Unclear Description: Humanoid Abomination

It's good by me.

Okay, I'm home. Here's what I propose:

In more recent horror works, dark things from beyond the fringes of mankind's consciousness are prone to showing up in forms that for all intents and purposes look like good ol' Homo sapiens (and in some cases, actually were human until they went beyond the pale). The Humanoid Abomination is distinguished from an Eldritch Abomination in that this at least looks somewhat human. And that's on a good day. Less subtle abominations will seem like a mockery of the human form with twisted limbs, malformed features or, oddly enough, being impossibly beautiful. Of course, this familiar form may actually be a disguise for something else, something you are probably better off not seeing.

Despite its (somewhat) familiar appearance, the Humanoid Abomination is in fact utterly beyond human understanding and likely cannot be reasoned with. True to their fundamentally alien nature, this entity will often lack anything resembling a conventional moral code. They will not conform to the expected laws of nature or magic, so expect a Lovecraftian Superpower or other madness-inducing properties. Given their vast, unknowable cosmic nature, the Humanoid Abomination, like their more eldritch cousins, is sometimes the subject of, or at least connected to, a Cult or Religion of Evil whose followers may cause your hero more problems than the Abomination itself. As to where these creatures come from, most back stories concern various Eldritch Locations such as other dimensions or rips in space-time. Or it is actually the offspring of, or otherwise created by, an even bigger abomination.

The Humanoid Abomination has its origins in the Cosmic Horror Story and as such, is usually the creation of Mythopoeia rather than a traditional monster such as a vampire and demon. To sum it up, a Humanoid Abomination is not merely a powerful supernatural being. As one Troper put it succinctly, "Abominations are violations of the very fictional universes that they infect."

edited 7th Feb '13 3:48:37 PM by efay

I prefer Septimus' draft out of the three presented. Mine starts out with something I normally try to avoid putting in descriptions and yours feels a little too long and overly narrow. Assuming there are no dissenting opinions I suggest we substitute that one in.

I still find that one too broad. We should definitely add something about how abominations - Eldritch or Humanoid - essentially break the laws of the universe they inhabit. They're supposed to be outside what we (or the main characters) think of as the normal order of nature or magic. A good example on the page is this from Discworld:

I Shall Wear Midnight introduces the Cunning Man, the shade of a fanatic witch-hunter who was so obsessed he went on even after eventually having no body. He appears as a man in black with empty holes for eyes (no, not empty eye sockets, HOLES, you can see through them) and Invisible to Normals; to those who can perceive it, he also appears to exude a terrible stench, though rather than an actual physical stench this is their mind's perception of the corruption in his. . .

To hammer home how utterly wrong he is, it should be noted that, in Discworld, the eyes always show a person's true nature. Even the gods can change anything about their appearance except their eyes. Now the Cunning Man has nothing there, as in seeing into the front and out the back of his head.

edited 8th Feb '13 6:07:40 AM by efay

I do not think that mine or Arha's are too broad. And just as a reminder, Humanoid Abomination can exist outside of a Cosmic Horror Story.

+1 for Septimus' draft.

I favour removing some bits from efay's draft to broaden it a little (mostly to remove the focus on the Cosmic Horror Genre), but it's more specific than Sept's, more distinct from Uncanny Valley, and has more connections to other tropes.

Also, we still really need to do similar trimmage and truncation to Eldritch Abomination, Animalistic Abomination, and possibly Adorable Abomination.

I don't see how Septimus's version can possibly be confused with Uncanny Valley, but I'd rather start with that and modify it as necessary to remove the confusion in those who find it confusing.

I don't find it confusing, but I think efay's is worded better, and I appreciate the connections established to the humanoid offspring of nightmares-wrought-in-flesh or ex-humans having their very natures twisted and moulded into unrecognisable new forms being examples, as well as simply the gibbering terrors attempting to pass themselves off as human and failing. It's more specific about what is or isn't an example.

We seem to have two acceptable rewrites here. Should we just put up a multiple proposition crowner for which we prefer or is that not necessary?

As for my own opinion, I don't see any real room for confusion with Uncanny Valley in any of these.

edited 9th Feb '13 3:53:26 PM by Arha

The fact that efay's rewrite starts off with a medium reference is a bad note. We've seen many tropes being stunted by such premature references.

Oh, wait, I thought the two posts from Noaqiyeum came from two different people and thus indicated more support for the idea than is actually there.

Anyway, there's what you said and there's also that your writeup is both shorter and not quite as narrow. I think both qualities will lead to a healthier trope.

Proposed edit. Removed the genre references and combined both descriptions.

It looks human, but it's utterly beyond human understanding. Dark things from beyond the fringes of mankind's consciousness tend to sometimes show up in forms that for all intents and purposes look like H. sapiens sapiens. In some cases, they actually were human until they went beyond the pale, but more likely this familiar form is actually a concealing disguise or misperception for something you are probably better off not seeing, or even the progeny or creation of something even worse.

Though its appearance is passable as human, it is still clearly... not quite. Even those that are very clever in human terms will have difficulty not setting off instinctive alarms in the human subconscious. Less subtle abominations will do their job too well and seem impossibly beautiful; the even less subtle will distort their human form, with twisted limbs or malformed features.

Not only will it barely look like a human, it will also more than likely not think in terms human reason can readily grasp. They will often lack anything resembling a recognisable or conventional moral code. At best, they will be comparable to The Fair Folk. Neither will they conform to the expected laws of nature - or magic, in such settings - so expect Lovecraftian Superpowers and other unspeakable traits.

Subtrope of Eldritch Abomination, and sister trope of Animalistic Abomination.

edited 10th Feb '13 10:29:34 AM by Noaqiyeum

That's the best so far.

Yes, that's good.

Go for @38

Does it overlap with Uncanny Valley, or are they completely separate? #38 implies there is an overlap, though some comments here suggests otherwise.

I have some doubts that Uncanny Valley has anything to do with Humanoid Abomination.

That "not quite" bit needs to be removed if there is no overlap. But if there is an overlap, I like that description.

They're not the same, but it makes sense that the HA could induce UV.

Edited the description - the link to Uncanny Valley really did belong more with the instinctive alarms in the human subconscious than the introduction to the entire paragraph. I also added a link to Inhumanly Beautiful Race (because apparently we don't have that for individuals? o_O ). Couldn't find anything suitable to link the third part of that paragraph to - I guess we don't have a Monstrous Humanoid trope, either, which might explain some of the page misuse.

Monstrous Humanoid is good for YKTTW.

That's better. I think the point with Uncanny Valley is that it isn't quite clear what's wrong (only that it is somehow wrong) that's important.

This is more about being on the monsterous side, the way I interpret it. Scary because it's frightening, dangerous looking, or gross, rather than because it's human-but-not-human-enough.

Isn't that what I said? I'm also kind of surprised to find someone agree, since everyone seems to disagree what Uncanny Valley actually is.

edited 10th Feb '13 11:04:09 AM by AnotherDuck

Half-right, I think - the point with Uncanny Valley is that the differences are subtle enough that they're difficult to identify consciously but you know that they're there anyway. Nyarlathotep and Angleton are both humanoid abominations of that form, and there are others on the page as well, so there is some connection as Willbyr said. The Uncanny Valley does not extend so far as to encompass Wilbur Whateley or Slenderman, or many other examples on the list, though.

I thought Nylarthotep was more about feeling wrong than looking wrong. But it's been quite a while since I read the original source material there. In any case, Uncanny Valley is purely about visuals, while the wrongness here may not be visual at all. It may not show up in photographs. It may be something that shows up only when you're actually in its presence.

And, of course, if there is a visual component, it may go far beyond the valley, into straight-up Body Horror territory.

edited 10th Feb '13 8:50:20 PM by Xtifr