Line #88 Main/CampbellCountry


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14	[[quoteright:350:[[Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lf_8.png]]]]
15
16	->''He's the hairy-handed gent\
17	Who ran amok in Kent\
18	Lately he's been overheard in Mayfair\
19	You better stay away from him\
20	He'll rip your lungs out, Jim\
21	Huh, I'd like to meet his tailor\
22	Ah-hoo, werewolves of London!''
23	-->-- '''Music/WarrenZevon''', "Werewolves of London"
24
25	Campbell Country is {{horror}} that uses UsefulNotes/{{Britain}} as a setting. Rural areas are the most common, but urban settings (especially in [[WrongSideOfTheTracks decrepit neglected neighbourhoods]] and/or in gothic depictions of VictorianLondon) aren't unheard of.
26
27	There is a decent amount of precedent for this, and for good reason. The rain, fog, and lonely moors all give the setting a nice creepy feel. England is a relatively small country with a long sense of retained history owing to its isolation as a group of islands. It's therefore easy to believe that an English village [[TownWithADarkSecret was the site of some dreadful secret dating back to medieval, Roman or pagan times]]. As a result, small European and British settings are often used for simpler horror stories, such as HauntedHouse tales, as there are so many old houses, castles and abbeys around the place.
28
29	Named for a suggestion to UsefulNotes/{{Brit\|ain}}ish writer Creator/RamseyCampbell by American writer Creator/AugustDerleth regarding the logistical limits of LovecraftCountry: to create your own equivalent in a place you know, either in your home country or a place you have visited.
30
31	Rural variants of this trope tend to overlap with HillbillyHorrors. For similar settings in the DeepSouth, TheWildWest, and {{Ruritania}}, see respectively SouthernGothic, WeirdWest[=/=]SinisterSouthwest, and {{Uberwald}}.
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33	Not to be confused with Campbell ''County'', of which the US has five. Also not to be confused with Creator/BruceCampbell Country,[[note]]The cabin from ''Film/TheEvilDead1981'' was located in Hamblen County, Tennessee, a couple counties over from that state's Campbell County.[[/note]] which has more comedy and a higher probability of survival due to, well, Creator/BruceCampbell.
34	----
35	!!Examples:
36	[[foldercontrol]]
37
38	[[folder:Comic Books]]
39	* [[{{ComicBook/Hellblazer}} John Constantine]] usually operates out of London, but he's been known to take a break from the unrelenting horrors of the city and relax with the unrelenting horrors of the countryside.
40	[[/folder]]
41
42	[[folder:Film — Live-Action]]
43	* ''Film/AnAmericanWerewolfInLondon'': The protagonist gets attacked by a werewolf and infected with lycanthropy while backpacking through [[OopNorth the Yorkshire moors]] with his friend, who dies during the attack and who subsequently begins showing up as a SpiritAdvisor. Before the monster shows up, the heroes visit a rural village where the locals give ominous warnings to stay on the road and beware the full moon. Bonus points for the iconic pub called [[AdjectiveAnimalAlehouse the Slaughtered Lamb]].
44	* ''Film/DieMonsterDie'': The setting is Arkham, but an Arkham set in England rather than in the USA. The town is plagued by problems caused by a radioactive meteorite.
45	* ''Film/DogSoldiers'': A squad of UsefulNotes/{{Brit\|sWithBattleships}}ish soldiers battle werewolves while training in the UsefulNotes/{{Scot\|land}}tish Highlands.
46	* When Creator/RichardMatheson adapted his novel ''Literature/HellHouse'' to film (''The Legend of Hell House''), he moved the eponymous HauntedHouse from its LovecraftCountry setting to the English countryside.
47	* ''Film/TheLairOfTheWhiteWorm'': D'Ampton is a small village in England that houses a giant dragon and reptilian vampire worshippers.
48	* ''Film/TheLodgers'': The setting is an isolated, crumbling family estate adjacent to a rural Irish town.
49	* ''Film/{{Men}}'' is set in rural England, in a village where something strange is clearly going on, with writer/director Creator/AlexGarland stating that a big focus of the film is ''"the horror of rural England. It's certain kinds of churches, certain kinds of forest – the shadows within dark green."''
50	* ''Film/TheMonsterClub'' features a little village just off the main road in pleasant English countryside, which has been ruled by ghouls since Puritan times.
51	* ''Film/TheStoneTape'' (1972) is set in an English castle that only dates from the 19th century, but it turns out the foundations are over a thousand years old. And there are noises said to be caused by "rats in the walls" [[HauntedCastle only it doesn't have any rats]].
52	* ''Film/TheWickerMan1973'' had an interesting way of giving its setting physical isolation - it was set on the (fictional) remote Scottish island of Summerisle. The story involves a policeman trying to investigate the case of a missing child and uncovering a pagan cult that's active on the island.
53	* As yet another werewolf-related example, the English village of Blackmoor from ''Film/TheWolfman2010'' definitely fits this trope, and it even comes complete with scary woods!
54	* ''Film/CaptainClegg'', like its [[Literature/DoctorSynTheScarecrow literary source material]], is a Gothic crime thriller about a gang of smugglers and ex-pirates, operating in 1790s Kent, in southeastern England, and the supposedly-haunted marshland surrounding the town.
55	* ''Film/StonehearstAsylum'': The titular asylum is a creepy place out in the English countryside far from anywhere else with many dark and unsettling secrets.
56	[[/folder]]
57
58	[[folder:Literature]]
59
60	[[AC:Authors]]
61	* Creator/JohnBuchan wrote various stories in this setting:
62	** [[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Fullcircle "Fullcircle"]] is a subtle example, but by the end, the idyllic country house at which it's set has clearly become far ''[[UncannyVillage too]]'' idyllic.
63	** [[http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0603071h.html#03 "The Outgoing of the Tide"]] is a horror story set in a Scottish seaside village that involves witchcraft.
64	** [[http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0603071h.html#05 "The Watcher by the Threshold"]] is set in the Scottish highlands and involves demonic possession.
65	* The {{Trope Namer\|s}} is Creator/RamseyCampbell, who sets many of his stories in the Severn Valley, a fictional region in Gloucestershire. Some notable towns located in the Severn Valley include:
66	** Brichester, a university town that appears to be a counterpart to Lovecraft's Arkham, and, by Campbell's own admission, is heavily based on Liverpool.
67	** Goatswood, an isolated town whose people are known for their distinctive look. This seems to be a ShoutOut to Innsmouth.
68	** Temphill, a decaying town that has a sinister church located at the center of the town.
69	* Creator/NeilGaiman set some eldritch stories in his native England:
70	** His story "Shoggoth's Old Peculiar" set in the apparently original Innsmouth on the British coast, as seen through the eyes of an American tourist who isn't in the know. (The title is the name of the pub's signature beer.) The local residents have caught onto events and they don't think much of Howard P.
71	** Most of ''Literature/TheGraveyardBook'' isn't ''that'' eldritch: the graveyard's ghosts provide a friendly community for young Bod Owens, and the villains are an AncientConspiracy of living humans. The real Lovecraftian/Campbellian horror comes when Bod visits the oldest grave, guarded by an illusory figure covered in blue tattoos and an unseen EldritchAbomination that awaits the return of the tomb's original owner. Ghouls and night-gaunts (both of which appear in Lovecraft's stories) also show up at one point, but the ghouls are played for laughs and the night-gaunts are surprisingly friendly.
72	** Lower Tadfield in ''Literature/GoodOmens'' subverts this along with TownWithADarkSecret. It's home to TheAntichrist, who's also a RealityWarper. But since this kid was raised as [[AntiAntichrist a normal boy]] and doesn't initially even realise the extent of his power, he's been unconsciously "warping" the town into an idyllic English village. Some characters are unsettled by just ''how'' [[UncannyVillage unnaturally picture-perfect]] Lower Tadfield is, but TheAntichrist's goal ''isn't'' ToCreateAPlaygroundForEvil, but rather to create a playground for himself and his chums.
73	* Creator/MRJames commonly used rural England as a setting in his horror stories. One notable example was the town of Barchester, originally created by Creator/AnthonyTrollope, for the setting of a ghost story.
74	* Creator/BrianLumley put a satellite colony of Deep Ones in NE England.
75	* Most of Creator/ArthurMachen's novellas and short stories, and his novel ''Literature/TheGreatGodPan'', have a rural Welsh or London background in which [[EldritchAbomination sinister ancient horrors]] lurk and are [[BodyHorror capable of interbreeding]] with modern people.
76
77	[[AC:Individual works]]
78	* ''Literature/CarnackiTheGhostFinder'''s titular ghost-finding adventures happen all around Great Britain and Ireland, and he's based in Chelsea, London.
79	* Creator/StephenKing's "[[Literature/NightmaresAndDreamscapes Crouch End]]" is a Cthulhu Mythos story set in Crouch End in north London.
80	* ''Franchise/HarryPotter'':
81	** In ''Literature/HarryPotterAndTheHalfBloodPrince'', Voldemort's family are portrayed as horribly inbred as a consequence of being such an ancient family.
82	** The Isle of Drear off the northern tip of Scotland, where the deadly monsters called Quintapeds are contained.
83	* ''Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles'' is largely set in a grim, dismal little village on the brooding Devonshire moors, a place far from modern civilization where communication with the outside world is difficult, neighbours are remote, the ground under your feet is treacherous and may suddenly become a thick bog that could swallow you alive, and where any number of ancient supernatural horrors may be lurking in the long, dark night and the thick, impenetrable fog that cloaks the land, while the local landed gentry, the Baskerville family, are the subjects of an ancestral curse dating back to a mid-17th Century ghost story. Ultimately subverted, however, since -- this being a Literature/SherlockHolmes story, after all -- the true power behind the events of the story turns out to ultimately have a [[DoingInTheWizard mundane]], [[ScoobyDooHoax down-to-earth solution]], and the Baskerville curse ultimately just turns out to be a piece of colourful folklore.
84	* Creator/HPLovecraft:
85	** "Literature/TheHound1924": About half of the story takes place in the protagonists' ancient manor-house on the moors in England. They live in isolation and the lack of social control suits their macabre habits expressed in the form of a museum filled with grave goods and body parts personally stolen. What they learn when they steal a supernaturally imbued grave good is that isolation also means that there is no one to stand by them when they are beset by a vengeful entity. St. John gets mauled to death one night when walking home from the distant railway station and the narrator moves to London thereafter, destroying the museum before he goes.
86	** "Literature/TheRatsInTheWalls": A man travels to his family's ancestral English home, which has a long history of spooky events dating back to ancient times.
87	* ''Literature/TheLaundryFiles'': The English lost city of Dunwich is not lost at all, but rather the training ground for the Laundry, a secret organization that prevents "reality incursions." Apparently someone in the Laundry noticed the very odd census reports, and the citizens were relocated and the town erased off the maps. The only way to get there is with a specially-programmed GPS unit and a key for the appropriate wards. Dunwich is also slowly sinking into the water.
88	* The short story "The ''Mainz Psalter''," by Jean Ray, takes place partly at a remote smugglers' cove on the Scottish coast. Soon, though, the narrator and his colleagues set sail on the titular ship, and find themselves [[EldritchLocation somewhere else entirely]].
89	* The 1922 short story by E.F. Benson, "[[http://www.lesvampires.org/negotium.html Negotium Perambulans in Tenebris]]", is set in Polearn, an isolated Cornish seaside fishing village, where an eldritch horror victimises wanton desecrators of the local church, and attacks when their lights go out (prefiguring HPL's own "The Haunter in the Dark").
90	* ''Shadows Over Baker Street'' is a collection of short stories by different authors (for example, ''Literature/AStudyInEmerald'' by the aforementioned Gaiman), about Literature/SherlockHolmes investigating various Lovecraftian mysteries.
91	* ''Literature/WyldingHall'' takes place at an isolated, ancient mansion in a beautiful but creepy patch of English countryside.
92	[[/folder]]
93
94	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
95	* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
96	** In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E5TheDaemons "The Dæmons"]], the Doctor and UNIT investigate strange goings-on in the quaintly named village of Devil's End, where devil-worshipping villagers led by an evil [[TheVicar vicar]] are attempting to awaken an ancient evil that lies buried beneath the village church, while being opposed by a white witch who is considered the town nutter. While given a (slight) sci-fi bent, all of these elements could have been lifted out of a Film/HammerHorror film of the period.
97	** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E8TheHungryEarth "The Hungry Earth"]][=/=][[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E9ColdBlood "Cold Blood"]] presents the dreary Welsh hamlet of Cwmtaff, apparently on loan from ''Series/{{Torchwood}}'', complete with mists and an old church, where the graves are apparently eating people.
98	* ''Series/TheLakes'' is set in a claustrophobically close rural community in a remote part of England (Cumbria) where the psychological tension is down to everybody knowing everybody else's dark secrets - or ''thinking'' that they do.
99	* Darkplace Hospital in ''Series/GarthMarenghisDarkplace'' is an AffectionateParody of this setting.
100	* ''Series/TheLeagueOfGentlemen'' is set in Royston Vasey, in [[OopNorth Northern England]]. It's... odd. Initially a comedy, the sense that the town is just a mask for insanity, evil and genuinely disturbing horror grows as the series progresses.
101	* The ''Series/{{Torchwood}}'' episode "Countrycide" involves the strange disappearances near a rural town in Wales, contrasting with the usual AliensInCardiff stories.
102	[[/folder]]
103
104	[[folder:Music]]
105	* The eponymous neighbourhood in Space's "Neighbourhood":
106	-->''At 666 there lives a Mr. Miller\
107	He's our local vicar and a serial killer''
108	* Ah-ooooo! "Werewolves of London" by Music/WarrenZevon plays this trope for laughs.
109	[[/folder]]
110
111	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
112	* Several of modules of ''TabletopGame/LamentationsOfTheFlamePrincess'' take place in a fantasy equivalent of Campbell Country, the remote town of Pembrooktonshire.
113	* In ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer}}'':
114	** The Bretonnian province of Mousillon is a giant poison swamp where the main industry is frog and snail catching, the populace are largely still recovering from a plague outbreak and far from the friendliest people in the Old World, every third house is empty and even the ones that aren't are rotten and dilapidated, grave-robbing is pretty much the local past-time (though sometimes the dead just help themselves out of their graves), the last Duke was murderously insane and very possibly not even human, his petty lord descendants all wear black armour and never remove their visors for some reason, and no-one in the rest of Bretonnia has any clue what the hell is wrong with the place.
115	** In the Empire, Ostland is a northern province dominated by the Forest of Shadows. Villages are few and far between, and filled with grim, unfriendly people who keep strange local customs and a fondness for double-barrelled firearms and strong alcohol. When they're not bearing the brunt of Chaos incursions, they're dealing with beastmen, forest goblins and ghouls.
116	[[/folder]]
117
118	[[folder:Video Games]]
119	* ''VideoGame/BarrowHill'' is set in a spooky Cornwall full of creepy ruins and folklore.
120	* ''VideoGame/DarkFall: The Journal'' uses the fictional West Country village of Dowerton as the site of supernatural disappearances dating back centuries.
121	* ''VideoGame/TheExcavationOfHobsBarrow'', which is set in the small village of Bewley on the sparsely populated English moors at some point during the {{Victorian\|England}} times, uses the rural setting, creepy folklore, and the distrust of the local community towards an outsider from the city to create a generally eerie, oppressive, and paranoid atmosphere.
122	* ''VideoGame/TheLostCrown: A Ghost-Hunting Adventure'' is set in the fictional East Anglian village of Saxton.
123	* Quite a few episodes ''VideoGame/TheLastDoor'' has you exploring large, rundown estates around the English and Scottish countryside. There is even an episode set in VictorianLondon, taking full advantage of stuff like the city's labyrinthine slum and foggy streets to build an effectively creepy atmosphere.
124	* Judging from [[IAmAHumanitarian Gregory's implied proclivities]] and the [[PoliceAreUseless uselessness of the police]], ''VideoGame/RuleOfRose'' is set here, in some undefined part of the English countryside in the 1930s.
125	[[/folder]]
126
127	[[folder:Web Original]]
128	* ''Literature/BritsuneGardenSeries'':
129	** [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed]] in the first novel, ''Literature/BritsuneGarden''. Shadonis are spooky horned vulpine {{Youkai}} who are the main antagonists. They infiltrate the gardens of Buckingham Palace and ''[[DemonicPossession possessed]]'' some Igiriko individuals. It's up to the royal family and the remaining Igiriko to restore the garden to its former glory and seal the Shadoni race away.
130	* ''WebAnimation/HunterTheParenting'' is an ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness'' story that follows a family of monster-hunters operating in the rural county of Norfolk.
131	[[/folder]]
132
133	[[folder:Webcomics]]
134	* [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed]] in ''Webcomic/GunnerkriggCourt'' as it rarely employs HorrorTropes, but one can't help but wonder how Gillitie Forest's [[TheTrickster Trickster-god]] and his race of technophobic shadow-men have remained hidden from the rest of the UK for so long.
135	* In Incase's ''Webcomic/TheInvitation'', all but one panel takes place within a sleepy British village where our protagonist has his summer home, [[spoiler: as well as the eldritch realm he opens up a portal to.]]
136	[[/folder]]

Context Main / CampbellCountry