Slappy the Dummy is a fictional character

Character (arts)

A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...

 in the Goosebumps

Goosebumps

Goosebumps is a series of children's horror fiction novels written by American author R. L. Stine and first published by Scholastic Publishing. It is a collection of stories that feature semi-homogenous plot structures, with fictional children being involved in scary situations...

 children's series by R. L. Stine

R. L. Stine

Robert Lawrence Stine , known as R. L. Stine, and Jovial Bob Stine, is an American writer. Stine, who is called the "Stephen King of children's literature," is the author of hundreds of horror fiction novels, including the books in the Fear Street, Goosebumps, Rotten School, Mostly Ghostly, and The...

. He is one of the series' most popular villains, and the lead antagonist in the Night of the Living Dummy saga.

Character

Slappy is a ventriloquist

Ventriloquism

Ventriloquism, or ventriloquy, is an act of stagecraft in which a person manipulates his or her voice so that it appears that the voice is coming from elsewhere, usually a puppeteered "dummy"...

's dummy that comes to life when the words "Karru marri odonna loma molonu karrano",which means " You and I are one now", found on a sheet of paper in his pocket, are read aloud. After coming to life, Slappy spends most of his time searching for a slave to serve him (usually the child who brought him to life). Slappy is shown to be a rude, sadistic control freak

Control freak

In psychology-related slang, control freak is a derogatory term for a person who attempts to dictate how everything around them is done — "a control freak. Scared to let us have differences"...

 who likes to pull mean pranks and frames the main protagonist

Protagonist

A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...

(s) in each book for them. Other defining characteristics are his raspy voice and near-superhuman strength. Stine has said, "I love writing Slappy because he is so rude."

As revealed in "Bride of the Living Dummy", Slappy was carved out of coffin wood by an ancient sorcerer. "Slappy's Nightmare" reveals that he has a twin brother Wally, carved from the same coffin; however, this revelation is only a dream. When "Night of the Living Dummy" was re-released in a special Horrorland edition, bonus material included with the book revealed that Slappy did indeed have a brother: Mr. Wood, the primary antagonist of the book, and that the coffin wood they were made from was cursed. Mr. Wood's destruction made Slappy twice as evil, and a thousand times ruder.

Notable Appearances In Novels

Title	Year Released	Information
Night of the Living Dummy	1993	In the first Night Of The Living Dummy book, Slappy appears as an ordinary ventriloquist dummy, and stays that way until the end of the book, when he realises that Mr. Wood, the main antagonist to that point, had been destroyed.
Night of the Living Dummy II	1995	Slappy becomes the main antagonist in Night Of The Living Dummy II, when Amy Krammer, the main character, wants a new ventriloquist dummy for her families weekly 'talent show.' Her dad finds Slappy at a local pawn shoppe, and gives it to her as a gift. She takes out a slip of paper that has the magical words on it, reads it aloud, and Slappy slowly comes to life, causing mischief and havoc for Amy and her family. In the end, he is destroyed by Dennis Amy's old dummy.
Night of the Living Dummy III	1996	Trina and Dan's dad finds the broken Slappy, fixes him and calls him 'Smiley,' adding him to a collection of ventriloquist dummies in the attic. Although Rocky, another doll, is frequently caught doing horrible things, Zane, the cousin of Trina and Dan, is the true culprit followed by Slappy. Slappy ends up being beat to 'death' by a mob of other dummies, and Zane ends up with Slappy, who is revealed at the end of the book to still be alive.
Bride of the Living Dummy	1998	Jillian takes her little sisters Katie and Amanda, accompanied by their doll Mary-Ellen, to a puppet show of Jimmy O'James, with Slappy the Dummy as his partner. Slappy then finds a bride for himself, and will stop at nothing to get her...
Slappy's Nightmare	1999	Slappy starts out being the disobedient puppet of Jimmy O'James. Fed up with Slappy, Jimmy replaces Slappy with Wally, who tells Jimmy how to control Slappy's evil: cursing him to doing three good deeds in one week. Although it is, in the end, revealed to be a nightmare, the book ends with his nightmare slowly coming true.
Revenge of the Living Dummy Revenge of the Living Dummy Revenge of the Living Dummy is the first book in R. L. Stine's Goosebumps HorrorLand series. This book was first published on April 1, 2008 by Scholastic in the United States.R. L...	2008	Britney Crosbey and her friend, Molly Molloy, have to put up with Britney's obnoxious cousin, Ethan, and his new friend, Slappy. Slappy, though, seems to be the one causing the trouble this time, and Britney decides to put Slappy to sleep, after realising she only had to say the magic words again—simple as that. But then when she finds out that Ethan was behind Slappy's pranks via electronics, Slappy rewakes and Slappy has a plan to use a special 'Mind-Stealer' doll to make Britney into his own personal perfect slave. At the end, Britney decides to use the 'Mind-Stealer' doll against Slappy, whose mind gets stolen at the end of the book.
The Streets of Panic Park	2009	Slappy appears in this book to team up with Luke and Lizzy to escape The Menace in Horrorland and Panic Park to outsmart The Menace and escape from both parks.
Slappy New Year	2010	Slappy New Year was a book in a planned to be released series called, Goosebumps Gold. The series was never released due to the expired contract that R. L. Stine had with Scholastic at the time. However R. L. Stine did release the book, but changed the plotline. It was originally going to be the sequel to Slappy's Nightmare, but over the years since R. L. Stine changed the book's plot he dropped the idea of it being a sequel. It was released on November 1, 2010.

Appearances beyond the books

Slappy has also been made into an actual ventriloquist doll available from major retailers. He was first manufactured by Goldberger Doll corporation after a nine year old boy from Long Island sent them a letter suggesting the idea in 1998. There is also a mask and a full costume available for sale. Night of the Living Dummy 3 and Bride of the Living Dummy have also been adapted for VHS and DVD,the second on DVD includes "Bride of the Living Dummy".

Reception

In 2007, The Onion

The Onion

The Onion is an American news satire organization. It is an entertainment newspaper and a website featuring satirical articles reporting on international, national, and local news, in addition to a non-satirical entertainment section known as The A.V. Club...

ran a story alleging that Slappy was gay. This story was picked up by The New York Times and School Library Journal.

External links

• Slappy the Dummy - Official Site
• "Slappy the Dummy," The Goosebumps Wiki