Horrifying the Horror: Difference between revisions

 

[[Played for Laughs]] in comedies almost as often as played straight in horror stories or action adventure stories. All too likely to happen when a [[Food Chain of Evil]] is in effect. See also [[Break the Badass]], for when this happens to more normal entities. May overlap with [[Mook Horror Show]] for sufficiently monstrous mooks.

 

* ''[[Night Wizard]]'' features a [[Journey to the Center of the Mind]], where the [[Band of Brothers]] faces off against a Devil-Queen of Nightmares who prey on dreams and devour the minds of the sleepers. Inside the mind of Elis Shiho, the mild-tempered [[Friend to All Living Things]] / [[MacGuffin Girl]], she is defeated... but manages to survive and hide out in a weakened state, determined to bide her time as her powers returns so she can seek vengeance. While looking for a good place to hide out, she finds a strange, black door in the dreamscape, and goes inside... followed by a [[Stock Scream]], and her running wild-eyed out of there on the verge of a complete breakdown. What could possibly exist in the mind of such a [[Beware the Nice Ones|nice girl]], that is capable of terrifying a creature that lives off nightmares?

** [[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic|My little pony, my little pony, ah-ah-ah-ah-ahh...]]

 

== [[Literature]] ==

* This comes up at the end of ''[[I Am Legend]]'' following [[The Reveal]] that not all of the vampires are mindless, bloodthirsty monsters. The vampire-hunting protagonist realizes that, to the vampires, he has become a terrifying figure, a myth of godlike proportions. Basically, he's become a legendary monster that ''vampires'' tell each other ghost-stories about.

* In [[H.P. Lovecraft]]'s ''Dream Quest to Unknown Kadath'' servants of Nyarlathotep, including (and especially) the monstrous [[Giant Flyer|Shantak birds]] are absolutely terrified of Nightgaunts, because they serve Nodens, Nyarlathotep's mortal enemy and the only being who really poses any kind of threat to him in the Dreamlands.

* [[Our Ghouls Are Creepier|Ghouls]] and [[Our Vampires Are Different|vampires]] have been known to run away screaming at the sight of [[The Dresden Files|Harry Dresden]].

** Early in ''[[The Dresden Files|Changes]]'' Harry comes face-to-face with a Red Court vampire. Keep in mind, a Red Court vampire can disembowel a half dozen mortal combatants in a matter of seconds, and this one in particular is one of the Court's best assassins. On seeing Harry, it [[Screams Like a Little Girl|shrieks in terror]] and ''[[Screw This, I'm Outta Here|bolts through a wall]]'' in the process of running for its life. Of course, over the course of the war, Harry has garnered himself [[The Dreaded|a bit of a reputation]].

* At the end of Fred Saberhagen's ''Empire of the East'' trilogy, the demon-prince Orcus, mightiest of all demons and founder of the eponymous [[The Empire|empire]] realizes just [[Luke, I Am Your Father|what]] [[Deus Est Machina|Ardneh]] is, and [[Thanatos Gambit|what Ardneh's plan is]], he flees screaming. Of course, by that point, it was much too late.

 

* The ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' episode ''Teacher's Pet''. A vampire is scared off when trying to attack a seemingly harmless substitute teacher. She turns out to be a giant shape-shifting [[Big Creepy-Crawlies|praying mantis]].

** Also in ''[[Buffy]]'', Glory scared a few vamps away by basically existing at them. This was before we found out she was a god.

* In the ''[[Angel]]'' episode "I've Got You Under My Skin", an ancient Ethros demon possesses a boy hoping to corrupt and steal his soul only to realize too late that the boy ''[[The Soulless|had no soul]]''. Instead there was a dark void that trapped the demon inside the boy. All of the creepy antics during the episode were the demon's attempts to escape by getting its host killed. When the demon is finally freed of the boy and Angel is about to kill him, it calmly accepts death and warns Angel about the boy's true nature.

{{quote|'''Ethros Demon:''' Do you know what the most frightening thing in the world is? Nothing. That's what I found in the boy. No conscience, no fear, no humanity. Just a black void. [...] I just sat there and watched as he destroyed everything around him. Not from a belief in evil, not for any reason at all. That boy's mind was the blackest hell I've ever known. [...] I know you bring death. I do not fear it. All I have ever feared is in that house.}}

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

* ''[[Girl Genius]]'': The Other, the genocidal entity that wiped out major parts of Europe and created [[Mad Science]] monstrosities of every stripe, is afraid of the mere mention of the ''name'' Barry Heterodyne.

* ''[[Amazing Super Powers]]'' in the [http://www.amazingsuperpowers.com/2009/12/ghosts-of-christmas/ Ghosts Of Christmas] [[Yet Another Christmas Carol|episode]].

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* In the occult/supernatural/monster community of the ''[[Global Guardians PBEM Universe]]'', Nicholas Chandler is the most feared "mortal" on the planet, and merely mentioning Chandler's name to a vampire or werewolf tends to generate a flinch similar to what happens when a wizard hears the name "Voldemort" in the ''[[Harry Potter]]'' universe. What makes Chandler ''really'' [[Badass]] is that he's only fourteen years old. He's considered the "creepy little kid" in his neighborhood, and is distrusted by parents and children alike... until the children come to him telling stories of strange things bumping around their windows at night. At age eight he used a baseball bat to kill a menacing spirit he calls of as "the Boogeyman" to this day. And he's succeeded in taking down every ghost, ghoulie, or monster he's come up against ever since.

* ''[[Boatmurdered]]'': "[http://lparchive.org/Dwarf-Fortress-Boatmurdered/Update%201-6/ Our legendary miner headed out to work on the elephant trap... and the elephants -ran away- from him.]"

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

 

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