20 Things You Didn't Know About The Sixth Sense

14. Are You Afraid Of The Dark? Served As An Insiration

The Sixth Sense
Nickelodeon Productions

For those who were a certain age in the 1990s, Are You Afraid of the Dark? was a must-see part of your regular viewing habits.

Aimed at a teen audience, the TV show delivered some of the most chilling scares that its audience had seen up until that point. Well, unless you’d been fortunate enough to get a sneaky look at something like Poltergeist, Halloween, or A Nightmare on Elm Street 3.

Straight from the mouth of director M. Night Shyamalan, though, The Sixth Sense pulled direct inspiration from Are You Afraid of the Dark?. To be precise, Shyamalan has publicly explained how a 1994 episode titled The Tale of the Dream Girl had a major influence on his 1999 movie.

In that episode, a young boy can only be seen by his sister – with the big reveal confirming that the boy is actually dead.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.