Scariest Clown Sightings Caught On Camera

Clowns have never, ever been funny, let's say that right up front. Even Ronald McDonald? Not funny.

We don't know what's going on with the epidemic of creepy clowns that keep popping up across the country. They've even now spread overseas. There's probably a rational explanation out there somewhere. For example, Wrinkles the clown is a terrifying sight, but you can hire him to scare the living soul right out of your kids if they've been acting up. (He only shows up for a few hundred bucks, which seems pretty reasonable.)

We hope that a lot of these videos are just friends pulling pranks on other friends, capitalizing on the innate fear everyone has of clowns and the popularity they're enjoying right now. We can also hope that maybe, some of these were staged just for YouTube. Fingers crossed. On the other hand, it's entirely possible ... never mind. We don't even want to think about that. Judge for yourself.

The U.S. might have sheer quantity of clowns, but New Zealand? New Zealand has quality. New Zealand also has some very, very brave people, and we're intrigued. What happened the next night? Did he go back? Was the clown still there? More importantly, was he still handing out free hugs?

So you're having trouble with your sweet little girl misbehaving and generally acting up. She's not listening to anything you say, and all your pleading falls on deaf ears. What's a parent to do? If you answered, "Hire the creepiest clown you can find to hide under her bed and scare the living daylights out of her," then congratulations, because you're these parents from Florida.

This creepy clown is called Wrinkles. Does knowing that make it any better? No. No, it does not.

Kudos to this one for suspense, and quite a bit of bravery that we're not sure we could muster. Clowns on their own? No thanks. Holding balloons? That doesn't make them any more friendly. Clowns holding chainsaws? Gonna nope right out of there.

In mid-September, two Alabama schools were placed on lockdown after a terrifying figure calling itself "Flomo Klown" issued some pretty serious threats through a Facebook page. Videos and photos were incredibly graphic, and we feel like we should probably apologize to Ronald McDonald. He's not on the side of the bad guys, or, at least he's obviously not a part of Flomo's gang.

Flomo Klown is a great example of what not to do. Arrests were made not long after the videos surfaced, and even though it was supposedly a prank, absolutely no one was laughing after. No word on whether or not Ronald was avenged.

No one's happy about seeing a clown on the best of days, and with all the hype going on about the random ones that keep popping up across the country, you can't blame anyone for being scared out their minds when one shows up in the backyard. You don't have to justify your fear by letting us know you're home alone, that's a totally reasonable time to be freaked.

The optimistic balloon offering is bad enough, but the knife? No thanks.

This one has a pair of adorable canine witnesses, and they're clearly not happy about the clown that's wandering ever-so-slowly away. There's no denying that animals have a sort of sixth sense about people and things, and most people will agree that they're absolutely right to be suspicious of this machete-wielding monstrosity.

Screaming aside, we'll give this one kudos, too. We all like to think we're brave enough to take a swing at any weird clown menacing us. There's just a regular sort of human inside that costume, right? A deranged human, maybe, one that needs to check out a hobby more along the lines of knitting, but a human nonetheless.

Right?

Once again, it looks like the U.S. might be responsible for starting a horrible trend that's spreading across the world. Along with New Zealand, clowns are apparently also showing up in Perth. This one stares into a home's CCTV camera and proves that it's absolutely not necessary to say a word in order to make a threat. Or, at least give someone more than a few sleepless nights.