The monster eats half the characters, they say "f..k" a lot, and there's gratuitous sex that has nothing at all to do with the plot!
LOL!
One of my bylines, of course.
Seriously, to me, horror has to be fun. Period. I don't care what, it has to be FUN. It also has to have a payoff. There has to be a reason to get to the last page and I should be able to close the book with a smile on my face, even if I've had chills, thrills and spills between A and B. Maybe redemption would be nice in some degree, but most of all, fun. To me, that's the whole point of sitting down and taking the time to go off in la la land in the first place. Not to get bummed and depressed. Scared, sure, but also with a safety net in the end. Humor is essential, at least to some degree to break up the tension, and the pacing needs to be steady. I hate for it to drag.
That's my take. Probably not with the crowd, but oh well. Never was one to go along with the crowd anyway.