Making an Eldritch Abomination funny

I want to write a tale in which my hero is transformed into an Eldritch Abomination by magic. I mean, a giant, unholy, as-scary-as-I-can-draw-it creature.

The problem is...my work is a comedy. And I'm not really sure how to balance out the horror with the humor.

Any ideas?

Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that an Eldritch Abomination is going to be alien . If we assume your hero is a relatively non-aggressive horror, then there would probably be a lot of potential for Fish out of Water style humor.

Also, you could try playing it off against the media stereotypes - have it meet a bunch of H.P. Lovercraft fanboys and see what happens...

The Lovecraft Lite trope is going to be your friend here, so check that out.

The only related trope I could find, sorry.

It from Stephen King's It was funny.

That's all I got.

edited 7th Apr '11 3:22:09 AM by cutewithoutthe

Like the monster in the dark from the Order of the Stick.

It could be a dark comedy: the monster itself may not be funny, but people's ridiculous reactions to it can be.

Bizarre Alien Biology can be nice to play around with.

If he's just recently been transformed, wouldn't the hero still have a bunch of his old human habits imprinted in his mind, despite the new body? Comedy could come from the hero's attempts to do the everyday things he did as a human, which of course he would fail at as an eldritch abomination.

Imagine him trying to attend school, for instance—wrapped in a long trenchcoat, gloves and a hat and constantly trying to keep his tentacles from falling out of the disguise. And doing his best to feign innocence when those students sitting next to him start hallucinating.

One could have fun with how any attempts at communication by something with completely alien methods of speech and sensory apparatus are completely botched. Even "I just want a sandwich!" could be mind-rending...

I'm wondering precisely *how* eldritch we're talking about here. Something like a Shoggoth, with the ichor-dripping tentacles of a squamous and rugose nature, or something more along the lines of N'yar lath-Hotep, who can shape-shift and can be rather personable when he feels like it. In short, where is it on the sliding scale of Eldritch Abomination to Humanoid Abomination?

Yes, have tea with it. Also, if you want the reaction in the audience more than the characters, describe it absurdly. Although I'm not going for an Eldritch Abomination per-se in my story, I've got the following line:

"The lairs of things not governed by space and time weren't supposed to be lit by strip lights."

Make the Eldritch Abomination invisible, and have it do un-Adominatony things, like eating door. That what I'm going to do with my Shinigami Landras in crossovers.

Make him apathetic towards the typical Eldritch goals and give insightful and ironic feed back on the dumb reasons for killing mankind when they could be doing something, like, let's say, creating a Universe?

Or make him overly friendly. or both.

Thats what I would do.

Kang and Kodos, the tentacle aliens from the simpsons. im not sure if they qualify, but it might be a start. they're pretty funny.

I have this idea where a girl captures a miniature tentacle monster and enslaves it... breaking his curse and turning him into a handsome Dogged Nice Guy and the girl into a Tsundere.

Perhaps he tries to fit in with the humans, but turns all scaly and slimy at rather inconvenient times, scaring the living daylights out of anyone who sees him get all Cthulhufied. At the same time, he's the laughingstock of his family of other cosmic horrors due to his wish to fit in with the weak-minded mortals.

Give him a feminine, nonviolent "I Want" Song like Satan in South Park.

edited 21st Jul '11 10:22:38 AM by PDown

Use a thesaurus and give him the purplest prose you possibly can. It worked wonders for the Caged Demonwolf in Empowered after all.

Make him speak in an Irish accent.

My work has an Eldritch Abomination as the Big Bad. He's for all intents and purposes an expy of Nyarlathotep, and much like the actual Nyarlathotep, he's in it for the lulz. I intend to play his as quite a humorous character, despite him being utterly evil. He literally has tea with one of the protagonists at one point (while holding her hostage), talks casually with his oopnents while in the middle of a fight, and might throw musical number at one point (not sure if I can actually fit that part in the story, tho). The way he sees it, it's all a game so he has no need to be serious (altho he hates losing, so he does get very angry when his plans are foiled).

Give him a Villain Song.

Make him Attention Deficit OOH SHINY!!!

"I WILL RAIN DOWN DEATH AND DESTRUCTION AND YOUR WORLD WILL BURN AS - HEY, A BUTTERFLY! UHH...WHERE WAS I? OH, RIGHT, DEATH AND DESTRUCTION!"

Make him be a dickish Troll who just goes around screwing with people for kicks, in ways that make it abundantly clear that he could be doing so much worse things to the point that it's Paranoia Fuel for the other characters. That sounds very humorous to me.

Make it look harmless, while still being Abominable.

Accidental Centaurs minus the centaur delusion?