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The films
- The sequence in the first film with Charles and George dressed as gorillas can be quite unsettling in a bizarre, surreal way. The way they stalk each other around the vault seeming to be unaware that the other is there. And then the following car chase where instead of showing the chase itself, you see an old pedestrian crossing the road while the cars speed by one by one, without any music, only the sound of screeching tires. The audience could feel the same way the old man does, confused and bemused.
- The whole of A Shot in the Dark, especially if you hate murder mysteries. The animated credits - and the jazzy theme - come right after the first of eight murders. It's the darkest of all films (especially because all the other films are about theft/fraud/kidnapping rather than murder). While the characters' deaths in other films are basically Played for Laughs (remember the carnival scene in Strikes Again?), the deaths in this film are actually realistic murders.
- The Pink Panther Strikes Again has earned its own page.
- Some of Clouseau's disguises look like this, though it's more for comic relief.
The cartoons
- Many of the cartoons have a psychedelic, surreal feel to them.
- Sherlock Pink
: It starts out with the Pink Panther setting up a sleeping bag and supplies in a field. While asleep, he sleepwalks and ends up sleep-eating his breakfast! The next morning, he wakes up and finds his breakfast gone. Not remembering what he did in his sleep, he thinks a thief stole it in the night. Seeing a suspicious little big-nose (dressed like a burglar) drive by in a car, he follows the car and sees the big-nose enter an old house. The madness begins when Pink Panther tries to enter the house itself, but the front door moves around so he can't enter...When he finally finds a way to enter, he chases the burglar through the house, the inside of which completely disregards the laws of physics and all other reason and logic. We are soon treated to things like looping staircases that defy gravity, and disembodied feet running around. Things only get stranger from there. - Psychedelic Pink: Possibly the creepiest one of the bunch, definitely the most surreal. The cartoon begins with Pink Panther staring deep into a hypnotic eye painted on the door of a "Bizarre Bookshop". He seems in a trance for a moment, then the door opens and he enters...He finds himself in total darkness, at first. As he walks on, colorful, psychedelic shapes appear and swirl around him and the background. Then books and shelves start to appear, and the cartoon embarks on a series of very surreal, word-and-book-themed antics. As usual, there is no dialogue, making the whole thing seem even more weird and dreamlike.
- Pink Panzer- A narrator with a creepy voice (the wonderful Paul Frees) provokes the Pink Panther and his neighbor into fighting over a borrowed lawnmower, which quickly escalates into a full-out war, machine guns, tanks, artillery, everything. At the end, to top it all, the narrator turns out to be the Devil.The Devil: (to the audience) You know, it might be a good idea to return that lawn mower you borrowed. MWAH HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!
- Pinkfinger- Creepy green spies and the Russian's evil laugh... brrr.
- An Ounce of Pink- not only the talking scale with no facial features, but Pink Panther's frozen face after he nearly falls out the window.
- The big green asterisk in Pink Punch.
- "Pinknic" featured the Panther starving in a snowbound cabin with an insane mouse trying to eat him alive. There's a POV shot of Pink struggling to stay awake and unable to get away from the mouse as it slowly approaches him with a hammer. It feels like something out of a horror movie.
- Pink Plasma is more silly than scary, with Dracula turning out to be a bumbling Bignose, but there is an ominous sign that says "Beware!" Vampire castle!" with a skull painted on it... which starts cackling.
- Similarly, Pink Panic, where the PP ends up visiting a (literal) ghost town, is mostly goofy and silly, but several times Pink Panther ends up trapped in a dark or confined space with something out to get him, sometimes not even knowing it's there, like the skeleton that climbs into bed with him (we hear Pink shriek in terror once the lights are out). It's horrifying to imagine being in his shoes... er... paws...
Music
- The music alone can be seriously creepy. Examples:
- A triangle chime that is often heard in the musical score, it accentuates a very unnerving, spooky feel.
- The music can also be very unsettling when it gets too high-pitched or too soft and subtle.
