Some ??? Monsters, such as Moo, have unsettling or non-standard designs, as do exclusive enemies, like Magma Heart, which is a dragon that looks like it's made of lava.
Wracky is a shout-out to the Child's Play series and is a living doll that wields sharp objects from Hammerspace. When you first get a Wracky in the mail, Colt thinks it's creepy and tries to throw it away, only for the doll to reappear the next week—and to unlock the breed as a species, you have to let a monster die. Their card data additionally says Wrackies are born from the grudges of dead monsters.
After you obtain the Joker Mask in 2, Master Pabs tries to wear it and gets it stuck on his face, unable to take it off, and it's implied if he kept in on he'd be possessed by the Joker inside the mask. They're only able to free him with a Gali Mask.
Jokers in general are terrifying, bloodthirsty, vicious monsters, especially in 2 where they're a Monster Clown. Occasionally, idle animations have them take off the mask, and the face underneath, which is different for every Joker subspecies, is horrifying.
One of the themes of Monster Rancher 4 is trainers using horrible methods to increase their monsters' strength. One such method is modifying monsters with rusty, ancient materials. One of your rivals eventually does this to his Golem to try and catch up with your hero. At first, he claims that Dodongo was perfectly okay with this; Rio calls him out, spelling out how Dodongo only went along with the painful procedure to make him happy. She strips away all of Gramm's illusions and makes him break down with horror upon realizing what he's done to his best friend.
Another one of your rivals runs his ranch by forcing monsters to run on training gadgets all the time, in tiny little pens. When he shows off his ranch, he brags about its efficiency, and how his ranch is on the cutting edge.
Rio has Blip Vert visions of an army of crucified Monsters in 4, which come out of nowhere and linger just long enough for the details and screaming faces to register.
Some attacks can function as a Jump Scare, like Suezo's Chewing, where it suddenly grows to an enormous size and chews on an opponent.
If your monster is severely outmatched by an opponent it can get injured, sick, or even die after a fight, making fighting any opponent with high stats extremely nerve-wracking if you have low life or defense.
The Non-Standard Game Over sequence from 2 which happens when you run out of money. It opens with an overview of the farm with no music. Colt then tells you in an empty shed that you're broke and the game is over. The monster is seen one last time, followed by a fade to black and the words "GAME OVER" appearing in the bottom right. The Mood Whiplash of a game ending like this is sudden and jarring.
In Episode 2, Holly berates Genki for thinking the problems Moo caused are like a video game. She reminds him that in this world, Moo is not a game and the destruction he caused was very real. Given what we learn of Holly's past in episode 8, where Moo's forces slaughtered her village, this sequence can be hard to watch.
Golem's Berserk Button being pushed in Episode 3; he slaughters all the Jells in a blind rage, even one that begged for mercy.
The death of Allan's Worm in episode 4. It has the life drained out of it, slowly, as Allan helplessly watches, and the monsters that killed it laugh at his reaction.
Tiger's introduction, where he mugs the heroes for their items and is in a position to easily kill Genki. He's described as The Dreaded for good reason, and his defeat of Captain Dino in the same episode implies that he slit the latter's throat or chest open. Including choking noises as he dies.
Genki's nightmare in episode 8, involving him believing the entire series was All Just a Dream and being trapped under the sidewalk with faceless, shadowy people surrounding him.
Holly's memory of Moo's attack on her village in episode 8. She steps out of the cellar and everything is gone; all that's left are remains of houses and Lost Disks. Suezo and she managed to find her grandfather, but he's mortally wounded and stays alive long enough to give Holly the Magic Stone and the task with finding the Phoenix.
Monol's story about the Monster Rancher world and how the ancient people of Pangea, after a series of natural disasters, turned savage and waged a Forever War. Eventually they created Moo in an attempt to end the war, who ended up nearly destroying the entire planet until they created the Phoenix to stop him—-and what it took to defeat Moo involved destroying virtually everything, including the Monsters themselves. Genki comments that things about that story remind him of his world, and the last shot of the flashback is of a completely red, decimated planet.
Pixie uses Never Say "Die" to creepy effect in her introductory episode.
Pixie:Disappear. [turns Captain Clay into a Lost Disc]
Ditto with Captain Scale Jell:
You're going to have to destroy that boy with your own two hands!
Joker ensnares the heroes in illusions so he call kill them easily. Tiger sees Moo, Golem thinks he's drowning, Suezo is distracted by female monsters, and Genki and Mocchi are chained up... and Holly has daggers falling from the sky at her.
Grey Wolf's introduction sees his Cabalos pack attack a village and burn it to the ground. In the aftermath we see a Scaled Hare, clearly hurt, making his way through the destruction and one of the villagers trying to fend off two of the cabalos with a hoe, the camera panning up as they rush him.
In the original Japanese, the Scaled Hare has a sibling they're trying to save, only for the pair to be caught and surrounded by the invaders.
Undine accidentally sets herself on fire when her tentacles make contact with oil and embers, then flings it to the ground surrounding her and nearly burns to death. When Golem tries to save her, she refuses and jumps into the fire herself.
Gray Wolf's fight with Tiger turns very vicious towards the end, so much so that after the episode's initial run in English, some of the fight was cut from subsequent airings.
Naga's introduction has him throw one of Gray Wolf's former followers out a window when he comes to tell them of Grey Wolf's defeat and tries to join his troops.
Moo regains his body and instantly seeks out the Searchers to personally deal with them. They throw everything at him, including a Combined Energy Attack and he catches it, one handed, in his claw then crushes it like a grape. The group are only saved when the stray energy from the attack hits a mountain side and lets in rays from the sunrise to which Moo starts reeling in pain, find that the fusion is incomplete and retreat for the time being.
The Baku episode starts off light-hearted, but once Chariot and the Zuum enter the forest, Baku's decimation of the troops is right out of a horror movie as he attacks from the shadows and instantly reduces a lot of them to Lost Disks. Genki and Baku's fight against Chariot is also a lot rougher than the battles seen prior. There's no blood, obviously, but you can tell both of them are doing everything they can to bring down the troop leader that it almost verges on desperation.
Baku's flashback likewise is both horrifying and heartbreaking as Chariot razed his original hometown to the ground. We see when he was smaller that he tried to defend his human family against him (the boy looks similar to Genki) to no avail and we see Chariot's shadow creeping over the family as he approaches. We're spared the details, but it's pretty obvious he murdered them.
The gang finding remains of the Astros' spaceship turned prison camp, including shattered lost discs, scrap metal that looks suspiciously like Astros, and broken prison chains.
The truth of the Pendant civilization, with the revelation that Monsters were created in test tubes. This also ends up disturbing the characters, as Mocchi asks Genki if he was born there, and Genki can't answer him. Colt's toucan, Joy, underscores this:
Joy: Born in test tube! Born in test tube! Squawk!
Moo does a lot of nasty things, and what makes it worse is that he can't be stopped until the finale.
His shocking of Pixie in episode 47. In the uncut version he visibly chops her wings off, and shocks Genki as well.
Moo torments Holly over the destruction of her village and corruption of her father in episode 47. He comments that she must be filled with more hatred than anyone, and it seems he's right.
In a case of Bowdlerization making things more intense, Moo's beam attacks against the Dragon army. They're clearly hit, and in the uncut version they spiral to the ground like airplanes. By removing that, the dub implies they were vaporized on contact.
Moo going insane with hatred in episode 47. His rational side shatters, and he focuses only on causing as much death and destruction as possible.
Even worse, this is visualized by a scene of Moo's human form being strangled as his body is tied up by strands of darkness.
Moo pulls a very unsettling face as the Phoenix burns him alive in the uncut Episode 48. The animation for it is even worse, with his eye bulging and dilating.
Mum Mew's eye lasers are powerful and out-of-place for such a cute monster to have.
In episode 73, after an entire season of lightheartedness, Moo (as a Ruby Knight) nearly kills Holly's father and absorbs Durahan and his gang to create its body. Then, Genki and the others journey into the heart of Moo's soul to finish him off. Not only do they see Durahan and his gang screaming in terror as the soul starts to consume them, Moo tries to possess the Phoenix as it nears defeat.
Mum Mew: [struggling with the evil soul] I don't wanna change! I like myself just the way I am now!
