"Why do you like to be scared?"

If not mentioned above, mentioned here: Titles directed by the great Derek Lamb.

Confession: I had a crush on Jeremy Brett's Sherlock Homes in the 80's. I could also do a really good mimic of the woman moaning/wailing in the Mystery intro. I was born in 1976.

Sarah can you please do a Buffy episode just for fun 🥺

can’t wait🎈 Happy Thanksgiving!!!🍂🪵🥮

Sarah, I miss hearing YOU tell the stories. No one does a long version better. Bring us down the rabbitholes! Don’t be shy, we love you.

Hi Sarah! Just listening to the True Crime episode and the bit about the expansion of the genre...And I just finished a podcast called No Place Like Home, about the theft of a pair of Judy Garland's ruby slippers. (Shout out to You Are Good). It does all the things good true crime reporting does- explores social issues, has complex and interesting people in it. Puzzled law enforcement, lawyers... Has a mystery with mysterious things. And, No one is or has been murderd. So perhaps there is genre growth out there.

I do not like to be scared. In fact, I recently realized I only like scary movies where the protagonist experiences a genuine upward affective arc through the movie (e.g. I would class Midsommar this way despite objectively her being in a bad situation at the end. Babadook as well as the protagonist is genuinely in a better place than at the start). Even if they live, if they have experienced trauma that will liner I'm not a fan.

As an anxious person, I avoid the horror genre. The feeling of dreadful anticipation is physically painful and exhausting. I don’t mind the occasional gore-fest, but only when it’s campy, like Predator. I don’t mind Nosferatu. I can’t empathize with enjoying horror-I’d rather get a root canal than watch a Nightmare on Friday’s Blair Ring Saw.

I had such a terrible phase in my childhood in which I went to therapy for my anxiety about demons and ghosts. I read a book about demons and exorcisms and at the time I couldn't even fathom the idea that a book would have half truths or blatant lies (not to say that demons and ghosts aren't real because who knows really). I have genuinely let that fear get in the way, especially during that time, but I slip back into it occasionally even now. The problem is that the stories interest me greatly. I love paranormal stories because of the magic behind it all. I watched Annabelle on Halloween. Probably the scariest movie I've ever seen for me and I almost consider it exposure therapy? The more I'm able to handle, the more stories I can consume, and the more I can live my life. I just went hiking by myself on a mountain the other day and I missed going to one of the outlooks because I heard a branch break in the near distance (I was absolutely the only hiker). My final thought about being scared is that I wasn't interested in pushing my boundaries about horror until the pandemic happened. I wanted to watch the scariest things in the midst of lockdown because at least then I was feeling SOMETHING. I watched It without blinking an eye and let me tell you, I Am Legend with Will Smith used to be scary for me. Thanks for asking this <3

Such a delight to watch and listen to those most exemplary intros ever! The art, the subtle humor, the music, and the narrator made it a true classic. Thanks!

Lifelong horror obsessive here! I couldn't get enough of the movies that traumatised me at a (maybe) too-young age, like ALIEN and TCM, THE SHINING and THE EXORCIST. They still scare me now and I love them all. These days I'm even more immersed. My husband and I go to as many horror film festivals as we can - London FrightFest, Glasgow FrightFest, Abertoir, Mayhem, Grimfest, etc., and my husband reviews even more at the House of Mortal Cinema. We both also write horror. It's fair to say we live and breathe it! So naturally, we're hard to scare. SINISTER was the last film that genuinely terrified me, and THE INVITATION is the most disturbing I've seen in a while. Since we both make this stuff up, it's hard to believe in ghosts and the like. But logic fails me when there's a strange noise at 3 am. That's the kind of fear I DON'T relish. But in the purely fictional realm, I love the rush and the temporary terror. It's a cathartic thrill ride and it has been for as long as I can remember. And I'm a (millennial-friendly) Gen Xer, so I go way back! I remember watching the Satanic Panic unfold, and a search for books about it is what led me to YWA in the first place. ​A humble request:​ ​ My pet YWA is the Salem witch trials. People still believe that A) witches were *burned* in Salem and B) there were actual witches in Salem. Please could you do an episode to set the record straight?

I like scary stuff as catharsis for sure. Though I will say I didn’t watch much in the last few years. It was too overwhelming. I made the mistake of reading Canticle for Leibovitz in the summer of 2016 and as a dystopian future novel it was also overwhelming. True crime felt like it could both be helpful in its analysis but too voyeuristic. So now I have rediscovered fiction to mix in with history and science non-fiction.

Just wanted to pipe in and say I loved the Catherine the Great episode.

PS I love that you at least brought up serfs/slaves in europe, americans tend to forget about that part of history and that frustrates me greatly.

Soo this is a comment on your Catherine podcast. Serfdom was not just ethnic russians, it was many other people too (I am estonian, most of my ancestors were enslaved or themselves doing the enslaving). Baltic countries, other territories and people who were forced to be part of Russia again and again have all been enslaved, it was not just russians, through conquest they aquired slaves elsewhere and among other ethnic groups.

happy halloween sarah. i think this might be your jam: https://www.logically.ai/articles/how-disinformation-is-a-new-kind-of-horror-fiction

2. What do I get out of it? Season inspiration. It's more a marker of the season - leaves, halloween, windy, rainy, cuddly, Thanksgiving. All fall stuff. Plus, I have a little guy. So, celebrating is a thing for a few more years no matter what. I guess horror movies get me in the spirit. Although, horror is my thing over all. Therefore, what I get from it by watching closer to Halloween is the acceptance from others that it's "normal". LOLOL!!! Sounds ridiculous when I say it.

1. Horror movies, if I can find good ones. I don't find horror movies to be made in the last 5 years or so very scary. Maybe all the plot lines are played out for me. Also a possibility is that there are too many options anymore that I don't know what to pick. I subscribe to another podcast (NoSleep podcast) and listen to the new episode they issue weekly, along with back episodes sometimes. Thus, horror is a year-round thing. Fav genre - ZOMBIES! Am I the only one in the house that likes horror - YES! Do I make my wife watch at least one horror flick during October - HELL YES!

1. While I love to watch horror movies year-round, I put in extra effort to get in the holiday spirit in October and December (Christmas horror is my favourite subgenre) by trying to scare myself and others if they're open to it. 2. As an anxious person, I spend a lot of time in my head thinking of the past or worrying about the future. Being scared pushes me to be in the present and centres me in my body. While it may cost me a few sleepless nights, I love the feeling of being scared, and when you can share it with others, it's all the better.

I had to go to bed by 9pm (when Mystery happened to come on). I was terrified of the theme/opening credits, so my mom would turn the TV up loud and I whould run post haste to bed!

No one mentioned the show, The Great, but I find it's loose dark comedy retelling of this whole thing pretty hilarious. It pulls from some bizarre places that are real, like throwing your drinking glass in celebration, and Catherine's encounter with the infamous rumor, which I was not aware of before the show. Everyone does a great job acting the part. Ol' Tony Stonem from Skins is brilliant at playing Peter. They must have read some of the resources you guys did. Like he doesn't explicitly play with toys in their bed (or maybe he does? I may have missed it), but he's constantly just a little boy with mommy issues who refuses to grow up and needs to make a game of everything. What stood out for me most with the Catherine episode and The Great, is it would seem Catherine is winning soldiers over by explicitly getting on the good side of generals, learning the soldiers names, and bringing them cookies (as much as it pains her since it doesn't solve a missing limb). So the writers must have done their research in that respect as well. I guess I'll find out in season 2 where this will lead, since the show is taking liberties to not be accurate for the sake of drawing out a show, which is frustrating but understandable. If Dana Schwartz has a write up of her thoughts on this particular show, I'd love to read it.

And to answer the questions, LOVE that you included the Edward Gorey/PBS Mystery opening!!! That is eternally stylish. I adore Halloween and Day of the Dead, both. I am hardcore with my decorations that i get out on September 1 every year. I send out Halloween cards to my small, personal mailing list (instead of Christmas cards, vomit) I attend every haunted event within a 4 hour drive and i pride myself on being un-scarable. My own horror experiences began in early childhood with older female bullies terrorizing me about a killer who only hunted girls my age. And as i grew up in an old mansion built in the last century by an oil baron, there was an ornate sweeping staircase that creaked, a basement and an attic that groaned, etc. So my bedroom was 2 floors away from my parents' room and they locked their bedroom door, so i had to find a way to survive the nights and that was to just embrace it. I began reading Stephen King and Poe and all the other horror i could get my hands on and writing and telling my own horror stories,, especially during games of Light As A Feather, Stiff As A Board and then in high school, i was lucky enough to be a main Feature Creature acting in a haunted house and that was one of the best memories of my life. My sister helped behind the scenes and it remains the biggest unrealized dream and goal for both of us to create and run our own haunted house. But honestly, the only thing that scares me now is white men. Conservative, religious political white men.

Here's something fun and funny, but available only for Amazon Prime members unfortunately (we can slam Amazon later), but if you do a search for House on Haunted Hill, 1959, with Vincent Price and then scroll down to the cast and crew- The very last cast member is a photograph of a skeleton, whose stage name is Skeleton and actually has a bio and several acting credits. I laughed my coccyx off. Thought Sarah and those who love this show would appreciate it also.

I recently took my family to a haunted house and had to ask this very question. My seven year old daughter has been begging me to watch the new IT movies (she’s seen the 90’s made for tv version…. Shes a horror child. We started with wizard of Oz at 2, little shop at 3, Beetlejuice at 4, goosebumps the moves and the tv shows throughout her childhood. She has always enjoyed horror for her own reasons, but it’s hard to find horror for children) and I thought this would be fun for her. I knew my husband would hate it because he can’t watch or experience anything that deals with human pain- including things like America’s funniest videos. He’s too emotional in a very specific way for horror. But he came anyway and it was honestly a huge mistake. It was way too scary for both of them. I could not stop laughing for the entire experience. I think I love it because I was a very scared child and I had to work hard to find enjoyment in horror. I saw the beginning of one of the Piranha movies on tv and had nightmares for weeks when I was like 8 or 9. So I had to learn how to laugh at horror, how to stay until the end, because at some point the monster’s makeup or cgi or animatronic shape is revealed a little too much and you can tell that it’s just a movie. I loved the haunted house because the people working there were just constantly in character and giving it their all to scare us. I loved the effort that went into creating rooms full of, for instance, mannequins being cut open by a screaming evil doctor, or a yeti taking children away in a cages. It was like wow, people really worked hard on this. At the end, as we were being shuffled out of the doors by a horned man with a cardboard chainsaw, with deafening chainsaw sounds pouring through the PA system specific to that last hallway, the 11 year olds holding onto my husband’s shirt behind us and all of us sweating through our clothes and masks, it just felt like a sort of… like we had done something. Conquered something. Been through something, with strangers even. It felt very nice. For me. My husband hated it and my daughter took three days to tell me she thought the chainsaw was real. I think it might have been actually traumatic for her, even though she was saying “I see you!” every time she saw a person crouching behind a doorway. She still seemed to have a better grasp of the humans behind the scares than my husband. And I think she likes horror because it’s something kids aren’t supposed to have access to. But there are whole lines of video games she is now into where you’re being chased by a serial killer or evil robot or other monster (hello neighbor, roblox piggy, Granny, and five nights at freddy’s are her favorites) and she likes to not only play them but watch people play them on YouTube. It’s like…. She likes the scary thing but she likes to see behind the scary thing too. And then she likes to BE the scary thing, putting drawings of red balloons all over the house and pretending she is pennywise. I might not have answered the questions. But I hope this is helpful somehow! And if you’re ever in New Orleans, check out the Mortuary. I think it’s pretty great.

Hello!! I personally find horror movies pretty overwhelming, I think because they often get too gory for me or they can handle topics like mental health and trauma badly. Having said that, I love a good ghost story and recently really enjoyed listening to the audiobook of the Haunting of Hill House. These questions also reminded me of a podcast I listened to recently which investigated the science behind this very question of why our brains enjoy being scared in certain circumstances, so if you want a bit of a different angle on this topic it could be helpful! It’s a BBC show so if nothing else you can enjoy our quaint British accents and sense of humour… https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0009qtl

I grew up with makeup artists for uncles so grew up around horror- watching scary movies were always on. However, I have always enjoyed horror movies as they tend to have some sort of social commentary and, also growing up in non-affluent cities a bleak plot with flawed characters felt more believable than other happy-go-lucky popular movies. I don't watch them for the gore/jump scares, but rather absorb those in order to digest flawed monsters

I used to be able to hold my attention for the full length of a movie but lately I find that it's been harder. When I'm scared, I'm fully engrossed in the media I'm consuming. It's fun to get out of my own life and into someone else's for a little while. Also, for the catharsis (in the context the ancient Greeks used)

1. Sort of. My wife and I watch at least 1 horror movie every day in October, as opposed to 10 or so every other month, but very rarely are we truly scared by them. 2. I think as a genre, horror taps into some very base emotions that are often very exhilarating. Fear and tension obviously, but also the release provided by a fake out or comic relief characters. There is also a connection to sex in a lot of horror that resonates with our monkey brain, even if too often it can be exploitative. I tell you, if someone can make a reasonably effective slasher comedy with a couple of decent sex scenes is going to make a fortune. Less philosophically, there is a a shit ton of variety in the genre, which can make it so fun Lastly, one thing I think links horror with Christmas movies...so often you get movies in those genres that are objectively terrible movies, but are still super fun examples of their genre.

I generally hate scary things but I work at a museum and have recently found myself tempted, when I'm the last one here, to turn off the lights in the *back* of the galleries and walk through the dark museum to exit, just to get in the spirit.

My mom is a huge Stephen King fan, so I come by it honest. I loved spooky stuff my whole life and probably encountered some of it earlier than I maybe should have. For instance, the first comic book I ever read was my mom's 1st edition of Creepshow which I snuck off the shelf after she told me I couldn't read it! I always preferred the supernatural horror especially because my dad was big into War movies, so I liked the more fantastical violence and fear than the actual tragedies. I like a lot of the more psychological stuff where it's not confirmed whether there was actually anything monstrous or ghostly too. My favorite book is Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle. (I have not watched the recent adaptations because they sounded more sad than scary and that's one emotion I prefer to avoid more!) My partner really doesn't like horror. He had a lot of trauma early in his life and does not understand why people like to be scared on purpose, but I know for me it's that I like to experience the fear and adrenaline in a controlled environment. I don't like horror video games where I'm in charge of moving the character and what happens; I prefer to be a passive observer. Though I did also work a haunted house two years in high school and had a lot of fun playing with tropes and scaring people myself!

Hi Sarah! Excited about Halloween content. Your questions: as said above, I don’t try to scare others, ever, but I do love horror movies. Went to grad school in clinical forensic psychology, probably at least in part to better understand and “defang” things that scare me. We always seek the transgressive in our lives, no matter how far out that line might be - for some, it absolutely stops at Law and Order/ Criminal Minds type-shows; some people need tougher stuff. (Although the explicitly political damage procedurals have done to our society - no, there’s not a serial killer hiding around every corner - is probably for another podcast.) I think there’s a good house-tree-person psych test inherent in what horror movie scares you the most, conceptually. For me, I grew up in the country then moved to the city; “country” horror like Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the Hills Have eyes scare the bejeezus out of me, because I secretly believe that it’s possible large swaths of the country are still that way. Meanwhile, ghost and possession stories don’t scare me very much at all; it was strange to watch my brother absolutely petrified of The Haunting of Hill House, a show I thought was great, but didn’t find remotely scary. Our demons, so to speak, are so personal.

I used to watch Mystery as a child with my Dad and my grandma. I love scary movies.....especially if they are not just a blood and gore fest. I try not to scare people. I think it is cruel to scare others that do not like to be scared. If however I know you like to be scared, game on! I love Halloween and spooky season starts for me mid September and goes until mid November.

I like to get in the Halloween spirit around the first week of October by reading the entries to the Jezebel scary stories contest. I've been doing this for about 10 years. Some of the stories are duds (and many probably fake) but some have stayed with me. I don't like horror movies because the images are too much for my obsessive brain, and of the horror stories, I prefer the ones that are about paranormal or supernatural occurrences, rather than the ones about corporeal scary people. The two I'm obsessed with this year are one about a girl who had a demon in the form of a girl on her ceiling for most of her early childhood, and one about a person's grandmother who saw his friends from the future during an electrical storm, and whose friends saw the grandmother from the past. I think I like these scary stories because they allow me to think about possible aspects of reality that we don't know everything about yet, and they make it seem as if maybe there will be some exciting things in store after death, or maybe even during life. I mean, maybe not - maybe the stories are complete BS, but I don't think we know enough to say they're impossible. I have been lucky enough to see the Northern Lights a couple of times, and I have had the same feeling, kind of - that I'm witnessing power that I can only slightly begin to understand, and it's evidence that there are things going on in the universe that are bigger than us.

Wanted to order a mug and some stickers, but it's $41 shipping to Australia 😭😭😭 Why can't we have nice things down under?

I don’t like to be scared. I have what some might call an overactive imagination as well as an anxiety disorder and the two combined with fear is not something I could ever call fun. Anytime I have actually watched a scary movie it takes me weeks to calm myself down. I have always spent enough time imagining bad things I don’t need professionals helping me along. But I do love Halloween, but the fun Halloween movies and candy part of it.

Hi Sarah! I too am a big fan of horror movies and thrillers, and I really love a good scare in my favourite season, spooky season. I think for me it is a form of escapism, I love getting caught in the mystery and intrigue. It’s so fun to me to explore an ‘other’ world where the day to day concerns I may have slip away with the urgency of truly mysterious or life or death situations. I can’t get enough!

Hi Sarah! Loved the recent episode, now I’m listening to Noble Bloods in my downtime. 1) I never try to scare others. That would be rude. I do like to scare myself a bit, but only in the “spooky season” aka between sept 15- oct 31. 2) I often wonder why I do this, and why I can only tolerate spooky things during this time. Probably a lot of it is cultural. I also have always loved October because it’s my birthday month. But I also think it’s the only time I really am able to live in the moment. Watching scary movies and enjoying the season through treats and costumes helps me to stay grounded in the here and now, and is the best distraction from the stresses of the world. I like these fantasy worlds, no matter how terrifying, because there is rhyme and reason and rules the characters have to live by. It’s like ordered chaos, in a world that frequently just feels like chaos. I know that what I’m getting into is something that will make me scared, but in a way that’s predictable and reliable.

omg I also remember the Mystery! intro and watched it with my mom.

I started out in horror with folktales and then (probably too young) careened into Stephen King--I don't think it's a coincidence that I loved his books, which are full of children who are the only ones who will acknowledge the evil happening around them. And I think that part of what I like about horror is that as grim as things get, there is the drive to survive (bonus points if the protagonist is also trying to help others!). Also, Sarah, the phrase "November gloom bonanza" filled me with joy. Thanks for that. ❤

I ostensibly study horror academically, I think for the same reason that I study depictions of the AIDS crisis academically; there is no answering the "why" of horrible things happening, but if I can only figure out the "how," then maybe death and violence and fear become less disturbing. Somehow, I think if I put horror movies in a box where they can be quantified and pulled apart, then my reaction to them will become less visceral and I can understand something about horror's place in the world and how it functions. Unsurprisingly, I find it difficult to watch horror movies even though it's the genre that fascinates me most!

I think you have to separate the shitty shock/slasher films that are designed to see how far they can go in being disgusting or inappropriate from the better horror movies that really are about something else. The horror is a tool, not the point. The Witch is about girls becoming sexual young women and how the family demonizes her and she is not even aware of the effect her sexuality has. Hereditary is about grief and family dynamics and how you can't escape your family history no matter how hard you try to recreate and control it. You can even go back as far as King Kong and say that is about slavery - white people go to an exotic locale to treat everyone there as less than human and one in particular as a trophy to bring home and make it work for them. When it turns out to have a mind and will of its own, the white people are horrified and of course they have to kill it because they can't impose their will on it. THAT is the shit that's truly horrifying. I find the glut of indiscriminate misogyny and violence in most films not labelled "horror" to be horrifying! Or Shallow Hal - that is a horror show as Aubrey & Michael skillfully pointed out.

Ps: Sarah I had to stop my Patreon payments cause I’m broke AF and in a bit of financial trouble at the moment it has nothing to do with Mike leaving, just horrible timing! I wanted to make that clear! Haha. Stay health and safe everyone! 😘

Everyday is Halloween. I just like being surrounded by the dark things but then also surrounding myself with floral patterns that you would find in a grandparents home. The combination makes me happy. Watching the dark things I like knowing why people do what they do. Especially things that I couldn’t imagine ever wanting to do myself. Fascinating. I also love watching multiple documentaries about the same dark thing to see how the same stuff is interpreted.

I don’t like scary movies, true crime or even fictional tragedies. I think I’m maybe too sensitive or empathetic? My like is hard enough without adding someone else’s fear or sadness to it. 😆. What I love is safe physical fear - roller coasters, thrill rides, driving fast on a curvy road…times where I’m still being “safe” but my adrenaline is up.

I love horror movies and scary stories. I think, maybe, at its most distilled form, it is an answer to curiosity. So many real-life things are scary and uncontrollable. If you can sit in the comfort of your own home or otherwise control the context in which you experience that emotion, it's a way to tiptoe to the edge of our curiosity about humanity's capacity for evil or about the mysteriousness of religious symbolism without actually being in danger. I think one must carry a certain level of darkness in themselves to enjoy it, though. We have to, in whatever tenuous way, know that macabre in order to seek it. It's a curiosity about ourselves, ultimately.

1. I love getting in the Halloween spirit by watching horror movies!!! 2. I have no idea why I do it. Lol. I wouldn’t even say that I “like” being scared! I stay away from real-life scary activities like roller coasters… Its not because I know the movies are fake and therefore safe either, because often the only way I can get a horror movie scare out of my head is by convincing myself it doesn’t apply to me (ex “Michael Myers can’t find and kill you bc he only does that in Illinois and I don’t live there”) rather than convincing myself the whole thing is fake (lol). I can confidently say that I enjoy horror as a genre for books and movies but I don’t like being scared. Looking forward to what you conclude about this 🤷‍♀️

Loved todays ep!! Excited for the future of the pod 😊

What’s scary is that we can’t find a better place for Sarah to record the podcast!

1. Yes! Although I like being scared/scaring others under very particular circumstances of my choosing. I love horror movies year-round, but I admit I stay mostly in the fun, campy part of horror (slasher movies, creature features), and venture into the truly scary parts of the genre as an occasional treat. Getting scared during a horror movie is like a wonderful surprise I wasn't expecting.

Halloween hasn’t given me “scary” feelings for a while, I now consider it “goth season” - a time where the so called “weirdos” of society are celebrated. I like that we all get a little weirder around this time of year 👻

I like feeling scared but safe! I think "safe" is relative because I don't love haunted houses but I did go skydiving once. I like to say I don't have a fear of heights, I have a fear of falling. One of my favourite sports is indoor climbing, and I can climb super high without being scared because I know the rope and my belayer are going to catch me. On the other hand, I once climbed up a particularly steep wat in Thailand (much less high than indoor walls I'd climbed) and when I looked down I realized my friend would have to go back home without me and inform my parents that I lived on top of this wat now because there was no way I would be able to get down. I did eventually slide slowly down the steps on my bum in tears but that was a real sweaty-palms, heart-palpitating, reasoning-skills-out-the-window fear. I guess when I went skydiving I just really trusted the parachute!

I don't like scary movies. Real life is scary enough!

I actually am not a fan of scary or violent shows. They are either boring or too scary for me! I love stuff like roller coasters or thrill seeking fear, or performing (I am a burlesque dancer and nothing like the fear and thrill of performing and stripping! LOL) but I cannot do scary. Haunted houses cause me to cry and panic and make me feel stupid because I KNOW its fake but I just cannot deal. Its like my reptile brain takes over and I just want to RUN! Scary movies usually aren't too bad in the moment but I have trouble after watching them, seeing things in the dark and seeing it in my mind over and over. I have to travel for work and still think about that hotel movie 1408 I think it was. I saw it probably 10-15 years ago and it always decides to visit me in visions at 2 am in a hotel. The more I have stepped back from consuming violent media, the more I am sensitive to it too. My husband loves scary movies so every Oct I say I will watch ONE scary movie. The slasher films are just boring and the ghost ones scare me SO MUCH. But one of my favorites is the Exorcism of Emily Rose, its so good and terrifying. I guess I like the act of watching, but I don't like the after effects of being fucking terrified of the dark when I am in my 30s!

I watch all my horror genre movies in the month of October-my husband and I make a thing of it and enjoy it together. I used to also dress up and go to haunted houses but it’s become more difficult to find people who want to do those things with me. It’s thrilling-the unexpected is what I like about it. Or the jump when I know what’s coming and it’s delivered.

I love horror that comments on real world fears, either internal or external, made up or real. I like a good horror movie that teaches about new fears or changes how we viewed older fears. My favorite trend in horror has easily been "the monster is good actually".

I’ve been thinking about this so much lately! I really want to understand the appeal (for others) of horror. I’ve never been able to tolerate horror films or stories—even something as simple as a gruesome ghost story will perturb me rather than entertain. I know I’m the odd one out for this—it seems very natural to enjoy horror. I would really like to know what trait I’m missing. Personally I enjoy thrillers, so I know it’s not an aversion to adrenaline or tension. And I like reading murder mysteries, I think for much the same reason as you detail for why you like horror—but I find that same reason doesn’t apply at all to my viewing/reading experience of horror fiction. I’ll be looking forward to reading your insights! P.S. Halloween is my favorite holiday—but more for the costume creativity and autumnal vibes. I like the spookiness so far as the “thin veil” and the bats/cats and witchy aesthetics go, but not the zombies/dead brides/axe murderer type takes on the occasion.

I'm not sure I like being scared as such, but I do love horror. So what do I love about horror? Perhaps it's that there is so much horrifying about the world/history/power/existential awareness that good horror can feel like a form of divination; a magic spell that draws forth what we ordinarily try to hide. It's not only horror that's capable of such conjurations but the more I learn about, say, finance capital, or the history of labour, the more alien gods and demonic pacts seem like reasonable metaphors. There's a quote from an anonymous 19th century worker I often think about, describing the conditions of his day: "after the workman fails to work, to the Bastile with him to be plagued, to be separated from his wife and children, and to be slowly starved with water porridge; and after he dies ... his corpse will be given up to the Skilful Butchers to be hacked and sawed asunder ... for the benefit of science and faculty." I suspect it may be similar feelings that drive some people to wild conspiracies rather than paying attention to the actual, perfectly mundane conspiracies that go on every day - except that they take the metaphor literally.

Recommendations: The Endless (people reacting realistically to an unrealistic situation) I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House (perhaps the most tense movie I have ever seen but also somehow the most boring)

1. No, but I consume a lot of 'horror' or 'thriller' media 2. I mostly like the genre trappings, like ghosts and monsters. But I often get frustrated when those go unexplored in favor of scares. I know this is a silly system I've set up for myself.

Halloween was always more fun than scary: my Mom's birthday was Halloween, she'd dress as a witch and even made devil costumes for my sister and me one year, which we wore to a church Halloween party. (Southeastern U.S., crawling with Baptists, but knew of no one who wasn't allowed to celebrate Halloween). I didn't get to do much in the way of scary movies, but I checked out all the ghosts/witches/aliens/poltergeists books (the children's section had a nice selection, and while I knew of Satanism, I wouldn't have guessed there was a panic) that were full of creepy black and white stills which did a much better job of searing into my memory. A movie was just a movie, but when you see it "non-fiction" it's real, right?

I find I gravitate towards ghost stories around Halloween. Maybe it's the season and the fact that it is dark so early. My very Catholic, very religious grandmother had an experience with a ghost in my parents' first house and I have heard that story since I was little. But my grandmother often said that " the dead can't hurt you, be more afraid of the living". So it gives me... polite thrills to hear ghost stories? I remain skeptical but wonder at the possibility of a human soul being so tortured or full of emotion that a bit of that energy is left behind.

I do not scare people for fun, or enjoy being scared. I do enjoy theme park rides, and find them thrilling rather than scary. I enjoy content about horror stories much more than horror itself.

Ahhh that opening sequence!! Always watched with my mom! :)

I guess horror movies give me a way to experience the adrenaline of being scared in a safe manner. I had an argument with a friend once on the moral quality of horror films, and I told her that my feeling was that horror movies were less disturbing than, say, movies like The Ice Storm or Closer. Freddie Kruger is never going to come after me, but in the real world people actually do treat each other horribly for little to no reason at times. So I'd rather watch a slasher film and not worry about it crossing into my real life than a "serious" drama about people behaving in awful ways to one another realistically. The former gives me a vicarious thrill, the latter just leaves me depressed.

Like some of the commenters above, I used to think I hate horror films, however on further inspection I just hate the ones that lack any style (my idea of style, which is not very cool, is the great 70s and 80s trashy unrealistic horrors that are just chef's kiss like 'Slumber Part Massacre' 1982), nor the ones that follow all the same tropes trying to be terrifying but just end up being murder porn. Women are already being oppressed, stalked and murdered in real time (interestingly only believable in film for some) ~ can we please have some nuance ~ or at the very least originality? The blood and gore or women dying is the last thing I am coming for in horror but a part of me wants to be prepared for my encounter with the single serial killer villain embodiment of all that is festering in our society. When watching these films you put yourself in the position of the hunted and you're forced to reckon with that fear in a safe imaginative way where you can plot how you would handle these scenarios in order to come out the other side alive. And sometimes you're forced to admit a dark truth about yourself, you acknowledge what you would be willing to do to survive. This format of course only really works for the non-supernatural horrors. So, it is a mild dissociative meditation? Is it a safe way to process feelings of fear, much like watching a sad movie and letting yourself cry? Is it both and also a welcome distraction to the real fears we are facing; climate crisis burning down our doors, a global pandemic and the constant threat of poverty in this neo-liberal capitalist catastrophe? Perhaps our pleasure in the Horror genre comes from a similar instinct that drives people to latch onto conspiracy theories and adamantly deny the real more horrifying truths we are immediately faced with. Perhaps we can more comfortably sit in the heightened emotions of fantasy and make belief than we can accept the ennui, the painful and overwhelming fear we are all hopelessly faced with that we feel powerless to change.

I don't like being scared, and I avoided the horror genre growing up because of it. But I started tiptoeing in as a teenager once horror game letsplays became popular on YouTube. It was fun to watch other people being scared, but over time I really began to enjoy horror games and the types of stories that could be told through them. Then I watched The Haunting of Hill House on Netflix on a whim, because I had avoided horror movies/TV for so long I didn't actually know anymore if it would actually scare me or not -- and I fell in love so hard with that show and the subsequent Haunting of Bly Manor. The way ghosts and hauntings are used as metaphors for trauma and existential fears makes for such beautiful and heartbreaking storytelling. Maybe I enjoy being sad more than I enjoy being scared.

Yes, I do like a good scare around this time of year, usually by way of watching a new horror movie that I haven’t seen before. I was always the kid turning my head away anytime the music turned slightly dark or spooky. Could this be because my dad allowed me to watch Christine with him when I was four years old? I may never have a definitive answer for that, but around 10 years ago I realized I was cheating myself out of some potentially great cinema by avoiding the scary stuff. This year, after binging the You Are Good podcast feed, I decided to give The Texas Chainsaw Massacre a try and I am absolutely glad that I did. (Thank you!!) Having lived with an anxiety disorder to some degree for most of my life, it feels good to get enjoyment out of things that are sometimes uncomfortable or scary.

I think because I am always so scared in my daily life, I try to avoid it in the media I consume for fun, but then again I spend a lot of time on Twitter which is also full of these scares. I don't *like* being scared but I am, a lot, which means that my therapist frequently asks me things like: "What is the fear doing for you?" What I've found is that being afraid is usually a defense mechanism - if you're feeling anxious and worried, it feels like you're *doing* something, which in turn gives you a sense of control over the situation.

I like feeling scared when deep down I know I am safe. I think it may be something that later on makes feeling scared when I *don’t* feel safe less of an out of body experience. It’s familiar, it’s not dire. I love to get scared enough watching something on tv that I laugh. I don’t like gore or torture porn. Just the suspense that makes me jump, laugh, feel safe, release, repeat. As an aside, I HATE haunted houses because that is real. You are in a house with (mostly) men who *enjoy* scaring (mostly) young women. And to that I say absolutely not.

I really, truly do not like being scared and I only watch scary movies when I feel like I have to because I would be missing out on a great piece of art otherwise (like "Get Out"). I am someone who closes my eyes and runs through a haunted house when forced to participate. I don't understand why people like being scared, but I do like eating spicy food and I've always thought the two are somewhat related. Because I don't like being scared, I can understand why someone might not like eating spicy food and I imagine that people who like being scared might be scratching a similar itch when they partake in scary movies or other scary events to those of us who like spicy things to eat

1. Yes, I do. It can be hard to find things that actually elicit terror (thank my age and my mood stabilizers.) I find haunted houses are the quick fix because I am high strung and easily startled, but I usually leave laughing and sleep untroubled. I did read Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson a few Halloweens ago, and I had to sleep with the lights on for a week. As for others, I write and tell horror stories which is something I’ve done since childhood. 2. As for why, maybe it is partially hereditary? I learned recently my great-grandmother would scare my grandmother every Halloween. My mother’s name is Rosemary, and one of her nicknames for me has always been “Rosemary’s Baby.” I think another reason is it gives me a safe space to explore the terrors of every day life. I am a naturally anxious person, and horror has always presented a way to assign and name my more abstract fears. During the worst of the pandemic, it presented an escape from the existential dread as it traded it for concrete threats. Finally, horror and fear have a certain macabre beauty. In my difficult childhood living in an isolated area of rural Louisiana, horror presented beauty and mystery that the mundanity of my existence lacked. My earliest written story at the age of five was horror themed. As a queer teenager it gave me an outlet to explore desires far from real world danger, vampires a great symbol for the fear of the other but the drive to be consumed by love. One of my earliest bonds with my boyfriend was our shared interest in horror. My best friend is a mortician. Horror in many ways has given me everything. I guess in wanting to be scared and to scare in return it is a weird way of honoring the good things in my life. As a side note, the Mystery intro was my first introduction to Edward Gorey and the perfect example of how horror has always unsettled but intrigued me at the same time.

I kind of approach horror the same way I approach psychedelics- I think I’m drawn to both as a way to indulge in an extraordinary experience while at the same time testing just how much control I have over my mind and emotions. At no point have I lost the ability to ultimately remind myself that it’s just a movie or I just took a little acid, but I’ve bumped up against the edge more than once and the edge is a scary but thrilling place to be. But I might just be kind of a dark weirdo.

I used to think I really hated horror as a genre, but recently I realized what I actually hate is jump scares. If I'm just waiting for a jump scare the whole time, it completely removes me from the experience, I can't pay attention, and I can't engage with the film at all. A couple years ago, a friend told me that I needed to watch Midsommar, because there were no jump scares it. And I loved it! It absolutely freaked me out, but I *like* being scared. What I hate is being startled. I've been able to watch a lot more horror movies since then, I just look up the timestamps of any jump scares first (thank you wheresthejump.com). It's still scary, and honestly, probably more scary for me this way, because I can get really into theovie without getting distracted. Maybe one day I'll watch enough of them that I'll get over the jump scare thing, but for now this is the ideal way to watch horror for me

For me two things come to mind. One is catharsis, the same reason we might watch a sad movie we know will make us cry. It lets us feel that emotion in a socially acceptable, safe way. Except instead of sadness, watching scary things allow you to release pent up fear. The second is that I think for some, it might be a trauma response? Specifically for true crime, I don’t know how applicable this is to horror movies. I think sometimes it’s consumed because it can validate the worldview that it’s okay to be afraid all the time. That the anxiety you feel is justified, and by consuming scary serial killer content it somehow arms you with what to do and what not to do. I don’t think this is one of the primary reason people seek out scary stuff but think it’s part of the story.

I like being scared in ways I can control it. Same reason I like rollercoasters, it's adrenaline but I have willingly gotten myself into it. And with books/movies, I can always stop and start back up if needed. But also as someone with an autoimmune disease (celiac) who has somewhat of an antagonistic relationship with my body sometimes, I like how body horror and eldritch horror can allow you to explore those themes and feel validated in those feelings. I don't like what I would call 'personal/domestic' horror - serial killers, true crime, etc, but I love stuff that gets supernatural or SF/F and just creeps me out. Mira Grant's stuff for example (the creepy mermaids especially). I also love going to corn mazes and just screaming into the dark and hear other people scream back. It feels like a sort of folk ritual and I find it exciting and comforting. I also just love funny horror stuff, esp if it is campy. My birthday is in October and I watched Death Becomes Her with some friends over livestream to celebrate, and ever since I was tiny I've loved stuff like Beetlejuice, Twilight Zone, Nightmare Before Christmas, Phantom of the Paradise, etc etc. I love it when camp and horror combine especially.

I hate being scared! Hate horror movies. Hate Halloween. I don’t like the feeling of an adrenaline rush. Don’t like roller coasters. Don’t even like sledding! 😂 I think for me it’s about control. I don’t like feeling out of control or like things are not in my control.

I guess it’s for two main reasons. I have PTSD and it’s like a control thing for me. I love going to haunted houses to be scared because it’s fun and I also can associate that shaky scared state with something good instead of flashbacks.

Getting updates like this one make me so happy to be a patron. :3 I LOVE horror movies because it's fun to experience fear and creepiness while feeling fundamentally safe, thinking "this will never happen to me". I mean, it *probably* won't. It's a bit like a rollercoaster. By contrast, I HATE war movies and in-your-face violence, because it's the opposite. A lot of what you see can and does happen to people. It's too real and intense. Ghosts, not guns!

I have no idea why people like scary movies! I saw Watcher In The Woods when i was little and had nightmares for the next year.

I did watch this with my mom. And found it delightful and scary.

I've sought out fear from a young age; I've always found it thrilling, and I like to be thrilled. Horror movies, scary story anthologies, ghost stories around a campfire, haunted houses, roller coasters and later, ropes courses. Being scared ramps my emotions up to a place they rarely get in a typical day, and I enjoy the intensity. I'm often laughing once the climax of the fear has passed. Of course, a big thing here is knowing I'm actually safe. Being sure of my safety allows me to trigger a dramatic response in myself and appreciate it while knowing, intellectually, that I'm in no actual danger. What a ride!

I was very sheltered as a child, not even allowed to watch King Kong on the Million Dollar Movie. I saw the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers on TV at 13, alone, while babysitting, and it scared me to death. I generally avoided horror after that until The X-Files. Thanks to the matter-of-factness of Mulder and Scully, I found I could watch and enjoy the horrifying, the gory, the unexplained. I’m still not a fan of true horror but, for instance, I’m watching Squid Game (like everyone else, apparently) and enjoying it, sometimes flinching, or with eyes closed.

Ah! One more thing! I can't do really dumb horror. It has to be thought out well enough to take me away into itself or I don't get into that peaceful place.

I absolutely love scary movies. Weirdly enough I think it is because I have pretty bad anxiety. In a way scary movies (or books) help me feel better because the physiological stress response is to something external rather than something just going on in my head. I also have the option to stop an any time which gives me a sense of control. I also like to over think everything I watch and see it as metaphore for something else. I find I actually sooth some of my trauma response away by exposure to these stories. As a domestic violence survivor I especially like haunted house stories. They often capture the feeling of what it can be like to be in an abusive relationship. The constant tension, the fear that no one will believe you and knowing that you are not safe in your own home.

Being scared makes my brain quiet down. I like extreme weather, both heat and cold, for this reason as well. It seems like if there's an intense enough sensation to deal with, me relentlessly, compulsively, mentally punishing myself goes on the backburner.

This may sound weird but I like being "spooked" but not actually being scared. So, I love spooky themes, stories, or things that evoke a feeling of curiosity and questioning the unknown more than straight-up fear. Also, just listened to the Catherine the Great episode! Hope you and Dana can do a bonus episode dissecting the TV show as you did for the Crown! I'm sure this was a hard first episode to put out with Mike's departure but y'all did a lovely job. A different vibe but NOT a bad thing at all! Looking forward to the next one!

As I've seen a few others say, I am very much *not* a horror movie fan. I especially despise jump scares, so you won't catch me at a haunted house either (nopenopenopenopenope). Something about the passivity and helpless feeling of the adrenaline rush from a scary movie, I think. It's real enough that it provokes a reaction, but I'm just sitting and watching helplessly. That's not to say I don't love a good hit of adrenaline, but I prefer mine in the form of doing live performance and taking flying trapeze classes.

I hate being scared. Haunted houses freak me out. I was embarrassingly old before I went on the Haunted Mansion at Disney! I mean, I go on it now. But I still doing like to be be in the dark where something or someone could potentially touch me. Having said that - I’ve grown to like scary movies more the older I get. But they have to have an element of unbelievability. So paranormal, sci-fi, I’m all good with that as fun scary. Anything with home invasion though - I am totally out.

I sometimes enjoy it, but I have to be in the right emotional state. I really don't like jump scares and gore, but looooooove strange and creepy. That is what my anxiety prefers. The VVitch was absolutely perfect for me. I love when I leave a movie or story with a creepy, unreal feeling. Not sure why, but I have been inhaling spooky, creepy ghost story podcasts recently. It soothes something in my soul to think that there may be things out there we can't explain. Rationally, I know it's all bunk, but as I listen, there is some is some doubt. Maybe it is something to see these unreal things to fear when there are so many real things to fear outside of my control?

haunted houses and scary movies are just an elaborate form of passive muscle relaxation for me. getting all tense and then release after = so calm :)

1). Sort of. A favorite fall hobby of mine for the past few years has been going on long solo walks/hikes in the woods (which are perfect out here in Connecticut) and putting on a horror podcast of some sort (currently partway through season 2 of the magnus archives) 2) I think it's a combination of a couple of things for me. First is just getting in the mood of the season, which I think is pretty straightforward (similar to reading Christmas/winter stories when it's that time of year and there's snow on the ground). Secondarily, I find it kind of jolts my brain out of its regular day-to-day rut of anxiety and helps me focus on the moment (enjoying a nice spooky walk in the woods) rather than worrying about my family/work/school. Then when I get home it's much easier to relax and actually have an evening/weekend where I relax and don't worry about those things. A last note is that this method always does give me quite a bit of control - it's very easy to switch to a different podcast/audiobook/music/nothing depending on my mood and if I'm not feeling it.

I've always gravitated toward the creepy, but never full-on scary. But I used to love horror and slashers and true crime. Then, I had a good friend who was murdered. She was Black, and I saw how the media treated her death. In the next year, another friend of mine was murdered, then another killed in a drunk driving accident. And *amazingly,* I can't do certain horror movies or thrillers anymore. True crime began to feel like rubber-necking to me, and its lost most of its appeal to me, though I'll still occasionally watch a cheesy rerun of Forensic Files, until I inevitably get bummed out again. As I've gotten older and further embraced my identity as a mixed-race person and begun to acknowledge the pain (and joy) this has brought to my life, my anxiety has gone up, so super scary movies just don't cut it anymore. Yet, I'm still drawn to the aesthetic. I love the goth aesthetic and old school, 70s punk aesthetic, and was a punk club-going teen in the 2000s. There's a shared creepy, shocking element to these looks and scenes. But I can't help but notice now that it was a lot easier for white and white-passing kids to get away with dressing outlandishly and acting out. I never felt I could fully do it, so I was always safely dabbling in those looks. That's a tangent, but I think there's something there...

I used to think I didn't like horror because I'm a baby when it comes to jump scares and was of the belief that the only trick in the horror playbook was jump scares. Then I made the mistake of showing my girlfriend Alien because I didn't really think of it as a horror movie or really even that scary, and it scared her half to death. (Good news, everyone: she did NOT break up with me for this.) So it turns out maybe I do kind of like horror? I still hate jump scares though, so horror isn't something I actively seek out most of the time. I don't really like to be scared but find myself in the weeds of scary material out of sheer curiosity. Horror fiction is an interesting look into psychology; the trope is that we like to think we would make smart decisions but when under duress we absolutely would not. How many of us have rolled our eyes at the person who hides being bitten by the zombie only to realize in 2021 that a single person making that decision is really UNDER-selling it rather than overselling it. I think I am interested because the creators of horror understand human psychology far better than the average comedy or drama storyteller, but also all the things they throw at us are things we actually don't really love about humanity. I also have a deep interest in serial killers for much the same reason. I have this morbid drive to try to understand what could even remotely make a person into a serial killer. The most terrifying piece of media I've ever listened to was the Golden State Killer call to one of his victims. I knew it was going to mess me up and I listened anyway because I had to know. It did not bring me joy but it scratched the itch of needing to know just a little bit more about a real life monster. And I couldn't even tell you why that itch was there in the first place, but I'm fascinated by monsters both real and imagined even if I don't actively like being scared.

I hate hate hate being scared. Hate it. Hate scary movies that actually scare me, hate haunted houses, will not go on roller coasters, I am the absolute opposite of an adrenaline junky. Possibly related: I have a diagnosed anxiety disorder. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Our house is by itself in a big forest. Last year since kids couldn’t go trick or treating we made a spooky haunted trail for families to take their kids through and pick up candy as they went. It was a huge hit so we’re doing it again this year. For kids it just seems being scared in a controlled fashion is fun and for adults I guess scaring kids is it’s own reward.

No. I'm Black. Life in this society is scary enough without me going in search of it.

I was recently trying to explain to a group of friends why an anxious introvert such as myself has always been so obsessed with horror and Halloween. I've thought about it so much, and although it's clearly some complex bouillabaisse of nature and nurture, I think the answer is more or less twofold: 1) Horror is a safe space to work out anxieties about the real horrors of the world - being a woman, being an American, being a human. Genre work, I find, does a much better job of tapping into existential anxieties than your average drama, which is often too on the nose. As someone who's always loved stories, metaphor often hits me deeper than the harsh light of reality. 2) Much more superficially, I'm someone who gets bored easily, and I therefore love a good - SAFE - scare. I often joke that the movie Free Solo about the solo climber Alex Honnold is the scariest movie I've ever seen. You'll never catch me climbing mountains with my bare hands, but I will consume horror content 'til the day I die (hopefully in bed, of natural causes).

i really like zombie and apocalypse fiction, and i think it's because it's thrilling and escapist in a very formulaic way that makes it safe.

I used to think I liked scaring myself (by watching horror movies and reading about true crime) because I liked unmasking the scary thing and understanding it so it wouldn’t be scary anymore. But now I think it’s simpler than that; I think I just like the thrill! It’s gross and creepy of me, but I think I just like the emotional response of hearing about the outliers of humanity and the worst things we can do (or imagine). It must give me some kind of serotonin bump.

I am a wimpy wimp who has gotten wimpier as I've gotten older. I can barely read any thrillers anymore and I rarely read horror—it has to be light on the spookiness and I have to be able to read it in one day if I'm going to attempt it. I believe Urban Legend was the last horror movie I watched, over 20 years ago, and I'm still worried someone is hiding under my car every time I walk across a parking lot. I wasn't allowed to celebrate Halloween when I was a kid because my parents were evangelical Christians so that could be part of it. On the other hand, I've rejected that faith and I was never a good rule follower when I was growing up. I do enjoy the dressing up part of the holiday but hate all the scary aspects associated with it.

I live in the woods by myself, I don’t need to scare myself anymore than my radiator already does. I’m actually currently forbidding myself from watching or reading anything too scary so I don’t freak myself out alone at night! T. Kingfisher’s The Twisted Ones basically ended my ability to sleep on the first floor already, I don’t need more of that in my life. Normally I do enjoy scary movies and books, but right now it’s just not a good idea.

While I wish I enjoyed being scared, or least able to watch a scarey movie, I cant say thats the case. My Holloween spirit comes from the Disney's Holloween collection, and even then I don't particularly enjoy it. I wish I was too scared. Even films my friend deem "not scarey," such as Netflix's Bird Box or The Happening still scare and traumatized me days after

1) Absolutely! I love haunted attractions when I can actually get a group together. Eastern State's Terror Behind the Walls was my go-to for a handful of years when I lived in the neighborhood. (RIP they're replacing it as of this year </3 ) Horror movie marathons of course, but that's an all-year-round thing. 2) I've tried to answer this for myself hundreds of times and I'm not really sure! I can remember being drawn to "spooky" my entire life. Even when I was an absolute scaredy-cat as a kid, I loved it. I have a clear memory of crying and my mom taking me out of the theater to calm down during "This is Halloween" in Nightmare Before Christmas, but as soon as it came out on video I was obsessed. My favorite show was Are You Afraid of the Dark even when it kept me up half the night, and I had every Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark book even though I had to hide them in the back of the shelf at night so I wouldn't accidentally see the cover. It started manifesting as "real" horror movie thirst when I was around 13, specifically after watching Jeepers Creepers at a sleepover. Some kind of switch just flicked. The best I can offer is that rush of adrenaline/giddiness after a good scare. Horror movies are the only reason I've missed movie theaters throughout this whole crazy time -- that moment everyone simultaneously lets out a breath and/or screams and/or laughs is hard to replace. Like a lot of other responders, I do have pretty bad anxiety in "real life," so maybe there is something to that. One other note is that for whatever reason, I gravitate toward supernatural horror and don't tend to seek out psychological thriller/slasher flicks. Not sure why that is. Farther from reality, maybe? (Love Saw, though.) Sorry for the extended personal backstory :')

I love all things horror and consume horror books, movies, stories, spooky music, et. al. throughout the year though I double-down during the month of October in the spirit of the holiday. As far as I can remember I’ve been this way. Even going to church as a kid (when I had to) I responded most to the “scary” parts of the Bible. Ghost stories, YA and young reader horror (Are You Afraid of the Dark, Goosebumps, etc.---all formative) to Stephen King to indie horror flicks and “Paperbacks from Hell”. Even when they don’t really scary me they serve a cathartic purpose for me. My partner definitely does not share this passion with me though she’s come to at least understand it over the years. Horror seems to be going through a progressive, diverse, expansion in recent years with storytellers and super-fans of all walks of life actively contributing to the genre and field which I really appreciate.

I have a lot of general anxiety, so horror and I do not get along in the slightest. That being said, I do like creepiness - there is something creative and enjoyable about those things that ride the line. I have a yearly viewing of Over the Garden Wall, which isn't scary but it certainly has a creepiness built in through the characters & the german asthetic it tries to cultivate! Or something like Garth Marenghi's Darkplace, which we also marathon, is funny with a little creepiness. I like to be creeped out without the obsessive dwelling on my fear that true horror media brings

I approach horror films in a similar way as I do other genres because most horror films don’t truly Scare me, but I love the feeling of a good, tense atmosphere. I prefer horror stuff that has big themes accomplished well, more than shock factor horror. And I also just generally like the spooky, dark theming of halloween season. But at the end of the day I like that it’s a “controlled” way for me to experience Emotions with a capital E lol, the same way I like to consume media that will make me cry every so often because it’s easier for me to deal with my emotions like that considering I deal with a lot of anxiety on a daily basis.

The Edward Gorey Mystery opening credits freaked me out as a child. Had to leave the room.

Though I don't particularly enjoy the horror genre, I see how the over-the-top aesthetic of fear and jump scares in horror films and during Halloween can be comforting, as it is clear-cut and conspicuous unlike the more quiet fear that permeates our lives as frail little creatures who don't really know anything. It makes us feel like we conquered something when in fact we have not. Happy Halloween Sarah!

I can’t help you, but I can’t wait to hear your answer. My partner loves horror movies and every now and then I’ll watch one with him, and it fills me with so much dread and sadness. No matter how ridiculous, I find the movie medium just sucks me into an empathy vortex and I can’t stop imagining everything that happens on screen happening to me or people that I love. Everyone I know who loves horror movies just says it’s fine because they know it isn’t real. But it feels real. And the feeling lingers. I would love to be able to enjoy the movies and watch them with some detachment.

Off topic but to anyone who hasn't seen it yet Sarah guested on an episode of Science Vs. called Blue Balls - You're Wrong About Them ☺️

For me, I feel like I am on a lifelong quest, chasing that thrill of watching a film that genuinely scares me. It is so rare to find a really creepy one, but even the non-scary ones are still fun to watch. I like to see what new ideas and stories that filmmakers can come up with in an attempt to shock and surprise audiences. I have also always found it interesting to see what other people find scary. I love asking people what their favorite scary movie is. It is also interesting to revisit horror films from the past and make the connections with the prevailing fears of society during those times.

I’m a horror fan. Movies, tv shows, books. I remember playing at séances as a pre teen with my friends and even though I don’t believe in the supernatural I like documentaries about haunted places and hearing friends’ ghost stories, and I think spending the night in a supposedly haunted hotel would be a lot of fun, though I never had the opportunity. I also do like true crime stories, though I wrestle more with the ethics of that. Why is a complicated question, one that I don’t really have all the answers to. Maybe I like having fears of things I know to be fake because they can’t really hurt me. Maybe it’s just that I appreciate the way genre fiction (including but not limited to horror) is never just about ghosts and killers. And I’m not sure if I can fully detangle that, but I was plagued by nightmares as a young child. Likely due to being bullied in school. My mother says I woke up crying almost every night from the time I entered kindergarten through a big chunk of primary school and I had nightmares all the way into adulthood though I stopped crying. I dreamt about being attacked by creatures, being chased by unseen things in various mazes, people I love being dead, my teeth falling out, and plenty of other things. At some point, i got so used to the nightmares, and some of them got repeated often enough, that I gained a measure of control on them. And it wasn’t as scary anymore. I write as a hobby and at some point I started using my nightmares as story material. In a way, I started enjoying having nightmares, because they weren’t terrifying anymore. Instead, they were interesting. I wouldn’t say that’s exactly why I enjoy horror, but in a way it was a similar journey. At some point between watching Ghost at age 10 (it terrified me and I woke up crying from nightmares that night) and watching Scream some years later, horror was no longer just scary, but also interesting. Hope this gives you some elements of answer, as confused as it might be.

While not a halloween thrill seeker, I love true crime. It's fascinating to understand people from that perspective and gives an illusion of control within my own life, if I can "predict" the horrors others might try to inflict. That said, haunted houses are my nightmare. As a child, I got so scared, I literally ran through the wall in my rush to escape. My parents weren't thrilled about explaining the child shaped hole.

When I was a kid and young adult I loved horror and violence in film. Maybe I found it exhilarating, but also it felt unreal. In my early 20s I started having panic attacks, and then suddenly all violence (even super fake) felt too real, too personal. It took me about a decade before I felt normal again, in the early aughts. When Trump got elected, suddenly I got fascinated with true crime. I couldn't get enough stories about people who seemingly had no empathy. Whereas I can't even step on a bug without it living on in my conscience for decades! I still remember a snail I accidentally stepped on in 1989. Killed in its own home. *WEEPS* Interestingly, the moment Trump went out of office, my desire to learn about true crime vanished. Maybe it was the increased anxiety from the pandemic, including panic attacks, I'm not sure. I'm no longer having panic attacks, thanks to Lexapro and therapy, and I occasionally listen to violence in books and whatnot, but I'm less fascinated. It needs to be part of a bigger story for it to keep my interest now. Maybe my fascination with violence was almost like the freak shows of yore. How awful can people be? But I feel like I know this now. Unlimitedly awful.

In reference to the seemingly constant murder/horror/suspense/psychological thriller theme of my entertainment choices, I frequently hear "reality is terrifying enough- why do you watch that?" But I think the question contains the very answer it seeks. I watch it BECAUSE reality is terrifying. Life feels shitty. Nadia watches something dark and twisted. Nadia feels better about life. I don't think it's that simple, but I do think part of the attraction, for me at least, is that the "bad" is usually so much worse than the "bad" of everyday life. It's an escape to a worst case scenario- which I think can sometimes be just as therapeutic. All that being said, I think some people are just genuinely attracted to the dark/creepy element of scary things in the same way their other preferences just are what they are. I LOVE YOU SARAH KBYE.

I think I love choosing to be in situations where I will be scared because of the sense of control. I love horror movies and love rollercoasters - why do humans enjoy feeling like we’re gonna die? Because we only enjoy it in situations where we don’t really *believe* we will die. People have died on roller coasters but those of us who love roller coasters (I’m using broad terms knowing I can truly only speak for myself but bear with me) don’t go onto a roller coaster thinking we will die on it. We believe it’s safe. We believe the chance for exhilaration is great enough to overcome any chance of injury or death, which is perhaps not a great survival mechanism on an individual basis, but statistically, we’re right. When does a risk become too risky? I certainly don’t know. Why do I like being choked during sex, but only by people who I trust who I’ve explicitly told it’s okay to do so? Because I want to feel like I’ve surrendered control *but don’t actually want to lose control*. I want to be in control of the feeling that I’m letting go - that’s how deep my control issues go. I want to control feeling fear and doing so is exhilarating, even if it’s all an illusion. I might die on that rollercoaster. I might get nightmares from that horror movie. The partner choking me in bed might break my heart. But in that moment? When my stomach drops as the descent begins? I’m not afraid of any of those real big scary fears. I’m just feeling. I’m just alive.

1) I like fall in general as the season to pick up thrillers and darker books that I would otherwise normally read -- though I do read horror all year round. It's weirdly comforting, as others have said, to be all bundled up in a blanket against a chilly night and read something that, for lack of a better phrasing, brings you into an altered state of consciousness. Horror gives me sort of a pleasant brain-buzz as I'm both absorbed into the book and then, on breaks, more aware of everything around me. As an ADHD and capital-A Anxiety person, being in control of *why* I'm all hyped up about something feels really good. It's like eating spicy food or taking an almost-too-hot bath. Intentionally spooking myself falls into the same category for me.

As a person who was raised very fundamentalist Christian (where Halloween wasn't a part of my life at all), I do tend to find myself engaging in scary things around Halloween at this point in my life. Something about the crisp air in October makes me want to go to haunted houses and watch scary things - though i tend to prefer psychological horror to bodily. In general, i don't like to get TOO scared. 😅

As soon as I saw the Edward Gorey Mystery intro, I knew I was destined to write this comment...That was by far my favorite little creepy cartoon as a child when I binged VCR-made tapes of the Jeremy Scott Sherlock Holmes specials. I mean, not to mention the banger intros from Vincent Price in his little library set. Anyway – I'm a huge scary/horror/thriller fan and that goes hand in hand with my love of roller coasters. They're as close as I can get to real danger without putting myself at real risk – and like you said, it absolutely helps me delve into the empathy I feel for folks doing their best in desperate situations. I shy away from drama and conflict in real life and like to keep the heightened dramatics to the media I consume when possible...!

I like horror films, but I tend not to consume them because they scare me, as they very rarely do; the only film to ever truly rattle me was Fire Walk With Me. With that film, I was responding to BOB without knowing that he was a demonic spirit - I thought I was watching a father rape his daughter, and the daughter seemed into it, and so I was horrified. What I do turn to horror stories for is either allegory (Buffy the show was excellent at this), or ingenuity - I love special effects, and so horror is the best place to find good practical stuff even in this CG era. Or, for a while there, horror and low budget movies were the only place to find interesting women. I do want to share with you a story of watching a horror film and being properly startled, because I think you'll get a kick out of it: I'd recently moved back home after a bad breakup, and the next door neighbour had obviously started using the room adjacent to mine in my absence. I didn't know this, or that anyone would be bothered by any noise, when I started watching The Orphanage late at night. A big plot point in The Orphanage is that she plays 1,2,3, Knock On The Door with the ghosts of dead orphans. A next door neighbour who is annoyed by noise you're making will often bang on the wall to get you to turn that racket down. Neighbour and spooky ghost knocking got synced up PERFECTLY and I damn near had a heartache. Good Times.

For me, it’s a comfort thing. I remember as a kid being absolutely fascinated with the box cover art for The Howling (my mom was an HBO subscriber in the early 80s).. I was also a child of divorce, so when my sister and I went over to my father’s house on Sundays, we were left to our own devices (my father basically ignored us when we were there). I saw a lot of movies there that weren’t age-appropriate, including The Howling.

Being scared feels actionable. I’m a person with Big Feelings™️ and sadness doesn’t drive anything. It just exists and cannot be processed in any proactive way. The thing that’s scary usually has a solution (run faster, don’t go back in the house, etc.). So that’s comforting. It’s also helpful that scary movies are really obvious about their terrible parts. Most days have at least one terrible thing we’re just not allowed to talk about/remind people of and horror just kinda says, “We should say those things out loud.” Feels more honest even if it’s usually impossible in the real world.

I used to like scary things—true crime stuff, Unsolved Mysteries, horror, Taxi Driver-type horror. Almost all of this has ceased since I developed C-PTSD in 2014. Frequently feeling uncontrollable terror and waking up screaming from nightmares half the nights has made actively seeking out terror not appealing. Which is why even though my fiction tends to be Gothic (and the forthcoming book is bordering on horror), it’s what I call “feelings horror,” like Mike Flanagan stuff, that seems to use horror tropes to do Emotions Stuff. A dear friend told me she doesn’t like his shows because they’re not really scary, and that’s why I *do* like them.

halloween is not so big in croatia because it's a painfully catholic country although there is some cultural spillover from all the american films and shows we watch. that said, i never scare others and don't watch horror movies, except during spooky season or if something is so weird it breaks into mainstream, like midsommar and hereditary. when i do watch horror, i like that it gets my adrenaline up and also my life seems easier in comparison to all these unfortunate people who get tormented by pissed off ghosts and some such. i understand a lot of it is like allegory or whatever but, you know.

I enjoy being scared sometimes! The scary things I seek out are more in the ghost/supernatural genre rather than the horror genre. I love a gothic romance novel with creaking doors and polite Victorian children. I think the mysteries of time, space, and life (and the fear that it brings) takes me away from day to day worries of not being able to pay my rent or that maybe my friends think I’m a bit annoying. You know—equally scary things.

1. Absolutely not, life is already terrifying. 2. N/A 😂

I love watching horror films, listening to/ reading scary stories etc all year round. Really cheesy horror films make great background noise when I'm working/doing chores 😅 For me, I think I love horror because it's this odd mixture of excitement and comfort? On the one hand, it's thrilling, on the other it's like "well, I'm stressed about XYZ, but at least I'm not being chased by a serial killer", you know?

To me the thing I love most about horror and scary stories is about the way they sort of... Explore symbols and associations that wouldn't necessarily come to mind as something to be frightened of, but so much horror is dredging the human psyche for imagery that provokes an intense emotional response for reasons that might not be immediately apparent. The most effectively terrifying stories, in my opinion, are also the stories that strip the interaction between text and audience down its most fundamental form, using a variety of techniques to provoke immediate and powerful reactions. Even the pulpiest, schlockiest, horror is, if it's managing to scare us, using symbolism to connect with the audience on a very deep level and there's so much about that I find fascinating.

As a person with GAD, horror is almost a coping mechanism for me. Sure, I get nervous and jumpy but it serves as a reminder that my laptop getting switched out for a better one today isn't going to make me explode. I may dread this meeting coming up, but at least there's no axe murderers - just Brad the douche canoe in accounting. Also what I get out of it, is that even if it's campy, can you imagine the production that went into making the horror films? The acting necessary to make it even semi-believable? So good. Love horror

I like to be scared year round, through reading/listening to scary stories, watching horror movies, and learning about creepy folklore. Different genres do different things for me. Supernatural horror gives me a reassurance that there’s something beyond our physical existence. In general, horror helps me feel less anxious by putting my problems into helpful perspective. I might be stressed, but at least I’m not possessed by a demon!

MY MOM AND I ALWAYS DO THE PBS MYSTERY THEME SONG FAINT 😂

❤️