Gremlin (Are You Afraid of the Dark?)

The Camera Gremlin was the primary antagonist of "The Tale of the Curious Camera", an episode of the 90's TV show Are You Afraid of the Dark?

Biography
The Gremlin manifested itself inside a prototype camera from the 1940s. The gremlin always chose its owner and always managed to find its way back. The camera had originally been in the possession of Mr. Calhoun, a photographer, until he sold it to a boy named Matt. The gremlin then proceeded to wreak havoc for the first time in years. The first victim was Matt’s shirt, which got an ink stain on it; the second was a vase, which shattered soon after Matt photographed it. Matt was slower to figure out what was going on, and before long, the gremlin destroyed most of the breakable things in his house, and killed Matt's goldfish.

After the death of his goldfish, Matt threw the camera away, only to find it in his locker at school the next day. He was soon accosted by our favorite red haired bully, and Matt decided to take a picture of him for revenge. The bully’s ankle was later crushed under a locker that mysteriously fell on him. Matt was overjoyed that the camera worked so well and celebrated by assembling a hit list of those who have picked on him.

But Matt ended up inadvertently taking a picture of his sister and had to quickly rescue her from a falling chandelier. That little brush with death was enough to convince her that Matt was telling the truth. Together, they looked over the photos Matt had taken so far, and his sister noticed a small smudge on one of the pictures. Upon further review, Matt realized the same smudge appeared on all the pictures. He finally noticed the gremlin when he looked through a magnifying glass.

Matt tried to return the camera to Mr. Calhoun, but to no avail. Dejected, he returned home and accidentally photographed of his parents, who were about to go out for the evening. When Matt showed his sister the picture, it showed their parents' car in an accident.

Matt’s sister took the camera outside and attempted to destroy it with a bat, only to find the camera sitting on the table in perfect condition when she walked back inside. Matt came up with the genius idea of setting up the camera to take a picture of itself.The plan worked great and the camera disappeared, just in time to prevent his parents from being destroyed by a truck. Unfortunately for Matt and his sister, their nightmare wasn’t quite over. The Gremlin managed to transport itself into a camcorder they foolishly left out and was now able to cause misfortune immediately, instead of waiting the 5 seconds for the photo to develop. Matt managed to defeat the Gremlin again by repeatedly turning off the TV that the camcorder was hooked up to. I’m not sure why that works, but it worked really well and the television blew up.

Just as Matt and his sister exited the scene, the gremlin is seen manifesting itself in a computer that was left on.