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Just For Fun
High Octane Nightmare Fuel

redirected from Main.NightmareFuelUnleaded

alt title(s): Nightmare Fuel Unleaded; Unleaded Nightmare Fuel; HO Nightmare

"Listen, if a book is going to give me night terrors right out of a Freud textbook involving me running through a Stockholm red-light district being chased by ravenous toothed genitalia all wanting me to pay them for the privilege of devouring me alive, you have to fucking tell me."

"Sometimes fear is the appropriate response."
1, 9

There's Nightmare Fuel. And there's this, the intentional kind. This is not Nightmare Fuel turned Up To Eleven; even the adults are frightened of this stuff.

In short, if a work is
  • not intended specifically for children
  • intended to be scary

Then it's High Octane Nightmare Fuel. For unintentionally terrifying work targeted for children, see Nightmare Fuel. If it is meant to scare but fails to deliver, and becomes hilarious instead, it devolves into Nightmare Retardant.

For most horror films, that's the whole point. For some reason, many of us like to be scared on purpose, there may be a euphoria generated by surviving something that seems scary, or maybe we know that fiction can't hurt us and the idea of choosing to be scared without the danger is fun. In any case, this is normal. Others are fascinated by the very things that others avoid. Occasionally, it overlaps with Squick.

Specific types of High Octane Nightmare Fuel include:

Just like its cousins, High Octane Nightmare Fuel can be broken up into several categories.


Examples, by Medium


Nightmare FuelFear TropesPrimal Fear
Help Help This Index Is Being RepressedIndex IndexHired Guns
Nightmare FuelMulti Page TropesNotable Webcomics
Nightmare FuelTropes Of LegendOr So I Heard
Fridge HorrorSubjective TropesNightmare Retardant
Hell Is That NoiseHorror TropesHollywood Exorcism
Nightmare FuelJust For FunNotable References To TV Tropes
Hey I Ts That GuyDisturbiaHollywood Nerd