Laughing Jack's biggest problem was pacing.

Hot take, but all the scares in Laughing Jack were pretty good. The nightmares, the candy, Fido's death, James' death. They were all pretty good scary moments in isolation.

The problem was the pacing of the story. It's very clear that author wanted to write a slow burn horror story but got bored and rushed to the ending.

"The son has a new imaginary friend... the mom has nightmares of a funfair... the sok recieves mysterious candy... then the dog dies and the son dies and the mom gets locked up the end.".

If the extreme scares were spread out over a longer plot I think Laughing Jack could have been cool.