The Grandfather Clock is a supernatural item found in the Haunted Mansion.
Description[]
The Grandfather Clock is an occult Gothic clock with anthropomorphized detailing, making its upper-half look like a fanged demonic face, its pendulum in the shape of a devil's tail, and its legs looking like animal claws.
The Clock appears in the Corridor of Doors with its face glowing green, and its crooked hands moving backwards past the number 13 in the place of 12. As guests pass by in their Doom Buggies a shadow of a human-like talon passes in front of the face of the clock.
During Haunted Mansion Holiday, a tag found on the clock says, "To Leota, Special Gifts for you - Sandy Claws" implying that it was a gift given to Leota by Jack Skellington.
Appearances[]
2003 film[]
The clock appears in the 2003 film but is depicted as a giant clock face mounted above the arched hallway leading to the ballroom and not a grandfather clock. A nod to the WDW version of the ride is also evident in this depiction wherein the clock has 13 hours.
Haunted Mansion Game of Life[]
The shadowy hand floating over the clock is identified as a "Ghost Writer" on one of the "Scare-eer" cards.
Video game[]
The clock also appears in the video game adaptation and acts as a progress saver for the player. It can be found in the foyer, upstairs hallway, and downstairs hallway.
Kinect Disney Adventures[]
The clock appears in this video game first in the Stretching Room sequence as a giant clock that guests must mirror the hands of to pass through. It is later seen wherein the player uses it to smash a possessed suit of armor.
The Haunted Mansion Parlor[]
A mantleclock variant of the clock appears above the lounge's fireplace and underneath a copy of the The Flying Dutchman painting. When it strikes 13, various haunting effects activate throughout the lounge.
Trivia[]
- Every park has a different variation of the clock's hands
- Walt Disney World: the hands resemble skeleton fingers
- Disneyland: The hour hand resembles a leech while the minute hand resembles a demon's tongue and when aligned correctly make up the silhouette of a bat
- Tokyo: the hands are of an ornate Japanese design, and in
- Disneyland Paris (Phantom Manor): the hands resemble snakes.
- Only the Walt Disney World clock has 13 hours while all other parks have the clock with 12 hours, the 12th hour marked as "13".
- In unused Ken Anderson concept-artwork for the Black Cat incarnation of the ride, the clock closely mirrors a scene from Edgar Allan Poe's gothic-horror short story, "The Pit and the Pendulum" where a man kidnapped by Spanish Inquisitors and is tortured by a giant clock's swinging blade-like pendulum as rats claws across his body. This form of design was used for the clock in the Bride's Boudoir of Phantom Manor.
- A sentient grandfather clock appears in Rolly Crump concept art for the Museum of the Weird, this grandfather clock was visually inspired by a similar coffin clock in the 1933 Mickey Mouse short, "The Mad Doctor".
- The way that the shadow-claw moves across the clock face mirrors a scene from the 1922 horror film Nosferatu in which a vampire uses the shadow of his talon to molest a woman as well as the 1932 film adaption of Edgar Allan Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue" where a gorilla strangles a woman to death in her sleep.
- The Number 13 is commonly associated with the occult and the supernatural for many reasons including but not limited to; the 13th disciple at the Last Supper having had been Judas, Ancient Mathematicians deeming 12 the perfect number, and several non-Christian faiths considering 13 to be a holy number only for the christian church to demonize it as a way to absolve their cultures.
Gallery[]
