Back in the 1970’s, the prime time television networks often featured a mixture of sitcoms, dramas, sporting events and variety shows.
Eventually ABC blocked off their Tuesday nights for something special – a series of made-for-TV motion pictures under the umbrella title of the ABC Movie of the Week. And it also had some cutting-edge graphics for an opening sequence. Okay, “cutting edge” for 1972…
The Movie of the Week became so popular, ABC eventually ran two nights of made-for-TV movies for Tuesday and Wednesday nights.
Some of the most famous motion pictures featured on the ABC Movie of the Week included the football drama Brian’s Song, the Steven Spielberg thriller Duel, and the pilots for Starsky and Hutch, The Six Million Dollar Man and Marcus Welby, M.D..
The ABC Movie of the Week also premiered one of the scariest broadcast movies I ever saw in my life.
In 1974, they showed the film Bad Ronald.
No, this isn’t about a fast-food employee on a rampage.
Bad Ronald was a psychological horror story about a boy who, after an accident caused the death of a young girl, was hidden away by his mother in the crawlspace of their home. But then the mother dies, a new family moves in… man, I’m getting some freaky bad vibes from just thinking about it.
Mind you, any time ABC aired one of these sensationalistic Movie of the Week dramas, they pushed the envelope as far as they could – especially within the bounds of prime time broadcast television. Yes, the stories were manipulative and sometimes over the top… but when it’s 1974 and you’re at home watching a film like this…
Well, it’s not 1974. It’s 2012, and you can now watch Bad Ronald right here on your computer monitor. And you tell me if this isn’t the freakiest 1970’s movie you’ve ever seen in your life.
Chuck The Writer 
Thanks, but no thanks! Not my genre at all, I hate being scared!!! Too many things that go bump in the night as it is !
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*GASP* Bad Ronald!!?? That movie totally freaked me the freak out and is to this day one of the creepiest movies I’ve ever seen. Didn’t it also have Jan Brady #2 in it? Like not the original Jan, but the fake Jan they used for a year or something? Am I making that up? Shuddering at the thought of it all.
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Loved this movie as a 11 year old!! How creepy is the notion of a wacked-out guy living behind the walls of your house!! It shows its age now, but boy, it scared the heck out of me then!
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Megan – you’re thinking of Geri Reischl, the “Fake Jan” from the Brady Bunch Hour. She was on several TV shows at the time, but the horror movie she’s famous for was a 1972 gorefest called “I Dismember Mama.” Ewww….
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love this movie….
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