Chucky’s Inspiration? Don’t Upset Robert The Doll
When you hear the term “scary doll,” what exactly do you think of? A large part of you likely imagines the famous dolls from horror movies, for example, Chucky, Annabelle, or Billy from the “Saw” movies. Others will remember real-life dolls that made headlines for their menacing appearance, with the prime example from recent years being the Huggy Wuggy. Fans of mythology and ghost theories will remember the stories about haunted dolls, apparently or not.
We must ask where exactly we can place Robert The doll. On the one hand, it is a scary-looking doll connected to paranormal activity and quite gruesome stories. On the other hand, we’ve yet to see her adequately represented in the horror repertoire aside from a few super negligible films – although, according to some reports, it was one of the obvious inspirations for the character of one named Chucky. So who is this Robert, what makes him scary, and where exactly can he be seen?
Robert The Doll: Creation
To understand Robert’s roots and the terrifying mythology surrounding him, we need to go back to the beginning of the 20th century: 1904, to be exact. Our location is Key West, Island, and also the capital city of a county called Monroe in Florida, United States. The main protagonist is Robert Eugene Otto, known by his nickname “Gene,” who was then a boy of about four years old, a member of a pretty respectable family. In honor of his birthday, Robert/Jean received a special gift from his grandfather: a doll of a sailor that he bought for him from the German company Steiff during a trip he made in the country. It was a rather impressive-sized doll of about one meter, with a relatively minimal-looking painted face, beady black eyes, straw-colored hair, and a slightly unsettling smile. The sailor suit was probably a garment used by Jean in earlier years, which the grandfather decided to add to the doll to give it character, or, if you will – social status.
Young Jin loved the doll very much. He spent hours with real Robert The Doll, slept beside it, and played imagination games like many children. The years passed, and Jean grew up. Later, he became a painter, writer, and a rather complex personality, but he still adopted the doll into his lap. At one point, he gave her his first name, Robert. But once Eugene moved to Chicago and New York to study art, Robert the doll stayed at the family home in Key West. In 1930, the grown-up Jean married in Paris the choice of his heart, Annette Parker.
After that, the two returned to the United States for a new home. Gene took some things with him, including the Robert doll, which he decided to place in the attic. According to one story, Gene’s wife eventually became afraid of the doll and her husband’s renewed obsession with it, including buying toys. She demanded that he lock the attic door after every visit. The couple spent several decades in the new house until Gene died in 1974 and his wife’s death two years later, with most of this time Robert being in his room in the attic. The house was sold to a woman named Myrtle Reuter and then to its current owner. In 1994 the doll was donated to a museum in Key West, and since then, a hysterical horror environment has developed.
The Mystery Behind Robert The Doll
You may have read the previous paragraphs and understood what the hell in this story links Robert the doll to our site: The doll may have a scary look, especially with the sailor outfit, but of course, that’s not enough. The simple and unsurprising answer is that this doll began to be connected with dangerous and unnatural acts over the years, usually reserved for horror movies about scary dolls.
It starts with the doll’s origin or its various versions. Remember the exciting story from above about the grandfather who decided to pamper his child? According to another version, the story is more complicated than that. Jean’s father was not characterized by too successful human relations, and the servants in the family home were the primary victims. According to the stories, one of the maids was very interested in the subjects of black magic, religion, and voodoo. She gave the boy the doll, about one meter tall, which was filled with straw and made herself.
Regardless of the question of where precisely the doll came from, seemingly strange things started happening around her. The family members and servants would hear the boy Jean talking to the doll. It might seem natural and logical to children, but something about the distorted, unfamiliar voice Jin used to represent his conversational companion was terrifying. Acquaintances of the family described an “unhealthy relationship” between Eugene and the doll, with the boy – and later his adult versions – taking her everywhere and talking to the doll, just like to a human being.
From that moment, events began that you have probably already seen, in different variations, in too many horror movies. At night, shouts were often heard from the bedroom. When the parents and family entered the room in a panic one night, thinking there might be an intruder or a mysterious alien, they saw Gene sitting in bed next to him, the doll Robert, and around objects turned upside down in chaos. In the following months, toys were vandalized or disappeared; some had their heads cut off, or their eyes gouged out. Voodoo dolls moved from place to place without explanation, or the doll ended up in strange places not intended for dolls.
To this day, it is claimed that the doll performed acts of this kind in some supernatural way. The parents and servants claimed they heard the doll giggling. Passers-by, standing outside the family home, were willing to swear they saw the doll moving around the room, or sitting on the windowsill looking back at them, waiting for her best friend to return from school. Damn, even a plumber who came to the house claimed to hear the sounds of giggling children when the house was supposed to be empty. He arrived in Gene’s room to find only the doll sitting on the windowsill. He left the room, heard sounds of flying objects, returned to it, and discovered several upside-down items on the floor.
Similar stories appeared very quickly in the new address of the mature couple, about a doll that watches from the window at passers-by, objects that change position for no reason, or strange sounds of footsteps and laughter. After the deaths of the Jean and Ant couple, the new owners of the property also claimed to have heard mysterious footsteps or giggling from the attic, or even that the doll moved its face angrily when unpleasant things were said about the previous owners.
At one point, the daughter of the family who moved into the house found the doll in the attic. She took it into her room but immediately claimed that the doll moved independently or tried to attack and kill it. The family home currently operates as a guest house, attracting curious people who want to see the rooms where the story happened if you believe in stories of this kind. You can find the Robert doll in a completely different place; in this case, it is also linked to a lot of trouble.
Here are the main points of the story in an animated version, that makes the video a must-have item for children as well:
Where Is Robert The Doll Today?
If you read our article about Annabelle doll, you probably know she is behind glass in the Ed and Lauren Warren private museum in Connecticut, USA. You will find the Robert doll in the museum and the historical building East Martello Museum in Key West, also behind glass, and to this day, horror stories are associated with it. Ther are also scary ghost tours in this area, where Robert is a familier theme.
Some say this doll caused many disasters, you can see as The Curse of Robert The Doll. Terrible things may happen, from divorce and job loss to injuries and accidents, for those who came to Robert the Doll Museum and “disrespected it.” You must obey Robert The Doll’s rules: The doll must permit you to take a photo. The fear that terrible outcomes may occur to those who dare to take pictures of the doll without permission means that Robert The Doll Kay West Museum gets hundreds of letters of apology every year. The letters are sent from tourists who decided to take photos of Robert, perhaps hoping that the note will provide them with forgiveness or at least a few likes on social networks. Others send letters of admiration or even request to spell Robert The Doll Curse on other people.
The employees and visitors to the museum tell about strange incidents related to the doll. According to them, once, when a camera crew decided to film her without permission, the camera stopped working for no apparent reason, and the materials were deleted. In some of the videos that did survive, you see (again, apparently) Robert the Doll moving its legs or blinking. Also, from the passers-by, there were stories about a doll that changes its place for no reason even when it is supposed to be locked up, children’s giggles at night when the museum is empty, and objects that fall and break for no reason. The museum curator states that she never noticed the movement of Robert the doll or, in any unusual case, by the way.
When Will We Get A Normal Robert The Doll Movie?
Whether you believe the stories about The Curse of Robert The Doll or not, you must agree that there is potential for a horror movie dream here. Unfortunately, we have not found a self-respecting film about this strange story. In 2015, the movie “Robert” was released, based on this story in a very loose way, including a not quite matching representation of Robert’s doll as it was in reality. Then came no less than four sequels: “The Curse of Robert the Doll” (2016), “The Toymaker” (2017), “The Legend of Robert the Doll” (2018), and “Robert Reborn” (2019).
There’s an apparent reason if you have yet to hear of these movies. These are very insignificant films, with a score ranging from 2.7 to 3.3 on IMDB (out of 10, yes?), each rated by a minimal number of only a few thousand viewers. Of course, in the age of the Internet and streaming, almost everything is available at the click of a button or for a few dollars, so you are invited to see and tell us how it was. You can also find some Robert The Doll Documentary TV series, such the episode “The Curse of Robert The Doll” from the third season of “Shock Docs.”
Another magical option is to visit Robert The Doll Museum in Kay West, which will happily welcome visitors of any kind – as long as they don’t photograph Robert without permission.
