The Wonderful and Frightening World Of... is the seventh studio album by the English musical group the Fall, released in October 1984. It was the band's first album after signing to the Beggars Banquet label. Newcomer Brix Smith co-wrote three of the tracks, ushering in a relatively pop-oriented sound for the group. Paul Hanley left the band immediately after the accompanying UK tour, ending the group's distinctive "twin drummers" period.

The album opens with the supernatural-themed "Lay of the Land", which starts with a chant taken from the television series The Quatermass Conclusion. One of three songs on the album co-written by Mark E. Smith and Brix Smith, it was described by Bob Nickas and Nikholis Planck in their book on the album as "sinister rockabilly with swirling guitars, doubled bass (Karl Burns also played bass on this song), double drums, and that killer riff from Brix". "2 x 4" features Steve Hanley's bass prominently, Nickas and Planck considering it the lead instrument on the song. "Copped It" (one of two songs on the album to feature guest vocals from Gavin Friday of the Virgin Prunes) continued Mark E. Smith's common lyrical theme of criticism of the music scene. The last song on side one, "Elves", bears a strong resemblance to the Stooges' "I Wanna Be Your Dog". Lyrically it was seen as chastising younger bands, with Mark E. Smith commenting that he was "trying to write about how shitty all Scottish groups are, and how Scottish groups always lecture everybody on how they are from Scotland, and how hard up they are."

Side two opens with "Slang King", which references "The Four of Us Are Dying", an episode of The Twilight Zone. "Bug Day" was seen as "revealing [Mark E.] Smith's interest in dub, and locking his band in a groove". "Stephen Song" is the second song to feature Gavin Friday. "Craigness" has one of Mark E. Smith's downstairs neighbours as its subject, although whether real or fictional is not clear. The album closes with "Disney's Dream Debased", inspired by an incident from the Smiths' visit to Disneyland in January 1984. After they got off the Matterhorn Bobsleds ride, Mark E. Smith was upset and decided the ride was evil; shortly afterwards a female passenger was thrown from the ride and decapitated by an oncoming car, with visitors comforted by employees dressed as Disney characters.

The album was recorded in mid-1984 at Focus Studios on Borough High Street in London, and produced by John Leckie. The songs were largely recorded live in the studio. The recording sessions were so loud that Friday claimed that afterwards his "ears bled for days". Leckie commented on the recording sessions: "Mark would have a can of Special Brew, vodka, and a line of speed going at eleven in the morning, just to start the day."

Three older, previously abandoned songs were revisited during these sessions. "Oh! Brother" and "Copped It" dated back to the group's earliest incarnation (they can be heard on Live 1977 issued by Voiceprint Records in 2000), and "Draygo's Guilt" was being performed live in 1981 (it can be heard in the Live in Leeds section of the Perverted by Language Bis DVD, issued by Cherry Red in 2003).

The album's cover artwork (like that of its predecessor Perverted by Language) was painted by Danish-born artist Claus Castenskiold.

The album was released on 12 October 1984, with the Call for Escape Route EP released at the same time. The cassette version was titled Escape Route from the Wonderful and Frightening World of the Fall, and included tracks from the EP and singles released earlier in the year.

The album was released on CD for the first time in 1988, with a similar tracklisting to the original cassette edition. A four-CD 'omnibus edition' box set edition was released in 2010, featuring outtakes, sessions, demos, and live recordings from the Pandora's Music Box Festival, and with a 48-page book included.