In a way, horror lets marginalized fans reclaim and redefine what it means to be a monster in a world that has already decided that we’re monstrous because of who we are. In our own content and, increasingly in the mainstream (like the scene below from USA Network and SYFY’s Chucky series), we’re able to see ourselves in horror outside of the monster that needs to be taken down or that’s terrorizing “innocent” people.
Horror hasn’t always been friendly to representation - issues of misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, and racism have plagued the genre for decades - but it still has a particular appeal to marginalized people, who come to the genre and find themselves in the monstrosity and amidst the murders. In my own life, I will occasionally feel fear interacting with other people when I realize how scary the human heart is and I will often put those experiences into my work.” I think that’s why I often write manga with the “Doppelganger” theme where a character sees another one of themselves. I’m not sure if it’s because of that, but I’m not very good at watching myself in media and I hate listening to my own voice too. I don’t think I’ve studied existential fears enough to answer, but when I was young, I was thinking about my ‘self’ and became afraid. I also think the human body which contains the complex human heart is scary.
“As far as body horror, I’m curious about the human body, so I think I’ve created more and more body horror stories over time. Experiences like that have had an influence on my work,” he says. “When I was a high schooler, I was in a remote village in Nagano prefecture looking up at the starry sky when I felt afraid that I was going to be swallowed up by the night sky. He cites HP Lovecraft as one influence on his horror stories, as well as his experiences growing up. Ito has always loved sci-fi and the excitement of being in a different, impossible world. It is directly responsible for the rebirth of the Klan and was used as a recruitment tool that led to an increase in lynchings and the new weaponization of “cross burnings” - a tactic introduced in the film - as a method of striking fear in the hearts of Black people across the country. It is responsible for reviving fears that Black people were going to hurt innocent white women and girls. The film centers a Black character (played by a white man in blackface) sexually threatening a young white girl before he’s punished for it and is lynched by the Klan in the film. The Birth of a Nation counts as early horror to Due and many other horror experts in Horror Noire because of what it revolved around and what it inspired next. “ The Birth of a Nation was a horror film, especially if you were a Black person,” horror historian and author Tananarive Due says at one early point in Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror. One early film that few people actually count as a horror movie but changed the shape of film, scared the hell out of people, and had a devoted fandom? D.W. This kept on across the next thirty years with the golden age of horror delivering some of the most iconic films in the 1930s ( Dracula, Frankenstein, and The Mummy to name a few) and giving birth to generations of long-lasting horror fans. By the end of the century, we have the earliest examples of horror on film with titles such as 1896’s House of the Devil and A Terrible Night standing out. John Polidori was inspired to create “ The Vampyre,” and Mary Shelley… she created Frankenstein. After days spent speaking with one another in the dreary villa and reading ghost stories, Lord Byron challenged them all to create better, more frightening stories. Some of the earliest and most iconic moments for horror fans - and creators - can be traced back to the vacation Mary Shelley took with her lover, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, and John Polidori back in 1815. There’s a vast community of horror fans dating back decades.