Why I like horror
I was a very anxious kid. I've heard theories that anxious people like horror the most, and although I haven't looked into studies on that, it feels true. It rhymes and all. For as much as little me was genuinely scared of ghosts and unknowable creatures lurking in the dark, they also genuinely loved to seek out and make up scary stories.
The theory I find the most convincing is that horror is like a roller coaster (which I also enjoy). It's exposing your body and mind to fear in a way that you know will ultimately be safe, giving you a sense of control and a rush of dopamine. And I think that, like roller coasters, some people really like that and some people really don't.
But there's the initial reactions to horror, and then there's the love for horror that grew with me as I got older. There's a big difference between the way I approached a creepypasta as a kid and the way I approach a horror movie as an adult. It might have initially been the draw to that thrill, but now it's that plus the appreciation for a genre with its own fascinating history and conventions.1
It's unmarketable trash.
The biggest reason that I like horror, and one that has come to me as an adult, is that it doesn't have to aim for a wide audience. It knows it's not mass-marketable, so it (usually) doesn't try to be. At its worst, this creates nearly unwatchable trash,2 but at its best, you get movies that don't shy away from experimentation and taboo subject matter.
Whether they handle that subject matter well is another story entirely, but there's a reason that those who feel like outcasts are drawn to this genre. Historically, it has been one of the few genres that was not afraid to portray queerness and disability, for better and for worse. You could literally research the ways that horror, disability, and queerness intersect for your entire career. In this series of posts, though, I'll only touch on how this genre has affected me.
Introducing... the next few posts!
The horror that I like the most is the silly stuff (e.g., Reanimator, Child's play), but I will go out of that lane for surreal stuff or movies with great practical effects. I am a big fan of body horror, which I will talk about more in a future post, and I do think that it hits the hardest when it's practical.
Horror is a very body-focused genre in general, both for the characters and for the viewers. The characters are often forced to reckon with their bodies' fragility or mortality, while the viewers watch for the thrill of an uncontrollable reaction in their own body.
If that last part sounds familiar to you, that's because horror is in the same meta-genre as comedy, romance, and porn.3 These genres also have in common that they're all viewed as a bit trashy when compared to dramas or anything else that "requires more thought". The cool thing about thinking, though, is that you can actually think about anything (and I often do).
So, this series of (probably) three posts is going to be me thinking out loud about some of my favorite horror tropes or conventions. First, I'll talk about body horror, which kind of acts as an umbrella for the other two. The second will be werewolves, one of my favorite creatures. The third will be the Bride of Frankenstein, whom I find to be an endlessly fascinating figure.
Notes
I will mostly be talking about movies here unless I state otherwise, because I'm more of a movie-watcher than a book-reader. If stuff I say here differs between movies and books, do let me know! I'd be excited to learn more.↩
You should know that whenever I say "trash", I'm almost always saying it with a bit of affection.↩
I didn't come up with this idea, or the idea that horror is a body-focused genre, but I unfortunately do not remember where I got these things from. I think it was an episode of You're Wrong About, but it also could've been in things I read in college. Sorry. I'm only here to be pseudo-academic.↩