Todd Barstow is the protagonist in the twenty-first Goosebumps book, Go Eat Worms!, and its accompanying television adaptation.
History
Book
Todd is extremely interested in worms. Todd and his best friend, Danny, loves using them to scare his sister, Regina. In preparation for his science fair project, Todd digs up extra worms from school's baseball field. While digging for worms, Todd's strange underground tremors.
Todd uses some of his worms to sabotage Regina's science fair project. During the science fair, Regina finds that her giant, papier-mâché robin has been filled with worms. After this, Todd begins finding worms everywhere.
Todd becomes greatly upset because he can't figure out how his worms are escaping. Towards the end of the book, Todd discovers that Regina had been the one placing worms in his belongings. Todd begins plotting a revenge plan, and the plan requires extra worms.
While Todd is digging for worms, a giant worm erupts from the ground and tries to drag him down. Todd speculates that the giant worm is the angry mother of the worms that he's been collecting. The worm is scared off when Regina passes by while carrying her giant, papier-mâché robin.
A few weeks later, Todd abandons his worm hobby in favor of a new one: pinning butterflies. One night, while Todd is working, he gazes up and sees a giant butterfly wielding a silver pin.
Television adaptation
The television adaptation is mostly the same as the book. However, in the end, instead of taking up the hobby of butterfly pinning, Todd becomes interested in fishing. Todd is pulled into the water by a group of fish. Todd begs the fish to let him go. Surprisingly, they do, but Todd has to somehow make it back to shore himself.
General information
Personality
Todd is depicted as being mischievous, somewhat cruel, and completely obsessed with worms. Todd finds satisfaction in using worms to prank his sister, and he also likes cutting worms in half. By the end of the book, Todd stops tormenting his sister and releases his worms, but he still abuses animals, as he takes up chloroforming and pinning butterflies, or catching fish in the television adaptation.
Physical appearance
In the book, Todd is described as skinny and tall. He has short wavy brown hair, dark brown eyes, and a very serious face. He can often be seen wearing an Oakland Raiders cap.
Trivia
- In one scene of the television episode, Todd is seen listening to hip-hop music. Fittingly, the actor who portrayed Todd, Noah Shebib, ended up becoming a hip-hop and R&B record producer under the pseudonym 40.
