it's been awhile, so-- horror cliches! [Archive]

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preyer

07-24-2005, 12:29 AM

an easy, fun thread. list 'em if ya got 'em! books, movies, whatever....

scfirenice

08-01-2005, 08:46 PM

Trixie descended the stairs, her stomach in knots. <insert corny scary music here.>

"Gee, this basement sure is dark. Huh, what's that smell?" she said wiping a strand of clairol number nine hair from her eyes.

"Gosh, I wondered who killed Tommy upstairs and left him in three seperate piles...I sure hope this basement is safe." Du, du, du, dum...

"AHHHHHHHHHHH," she screamed as....

Richard

08-01-2005, 09:19 PM

"The phonelines are cut, there's blood in the kitchen, the festering smell of death lingers in the air. Anyway, lets have sex."

Fractured_Chaos

08-01-2005, 10:53 PM

Every single 80's horror flick in which the virgin locks herself in a closet, or some other place where there is no visible means of escape, to hide from the psychotic serial killer, who is hot on her heels, yet miraculously, he passes by that door, and she survives to make another really bad sequel.

...

Another bad cliche would be run-on sentences.

Fractured_Chaos

08-01-2005, 11:02 PM

Angsty vampires. Ever since Anne Rice did it with Louis, there have been more than enough copy-cats. Or some spoiled brat who revels way too much in his vampirism (a la Lestat). One of the best vampire stories I'd ever seen was about a night watchman at a blood bank who was just wanting to be left alone. He even had to have fake fangs because he'd lost his teeth before he was turned.

Psychotic serial killers with masks and no personallity. I want an intelligent, sexy, charming serial killer, dammit! (no one gives Keanu Reeves any credit for 'The Watcher').

The tortured 'soul' that needs to be 'sent on', and is only trapped here because of a tragedy. Why can't we have a ghost who is just an obnoxious curmudgeon who -wants- to stay here?

Mad Scientists. Period.

The Evil Overlord (http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html) who creates his own demise.

preyer

08-03-2005, 04:57 AM

this is a newer one you may not find on many cliche lists, but it seems any bit of obscure information can be found on the monster in three seconds using the internet. the information is always exactly what's needed and the characters believe in it without a second thought. thank gawd for google, eh?

maybe it's just my computer, but 90% of what i find actually useful research is contained in a book for sale. were i to look up how to kill that one particular brand of werewolf, that would only be found in an ebay or amazon link for the low, low price of six bucks. and no porn sites ever pop up, either. (anyone who knows how to permanently block vizitus.com, please let me know!) (okay, this more of a movie cliche....)

in books, the virgin daughter is incredibly hot who at most manages to keep her virginity intact by providing other services to her boyfriend, who she had to leave behind when her family moves to a new burg, almost always some rural area. confronted by the evil, she suddenly can't control her hormones. well, she can, but barely. sometimes. sometimes the evil takes her virginity. all this to illustrate that sex is evil and punishable by death. oh, but, bj's are okay. :) what a nice message, eh? lol.

the surviving heroine from the first movie is now a side-character in the sequel, invariably having gone through an extensive psychiatrict process, sometimes still entombed within the sanitarium.

*if* there's a single survivor, it's always a female. men are too stupid to live, apparently. (personally, i have no biases like this: i kill every character by the end just to be fair.)

being mindless means you are criminally unsane. intelligence, i guess, promotes good. too much intelligence, though, and you're too smart to be good. another great message to send out: if you're dumb, you're a killing machine: if you're a genius, you're out to kill millions in one fell swoop *or* fall into the serial murderer category. either way, each extreme means you have a criminal mind. average people *can't* be killers.

factory workers are evil in a special way. have to have some skillz like a machinist, though. popping rivets into sheet metal just isn't enough to drive people off the deep end. you need to be able to fabricate your own weapon, preferably something to replace the hand you lost.

GonnaBeFamous

08-03-2005, 05:22 AM

Ive written a horror film preyer, and I felt I had to keep the female character alive. I won't divulge anymore of my story, but there is a reason for that cliche IMO.

BlueTexas

08-03-2005, 06:55 AM

katiemac

08-03-2005, 08:47 AM

They leave the front door wide open and go investigate a noise coming from somewhere else in the house.

They run up the stairs to avoid the source of said noise, which is two feet from the open door.

triceretops

08-03-2005, 09:39 AM

Every monster from A--Z that has a fetish for chomping down human flesh with massive, slurping gulps, then stares down the barrel of the camera lens, showing this bloody maw complete with bits of meat and sinew hanging. Humans are better than fast food. Jeepers Creepers really took this to nauseous extremes with the jailcell scene. Glulp...glulp...glulp. Yeah, we get the picture. Dum Bastids.

Tri

Fractured_Chaos

08-03-2005, 07:40 PM

Tric reminded me of the literary cliches that I hate the most....

Using nothing but shock and gore to "scare", rather than building up tension.

Sorry, shock and gore have their places, and can be a nice tool....if used sparingly! But a book full of it? No.

On the subject of the "Ew" factor....what the hell is with showing people vomiting on film so much now?

It's not funny, scary, shocking, or even entertaining. It's disgusting! And there are probably alot of people like me, who are sympathetic pukers. If I see it, I'm doing it.

Many a really good movie has been ruined because of the close-up spew-shot. And I don't even -want- to know how the FX people did that, okay? >.<

preyer

08-04-2005, 02:03 AM

you'd love 'team america: world police.' no puke scene there.

triceretops

08-04-2005, 02:10 AM

Preyer--I bust my gibblets every time I see that commercial. There's a love scene where the puppet's joints are plainly seen--what an imagery hook. I've wondered if they're wasting their time (in an anatomical sense).

Doh!

Tri

preyer

08-07-2005, 11:31 AM

gotta love the south park team. :)

'urban legend: bloody mary,' which i watched tonight, has yet another 'run to the internut and collect vital information on obscure subjects that most likely would never be included in *any* website' scene. and, yes, *spoiler ~~ the girl in the movie survives. sorry, GBF. seriously, though, the chick living on is just very typical. name practically any horror movie and it's the girl who lives to tell the tale from the unsane asylum. 'final destination,' 'the shining,' 'hellraiser,' 'friday the 13th,' 'holloween'... the list is endless. i reckon it's because women are supposedly the weaker sex.

'urban legend' contains another cliche that you won't find on too many lists, that being of a normal highschooler/college chick getting whammed upside the head with a shovel, suffering kicks to the ribs that would knock the bark off a petrified redwood, and beaten around the neck and shoulders *then* managing to deliver a half-asssed defensive blow that allows her to scuttle away through the woods. yep, if it's one flaw every mad-dog killer has it's their inability to defend themselves against a young woman with absolutely no fight training whatsoever. i guess it's adrenalin? lol.

Ivonia

08-08-2005, 02:58 AM

Another cliche' in horror stories/films I see occasionally is when someone is running away from a killer/monster, no matter how fast they run, or how far they get, said killer/monster is always right behind them (usually after they trip over something. Man, those sidewalks can sometimes sure can hide some nasty little bumps that make you trip and sprain your ankle when wearing sneakers/running shoes right?).

Another cliche is no matter what vehicle they jump in, either it doesn't work, or else the killer/monster will either A: somehow manage to catch up to the vehicle (here's a hint, drive faster than 10mph idiots!), or B: have a vehicle of their own to catch the victim (it would be funny to see a werewolf hopping into a car to chase down someone on foot though, and maybe run them over hehe).

Some horror movies seem to rely too heavily on gore for a scare factor, although I don't find it scary anymore, just disgusting. I find the psychological stuff creepier (like ghosts and stuff of that nature). A pretty good example of this is the end to the Ring movie.

A big, abandoned, scary looking house. Logic and common sense would tell most people not to go in there, but most victims are too stupid to realize that.

preyer

08-08-2005, 12:16 PM

funny you mentioned the Ring, because i wanted to comment on what's becoming pretty cliche pretty quick and that movie was the first time i'd seen it in, where the ghost 'fast forwards' from point A to point B in half a second to suddenly be right in the character's face. it seems *every* movie with a paranormal slant to it does that now. while that's still pretty new, relatively speaking (but getting old fast), the old part of the cliche is the creature suddenly moves at the speed of snail when up close. so they can traverse fifty yards in the blink of an eye yet can't throw a punch fast enough that it can't be blocked?

i agree, ivonia, gore for its own sake doesn't do much for me. used appropriately and it rocks, just not in every scene. you know what's funny? you watch those old freddy and jason movies that were supposedly the epitome of gore and there's more often than not not really much gore at all beyond some blood spurting.

okay, this cliche is rarely used, but whenever a lazer beam or thin wire cuts someone in half, there has to be a long pause before gravity takes affect and the head slides off the neck ('resident evil') or the person falls in half ('ghost ship'). i love those f/x, but they're sooo ridiculous, lol. (i especially love 'resident evil''s, where the team is stuck in a tunnel which has a slow moving lazer beam. after two passes, the beam turns into an impossible to escape lazer grid and kills the last guy, but it leaves you wondering why didn't they just make the grid the first defense to begin with?)

i'm a stickler for logic. if something doesn't make sense, i find it hard to be held in suspense. *but*... when you force logic, it's always just as predictable.

MadScientistMatt

08-08-2005, 04:45 PM

Just for giggles, I'd like to see a scene where a not too bright minor character tries to search for information on the monster and thinks the first place to look is Monster.com.

Fractured_Chaos

08-10-2005, 10:02 PM

Just for giggles, I'd like to see a scene where a not too bright minor character tries to search for information on the monster and thinks the first place to look is Monster.com.

*ponders*

*Gets a germ of an idea*

*Cackles maniacally*

Rhush

08-14-2005, 12:34 AM

Gotta add my 2 cents here.... I agree completely that senseless gore is just annoying. And I am "anti-puke" myself! That's why I just HATE every time Rob Zombie puts a movie out. Which is a shame cuz I LOVE his music, but his movies just suck! House of a 1,000 Corpses and Devil's Rejects (which I went to knowing I was going to hate it, but had somehow managed hope) were both so plotless! Gorefest... for no reason. And you can completely tell that he is a big fan of the 70's genre of horror which is just more "gross out" than "scare". And cliches all over! We got the token crazy "tx chainsaw-eque" family living in the middle of no where, the clown, the wearing of some dead guy's face... I mean Devils Reject was Tx Chainsaw Massacre with a clown thrown in, along with A LOT of pointless sex and language beyond anything even possible for a hell's angel biker to say in a 2 hr period!And the biggest cliche in almost everything? When you have killer mr x cornered with a gun, dont chit chat him up about your feelings. We know youre mad at him. Just shoot him!!!!

louisgodwin

09-28-2005, 12:36 AM

(Quote originally posted by preyer)

okay, this cliche is rarely used, but whenever a lazer beam or thin wire cuts someone in half, there has to be a long pause before gravity takes affect and the head slides off the neck ('resident evil') or the person falls in half ('ghost ship'). i love those f/x, but they're sooo ridiculous, lol. (i especially love 'resident evil''s, where the team is stuck in a tunnel which has a slow moving lazer beam. after two passes, the beam turns into an impossible to escape lazer grid and kills the last guy, but it leaves you wondering why didn't they just make the grid the first defense to begin with?)

Don't forget Darth Maul's demise in Phantom Menace, and also Taye Diggs getting his face cut off in Equilibrium. Also, in Underworld, when the top half of Viktor's head slides off. Man, this trick really has been overdone.

David McAfee

09-28-2005, 01:00 AM

Rabe

09-28-2005, 03:57 AM

Watching "Charmed" now and it reminded me of some cliches that *always* bother me!

The District Attorney (or Assistant District Attorney) always being at the crime scene from the very beginning, investigating the crime. Sorry, but isn't that the *police's* job?

Along with the above complaint about the police how about this one:

Scared Character: "shouldn't we call the police?"
Dumb Hero: (picking up impromptu weapons (and/or) single guns with limited ammunition. "and tell them what? Besides, they're not equipped to handle this."
Bored Moviewatcher: "yeah, cause y'know, people trained in the use of defensive tactics, cover/concealment AND weapons who have access to a LOT of firepower, much backup, ammo and even more specially trained guys are NO match for a boogeyman that will be faced down by a single guy who - watching this movie - hasn't the first clue to actually use the shotgun with the two shells he's actually carrying. I mean, really, those kevlar vests that can stop a bullet and adds a pretty thick layer of protection to the abdomen would do NOTHING to stop some nasty, swiping claw attacks which are always slow enough for the Dumb Hero to be able to do a really bad, overbalancing jump back move that allows the swipe to miss the Dumb Hero's abdomen."

Come to think of it, I'm convinced that you shouldn't involve the police. Then again, if the movie/book/whatever is being *that* illogical then why are they letting 'dumb hero' be allowed to survive long enough to make mincemeat of the 'nasty that has survived hundreds of years but is too idiotic/unable to survive one badly dyed overblown cool wannabe'?

Oh, and another horror cliche that needs to be officially retired? Where the "killer/nasty" is ACTUALLY the same person as the hero! Or, in the alternative, wherein a GOOD GUY is suddenly and horribly converted into a BAD GUY but they still have a 'spark of goodness' that can be reached by the most hopelessly useless member of the cast who is also the world's biggest goof. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we all loved to see Bad Willow break down and cry in Xander's arms...but even more realistic? Xander should have been skinless chicken breast by that point.

Also, when you have the hero and the nasty struggling for the weapon and then suddenly you *know* the weapon has been used (such as the gunshot going off) and the weapon is off-screen - wherein both parties are then acting as if they are both the ones affected until suddenly the big bad is slumping to the ground, victim of his own cluelessness/inability to take away the weapon. This one actually spans genres but in *all* of them it needs to be gone.

Sorry...but I do hates me some horror cliches.

(course, all the horror cliches that should never be used again would result in but one thing - Hollywood no longer making horror movies. Which I'm fine with.)

Rabe...

TheIT

09-28-2005, 04:31 AM

Putting down the weapon because they think the unkillable monster is dead, the the monster gets up and the chase starts all over again. In Halloween, just how many times did Jamie Lee Curtis's character put down the knife?

Not emptying the entire clip into the monster to make sure the monster is really dead if it is killable.

Come to think of it, any plot which relies on character stupidity to succeed.

TheIT

09-28-2005, 04:42 AM

Perks

09-28-2005, 05:13 AM

On the subject of the "Ew" factor....what the hell is with showing people vomiting on film so much now?

Oh my god, that's so funny. I always say if you lean over the basin, toilet, pavement, etc. and make retching sounds I'll believe you. No one ever got an Oscar for holding prop vomit in his mouth whille the crew got into place and the director contemplated calling, "Action!"

Fractured_Chaos

09-28-2005, 07:31 AM

Putting down the weapon because they think the unkillable monster is dead, the the monster gets up and the chase starts all over again. In Halloween, just how many times did Jamie Lee Curtis's character put down the knife?

Or getting within reaching distance of the killer, to see if it's dead, and getting grabbed...every time!

No. Just no. If I had to kill someone in self defence, I'm running like hell afterwards. I am NOT sticking around to make sure he's dead.

Not emptying the entire clip into the monster to make sure the monster is really dead if it is killable.

Or emptying the entire clip about the head and chest of the killer, and he. doesn't. DIE! Sorry...but if it's human (and not an alien from a distant galaxy), if you shoot him in the head several times, it's a pretty good bet he's going to be dead, or severely disadvantaged.

Come to think of it, any plot which relies on character stupidity to succeed.

Aww...you know what they say, God watches over Drunks, Children, and Fools...or something like that.

Rabe

09-28-2005, 08:46 AM

Not emptying the entire clip into the monster to make sure the monster is really dead if it is killable.

Come to think of it, any plot which relies on character stupidity to succeed.

Good point!!

So good, in my Eagle Ridge series, in the MC's first encounter with a big nasty, not only did he empty the clip into the monster, he reloaded and kept firing...AND kept the gun on the monster until back up arrived, despite severe muscle fatigue. Yeah...that's an excellent point.

Rabe...

preyer

09-28-2005, 08:59 AM

they never shoot for the eys, either. unless jason has a third eye, destroying his ability to see should render him largely impotent of killing potential, eh?

louisgodwin

09-29-2005, 11:32 PM

louisgodwin - just commenting on your signature. As a Simpsons Junkie, :D I feel it is my duty to inform you of the actual line used in the Simpson's Treehouse of Horror spoof on The Shining. It was:

"No TV and no beer make Homer go crazy."

I love them little yellow guys. Gawrsh!

Ok, I should get to work now....

You know, I had a feeling I didn't have that Homer quote 100% correct. It's been years since I last saw that particular episode. I think it was one of their first Halloween specials. So in light of that, I have officially changed my signature. Thanks, David.

emeraldcite

09-30-2005, 02:17 AM

Some of my favorites:

"Hey, I've got an idea: let's split up!"

or

"I know where we can get some information! Our local library has loads of books on local cults, madmen, and rare esoterica!"

or

Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. (Hey, wasn't that a six-shooter?)

or

Mary reaches out for John's shoulder. When she pulls to turn him around, the faceless, bloody body falls on top of her. She nearly suffocates under the weight of the blood-drenched corpse, and she is covered in blood as she pushes the gushing body off of her.

or

"Hey, look! An abandoned house. Let's go hide there..."

just some of my favs.

preyer

09-30-2005, 07:27 AM

'Mary reaches out for John's shoulder. When she pulls to turn him around, the faceless, bloody body falls on top of her. She nearly suffocates under the weight of the blood-drenched corpse, and she is covered in blood as she pushes the gushing body off of her.'

good one.

walls that move/close-in on you/houses a ghost that bends the drywall and paint yet doesn't crack either one and despite these amazing powers over the mundane still gets his wispy asss cracked in the end when someone opens a jar or portal to suck them back into hell. (no one ever has a magickal toilet that sucks ghosts into and you just flush 'em back from whence they came.)

louisgodwin

10-16-2005, 09:57 AM

A gooey substance leaks down from above onto a victim. When the victim looks up, the monster above them goes in for the kill. :scared: I know this was done in probably every Alien movie, and the 3-headed dog did it in the first Harry Potter movie.

Fractured_Chaos

10-16-2005, 05:55 PM

(no one ever has a magickal toilet that sucks ghosts into and you just flush 'em back from whence they came.)

*Makes a note to use that in her book*

I LOVE that idea! :ROFL:

emeraldcite

10-18-2005, 10:56 AM

did anyone mention the "black cat scare" cliche where the music swells and with a giant orchestra hit, a black cat jumps out of nowhere and scares the beejeebes out of everyone...then it turns out to be nothing at all

and on the converse:

the black cat jumps, scares, everything returns to calm, and then the monster comes...

or when something comes, you see the frightened face, and the screen blacks out...