A Case of the Bumps: Wriggle Me This!

Goosebumps has had its fair share of bad books. Often more a case of outside opinions and not any that come from R.L. Stine himself. But what about the books that even he doesn't like? The ones he felt were flops? That he couldn't make a strong book about? I think no book best reflects that than the twenty-first book in the series, Go Eat Worms! A book that even Stine has stated is one of his weaker works. And I ultimately agree with Stine about that. Why? Well, let's find out why as I once again open up A Case of the Bumps and focus on the creepy, crawly, and slightly crappy Go Eat Worms!

#1. THE PLOT

Todd Barstow is obsessed with worms. So much so that he has a giant tank full of them. He also likes to use them as pranks on his sister Regina. He uses them for his science fair project, a worm hotel. Yet he still ends up losing. However, some time later, it seems the worms have turned on him. Showing up everywhere and causing problems for him, to the point that he has to get rid of the tank. He soon discovers that Regina was the one putting worms everywhere. But that doesn't stop Todd from being attacked by a giant earthworm which gets scared by Regina's paper-mache bird "Christopher Robin". Todd gives up on worms, butt doesn't give up on bug collecting as he turns his attention to butterflies instead. Only for a giant butterfly holding a pin to enter his room, ready for a little revenge.

The story, for the most part, goes for a slice of life style affair. Far less focused on the supernatural elements of most books, save for the ending, which we'll talk more about in a minute. The book's majority is more about Todd's obsession, or being easily tricked or ostracized by everyone, namely Regina, or by Patrick MacKay, a more popular kid who does the whole worm project as well for the science fair, mainly to mock Todd. So the book's majority is mostly this kid being a weirdo, getting pranked on, then at the very end, there's a little bit of supernatural to at least call this one a Goosebumps book. I can see why Stine looks back on this one less fondly when it suffers from a lack of strong story beats. 

#2. LET'S TALK ABOUT TODD

Unlike the butterflies in his later collection, Todd Barstow is a tricky character to pin down. I mean unless you're a giant butterfly holding a giant pin. That would make it easier. I've called Todd a sociopath. A kid whose destiny is to be a villain in an episode of Criminal Minds. The bizarre unsub with the worm obsession. That's kind of how he is for the most part. Goosebumps kids often have one set hyperfixation that plays into the story. But in Todd's case, the hyperfixation borders on unhealthy. So much so that it's made him a laughing stock to everyone else. And that can easily apply to the reader as Todd's actions can make it hard to stand up for him.

And I think that's ultimately by design. Todd reminds me a lot of Eddie from You Can't Scare Me! A kid obsessed with something to the point that it becomes his entire modus operandi. But where Eddie ultimately was forced to change his ways after possibly seeing the mud monsters, Todd isn't the same. He simply goes from worms to butterflies, or in the television adaptation, fish. So the karma that comes to him is a bit more warranted. One could even say that his follow-up obsession is worse, meaning he doesn't learn a thing. Which again I believe was by design. Not every Goosebumps protagonist can be Carly Beth, both in terms of writing and in terms of being a lovable loser. And that's the ultimate way to describe Todd. A loser without as much of the lovable part. So, again, I can see why Stine could have issues with this character in hindsight.

#3. THE LAST-SECOND SUPERNATURAL BAND-AID

I have my suspicions about this book. I think Stine wanted to make this a slice-of-life story entirely, devoid of supernatural elements. That the "villains" would have been Regina and Beth and nobody else. It makes sense in how we start the book with Todd being an easy mark for Regina's prank. And when we get the reveal that it was always Regina and Beth putting the worms everywhere to mess with Todd's head, I think that's where Stine wanted to end the book on. But it wasn't a sufficient enough ending, so we add supernatural stuff at the end involving giant bugs. A giant earthworm randomly shows up and attacks Todd until Regina and Beth scare it off with "Christopher Robin". And even then it's positioned in a way that only Todd saw the worm, so while it could supernatural, it could all be in Todd's head. His fixation finally turning against him mentally.

And then there's the twist which muddies the water. Both the book and episode have two different concepts. The book is more overt, as while Todd is busy pinning butterflies on a board, a giant butterfly enters his room with a giant pin, ready to finally stab this dumbass. In the episode, Todd takes up fishing and in a more cartoonish finale, eats a sandwich which has a fish hook in it, which gets him dragged into the water. I know people who see the TV ending as worse, or too cartoonish for its own good, made no better with Todd's commentary (added there so we know Todd's not dragged into the water to his death), but I've always liked it more than the butterfly. It's more in line with Goosebumps being kiddy horror that's intended to have a sillier take to it. 

So, do these elements help or hurt the story? Honestly, they're the saving rolls. Because without them, this feels so un-Goosebumps. Aside from, arguably, You Can't Scare Me! the series always focused on more imaginative horror scenarios. Cursed objects, monsters, bizarre situations. Without the final beats of this book, it would have been the most bland. Just a parable about a kid taking their obsession too far, getting paid back by the people he bothered and that's it. And if that were it, then yeah, chalk this up as a front-runner for worst book in the series.

#4. THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN A SHORT STORY

So this book came out in July of 1994. Three months later in October of 1994 came Tales to Give You Goosebumps. The first in a series of short story compilations. And, like I've said before, I think this should have been one of the short stories from that book. Because the biggest issue surrounding Go Eat Worms! is that it spins its wheels a lot and there's a lot of dragging its feet in the middle. The wild goose chase to find Patrick's house early on, the science fair, even little things when Todd thinks the worms are turning against him. All could be cut (and most were for the episode) and put into a short story with very little lost in the shuffle. Not every story needs 100+ pages and a story like Go Eat Worms! is chief among them. Though that could go for a lot of Goosebumps books when you think about it. Many suffer from middles that are too middling for their own good. But even those don't feel as needlessly stretched thin as this book. 

If the book had done more with the supernatural stuff instead of a late-book band-aid like having the worms actually start to turn on Todd, then maybe you could make the book's pacing work in its favor. But the version we got doesn't feel like it earns the page length it got. And I think Stine realized that as well in post. That this wasn't a book that could work well as a long-form story. It's also one of the last real slice-of-life Goosebumps books of its kind as its execution seemed to scare Stine away from it for a good while, with every Goosebumps book afterward being more heavy on the supernatural early on, or building the horror better overall. And maybe, if he had just truncated this to a 13 page short story, Stine could have made this work and maybe it wouldn't take until Series 2000 for him to try again. But what's done is done unfortunately.

#5. REDEEMING QUALITIES

So, I've bashed this book a bit already, but here's the thing. I don't think it's a great book, clearly, but I don't think it's the worst book ever. Certainly not the worst Goosebumps book ever. Stine is in the right to have his issues with the book, but I don't think everything involving it is bad. It has one scene which I think works better than most of its kind from Stine. And that's the worm tub dream. In the book, Todd has a nightmare of being in a bathtub. When he turns the faucet on, thousands of worms come pouring out of the faucet, filling the tub and burying him underneath them. Stine's nightmare scenarios can be a mixed bag, but this one is up there with the skeleton dream from Welcome to Dead House as the most legitimately nightmare-inducing. 

I also think it's a better use of slice of life than You Can't Scare Me! if only because, while Todd is indeed flawed, he's not as awful as Eddie. Nothing Todd does in this book comes close to the depths Eddie was willing to go to scare Courtney. Eddie got so obsessed that he dreamed of siccing vicious dogs on Courtney. I'd argue that Eddie is more of a sociopath with more of a crazed hyperfixation. Todd's is more of a fixation that borders on weird for everyone around him. Eddie's (and by extension the other kids) feels more dangerous. Yes, Todd sucks. But he sucks less than Eddie, so I consider that a redeeming enough quality right there.

#6. ALTERNATIVES TO GO EAT WORMS!

So, what's a better take on this story? Well, I can't really find one in Goosebumps to compare it with. As we really don't get any books afterwards that focus on a kid's obsession with a bug. So I'll focus on slice of life horror and will again give props to Series 2000 books Are You Terrified Yet? and Scream School. The former more so. While it doesn't focus on bugs, the scene with the spider jar still feels like it gives that bug tension that Go Eat Worms! failed to deliver on. And while this isn't from Stine but Stine-adjacent, I'll also give another bit of love to Ghosts of Fear Street's The Bugman Lives! If you want a more freaky bug-themed story, you can't go wrong with that one.  

And then there's one other short story I again want to shine a spotlight on. And it comes from More Tales for the Midnight Hour. The Collector tells the story of a boy who collects moths. It mentions how he manages to do so, and the story has a more satisfying payoff in how the boy's moth collecting finally gets the better of him. You know how I just went through saying that Go Eat Worms should have been a short story? Well this story right here is proof positive of it. Feels so close to the concept that Stine was going for, and is smart enough to keep it a scant few pages instead of stretching it out with less satisfactory results. To quote Scrooge McDuck, it's a case of "Work smarter. Not harder." 

#7. FINAL THOUGHTS

Is this one of the worst Goosebumps books ever? Probably. By all accounts, it lacks in the oomph that the books before it had and suffers from a feeling of wheel spinning unlike any book. Is it THE worst Goosebumps book? Bad enough for even R.L. Stine to say it was bad? Nah. It's not the worst. Not that it's a hidden gem either, it's still a mid as hell book, but in terms of not just Goosebumps, but Stine's works in general, it barely scratches the surface. It's not as frustrating as Monster Blood IV, not as poorly thought out as Say Cheese And Die–Again!, not as deplorable as Revenge R Us, not as on-autopilot in the worst way like Haunting With the Stars. 

And even outside of Goosebumps, it doesn't have as horrid a protagonist as the Silent Night trilogy, doesn't feel as mean-spirited as Hit and Run, doesn't destroy any good will it had like The Babysitter III, or is anywhere as infuriating as Halloween Night II. I have read WAY too many of Stine's books since first reading this book and honestly, it's more "off-day" than "awful" when it comes to Stine's history. Ultimately Go Eat Worms! isn't at the bottom of the barrel, more the layer just above the bottom. Bad, but ultimately manageable.