Lost media

I describe myself as someone who suffers from Automatonophobia "Automatonophobia can be loosely defined as the fear of wax figures, humanoid robots, audio-animatronics, or other figures designed to represent humans." - Lisa Fritscher freelance writer. Mine focuses more on anamatronics.

When I try to think back and work out what things could've potentially triggered my phobia or made it worse one of my oldest memories is the UK TV series Prank Patrol which aired on the children's channel CBBC around the early 2000s starring Barney Howard in which him and the purple 'ninjas' would go around and cause mischeif by (clues in the name) pranks. There was an Australian version too if I'm aware but I was only subjected to the UK version.

I grew up in England with the only children's channels on my TV being CBBC and CITV and I used to love Prank Patrol. However the show was notorious for sometimes taking pranks a bit too far. I even remember an episode where they pranked a kid with an old woman actor who gave them 'rock cakes' which where designed to be too hard to actually eat, bless the poor kid who bit into them because she actually bit so hard it broke her tooth the actor broke character and they had to end the prank.

Alot of episodes are easily free to watch on YouTube although this episode seems to be lost. But this post isn't about that episode but another lost episode where a brother tries to convince his sibling he had been cloned...

(bare in mind I'm yet to have a deep dive and search hard for these episodes)

One day I eagerly got home from primary school excited to watch an episode of Prank Patrol, the catchy opening theme played which I thought was the coolest ever at the time. A boy talked to Barney and said that he wanted to convince his younger sister he had been cloned. They got in a very good yet intimaditing actor who played a scientist. I don't recall how they ended up there but one thing led to another the brother and sister ended up in this fake lab, the sister of course unknowing that it was fake and the scientist was an actor only the brother knew this.

I remember the scientist saying to them to be careful as he leaves the room for a while. He left them alone and I vaguely remember one of them knocking over a test tube with some substance in it and spilling it into some other liquid. The scientist came back in angry shouting at the kids for doing this which already started to make me tense as I wouldn't have liked to be in that situation myself as the actor seemed so realistically angry and the kids looked ridden with guilt (even the brother seemed guilty although being in on it due to this guys acting)

The rest is a bit blurry for me but the most significant scene feels as clear as day in my head.

The younger sibling gets left alone in the lab and the doors open. Smoke comes through the doors and through the smoke slowly wheels out an uncanny valley, anamatronic monstrosity. A anamatronic copy of her brother from the shoulders up in a glass tank on wheels.

They used silicone to make a cast of his face to place on this animatronic and it moved so glitchily and creepily the jaw wagging back and forth like some sort of zombie, the head moving unnaturally. The show didn't have a huge budget which only made things worse, if they had more money and also more modern technology maybe they could've made a nicer, smoother and more real animatronic but without this it looked like they stretched someone's skin over a robotic skeleton, dead under the eyes.

The sibling stood still, frozen in fear. The show was all about getting reactions, screams and then revealing its all a prank. "There's a camera there, there and there!" And they would all laugh. But no. I could see this kid was traumatised by what they where looking at, I was equally so, watching this unfold on my television.

They finally all came out and said the classic "it was just a prank!" no laughter resonated from the younger sibling, they where in shock. It made me shudder and who knows what came of the sibling. Maybe it's just me being quite sensitive and already having a fear of animatronics but I hope they turned out alright and weren't traumatised by it.

I'm very interested in finding this and to know if others out there remember this episode and can find it as it has to be floating on the internet somewhere.

If you enjoyed reading this I plan to write next about the 'Uncanny Valley' and if you're interested in phobias I also have an account within 'Phobia Amino' and I post similar content under the username Automaton.

Thanks for reading.

"Here they come they're on a roll, where they'll strike nobody knows. If you have a point to prove they'll make a plan and see it through. They'll sign you up to join their crew. Barney and the Ninjas too. Here they go come on join the Prank Patrol"