Scary Stories To Tell In the Dark: Me Tie Doughty Walker Explained

Of all the book to film adaptations from 2019, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, the Jangly Man and his key phrase, “Me Tie Doughty Walker” was by far the scariest. The movie brought the monster to life in ways the short story simply didn’t and added more to the character for horror’s sake. While all the pieces are there in the movie, the original story is very different. What does that phrase mean, anyway?

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark was a highly anticipated film, not only because Guillermo Del Toro was attached, but because of the film’s source material, a popular children’s book series penned by Alvin Schwartz. However, the three books are mostly noted for their grotesque and haunting illustrations by Stephen Gammel.

The film received generally favorable reviews and managed to wrangle a 78% critic score and an audience score of 72% at Rotten Tomatoes. Its PG-13 rating doesn’t hold it back much, either. In fact, if blood was added to Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, it would be downright terrifying. Those who believe that the movie wrapping the short stories together didn’t work would hardly be wrong, but that’s probably not what most watched it for.

Me Tie Doughty Walker: Book Vs. The Film

While book to film adaptations tend to leave out details, that isn’t the case with the Me Tie Doughty Walker story. In fact, it’s the opposite. The short story is under four-hundred words, so much of its depiction in the film is not from the source material.

The story itself involves a haunted house, where people claimed that a bloody head fell down the chimney every night. A rich man said he would give two-hundred dollars to anyone who would stay the night, and a boy agreed to do it as long as he could bring his dog. The boy starts a fire and nothing happens until past midnight, where he and his dog hear the faint singing from the woods, “Me tie doughty walker.” To the boy’s surprise, his dog begins to speak and replies to the voice with, “Lynchee kinchy colly molly dingo dingo!” The singing continues to get closer and a bloody head falls from the chimney, scaring the dog to death.

The film’s take on the story brings in a new creature that’s semi-inspired by the Me Tie Doughty Walker story. Not only does the movie show a bloody head falling down a chimney, but also a pair of arms, legs, and a torso. All in front of a talking dog, to boot. However, the similarities stop there. The creature is named the Jangly Man, and he’s truly terrifying in action.

Scary Stories To Tell In the Dark: Me Tie Doughty Walker Explained

What does “Me Tie Doughty Walker” mean? Nothing. What about “Lynchee kinchy colly molly dingo dingo?” Also nothing. It’s the kind of nonsense found throughout the book series to seem mysterious, and for a children’s book series, it achieves just that. While there may have been an original meaning behind the saying, it hasn’t been revealed.

In an interview with Bloody-Disgusting, director André Øvredal mentioned that the meaning of the phrase almost made it to the film in some versions of the script. However, what he could say about the meaning likely wouldn’t satisfy many people who’ve been longing to know. “..it was a theory that it was something, like words of some cement company that the head saw when it rolled out, and it saw the letters that we half scratched off and it became that.” Multiple meanings had apparently been thrown around during the writing phase, but never made the final cut.

While nothing has been announced as of yet, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark definitely set itself up for a sequel. Several stories from the series could be adapted in future movies, so the possibility of seeing the Jangly Man in a sequel probably isn’t completely off the table.

About The Author