I agree with that. The very definition of horror is something that is shocking and disgusting. Where death is the climax of that, because it is shocking, or at least it is supposed to be. It has nothing to do with scares. Thriller is supposed to be tense, and sometimes scary.

Now most movies are labeled horror/thriller.

No, it doesn't have to do with scares. It has to do with being scary. By the very definition of the word. Which is not to say that shock and revulsion are not aspects of horror, although I would argue they have less strong associations with it. Furthermore:


There's also this Horror Writer's Association essay that talks about how Horror has lost its meaning over the years.

I would say that death is not the climax of horror, but the moment right before it. Death, in a sense, is a form of relief.

horror is a word that has an extremely malleable meaning when used in real life to refer to fiction. anything with dark elements will generally be called horror by a large number of people.

I would say that it is more about being shocked or disgusted. I am not scared by an horror movie for 20 years now (and I watched more than 100 horror movies easily as I actively seek good horror to watch), but they somehow can still shock or disgust me sometimes. Take Hostel or Evil Dead, for example, very disgusting.

Yeah, and I would say you're wrong. That's not a meaningful form of discourse though.

I agree with Mown in that horror is supposed to leave you with chills, not to just freak you out or make you jump. Death in horror should be the moment of catharsis -- the point where all the tension that's been built up is released -- but it is not necessary by any means.

Note the following examples are from media I have not directly experienced.

H.P. Lovecraft's work, especially on the Cthulhu mythos, focused a lot on the creeping fear of both the unknown and of the processes and events that are much bigger than any person, with the ultimate goal usually to reduce the reader to feeling so very scared of the much grander universe beyond their knowledge, mostly without death being a focus. There are, after all, fates much worse than death.

I am also reminded of a quote from, apparently, Stephen King, "Nothing is so frightening as what's behind a closed door." Just having a death or something disgusting "on screen" as it were does not induce horror because it does nothing to ratchet up the tension on its own.


I'm always of two minds whenever semantics are brought up.

One side of me is saying, in Bob Chipman's voice, "WORDS MEAN THINGS".

Another side of me is saying, "yes, language is a thing, that's why literally means figuratively in the dictionary".

I think a large part of the problem is that mass media puts labels like these in the way they want people to think, and as people are exposed to more and more of those examples (especially younger audiences who are more susceptible to such suggestion), then it becomes the common usage of the term because it's what we've been conditioned to expect. The thing is this doesn't create a meaningful distinction to those wanting to discuss it (and also has the added frustration of needing to supplement the original meaning in order to differentiate it from the new one). In times like these I usually default to referring to those who would be deemed suitable references: in the case of defining horror, authors held up as horror writers; in the case of defining a furry character (a discussion I recently had in the meat), people actually in the furry fandom; and so on. I hate either relying on dictionary definitions or going with the "3 million people can't be wrong" mentality.

I think it's less important what words mean, and more important that everyone can agree on a definition of them. If everyone in the world started calling cats dogs and dogs cats, there would be no problem whatsoever.

I'm really liking what I've seen of JoJo's Bizzare adventure so far. So ridiculous. So good.
"We used masks to turn these horses into vampires."
"He fired his severed arms from the hole in his chest!"
"He needed a distraction, so he set his scarf on fire."
"I'll be a good sport and burn to death after all."

And my god, the poses. It's like getting a highly-caffeinated middle school drama class to do fashion model/body builder impressions. I swear, one guy jumped up, struck a sitting pose and fell straight down into his chair, all just because. Another guy made a dramatic speech while standing at a 30 degree angle to the ground (but he had help from the camera angle).

1. I don't think anyone is arguing that point. In fact the second half of my last post was kind of this very subject.

2. It's also kind of missing the point since what we've been arguing about is over the fact that we have different personal definitions of what the word "horror", as prescribed to a genre of media, should mean.

All this talk about horror made me want to watch some. I had already watched this year: Unfriended, Honeymoon and Darkness something (I cannot remember the name). I watched now Poltergeist and The Pyramid.

The best was Honeymoon, but t is not a gory horror movie, more like a thriller.



I agree with this. Too bad it gets less intelligent later, but it gets also more bizarre. So things even out.

I've just got into Stardust Crusades, and so far I'm not liking it as much as the second arc. Almost on par with the first though. Here's hoping the awesomeness level rises.

I liked the first and second arc more than the third arc (still a few episodes to finish), but it is still good and gets better with time.

Villains are very hard to kill in this anime. Three times is simply not enough.

And yet they never check the corpse.

Rule #2: Double-tap.

Just remembered the name of the movie I forgot. Dark Was The Night. And I cannot believe I forgot it, because it was the second best horror movie I watched this year. Kind of generic, but well-made. Overall the movies I watched this year were not very good.

And of course they have a submarine.
Stardust Crusaders still isn't as good as Joseph Joestar's arc, but halfway through the first season, the characterization picks up and surpasses anything from the first season.
Kind of sad that Kujo keeps stealing Joseph's moments in the spotlight. Joseph was the better protagonist and now he's stuck doing nothing while Kujo steals his shtick of being one step ahead of everybody.

I liked the first and second arc more because it reminds me more of Yu Yu Hakusho, where the protagonist wins the fights more based on intelligence than willpower. This angle is almost entirely forgotten at third arc. Started the forth, but not enough episodes yet.

Watched Tokyo Ghoul that it is really great, specially season 1. I give it a 8, more based on season 1 than season 2. Season 2, at least, is able to keep the score.

And also Death Parade, which I give an 8. It is missing something to be truly great, but it walked very near to a better score.

Just curious. Did you take one of my recommendations here?

Yes, in part. It was on my radar for quite sometime, I had read about it a lot, good things. So after reading your review, I decided to read a new review at AniTay and that definitively makes me want to watch it.

Here is the review.

The system works. Kind of...