like weird spaces, right? That are scary or spooky. And it's it's almost like he's like some kind of like proto-entity because he's not a ghost. Like he doesn't operate by ghost rules, right? It's got all this other stuff that spun out of it. Like you were saying, like the guy with the weird thumbs, but there's also like variants in like, you know, there's a, I know in like, there's a Celtic, that's like the Fika I think or something like that. And it's almost like a little goblin. That's like a shadow being and it lures people. Like if you're mean to it, it lures you away and like to a cliffside or something, but it's more like tricksters and stuff like that. But the boogeyman doesn't seem like a trickster. He's kind of like pre that. He's not a, he's not a deity and it's not a, it's just like this weird like enforcement of the threshold of like, like, you know, it's like something that's like before a lot of that stuff, you know, it's like before we started assigning like, okay, this has like a, this has like a name. This is like, this is a purpose. This can be reasoned with. The boogeyman can't be reasoned with. It just takes you away, you know? It's like, it's like, there's nothing, you know, it's very weird in that sense. Like it's like an early, like it's almost like everything, like a lot of these other threshold enforcers kind of seem to get spun out of this thing that's like, I don't know, almost like, like, yeah, like I said, like a proto entity of sorts, you know?

Baba: Right, right. Yeah. And it's interesting. So we think of the boogeyman as being closet a lot of the time,

Danny C: it always originate with the closet?

Baba: I don't think so because here's the thing. How many people have closets in the 15th century? Like actual closets with clothes and things in them. No, or beds and stuff. Yeah, right? I mean, you might all be in the same bed, you know, or all the kids, you know, all 17 of them before they get, that's why you need a boogeyman. That's expensive.

WDG: Hopefully the boogeyman will come today.

Baba: Like we need to thin, we need to thin out these kids. Boogeyman, yeah, I can see my ribs. We need a boogeyman.

WDG: Well, I guess like the bugbear thing, like the idea, it's like it's a creature sort of in the woods or like if it's spun out of some early, like, you know, say like hobgoblin type things, like the evil- Yeah, you've seen it about right. Which are like, cause you know, there's like, they're kind of like even more evil than regular, you know, goblins, you know, they're much more like, you know, they can be attached to places and stuff. So it's like, yeah, it's kind of like, it could just be in the woods or in the, you know, something that's gonna, if you go into the dark, you're like, if you get away and you get into the dark kids, something's gonna get you.

Baba: Like, you know. So there's part of this, it's like, we talk about the idea of like the primal fear. That's just sort of either embedded in our or it's just kind of that pass down, you know, beyond the point where you're likely to get eaten anyway. Cause there's an obsession here with those two things, being eaten by something and being abducted and taken away. Now being abducted and taken away falls into a category that we probably shouldn't cover. It's just probably, they don't like being talked about. The fae, the fae. And so that, mean, that really comes from, what I'll just call the UK. If you don't like that, put it in the comments. Put it in the comments. Let's have a discussion. I just call it the UK. So the fae. And they're what we would mostly probably call like fairies. And a lot of people think of them as being like good friendly spirits, but not people that are familiar with the stories of the fae because they abduct children and they swap them out for their own kids. And then when their kids get old enough, you know, living off the, living off whoever they swapped them with, they come back and get them or something. So the idea of the changeling is in that world. The idea of like, and so you would have this situation. Actually, the real history of this is quite disturbing because there were many people that suspected that their children were swapped with changelings and they would do things like burn them with things and do kind of crazy things to them to try to figure out. You know, it's kind of like the, you know, build a bridge out of her kind of approach. You know, like, no,

WDG: like what are you doing? Because our fear of the other has definitely evolved to be rational, you know?

Baba: Don't put it in the comments if you want to talk about that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we're a weird species. And so, yeah, so, but the, the, the fae abduct people and take them somewhere else that you might not be able to get away from. The aliens, space aliens abduct people and take them to a place where you might not be able to get away from. Some stories of them probably involve eating people, but so there's these overlaps of these common, in fact, they must, right? There's so many alien stories. They must sometimes eat people. They got hungry too. They got hungry too. Yeah, far from everywhere to here. Every, yeah. So yeah. So getting eaten and scared of the dark and getting abducted. These are like these things that seem to be like very much in our common stories. And so when it comes to, so part of that's like, well, what can you see that's out there? You know? Or if you have to travel from one place to another, you know, you're traveling among things that aren't, lands that aren't populated, but it probably you have to travel overnight. You know, there is real fear out there of what's, you know, beyond the campfire, you know, beyond your source of light and beyond what you really know. So I think like that fear might just be there, but like, but what's with the sack? What's with the, a lot of times they are in the, in this old woman or old man kind of shape or like the long nails and sharp teeth. I mean, I guess that just kind of makes sense in general. Sometimes they are ghosts. So talk about ghost rules. So if you're taught, if you define the boogeyman as something that comes after kids or bad kids of various forms, and is also associated with parental warning structures, it's instructive that the word monster actually is derived from the word warning, like I said, like an omen. And so the idea being that like, if you wore on into one of these, you're out of step with the word, like you're doing something wrong for a monster to show up, you know. And so the idea that you've, parents using this as a warning to get their kids to comply. Well, in Egypt, I'm just going to do my best on the name. Abu Riggle Masluka, Masluka, something. It means the man with the burnt leg or the man with the skinned leg is a ghost that was bad as a kid, which is why they have a burnt leg or a skinned leg. Because they were punished for being bad and they come back to get bad kids. Or that man comes back to get bad kids. So there's that. So sometimes they are just people. There's a figure that is a little wobbly as to exactly, because there's some confusion with another one. Is it Potomuma? I have it written down. Ah, that's not right. Pugo Mamu, Pugo Mamu. It's a monster from the Philippines that goes after kids that are up after dark or out after dark. And it is headless. It is a headless creature, talking about headless things that wander around. And it's crossed over with a spirit called Pugo, P-U-G-O-T. And this is a headless priest, specifically a headless priest. So there's some crossover on whether the Pugo Mamu is self beheaded, it's referred to as the self beheaded, or whether that is actually referring to this headless priest. But something that might be self beheaded is wandering around without a head and it eats things through the hole in its neck. It eats the children whole. It eats them in their entirety. So that's kind of scary. on what the overlap is with this headless priest, and why the, or whether it's just a coincidental overlap, I mean, I think Pugo means headless. You know, so it's not that far of why this would happen. But yeah, so very strange, all these different shapes that he takes. I found a really cool, another headless one. So going with our little headless horseman world. There's a headless one called Bloody Bones. Now that name comes from England, once again. And all this talking about all the bogeyman's making me sweat. Bloody Bones is a headless skeleton, presumably a bloody skeleton, dances. And that is still apparently one of the bogeymen of the Southern United States. Listeners in the Southern United States, do you know tales of Bloody Bones? Did you hear about this as a kid? You talk this to your kids. Why, why do you do that? It doesn't keep them up. And also Tommy Rawhead, also known as just Rawhead, which has a skinned head. And sometimes they're thought of as being the same, one in the same, Bloody Bones.

WDG: Do they like hurt themselves as a kid? And now they've come back to get- Don't know. It doesn't, I think the Coco, the- Coco.

Baba: The bogeyman also- Also El Coco.

WDG: Yeah, sometimes has a skull head too, like a skeletal head, I think. Coconut is named after that. But it's also a shapeshifter, like it's like depending on the, similar to traditional bogeyman, the shapeshifter type deal. But yeah.

Baba: Yeah, so it's, so there's a wide spectrum of them.

WDG: I kind of feel like though the thread tying the bogeyman together is that he's no fun. It's, it's like, if you want to have fun, or you want to like be a kid who has fun or explore the unknown, it's a, it's like he's the rule, like the rule of like- He's the one that works for the system. Yeah, he's like, he's basically like, oh, like you can't do anything cool. Like he's, he's like not, he's like the opposite of like a chaos entity or even like a trickster. He's not really that a trick you, he's just there to prevent you from doing anything you might want to do that's considered bad by the authority. Like I want to stay up at night. No, you're going to get eaten. It's like, I want to get out of bed. And nope, something's going to drag you underneath of it. I want to check out something beyond this campfire. Ah, like you're dead. it's kind of like a, you know, like you don't know if there's someone in that police car on the side of the road that you just spend past. he going to pull you over or not? Did you really going too fast? it's just there to like enforce literal boundaries in certain respects. Like, you know, and, and

Danny C: So, Baba, in your research for all these different entities, okay. Do any of them specifically go after adults? Cause I noticed you mentioned specifically children in some instances, but are there any words like they go after adults?

Baba: Okay, so there's, so it's funny because adults, historically, I think you've got the incubus and the succubus, which aren't exactly boogie men, but because it's just about, I mean, it's for men having lost full thoughts, you know, otherwise, otherwise known as men. And then you've got women trying to be left alone and get a good night's sleep. I don't think they necessarily have to have lost full thoughts to get attacked by an incubus. That sounds about right. So the, but those aren't really boogie men. There is one really freaky one the bubak, B-U-B-A-K. And it, it's kind of weird, right? Okay, well, of course, all this is. It mimics the sound of a lost child or a baby. And then when it, its victim is near, it kills the victim. It kills the victim and it weaves their souls into its clothing. Now that, I was having problems getting corroboration on because it was like, is that a contemporary take? But I've heard it in a couple of places, it weaves their souls into its clothing and that gives it power or whatever. I mean, that jives with like weird, like magic traditions and things like that. But I just don't know if that's just like a late add-on or not.

Danny C: I remember hearing stories here in the States, very similar kind of mimicking entity where it, you know, you think you hear a baby crying out in the woods and these people would like, they would go and check it out or, you know, people would say, you know, if you hear this at night, don't go there. Like this area has been known for whatever. So it seems like it's more than just a Czech thing, but.

WDG: Yeah. It doesn't like, coyotes or? Foxes. Foxes.

Baba: I think foxes will mimic a wounded animal of some kind to draw in.

WDG: Yeah, like, yeah, it's like, yeah, they kind of.

Danny C: Well, it's a fox, is it carnivorous or is a fox, a scavenger?

Baba: Good, yeah, like, is it a predator?

Danny C: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I meant ... carnivorous.

Baba: I think it's probably an opportunist, but, so if you think about like things that might eat wounded animals, I mean, large animals, right? But also like birds. So like it might be trying to, cause birds aren't, sorry people, we try to keep this a nice discussion, but birds aren't necessarily gonna wait until the animal's dead. Sorry guys, sorry, that's kind of gruesome. That's life. Yeah, and yeah, at least it wasn't the pugo mamu, cause that will eat you alive whole, you know? You don't even need to be wounded and on the brink of consciousness. So yeah, so maybe birds, but yeah, good point. I don't know that they're really predators of that, cause they're kind of small. They're, I mean, they're what, like 16 inches, 18 inches, maybe.

Danny C: I'd be like that, yeah, like a little--

Baba: In height, you know.

WDG: Yeah, a small dog, like, yeah.

Baba: Yeah, and I don't think they really, when I see foxes, cause around here there are foxes, I see them by themselves. I don't see them hunting in groups, like wolves will hunt in groups, but yeah. So yeah, good question. That would, you know, I'm gonna tell you people, are fox experts out there? Or anyone that had a chance to research it, let us know. Are foxes predators? Or do they just think it's funny when something comes along and there's just nothing there?

Danny C: The one's like, dude, dude, dude, dude, impersonate the dying animal, go ahead, do it, do it. (Laughing)

Baba: This is our humor. So let me see, I do have some notes here, but they're drawn in a circle, cause that's just the way I think. You ever encountered the boogeyman? You guys ever have any like of the boogeyman? Like as a kid, do you ever have any of these bleary eyed moments where you're like, what's that, expletive was that? Whatever your choice expletive at that age would have I'll ask you two.

WDG: Yeah, no, not really. I mean, I have the memory of being like scared of like something under your bed or something under your closet kind of thing. But like, you know, but I don't know if that just came from like seeing like bad movies. (Laughing) You know, like I think of specifically like.

Baba: Well, you had access to some movies.

WDG: I was really thinking like, even though like you might feel like silly by today's day, but I think of something like, I think I saw like Poltergeist, the first one, and I was too young to see that. And like that kid getting dragged under your bed, you know, from the creepy clown thing. And then like something like, wasn't there a, I think it's like, like I remember like a rerun of, cause I don't even know when that was on, but like of like tales from the dark side. And there's like, it's like a creature that was under, like, you know, it was like, it's like in a house, there's a creature under the bed and like trying to eat people, you know? So like, I think obviously probably cause it's supposed to be like the boogeyman. Yeah, yeah. But I don't really remember like, you know, like that, like specifically knowing like, like I'm thinking of like as a little kid, like being like, don't get up, something's under your bed or something like that. You know, like I don't remember my parents telling me that kind of stuff. So I had to come from somewhere, either like things you talk to other kids about or weird stuff you shouldn't watch when you're like, movies and stuff, horror movies. You know, it's like, but yeah, but I don't like, yeah, but I don't think I've had like specifically boogeyman, like encounter type things, you know? It's like, I think of just being generally scared of stuff, trying to get you at night, you know, I think is just, you know, Darkhouse kid wandering around at night, just creepy, you know, just as when you're small. Yeah.

Danny C: Yeah, I'm kind of in a similar boat there. I don't remember ever like actively being scared of a thing, like parents saying like, well boogeyman, you gotta go to bed. Like I don't remember anything like that. And even as a, looking back as a kid, I don't remember having any kind of like preconceived idea of what the thing actually was. It was just more of like an inferior concept of the boogeyman, like this thing might come out of the closet or under the bed. I've always had this weird idea of like things grabbing my feet from under the bed, kind of like when you were just like, but that was about it. I think kind of like what you were saying, Bill, it was more of like friends talking about it or something like that, or older siblings, you know, trying to scare the younger ones or something like that. But yeah, nothing, nothing on me.

Baba: Yeah, that was like the same brother that convinced me, coerced me into summoning Bloody Mary, told me that, this is like the mashed up version. ET was in the closet and if I would close the closet door, he would give me candy. So this is kind of like the box, you know? Like you get there and nothing happens. The fox is just laughing at you from the top bunk. yeah, that didn't work out, but he probably wouldn't mean to close it because the boogeyman. So I don't know. So it comes together in that regard. But yeah, I used to be afraid of, I remember talking about the red eyes and the green eyes and these eyes that I was convinced or believed were there in the dark. And it's funny because like you'll hear about these people having an encounter with something and it'll be like, it had glowing eyes. And it's like, why would that be? Like what would cause light, what would cause eyes to emit light, you know? Now we've talked about like reflections in the eyes that reflect back what seems to make it look like glowing eyes, but like, but I think that's cause it's supernatural. It does weird things, but okay. So like what if aliens the boogeyman the fey are just like our evolving understanding. I shouldn't say evolving implies a direction. These are shifting explanations for unexplained things that are outside of, that don't follow the rules. Although, I mean, we were talking about this as a rule enforcing mechanism.

WDG: Yeah, it's, but I mean, rules in that it doesn't have specific like ghosts, like there's nothing you can kind of do to get rid of the boogeyman. Like you can't like wear a certain pendant or like run across the bridge or, you know, whatever it is. Like, it's like, it's more just like be obedient. And even that might not be good, depending on the circumstance.

Danny C: Hold on for a second though. What about like calling for your parents? Does that make the boogeyman go away? Like they walk in and it's like, no, there's nothing here, it's okay.

Baba: Some versions of the boogeyman, I don't think I noted which particular ones. You can scare away with noise. But not all of them, right? And so that's where the, so in the States, probably because like, What if

WDG: you don't call for your parents the boogeyman gets you before they get there.

Baba: They work for your parents. So you don't want to call, you have to tattletale on yourself then.

WDG: Yeah. What were you doing out of bed?

Danny C: I wasn't doing anything, I swear. It just came out of the closet.

Baba: (Laughing) Got me. Yeah. So yeah, now I always think when I think of the boogeyman, I often think of Ghostbusters, the cartoon, and the episode where they get hired to catch the boogeyman by some kid or two kids hire the Ghostbusters, which goes to tell you that anyone out there with a small business, you can probably relate. Sometimes you just have to take the job you're offered. Sometimes you have to give it discount.

WDG: Well, I feel like the Ghostbusters was notoriously behind on their rent all the time. I mean, like, it's like, if you did some business, it's kind of a hard one too.

Baba: Before Airbnb, they couldn't rent out that bottom floor for like, I mean, weren't they in New York? Yeah. That place had to be super, why did you get that? That had to be something.

WDG: Well, I guess it's New York in the 80s, maybe the property bias for next.

Baba: You know, actually, yeah, but sometimes when New York was higher crime, it was more affordable.

Danny C: And maybe they were thinking more of population density, you know, like a lot of people have ghosts in a very confined area, maybe it made the most sense.

Baba: Yeah, yeah, and maybe we just saw the highlights. We didn't see all the things that were like, yeah, we went there and there was nothing there. We told them there's something there anyway, so we could make our own.

WDG: It's like when you have like the ghost, the hunter shows, like they never want to do like a thing where it's like, we went to this place, it was haunted, and absolutely nothing happened.

Baba: Yeah, yeah.

WDG: And it just was really boring.

Baba: Yeah. We're going to have to call some people to make some noise.

WDG: Yeah, like it's like, oh no, I turned the camera into the, like the-- Did you hear that? Like, yeah, the night vision camera, it's like, oh God.

Baba: So in the "Ghostbusters" cartoon version, they're working for these two kids that the boogeyman keeps coming, and they, okay, the boogeyman keeps coming, and for some reason, Egon has a pompadour and white hair, probably for merchandising reasons in the cartoon version. He didn't have that in the movie. And the boogeyman's realm is like very MC Escher. It just goes between closets. So it's a more modern take on the boogeyman, when closets definitely existed. And the "Ghostbusters" pop out of somebody's closet, they're chasing the boogeyman, they pop out of another closet, and the boogeyman runs through first, and the kid's like, ah! And then the "Ghostbusters" come through, and the kid's like, yay, get up, "Ghostbusters." Well, at least they're probably already-- I guess it was a local closet, because I mean, how far did that advertising go? You can answer a call in Oregon. Plus, you'd be actually probably better, because you might be dealing with a different boogeyman. Boogeyman, there I go, boogeyman. Boogeyman. That proximity alert again. (Laughs) But yeah, so that's what I always think of when I think of the boogeyman. And Boogity Boogity Boo, Mr. Boogity, I think is a take on the boogeyman, who left green footprints all over the place when he walked on the ceiling and stuff. Yeah, so that's what I tend to think of. Now, a few years ago, just because it's still scary on some levels, there was a movie called "The Boogyman," which I believe was a spin on a story by Stephen King. I believe you're correct. And again, it comes back to this thing like kids believe in the boogeyman, parents don't believe in the boogeyman. So no one believes you. Okay, actually, this goes to the movie "Halloween," with Michael Myers. For those of you that haven't seen this 700 year old movie, (Both Laughing) almost as old as the term, the boogeyman, Halloween is about a psychopathic serial killer, a human psychopathic serial killer. And the kid that witnesses this guy at first has a bunch of kids coming after him at school because he's scared of the boogeyman and they're like,

Danny C: "The boogeyman's gonna get you, the boogeyman's gonna get you."

Baba: And they try and freak him out. So when he sees this real life psychopath carrying a body or something, he just figures it's the boogeyman. So he goes in and he tells people that the boogeyman is after him. And no one believes him, because the boogeyman's not real. So there's this credibility thing that seems to carry over to the 2023 movie as well. And yeah, and no one believes these kids that believe in the boogeyman and adults don't believe in the boogeyman. But then those adults go and tell their kids that the boogeyman's real, presumably to keep them from being awake, which sounds like really like, I don't know, like you've finished a fifth before you made that idea up. (Both Laughing) Like, why would this keep their kids, why would it get them to go to sleep? Like going to sleep is something you decide to do. Yeah, and also-- There wouldn't be insomniacs at all.

WDG: There is a weird thing of like, trying to make a place you're supposed to feel safe, like where you're sleeping, like a hostile environment, both psychologically and I guess sort of, and if you believe the boogeyman is real, something physically terrifying.

Baba: You know, that's-- When you're all sharing a bed, aren't you disincentivized to get those kids to stay in the bed? Cause like, if that time comes when they have to, you know, deal with their business, you want them, you're sharing a bed, why are you trying to scare them about the, anyway. Just a thought, I mean, I don't know. Anybody else feel the same?

WDG: Yeah, I don't know. I was thinking of like, just the, yeah, it's just, it is a weird, but it makes sense with the curfew one, like the things like that, because it's like, oh, only bad kids stay out after, you know, what did it like, you were saying seven o'clock or something, makes sense. You know, it's like, if you're out at seven o'clock, you're probably up to no good, like, I was in trouble.

Baba: Got you by the seven o'clock.

WDG: You're gonna take it out, yeah, like, you know, or like, go and wandering in the woods at night. Yeah, probably not a great idea, you know, like you might get eaten by a bugbear or bogart or whatever is out there, you know, it's like, that kind of makes sense, because that is pretty, you know, especially pre, you know, like, systems of having like easily portable lighting, you know, it's, you know, again, it's dark, scary. I mean, like, it's anyone who's ever been camping, and it gets really dark, you know, and you go wandering, it's really hard to see what's in front of you, even with a headlamp or flashlight. So it's like, so it makes, that kind of makes sense in a sense of like instilling some type of dread in the, maybe not supernatural dread, but it's, you know, it kind of, yeah.

Baba: Maybe it just got out of hand, but, you know, I think the most likely explanation is the one that Bill, you actually offered. The boogeyman works for the system. Yeah, you go, the weirder it gets. And at some level, deep down is the boogeyman. Now, so the boogeyman enforces rules. How would you weaponize it? If you could, and I'm gonna suggest that it's been weaponized. It's actually, it's helping the sleep aid You could get between closets now that people tend to have them. like we did in "Ghostbusters." You could definitely spy. You could abduct people. Okay, this is deep state stuff, you know, this is the kind of, they're usually accused of cannibalism on some level too. weaponize it. And I think it's ripe for abuse.

WDG: Well, I think you already got the whole system of like, there's cameras everywhere. You never know who's watching you

Baba: before the technology caught up with it, they might've relied on an older technology. The technology that definitely creates the 15th century. I think it's all coming together here.

Danny C: So I'm gonna say now that we know that the governments around the world are utilizing the boogeyman for surveillance and enforcement, I'm going to encourage all of our watchers and listeners get in touch with your local governments. We need to cut funding for the use of the boogeyman. That needs to stop.

Baba: Or wait, wait, wait, no, hold on. Because we might be able to work something out. Terms and conditions, okay. And you know you can trust the government when they agree.

Danny C: I'll tell you as much as you can trust the boogeyman.

Baba: So think about what this could do for your morning commute. Maybe it's good if this doesn't get widespread. What could this do for your morning commute? Because you wouldn't need cars or car insurance anymore. You, Are you talking about jumping from closets to closets?

WDG: I don't know though, but the thing is, you have to deal with the boogeyman if you jump through your closet. So your morning commute might end up with you being, I don't know, eaten. The whole other kind of insurance it sounds like. Yeah, it's like if you have to jump from a closet.

Baba: At least you wouldn't have to go through an office day.

WDG: And what if it only works at nighttime though? That means like you gotta give up like super like early, but it's still dark.

Baba: Well, how do you think, why do you think CEOs get up at four in the morning?

WDG: Well, that's just because they just like to brag about.

Baba: Yeah, they don't, they don't. They're still up, is it?

WDG: Well, they're the system. Yeah, they want to enforce rules. They like the things the way they are. They don't want anyone to step out of line. They want everything to be under control. You better do what they say. And they are always like probably in some kind of shady place, like a dark room or a dark closet or hiding under your bed.

Baba: And you know what? I thought we might solve this one because it's in old country.

WDG: Bob's just grabbed my sleep, that would be pretty creepy. I think that's well.

Baba: Like which CEO would you be most scared of actually being the boogeyman?

WDG: I don't know.

Baba: Actually that makes me nauseous to actually think about that. I think I would rather just get rid of all my closets.

WDG: Yeah.

Baba: All of them.

WDG: That's why they have such huge walking closets and spend so much money. There's this giant, like they always like, "Oh, here's my giant walking closet." That's because they're all boogeymen.

Baba: I felt better about this before that maybe it... Boogeyman, please don't be the deep state. Maybe this is just disinformation. Maybe they couldn't beat them. Like I said, can't beat them, join them. I want a side gig with the boogeyman.

Danny C: Okay, so let's hang with that. Okay, so give me the opportunity to work alongside the boogeyman, work out some kind of an arrangement. Would you do it? Baba, you brought it up, go.

Baba: Yeah, but like, I don't really like kids. Like, so maybe like, maybe if you just scared them, like maybe if it's like the low level or if like he doesn't really do that. You know, maybe actually it's like petty theft. That's kind of more my level. Still feeling to promote control. Get something out of their fridge. look guys, I do run a business. White rabbit hypnosis. So maybe I don't have to do this. Maybe you can help go book a session. But, and if you're scared of the boogeyman, definitely go book a session. But, because we can work it all out, we can all come together. I would, I want a side gig. Even if it's just making sure people, how about this? I want a side gig making sure non-bogeymen don't come through closet. Cause I probably could scare them. They wouldn't expect anybody to be there. It's really not the boogeyman.

WDG: I want, I want to hire me. Like don't hide in like smaller things that slightly resemble closets, but aren't like, they never, the people aren't usually worried about the boogeyman in like the bathroom or I don't know.

Baba: That's a shadow people. Cause you already made it there.

WDG: Or a pantry.

Baba: You threw the liminal space of the dark.

WDG: You got out of the boogeyman, I threw the pantry stealing my Fritos.

Baba: All right, so there's a boogeyman, real quick. I don't know how to find on this one. Luomo Nero, sorry, Italian folks, who parents will knock on the table and say it's Luomo Nero. He's coming to get the people that won't eat their soup.

WDG: Is that Baba? Baba, he's also.

Baba: I don't know. It might be another variation on the same. Yeah, but it's if you don't eat your soup or probably other veggies and things like that, but probably largely soup. Cause again, think about the time and what are people eating for the most part? Soup, but everything in soup. So if they don't eat their soup, this guy can come and get them. It's always about rules. And he doesn't eat you, he just abducts you.

WDG: Well, that's a lot safer.

Baba: Yeah, you're not worth eating cause you don't eat your soup.

WDG: I guess you're kind of thin and scrawny, they don't wanna. You think that may be one that would eat, that maybe they only eat the kids that eat all their soup. That's

Baba: the other one, there's no head. Yeah. You guys want a side gig?

WDG: No, I definitely don't. I don't like nighttime. I'm not a big nighttime person. So yeah, I don't wanna. Nothing is actually scared of the dark, but I'm just like more of a daytime person. I think, I like sunshine. And it's like having worked some nighttime jobs, I don't like, it's very bad for your health. The boogeyman probably will mess up your circadian room. It's pretty bad.

Baba: Hopefully your boogeyman is the seven o'clock man anyway, cause as long as you're asleep, he can't get you. Yeah.

Danny C: Dan, you want a side gig? Yeah, maybe, I think that could be some fun. I would wanna take more of the role of the trickster. So maybe move their keys from where they have the keys into the refrigerator, put it in the freezer. take their banana guacamole maybe. Like do crazy things like that and just watch as well.

Baba: Steal the long fabled banana guacamole. I would like to take their keys, I would only do this to luxury car people actually. Sorry guys. I would take their keys through to another closet and switch them with someone else's keys somewhere else.

Danny C: I was just thinking that as you started to say that.

Baba: And maybe even like the same make. So they're like out there like trying to get things to, or like they're trying to open their door, cause now it's doors just unlocked when you walk near them, right? With those.

WDG: If you think about having a side gig with the boogeyman, you gotta do all the, it's kind of like having a coworker who's just like the worst, you know, right? Because like even if you want to be trickster like less malevolent, you still got this person who's eating people. Yeah, that's like that. It's like on a regular basis. And like it's just constantly is all about the rules and also about eating people or kidnapping. But it gets like, this is like probably not the best thing, you know? So not the best person you want to be working with on a regular basis, like if at all, like, you know.

Baba: It sounds like we landed on a solid, it depends. Yeah.

WDG: So even though you're like, yeah, I could go just be, have like play pranks on people I don't like or just be a little mischievous. The guy you're working with, who may or may not be your boss is definitely doing terrible things.

Danny C: There's so many things we could say related to that. So many, so many things.

WDG: Again, let's see if we can. (Laughing) It's back to that again. Yeah, hold on. Your coworker or boss is murdering people and or just enforcing rules that are seemingly arbitrary.

Baba: I'd like to make a deal with the boogeyman. I want the boogeyman to work with me for a different system, system of witches.

WDG: He doesn't like that though. He just does what he wants. I think it's because he does.

Baba: I think the boogeyman has a bigger imagination than people realize because, you know.

Danny C: He's probably tired of doing the same thing all these years. He's probably looking to change careers.

Baba: I think lot of this is disinformation. I think the boogeyman is not as bad as we think.

WDG: There's a lot of better people to work for. Seems like he is bad.

Baba: There are fewer and fewer better people to work for.

WDG: At least if we're going for like other spirits, there might be some more fun things to work for.

Baba: Yeah, no, you're probably right. You're probably, you're definitely right.

WDG: I don't know, I mean like.

Baba: You gotta get the job you can, see previous note. So, all right, is he scary? Are you scared of the boogeyman? I'll vote first since I'm the one that can't shut up. It depends, it depends. I'm gonna give the boogeyman, I'm gonna give the boogeyman three monsters, three complete monsters, because the one without a head is kind of scary. I think it's scary at the right time in the right context. Not the boogeyman per se, but the unknown thing in the dark that could kind of be anything.

WDG: But that's the boogeyman though, isn't that like, that is what it is.

Baba: Yeah, and that's why it's a solid three, because the boogeyman, see the boogeyman in the States doesn't have that shape. It doesn't have the shape of like specific things, but in certain places, there are like specific forms of the boogeyman. And I think it's because like, the United States is one big smear of everything. Like, we just have all kinds of different regional versions, but the boogeyman in the big version is just like, well, whatever. So I think that well, whatever is scarier than some of the various forms. And there were some that we just really didn't get into, because there are so many forms. So yeah, I'd say, yeah, actually that's kind of scary. I'll give it three out of five monsters. It's like not scary, like we had this conversation and tonight I won't prepare to be particularly scared of the boogeyman in the same way that like, I don't know, researching and talking about Bloody Mary forever kind of like digging me a little pause in my bleary eyed half of sleepness, you know?

WDG: Can I throw out a little caveat? Yeah. If you're the way you sleep in your bed, if it faces a closet, will you, are you fine sleeping with that closet completely open like? No.

Baba: No, yeah, you know what, that actually, is the question that unveils it, isn't it? Yeah, that's right. I'm gonna say three, I'm still sticking with three, but actually it's no longer hypothetical, because yeah, no, I don't like that. I also don't like, like this room's all blacked out a lot of the time, and it, yeah, tonight if you look into this room, I don't wanna look into this room. So yeah, boogeyman in the form of just the darkness that could have something in it, yeah, that's kinda scary. If I talk too long on him, I've changed my mind.

Danny C: You know, of all the other things that we encountered, so to speak, this one isn't very, very high for me. And I don't know if it's because of, I have a hard time thinking about what it could be, as opposed to like Bloody Mary in the mirror. And we've talked about my feelings on like mirrors and seeing things and like, or even the old hag, the concept of that, waking up and seeing this face, on top of you kind of. for me, the boogeyman is just kind of like more of like this ethereal like thing that doesn't really have a real description. So for me, it's a hard, I have a hard time just kind of like being scared of it, I guess. So I'm gonna rate this one kind of low. I'm gonna think, maybe like two monsters and maybe like that one without the head, with just the gaping hole.

Baba: All right.

Danny C: But going back to the closets, for instance, I don't like having the closets open either at night. And in fact, if they are open in just a little bit, I will go and I will close the closet. (Laughs)

WDG: It's like, that's the real kicker. Oh, but you didn't say, do you wanna encounter a boogeyman? You didn't answer that.

Baba: Yeah, oh yeah. It depends if the pay is right. Yeah, if it's, as far as the thing I'm scared of, the ambiguous thing and probably not. Probably because of the fact that it doesn't really have, I don't know the rule book. Yeah.

Danny C: I think I'd be okay with it. I think I'd be willing to, I think we could strike a deal of some kind, you know? Cause like that primarily after kids. So I think, you know, that puts me at an advantage where it doesn't seem like it's gonna come at me.

Baba: That's right.

Danny C: I think we might be able to work something out. I have some great business opportunities that I think we could leverage together. And I think we could work out something in both our best interests. I think we can make it happen.

WDG: don't wanna encounter the boogeyman. I don't think, like in just any, I mean, the idea is like shadow getting you, you know? I don't really wanna, there's something dragging you into something, you know, disappeared dimension or something like that. I don't think that's something I'd particularly feel like it. But yeah, so let's see, scary. It's weird, like I'm kind of listening. I might go for like just the, they all go for four monster heads on this one. I was gonna be around Mark Crispus at three. Just the heads? Just four full monsters. Oh, okay. Yeah, four monsters on this one. I think, like, it would be about three where you were at. But I kind of feel like just the fact of like, yeah, like, I don't particularly like the dark. I mean, I can deal. I don't know, it's fine. But I'm just like, I don't really like it, never have. I definitely almost always end up inevitably sleeping on the side of the bed, the face is the closet. I've moved a lot. And it depends the type of closet, but usually like if it's like the sliding door, shallow, I'm not too worried, but like, but yeah, but if it's open to like the empty void and it's nighttime, maybe I just have an overactive imagination. Maybe there's just something there. I don't know, but I, yeah, I don't like it either. And like, it's, and the fact is to me, like, that's like the boogeyman, right? It's like this fear, like, it's just like something you're afraid of when you're not quite awake, you're not quite asleep, you're not, you know, it's something, so it's like, so I think, and that's, even though it doesn't have a shape, it doesn't have a form, it's kind of like, that's actually, I feel like more scary, you know, because it's just, it could be, it's just like, it is kind of primal fear, you know, and like, so yeah, so I think fear is frightening. So I'm going to give it a four. I think that's where I'll land on that.

Danny C: I wanna see that dancing one. What was it called? Like, that is a dancing skeleton, right?

Baba: Yeah, that, uh, uh, um, bloody bones, bloody bones. Yeah, yeah, there's a, oh man, there's one of the English ones has iron teeth. What's his name? Tommy something. Tom Dokken has iron teeth to eat children.

Danny C: I feel like we need to create like a set of like, tarot cards that has like all the various boogeymen on it. I feel like that dancing skeleton one, that's like spot on for, that's tarot card written all over it.

Baba: Keep your eyes out for the, um, the "Wondering Monsters, Beastiary Deck and Companion Book"