Everyday Horrors: Gangs

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Occasionally, as in The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight, by Jimmy Breslin, gangs are treated with humor. (The police and the New York and Chicago branches of La Cosa Nostra also refer to the midwest and east coast gangs' Los Angeles counterparts as the “Mickey Mouse Mafia.”) Most of the time, though, they’re treated with respect and fear. Although most people don’t think of the Mafia as a gang, considering them, instead, to be members of “organized crime,” they are, of course, a gang--or several loosely associated gangs, actually--by definition. The Hell’s Angels, like other so-called motorcycle clubs, are also gangs. Any organization, big or small (except the IRS and the federal government in general), that uses illegal methods, including extortion, intimidation, violence, and weapons, to effect compliance from victims for any reason is a gang.

According to The Mafia Encyclopedia, 2nd edition, by Carl Sifakis, one of the most violent gangs was the Westies, who lived in, terrorized, and controlled New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen. When a Mafia loan shark, Ruby Stein, visited their neighborhood to collect some debts, the Westies murdered him and took over his collections. One member of the gang, Patrick (“Paddy”) Dugan, found this enterprise so lucrative that he continued to rob loan sharks even after the Westies had aligned themselves with the Gambino crime family. His fellow gang members overlooked his peccadilloes in this regard, as did Carlo Gambino, the godfather for whom, ostensibly, the Westies now worked as hired hit men. When Paddy killed a friend of the Westies’ leader, Jimmy Coonan, however, he’d finally gone too far, and Dugan himself was murdered. His body was cut into small pieces and distributed over a large part of the city, a piece here and a piece there, except for his fingers, which Coonan kept in a bag, along with those of the gang’s other victims, to intimidate people and to frustrate the police’s identification of the dead. The Westies had liked Paddy, however, and they honored his life with a wake. They took his decapitated head with them to a tavern, set it atop the bar, and plied it with drinks, even lighting a cigarette for what was left of their friend, placing it between his lips so Paddy--or his head, at least--could enjoy a last smoke. It was only when Coonan met John Gotti, who’d murdered Gambino so that he could take over the crime family that the previous godfather had led, that the Westies’ leader met “a grease ball tougher than we are.”

Given the record of such gangs (and those of many others), it’s no wonder that gangs have appeared as bad guys in several horror stories (mostly TV series or movies, rather than novels).

An early film with the unenviable title I Was a Teenage Vampire brings Dracula’s teenage son to America, where he feeds off the Vandals, a street gang, before coming to an untimely end from a severe case of sunburn as he flees on a motorcycle to the safety of his grave in the local cemetery, but is caught by the rays of the rising sun as his bike crashes into the cemetery’s gates. The Vandals reappear in another movie with the unfortunate title The Teenage Frankenstein Meets the Teenage Werewolf. (At least the studios knew how to market their products to a targeted audience!) In a previous film The Teenage Werewolf, a mad scientist-cum-hypnotist transformed Tony Rivers into a werewolf, but the teen wolf died in a fall. In this sequel, he’s back, a revenant risen from his grave, and he joins the Vandals. The gang attack a hunchback, Gregore Frankenstein, who happens to be a descendant of the original monster maker. Having acquired the remains of his ancestor’s creature, which he keeps in a woods, Gregore revives the monster, and it attacks the Vandals. In the ensuing fight between monster and werewolf, a forest fire is ignited, which consumes the monster while the werewolf escapes to the safety of a river. (See? We told you that teenagers and young adults are dangerous!)

In “Becoming,” an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, an outlaw motorcycle gang of vampires arrives in Sunnydale to party and terrorize the local citizenry, having heard that the slayer herself has been slain. (Unknown to them, Buffy’s friend, Willow Rosenberg, a powerful witch, has brought the dead slayer back to life).

A street gang of vampires also stars as the villainous protagonists of The Lost Boys, one of whose members, Michael Emerson, attracted to the gang’s sole female member, Star, drinks blood, which he thinks is wine and is himself transformed into one of the undead. A novel by the same title was written by Craig Shaw Gardner for release with the film. The movie was part horror, part comedy, as its tagline indicates: “Sleep all day. Party all night. Never grow old. Never die. It's fun to be a vampire.”

In Gangs of the Dead, rival Los Angeles street gangs join forces with one another--and the police--to fight off an army of zombies born, so to speak, of an extraterrestrial virus that arrives courtesy of a meteorite. President Ronald Reagan once observed that the threat of war by an extraterrestrial species would unite the warring nations of the earth against a common threat. For street gangs, an army of dead men walking seems to work, too.


“Everyday Horrors: Gangs” is the first in a series of “everyday horrors” that will be featured in Chillers and Thrillers: The Fiction of Fear. These “everyday horrors” continue, in many cases, to appear in horror fiction, literary, cinematographic, and otherwise.

Everyday Horrors: Plagues

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

When most people think of the plague, they are likely to think of the bubonic plague, or “Black Death” that decimated the populations of medieval Europe and other parts of the world. Caused by bacteria carried by infected rats and the fleas who regarded their rodent hosts as moveable feasts, the plague killed as many as 30,000,000 Europeans, or about a third of that continent’s population, in the 13th century. About 550 years later, the same disease killed about 12,000,000 Chinese. Although the plague continues to kill men, women, and children today, its death toll has been greatly reduced, there having been a mere 2,118 fatalities in 2003. A handful of individuals in the United States succumb to the disease each year, but “there has not been a case of person-to-person infection. . . since 1924.”

Usually, the plague attacks the lymph nodes, causing flu-like symptoms within three to seven days, including “fever, headache, chills, weakness, and swollen tender lymph glands,” or buboes (“hence the name bubonic”). Today, the plague is treated with antibiotics.

In addition to rats, “many other rodent species, for instance, prairie dogs, wood rats, chipmunks, and other ground squirrels and their fleas,” also “suffer plague outbreaks and some of these occasionally serve as sources of human infection.” In addition,

Deer mice and voles are thought to maintain the disease in animal populations but are less important as sources of human infection. Other less frequent sources of infection include wild rabbits, and wild carnivores that pick up their infections from wild rodent outbreaks. Domestic cats (and sometimes dogs) are readily infected by fleas or from eating infected wild rodents. Cats may serve as a source of infection to persons exposed to them. Pets may also bring plague-infected fleas into the home.

According to a source that the online encyclopedia, Wikipedia, does not bother to cite:

The bacteria multiply inside the flea, sticking together to form a plug that blocks its stomach and causes it to begin to starve. The flea then voraciously bites a host and continues to feed, even though it cannot quell its hunger, and consequently the flea vomits blood tainted with the bacteria back into the bite wound. The bubonic plague bacterium then infects a new victim, and the flea eventually dies from starvation.

In The Decameron, Boccaccio provides an account of the plague; even a small excerpt of his narrative conveys something of the horror of the black death:

. . . in men and women alike it first betrayed itself by the emergence of certain tumours in the groin or the armpits, some of which grew as large as a common apple, others as an egg, some more, some less, which the common folk called gavoccioli. From the two said parts of the body this deadly gavocciolo soon began to propagate and spread itself in all directions indifferently; after which the form of the malady began to change, black spots or livid making their appearance in many cases on the arm or the thigh or elsewhere, now few and large, now minute and numerous. And as the gavocciolo had been and still was an infallible token of approaching death, such also were these spots on whomsoever they shewed themselves.

There are other plagues besides the Black Death, a famous series of which were the 10 plagues described in Exodus.

1. Water turned to blood
2. Sky raining frogs
3. Lice
4. Flies
5. Diseased livestock
6. Boils
7. Rain of hail and fire
8. Locusts
9. Darkness
10. Deaths of firstborn sons

Professor Roger Wotton of the University College of London identifies several natural events that might have caused the Biblical floods:

A large storm may have caused the rivers of blood with heavy rain on the dry, baked soil of Egypt causing sediment-rich underlying soils and rocks to flow from tributaries into the Nile, which could also explain the killing of fish.

The fiery hail as described in the Bible could have been large hail and ball lightning that often followed dramatic storms, as could the darkening of skies.

The lice plague could be explained through the sudden mass hatching of lice after rainfall that followed hot and dry weather and the plague of frogs was explained by the emergence of spadefoot toads from hiding places in damp undersoil following a large rain.

The described biblical swarms of flies may have been clouds of biting midges which could have been seen as pestilence that killed cattle and caused boils on humans.

Both the Black Death and the Biblical plagues have inspired both horror novels and films, including Robert McCammon’s Swan Song, Stephen King’s The Stand, The Abominable Dr. Phibes, and The Reaping, among others:

Swan Song:

On the edge of a barren Kansas landscape, an ex-wrestler called Black Frankenstein hears the cry. . . . . "Protect the Child!"--In the wasteland of New York City, a bag lady clutches a strange glass ring and feels magic coursing through her--within an Idaho mountain, a survivalist compound lies in ruins, and a young boy learns how to kill.

In a wasteland born of nuclear rage, in a world of mutant animals and marauding armies, the last people on earth are now the first. Three bands of survivors journey toward destiny--drawn into the final struggle between annihilation and life!

They have survived the unsurvivable. Now the ultimate terror begins.

The Stand:

One man escapes from a biological weapon facility after an accident, carrying with him the deadly virus known as Captain Tripps, a rapidly mutating flu that--in the ensuing weeks--wipes out most of the world's population. In the aftermath, survivors choose between following an elderly black woman to Boulder or the dark man, Randall Flagg, who has set up his command post in Las Vegas.

The two factions prepare for a confrontation between the forces of good and evil.

Dreamcatcher:

Four lifelong friends gather in the woods of western Maine for their annual hunting trip. When they were young, they were bound together forever by an act of bravery involving a fifth friend, whose influence has given these men special powers. Their trip is disrupted when a stranger, disoriented and delirious, wanders into camp, muttering about light in the sky. Before long, the friends find themselves pitted against an alien invasion and must draw on their old friend's strength once again to fight for their lives.

The Abominable Dr. Phibes:

Dr. Anton Phibes, a mad doctor (his Ph.D is in music!). . .was horribly disfigured in an automobile accident while racing to see his wife in the hospital, where she was undergoing unsuccessful surgery that left her dead. . . .

Set in 1925, the plot follows the mad musician as he kills off the surgical team behind the failed operation, using grimly imaginative methods (bees, rats, bats) inspired by the Old Testament plagues Moses called down upon Egypt (it seems Phibes also studied theology while getting his musical degree). . . .

The Reaping:

Investigative scholar Katherine Winter (Hilary Swank) is a debunker of modern "miracles," bringing scientific light to superstition and fraud. But events in tiny Haven, Louisiana, defy even her expertise. There, the 10 Biblical Plagues seem to be reoccurring. And the more she seeks answers, the more she questions her own beliefs.

Not to be outdone (or left behind) by the masters of horror, several science fiction novelists and scriptwriters have also based stories upon the idea of plagues, one of which arrives from outer space (Michael Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain), and another of which resulted from a disease caused by biological warfare. The victims undergo bizarre mutations that transform them into vampire-like creatures. The Omega Man is a military scientist who’d injected himself with an experimental vaccine against the disease. It’s up to him to try to save the world.

“Everyday Horrors: Plagues” is the first in a series of “everyday horrors” that will be featured in Chillers and Thrillers: The Fiction of Fear. These “everyday horrors” continue, in many cases, to appear in horror fiction, literary, cinematographic, and otherwise.

Everyday Horrors: The Atomic Bomb

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

When we see or hear the word “bikini,” we tend to think of--well, not death and destruction, certainly. However, it was upon the Bikini atoll, in the Pacific Ocean, that the first several nuclear bombs were tested. After detonating the bomb, the U. S. government relocated natives back to the atoll, from which they’d been evacuated, but the levels of radioactivity within their bodies suggested that they should be relocated again, so they were moved to Kili island, where they remain, wards of the federal government.

It was a Bikini atoll test that awakened the Japanese monster Godzilla. However, the U. S. was involved in far more sinister activities than those precipitated by the awakening of the fictitious Godzilla.

One of these activities was Project 4.1, a medical experiment that the government conducted in secret upon Marshall Island residents who had been exposed to radioactive fallout as a result of the government’s Castle Bravo nuclear test, which took place upon the Bikini atoll. The experiment, which began within a week of the Castle Bravo test, was known, officially, as “Study of Response of Human Beings Exposed to Significant Beta and Gamma radiation due to Fall-Out from High Yield Weapons.” (The powers of many of the Marvel Comics characters, including the Hulk and Spider-man, are results of radioactive experiments. Perhaps Stan Lee knew more than he’s saying?)

The Department of Energy stated the threefold purpose of the project: “(1) evaluate the severity of radiation injury to the human beings exposed, (2) provide for all necessary medical care, and (3) conduct a scientific study of radiation injuries to human beings.” The study showed significant effects from the Marshallese’s exposure to the radioactive fallout, including hair loss, skin damage (“raw, weeping lesions”), miscarriages, stillbirths, cancer, and neoplasms.

As bad as the fate of the test site’s human guinea pigs was, that of the Japanese at Nagasaki and Hiroshima were even worse. Those victims of the atomic bombs designated as Little Boy (which took out Hiroshima on August 6, 1945) and Fat Man (which took out Nagasaki on August 9, 1946), who survived the attack experienced severe burns, radiation sickness, and a variety of diseases, including cancer. As many as 140,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 in Nagasaki were killed by the explosion of the bomb. The cities themselves were leveled, with only a few, burned-out structures remaining. Had Japan not surrendered, ending World War II, the U. S. had planned to drop several more atomic bombs on the island nation, as more of the weapons were in production and were expected to be completed during the next few months.

The atomic bomb was the product of the Manhattan Project, headed by J. Robert Oppenheimer.

During the 1950’s and 1960’s, many B horror films were made that featured monsters (often Bug-eyed Monsters) created by the effects of the atomic bomb or radiation in general, including:

• Amazing Colossal Man, The
• Attack of the Giant Leeches
• Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, The
• Bride of the Monster
• Creature from the Black Lagoon, The
• Damnation Alley
• Day the Earth Caught Fire, The
• Day the earth Ended, The
• Fiend without a Face
• Godzilla
• Hills Have Eyes, The
• Incredible Shrinking Man, The
• It Came from Beneath the Sea
• Killer Shrews, The
• Omega Man, The
• Rocket Ship X-M
• Them!

Even more novels, more science fiction than horror per se, resulted from plots involving atomic bombs or radiation:

• Airship Nine
• Alas, Babylon
• Amnesia Moon
• Arc Light
• Ashes Series
• Brother in the Land
• Canticle for Leibowitz, A
• Children of the Dust
• Chrysalids, The
• Commander-1
• Dark Tower Saga, The
• Dark December by Alfred Coppel
• Dark Mirrors
• Day They H-Bombed Los Angeles, The
• Dr. Bloodmoney, or How We Got Along After the Bomn
• Domain
• Doomday Wing
• Down to a Sunless Sea
• Dune
• Earthwreck!
• End of the World, The
• Farnham's Freehold
• Gate to Women's Country, The
• Hostage
• Last Children of Schewenborn, The
• Last Ship, The
• Level 7
• Light's Out
• Long Mynd, The
• Malevil
• Not This August
• On the Beach
• Outward Urge, The
• Postman, The
• Red Alert
• Resurrection Day
• Riddley Walker
• Pre-Empt
• Pulling Through
• School for Atheists, The
• Seventh Day, The
• Small Armageddon, A
• Solution T-25
• Swan Song
• Systemic Shock
• Road, The
• This Is the Way the World Ends
• This Time Tomorrow
• Tomorrow!
• Triton Ultimatum, The
• Warday
• When the Wind Blows
• Wild Shore, The
• World Set Free , The
• World Next Door, The
• Worldwar
• Z for Zachariah
• Zone, The

However, when one considers the U. S. government’s irresponsible testing and use of human guinea pigs, to say nothing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the films featuring monsters pale in comparison to the horrors unleashed by the feds. It’s as is, in seizing the power of God, humanity has become not divine, but demonic, a destroyer rather than a creator.

More horrible yet may be the proliferation of atomic weapons around the world. According to the Federation of American Scientists, these nations have nuclear weapons capabilities:

• China
• France
• India
• Israel
• North Korea
• Pakistan
• Russia
• United Kingdom
• United States

“Everyday Horrors: The Atomic Bomb” is the first in a series of “everyday horrors” that will be featured in Chillers and Thrillers: The Fiction of Fear. These “everyday horrors” continue, in many cases, to appear in horror fiction, literary, cinematographic, and otherwise.

Identifying Elements of the Horrific

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

What constitutes the horrific? While the answer to this question may depend to some degree upon the individual and may vary from one person to another, most people would agree that some features are horrific in general by their very nature. As an aspiring horror writer, one should be familiar with these elements. This post will consider some of things that most people believe to be horrific.

Anything that is subterranean or submarine is frightening: basements, caves, crawlspaces, hell, mines, the ocean bottom or river bottoms, submarine vessels, and tunnels. We know not where (and to what) they might lead. They are paths to mysterious regions that are yet unexplored and uncharted, where there may be monsters. Were we to follow their lead, we might become irretrievably lost. We might die of hunger and thirst and exposure, alone and far from friends, family, and the culture and civilization which, in large part, give meaning to our lives. Even our corpses might be lost, remaining unburied and, worse, unmarked and unremembered. It might be as if we'd never lived at all.

Anything that is close is frightening: narrow spaces of all kinds, many of which overlap with the ones mentioned in the previous paragraph: basements, caves, crawlspaces, submarines, and tunnels. To this list, in “Premature Burial,” Edgar Allan Poe added the grave itself, as a place of absolute confinement, in the case of one who has been buried alive. We might add engines of torture in which the victim is confined, such as the iron maiden or walls that press in upon one, as they do in Poe’s “The Pit and the Pendulum.” We might also add cages, cells, dungeons, and collapsed mines.

That which is of a hideous appearance alarms. Deformities and birth defects and mutations top the list in this category, but those whose faces have been destroyed by acid, disease, or fire are also ghastly and unsettling to those whose own countenances, if not lovely or handsome, are at least of normal appearance. The deformed body is as horrific as the misshapen face, as pitiful stories of the Hunchback of Notre Dame and the Elephant Man attest.



Mementos mori frighten us because of what they are: reminders of our own looming deaths. The skull and the skeleton spring to mind as such reminders, but so also are catacombs, cemeteries, coffins, graves, headstones, morgues, mortuaries, tombs, and worms. As John Donne shows us, even the pealing of a bell can recall to us our imminent demise: we need not send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for you and me.

Vast spaces can be intimidating, as cornfields, deserts, forests, icebergs, jungles, mountains, oceans, pastures, planets, and outer space suggest. Many of these places are also isolated, which cuts characters off from society and culture and the defenses that each provides against both brutish nature and the animal nature within humanity. However, smaller places, such as total installations (boarding schools, camps, colleges and universities, forts, hotels, military installations, nursing homes, outposts, prisons, research facilities, resorts, or even trains) can also be remote and, therefore, can be not only lonely but also cut off from the larger world and its comforts, resources, and protections.

Some animals’ appearance is repulsive. Most amphibians and reptiles are, by nature as well as by their looks, abhorrent to many. God himself used a plague of frogs against ancient Egypt in his campaign to force pharaoh to release Moses and the Israelites from bondage. Insects are, likewise, revolting to many, as are worms and many other creepy crawlies. Some contend that amphibians and reptiles (and their eggs and spawn, especially) remind us of sex; others say they are mementos mori.

Wild animals, especially when their strength and abilities are magnified by conferring gigantic size upon them, frighten most people. Think of what the world would be like if it were still populated by dinosaurs and one was as likely to encounter a tyrannosaur as a hamburger at the golden arches.



Wildernesses are frightening, because they tend to be remote. Moreover, most such places are not only inhospitable in themselves, but they are also likely to be home to wild animals that will attack and, quite possibly, eat humans who, for whatever reason, trespass upon their domain. In addition to deserts, forests, islands jungles, mountains, and underwater environments, wildernesses may include the arctic, the Antarctic, hidden valleys, lost worlds, and swamps. Some may also offer dangers peculiar to themselves, such as animals that were thought to have become extinct but have somehow managed to survive in a remote area, pools of quicksand, or tribes of headhunting cannibals.

Anyone who is not only a danger to him- or herself but is also a danger to others, whether intentionally, as Leatherface or Jason might be, or unintentionally, as many teenagers tend to be, are also people to fear. Some people, just by their attitude or behavior, seem to dare the monster to spindle, fold, and mutilate them, and, of course, any monster worth the name is going to be more than happy to oblige.

Instruments of torture and death are also frightful devices, to be avoided at all costs. The number of such devices is many, and they needn’t be listed. Suffice it to say, if something looks as of it could cause pain, suffering, and/or death, most likely it can and it should, therefore, be avoided.

Of course, in a horror story, none of these persons, place, or things should be avoided forever or even for very long; if they are, the story won’t be horrific or even suspenseful. Sooner or later, characters must suffer one or more of these fates before succumbing, at last, to a hideous and ugly death:

• Abduction
• Battery
• Being bound or fettered
• Being chased or stalked
• Being eaten alive
• Being hit over the head with a blunt object
• Being flayed alive
• Being lost
• Being roasted or otherwise cooked alive
• Being shot with a pistol or a rifle (or even a crossbow)
• Being smashed by a falling boulder or other heavy object
• Cannibalism
• Disfigurement
• Dislocation of joints
• Drowning
• Electrocution
• Explosion
• Gassing
• Hanging
• Immolation
• Imprisonment
• Isolation
• Kidnapping
• Live burial
• Mauling
• Mutilation
• Poisoning
• Sexual assault
• Stabbing
• Starvation
• Strangulation
• Suffocation
• Torture

Buffy and Kendra: They Just Slay Me!

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

In the “What’s My Line, Part I” episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s second season, Kendra Young debuts as a second slayer. Neither Buffy Summers, the “real slayer,” as her friend Willow Rosenberg calls her, nor Buffy’s Watcher, Rupert Giles, knows of Kendra’s existence before her Watcher, Sam Zabuto, sends her to Buffy’s hometown, aware that “a very dark power is about to rise in Sunnydale.” Kendra also appears in the second part of the episode and in a third episode. “Becoming, Part I,” of the same season. She’s a foil to Buffy, and, as such, she highlights Buffy’s traits, but, at the same time, reveals both Buffy’s flaws and foibles and her own, suggesting that neither is the ideal slayer and that neither of them is more effective in the slayer’s role than the other.

Buffy and Kendra are evenly matched in age, strength, stamina, agility, speed, and fighting prowess, and both are adept in the use of weapons, wooden stakes and otherwise (although Kendra has trouble with a crossbow, destroying “an evil lamp”). Otherwise, the two slayers couldn’t be less alike.

Kendra takes orders from her Watcher; Buffy prefers to do things her way. Kendra reads her Slayer’s Handbook and conducts her own research concerning vampires, demons, and other monsters. Buffy lets others do the book learning. Kendra evaluates others on the bases of her studies and what she has been taught. Buffy judges others on the bases of her own experience and beliefs. Kendra has no friends, is not allowed to date, and was taken from her family at such a young age that she doesn’t remember them other than as images in photographs. Buffy is surrounded by friends who call themselves “The Scooby Gang” or “The Scoobies,” lives with her mother, and has a vampire boyfriend, Angel. Kendra is serious and single-minded about her duties as a slayer, whereas Buffy seems to be casual about her slayer’s responsibilities. Kendra is rational, Buffy romantic. Kendra believes in taking a deliberate, rational, and logical approach to slaying. Buffy says her emotions are “total assets” that empower her. While Kendra defers to men, Buffy is a modern, liberated young woman. Kendra considers her calling to be a slayer a privilege and an honor as well as a duty, but Buffy would rather lead a “normal” life.

Which of them makes the more effective slayer? Concerning Kendra’s death at the hands of the mesmerizing vampire Drusilla, who orders Kendra to look into her eyes so that she can hypnotize her, Jana Riess contends, in What Would Buffy Do: The Vampire Slayer as Spiritual Guide, that Kendra’s willingness to follow orders without question leads to her death. However, as Kendra herself tells Buffy, when Buffy says “I don’t take orders; I do things my way,” “No wonder you died.” Buffy may act with autonomy and independence, but she is also headstrong at times and rash, and it may be argued that these traits led to her own death in her fight against The Master, at the end of the series’ first season. It seems that the show’s writers, in positing Buffy and Kendra as opposites, suggest that neither of them is the ideal, or more effective slayer, because each is too extreme and dogmatic, in her own way, insisting that hers is the better--indeed, the only true--way to discharge her duties as the slayer. The ideal slayer, the show implies, lies somewhere between these two extremes. Kendra is too dependent; Buffy, too self-reliant. Kendra is too academic; Buffy, too pragmatic. Kendra is too theoretical; Buffy, too empirical. Kendra is too staid and reserved; Buffy, too garrulous and affable. Kendra is insensitive; Buffy is oversensitive. Kendra is straightforward and honest; Buffy, although dutiful, pretends to be carefree. Kendra is too repressed; Buffy is too uninhibited. Kendra allows men to subjugate her; Buffy tends to be disrespectful and rude to men. Kendra is willing to sacrifice herself for the sake of her calling; Buffy is willing merely to do her duty. Neither is the ideal slayer, and neither is the more effective slayer, for each lacks balance. Both are too extreme in their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.

The writers intimate that the ideal slayer is the one who is self-reliant but also accepts assistance from others; participates in research rather than leaving it to others; has friends, including a boyfriend, if she likes, without letting her friendships interfere with her duties; understands that, as sacred as her calling as a slayer may be, it is no more hallowed than her family; uses both her learning and her own experience to evaluate situations and to judge others; takes her duties seriously and is not afraid to let others see how earnest she is about her role as a slayer; is neither overly repressed nor too unrestrained; interacts with men with respect but as an equal; and is willing to make sacrifices but also seeks to enjoy a personal life to the extent that it is possible to do so without shirking her responsibilities. Neither Kendra nor Buffy occupies the position between opposing extremes that Aristotle referred to as the “golden mean.” Therefore, they both show tremendous promise and potential, but neither is as effective a slayer as she could be were she the ideal slayer.

Since the ideal slayer doesn’t exist except as an ideal, one might conclude that both Buffy and Kendra are all that they can be--themselves--and, as such, are the most effective slayers that they can be. Kendra calls herself “the vampire slayer,” as does Buffy, and both are right: they are each a slayer and the most effective slayer that they, as themselves, with all their faults and strengths, can be. That’s all they have to offer. As it turns out, all they have to offer is both never sufficient and, at the same time, paradoxically, always enough.

Ideas That Don’t Work

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

When major players in the horror (or any other) genre succeed, they do so on a Wimbledon, World Series, or Super Bowl level. However, when they fail, they also fail on a spectacular level. Most of the time, the Stephen Kings and the Dean Koontzes and the Robert McCammons and the Douglas Prestons and the Lincoln Childs succeed. Occasionally, they don’t. This post is going to look at, possibly with a wince and a cringe, a couple of the more monumental disappointments in horror fiction--at ideas that didn’t work.

If in no other way than sheer volume, Stephen King’s novel, It, is one of the true monuments of horror fiction. Vast in scope, it’s equally ambitious--some have contended that it’s maybe too ambitious. Published in 1986, the tome contains over 1,000 pages. It tells the story of a band of unlikely adolescent heroes, The Losers’ Club. In 1958, they rid their town, Derry, Maine, of an ancient evil that comes in the protean, ever-changing form of a shape shifter dubbed “It.” Often, It wears the face of a diabolical clown, Pennywise, but it also appears as a mummy, a werewolf, or whatever other monstrous shape most terrifies the boy or girl to whom it appears.

Flash forward. It’s now 1985, and the Losers are successful adults, living out their lives in various, far-flung cities. Only one of them, Mike Hanlon, Derry’s librarian, has remained behind. When it seems that It has returned to Derry, Hanlon alerts the others, who’d sworn to return to vanquish the monster again if it ever comes back. All of them do return, except Stan Uris, who commits suicide upon hearing the news that their old adversary has returned. The adults take on their childhood foe, vanquishing it again in the sewers beneath Derry--for the last time, they hope.

The story proper is suspenseful, action-packed, and chilling--just what readers want and expect from King. It might well have been his magnum opus but for three ideas that don’t work. One of these ideas is similar--in fact, identical--to a J. R. R. Tolkien idea that doesn’t work, and Tolkien’s idea doesn’t work for the same reason that King‘s doesn‘t work.

Tolkien’s massive trilogy, The Lord of the Rings, is even longer, and far more complicated, that It. Although Tolkien’s tale is a fantasy, rather than a horror novel and it has moments of humor, it is, like It, an epic tale, and its tone remains elevated and noble throughout (except at one climactic moment), as befits an epic adventure. If not exactly elegant, the tone of King’s story is at least fairly serious, most of the way through, and would be sufficient except that, at the moment of the story’s climax, what has been a grand epic suddenly becomes a farce as the protagonists who have risked life and limb, both as adolescents and as adults, finally come face to face with the ancient evil that has haunted them since their childhood and has stalked society itself for centuries, and it turns out to be the same sort of corny, comic book monster that Tolkien, after the long and arduous journey that his band of heroes has undertaken, at great cost to their own physical and mental well being, presents to Frodo and Sam Gamgee: a giant spider. At these moments of climax, both King and Tolkien sorely disappoint their readers. Have they come so far, witnessing so much suffering, death, sacrifice, horror, and terror--and have they spent so many, many hours--to face, at the stories’ most emphatic moments, nothing more than an overblown arachnid? It’s ludicrous. And it’s a letdown.

A spider writ large is an idea that doesn’t work.

It’s not only disappointing, but it also makes the reader feel as if he or she has been cheated--and, worse yet, cheated after having read hundreds and hundreds of pages!

It would have been better to have left the big bad thing unseen or to have simply suggested its appearance than to have presented the reader with a spider as the embodiment of inexpressible horror. All that buildup has led to nothing more than a spider? We feel as if we’re Little Miss Muffet, and we wish we’d never sat down on our tuffets to read such claptrap.

We can forgive Tolkien, although not easily, because the rest of his epic is a true epic, in execution as well as in spirit. Although King has thrilled and chilled us at many turns and has, in the main, told an engrossing story, he didn’t stop with his stupid spider. He topped himself in reaching an even lower low. The spider’s age-old enemy is--drum roll, please!--a turtle.

It’s not just any turtle, though. It’s special.

In fact, it’s the creator of the entire cosmos. Countless ages ago, it seems that the reptile had a bad case of indigestion, causing it to regurgitate, and it vomited the universe from its upset tummy. As if even that‘s not enough for King, it’s implied that the turtle might have vomited forth several other universes as well. The spider-monster was a terrible idea, as is the turtle, but making them ancient enemies and having the universe result from a case of terrapin heaves is just too Kurt Vonnegut, especially for a horror novel that, up to now, at least--which is to say, for hundreds and hundreds of pages--has taken itself seriously and has given the reader every impression that he or she should also take the story seriously.

The result is that It becomes an ouroboros, putting not its foot in its mouth but another part of its anatomy. Tolkien’s tale, although damaged somewhat by the tacky, tacked-on spider-monster, retains its overall epic stature, because he doesn’t offer another idea that doesn’t work, letting ill enough alone. King’s It, which had such promise and could have been a great horror story, a masterpiece of the genre, is, instead, a massive, spectacular failure that ends as a parody of itself. King got into such a fix, perhaps, because he doesn’t know when to stop. The novel, in some critics’ opinions, is too long by half. In going for length, the author sacrifices quality, one bad idea being followed by a second and a third.

The spider-monster is an idea that doesn’t work.

The turtle-creator is an idea that doesn’t work.

The creation of the universe ex vomitus is an idea that doesn’t work.

Ultimately, therefore, It is a wannabe epic novel that doesn’t work.

It’s hard to believe that King's first novel, Carrie (1976), is of better narrative qualitythan It, which was penned relatively late in his career.

A Sense of Horror

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Heard on The History Channel: “Why was Helen Keller a bad driver?” (long pause) “Because she was a woman.”

“We murder to dissect,” William Wordsworth observes, and, in “Sonnet: To Science,” Edgar Allan Poe pretty much agrees. Critics have been dissecting humor for a good many years now, and, as a result of their painstaking research, they’ve exposed much of the tissue--and, indeed, the viscera--of comedy. In short, they’ve gutted their subject so thoroughly that its pretty much a bloody mess. That’s fine, of course, with the horror buff.

As a result of their dissection of humor, critics now bandy about terms like “bathos” and “slapstick” and “irony.” They talk about “ambiguity” and “exaggeration” and “understatement” and “incongruity.” They pontificate about “timing,” and “nuance” and “setup.” They argue about “straight men” and “punch lines” and “context.” They quibble about the use and abuse of “language.” They use these learned words as if, in doing so, they’re talking a good deal of sense when, as often as not, perhaps, they’re talking nonsense. That’s also fine, of course, with the horror buff.

It’s not really that the critics are wrong in their assessments and the pronouncements that derive from them. It’s that they’re looking at humor from without, rather than from within. We can learn a great deal about things by taking an objective approach in our studies. Neil Armstrong is proof of that. However, despite the wealth of scientific knowledge we’ve accumulated since astrology became astronomy and alchemy transmuted itself into chemistry, we may say, with Soren Kierkegaard, that we ourselves are left over.

There’s a great deal of truth to be gleaned through observation and analysis, but there’s also some to be gained from introspection, from self-analysis, from one’s experience of his or her own subjectivity, and from the contents of his or her own consciousness. Women go to male gynecologists and obstetricians, but only the pregnant themselves can appreciate certain aspects of pregnancy and childbirth, because these aspects of the processes can be known only from within--from within the flesh and the soul. The same is true of humor.

Comedians know what’s funny, and they can explain, to some degree, why it’s funny. W. C. Fields attributed humor to a streak of cruelty, saying those who laughed most and hardest at his self-deprecating humor were the ones he’d turn to last, if at all, for help if he was in need, because their laughter at his misfortune, even if his suffering was staged, indicated that they were relatively sadistic. George Carlin declared that comedy is “distortion,” but he didn’t say how or why or what’s being distorted. Some of the comedian’s tricks of the trade, apparently, must remain tricks of the trade, just as magicians are loathe to let the public in on such secrets as how to saw a woman in half or how to make the Statue of Liberty disappear.

Carlin also said that he doesn’t try to make his audience think. “That would be the kiss of death” for him as a comedian, he maintains, but he does let them know that he’s thinking.

Sometimes comedians disagree as to what’s funny and what’s amusing. Most comedians think all is fair game for the comic, but Bill Cosby drew a line at profanity and encouraged Eddie Murphy to do likewise. Murphy didn’t, but his career as a comedian didn’t seem to suffer. Most comedians seem to agree, however, that some audiences are quicker than others and that they need to adjust their repertoire of material and their timing accordingly.

Are comedians born or made? Is a sense of humor a product of nature or nurture? This question is as old as comedy, with proponents of both sides arguing their cases ad infinitum. The truth is probably somewhere between these two extremes, meaning that it’s both genetic and environmental. Some people are born with an affinity for the amusing, the droll, the comic, and the witty, but they can learn from other funnymen and women, as Mark Twain learned from lesser comic writers he knew in his early, formative years, such as Artemis Ward, Alexander Macfarlane, and Josh Billings. No doubt, comedians are also inspired by the greats who have gone before them.

By now (or probably way before now), you’ve no doubt thought that (a) the title for this post is erroneous or (b) the idiot who’s writing this stuff forgot to take his Prozac or (c) both of the above. Isn’t this article supposed to be about “A Sense of Horror”? Then, why is it about humor?

We’re used to the phrase “sense of humor,” but we don’t usually talk or hear about someone having a “sense of horror.” Nevertheless, just as musicians often have an ear for music and comedians can, in some sense of the word, “sense” humor, so, it may be argued, can horror writers discern the horrible in persons, places, and things that other people see as commonplace and everyday and not in the least horrible or even the least little bit unsettling. When Stephen King was asked what scares him, he replied, “Everything!”

If you read “Everyday Horrors: Cornfields,” you’ve seen how cornfields, to ordinary folk, are just cornfields. They’re mundane, ordinary, and commonplace. They’re vegetables. What’s scary about a crop of corn, for Pete’s sake, or even for Dave’s sake? It’s only after we recount how many horror stories, both in print and on film, are set, in full or in part, in cornfields that we think, Wow! Cornfields are scary! Of course, that’s because writers and filmmakers have shown us how and why cornfields are scary.

Nobody told them cornfields are scary, though. They knew it or they intuited it or they just felt the fear rolling out of those neatly spaced rows of corn that are knee high by the Fourth of July. Stephen King (Children of the Corn) and Dan Simmons (Summer of Night), Jonathan Maberry (Ghost Road Blues), Norman Partridge (Dark Harvest), and the makers of such movies as High Tension, Freddy vs. Jason: A Match Made in Hell, Hallowed Ground, The Silence of the Lambs, Scarecrow, Jeepers Creepers II, The Corn Stalker, I Walked with a Zombie, The Stand, Night of the Scarecrow, and Shallow Ground saw, and, seeing, knew that cornfields are inherently scary, despite their wholesome appearance, and, in their stories, they showed the rest of us the horror and the terror of these ranks of tall annual cereal grass with big ears.

So, is a sense of horror innate? Can it be learned? Like a sense of humor, it is likely both, and that’s a significant lesson for the aspiring horror writer.

Among the influences on his career as a writer, Stephen King lists authors as diverse as Robert Bloch, Ray Bradbury, William Golding, Shirley Jackson, Fritz Leiber, H. P. Lovecraft, Richard Matheson, John D. MacDonald, Don Robertson, Thomas Hardy, Theodore Dreiser, John Fowles, Edgar Allan Poe, J. R. R. Tolkien, Stanley G. Weinbaum, Robert Browning (Dark Tower Series), Daphne du Maurier, and Alexandre Dumas. It’s quite a list. He’s taken something--an observation, a technique, an insight, a tip, an idea for a plot--from each and every one of them (and probably others as well, whom he’s forgotten to name). Each one of them has inspired him, just as they have each taught him how to be a better storyteller and, therefore, a better horror writer. Yes, writing, like comedy, can be learned.

But a sense of horror is also innate and, as such, it must also be nurtured from within. In looking, learn to see the horror implicit in the person, place, or thing that’s being seen. The post concerning “Everyday Horrors: Cornfields” does this (see the list of bullets), but after, not before, the fact. After horror writers suggested--in fact, showed--the horror of the corn, it was relatively easy to backtrack through the maize and determine what, exactly, is eerie and alarming about stand upon stand of 10- and 12-foot-tall annual cereal grass with big ears. The point, though, is to discern these qualities and features while one is observing the things themselves of which they are parts or effects.

So take a look at a German Shepherd, and see Cujo; a car, and see Christine; a dead cat, and see a twisted zombie child; a stranger’s arrival in town, and see an old-world vampire; an alcoholic writer, and see a man haunted, or even possessed, by the past.

Then, one’s sense of horror can prosper and grow until one is, like King and other masters of the macabre, afraid of “everything!”

Why did Ed Gein keep his house so warm? (long pause) So the furniture wouldn't get goose bumps.