Nightmare Fuel cleanup and maintenance

Speaking as both a huge coward and a huge Jojo fan, the only one of the ones you want to cut I might keep would be Jack the Ripper emerging from the horse's neck stump, which was some pretty disturbing imagery. It didn't reach Nightmare Fuel levels for me, but I can definitely see how it could be really disturbing for someone.

Here's another bad Nightmare Fuel page: NightmareFuel.God Eater.

This page goes into way too much detail about the backstory and lore of the series, instead of simply focusing on what is actually frightening. It's also full of Natter and, of course, spoiler tags.

I'd trim it down and keep the following points:

• The Aragami threat, against which Resistance Is Futile.

• Body Horror due to Aragami Infection

• The inevitability of the Devouring Apocalypse.

• The Dyaus Pita (Not sure about keeping this one, the descriptions go into enough detail about why it might be frightening, but it didn't scare me at all).

• Soma's birth in the anime (I haven't actually seen the anime, but the entry makes a good enough point about how disturbing the scene is).

edited 12th Sep '17 6:34:15 PM by Zuxtron

I'm wondering if this cleanup may be going overboard, honestly. While most Nightmare Fuel pages come across as being written by the most absurdly fearful people humanly imaginable, enforcing a standard of "objective scariness" seems like an insane effort for very little real gain. It is an audience reaction.

edited 12th Sep '17 6:57:05 PM by nrjxll

Not going overboard when it creates the mess it has. Being an audience reaction is frankly not an excuse for what it has become especially when we know what the original intent was to begin with.

edited 12th Sep '17 7:47:23 PM by TuefelHundenIV

I do think it can go overboard. We are not in the business of gauging the relative worth of opinions due to the non-existent benefit/cost ratio of such a deal. This cleanup is specifically about hypothetical or just plain silly entries. That is fine so as long as it doesn't go too far.

We do need to have some kind of standard for what is allowed on these pages. It's not uncommon for some entries to have been clearly written by someone who was not scared at all, and is simply trying to make the work appear Darker and Edgier than it is.

With that said, I'll try to restrain myself and only cut blatantly shoehorned examples, or those that break the already established rules.

Looking into the NF page for A New Hope and ran into this example. The example from Legends is pretty good, but I don't know if the sheer size of the Death Star is enough to qualify as nightmare fuel and the amount of resources used for making it.

• Just the size of the Death Star. The Star Destroyer that completely dwarfed the Tantive IV in the intro is microscopic in comparison!
  • Consider further that it's only been 20 years since Episode 3 and they built that whole Death Star in LESS than 20 years. Imagine the resources that its construction ate up, the (forced?) labor the Empire used, and where they had to mine that all from. And then consider most of it was done, if not entirely in secret, then certainly under very tight-lipped instructions...and that another even bigger one already had to have already been planned. Yikes!
  • In Legends, it was built using convict labor over the prison planet of Despayre. This labor force was executed and replaced with enslaved Wookiees once it turned out that they were incompetent. Once that was done, Tarkin transported the entire work crew, along with their supervisors, to Despayre...which he then blew up, killing millions of prisoners and thousands of loyal Imperial personnel, both to test the laser's power and to eliminate loose ends.
  • In the new canon material, it was built by Geonosians—almost all of whom are now dead.

edited 13th Sep '17 7:01:32 PM by SithPanda16

Honestly, I think I'd nuke the entire example. Everything about its size is more awe-inspiring than anything (seriously, how are you supposed to find that frightening?), the part about Tarkin killing the construction crew sounds more like Kick the Dog or something related, and the last part reads like a ZCE.

edited 13th Sep '17 7:41:53 PM by Willbyr

I nuked the example, I moved the one mentioning Tarkin destroying the planet to the Star Wars Legends Nightmare Fuel Page. His actions sound monstrous.

To avoid getting too cut-happy, I think it would be a good idea to always post the examples here for review, rather than paraphrasing or just mentioning them, and then put forth an argument for each example, rather than sweeping generalisations.

That'll work for smaller pages, at least... Any questionable stuff should be quoted regardless of page length (which I think is just me agreeing with you with a caveat?).

I mentioned this in the TRS thread, but the page for The Sexy Brutale could probably be cut. By my count, there's maybe one or two entries salvageable. It could probably be moved to the YMMV/ tab.

My responses to each of these:

• The first two could be consolidated into one entry, and I'd argue that the first time it happens is the scary part but afterwards it's just something to cause anxiety, not fear. You're even told that the guy didn't see you and wasn't following you, and after the hundredth time it happens the fear factor has been dead a long time. I mean, it's so "not scary" by the end of the game that I've seen Let's Players actively try to use it to their advantage since it stops time from progressing.
• The third one could be scary, but there's no voice acting in the game, so however terrifying the character actually sounds, it's all in your head.
• The fourth is more "disturbing" than it is "scary." It might actually count as a tearjerker, given the pity that's inherent in the write-up.
• The fifth is also more "disturbing" than it is "scary." For context (since that example lacks any), the characters only say "Oh no" and then get burned. They do not kick or scream or anything like that. It seems to be a stretch to say it's "scary" more than it is "sad." Unless it (i.e. being trapped in an elevator when something bad happens, getting burned) is just something that personally scares you.
• The last entry doesn't seem to be "disturbing" or "scary." Unless it (i.e. hospitals, being sick, being on a respirator) is just something that personally scares you.

Something that's important to understanding the game is that it's all meant to be sad. From the writing's perspective and from the character's perspective.

edited 14th Sep '17 6:01:57 AM by WaterBlap

I don't really understand the first, since it doesn't describe what part of it is actually scary.

The second answers to the first, which other than being against our formatting rules, does seem more on point for the trope.

Screaming doesn't need a voice for it to be scary. It's like saying nothing said in a novel can be scary. Very lacking in context, but I can at least understand what's scary about it.

I think "disturbing rather than scary" is nitpicking. For an objective trope, sure, that's not good enough, but for a subjective trope there's certainly overlap between those two rather similar emotions.

The Clean Room one I don't see anything potentially scary in, unless there's a specific phobia or something like that.

I haven't got any feedback on this page. Could you have a look?

* If you read the book, Caroline's reaction to Lizzie's words here !

• Caroline Lee in general. A manipulative, but apparently nice girl, who could, on a meta-level, turn a great part of a fandom's heads despite the Foregone Conclusion, because she looks clueless, charming and sweet. Paired with a Socially Awkward Hero and an Horrible Judge of Character, one of which is her Unwitting Pawn and has a very shaky personal and financial situation she has interests in spoiling, on a vlog with tens of thousands of viewers, you get potentially the most damaging antagonist, if you exclude Wickham.
• Watching Lydia's later videos and knowing that something horrible is going to happen to her is scary.
• Lydia's Character Development: from talented, charming Genki Girl who Desperately Craves Affection and has an Inferiority Superiority Complex to slightly manipulative Stepford Smiler entering a Revenge Before Reason plot and being Love Hungry towards everyone, hiding her Self-Deprecation.
• Wickham's increasingly uncomfortable leery manipulation of her, so much that Tumblr fandom blogs tag it under the trigger word of abuse so others can blacklist it.
• This. Wickham is officially straddling the line between Jerkass and evil.
• Georgiana "Gigi" Darcy is either a Emo Teen, either a Broken Bird. She is very young (possibly under 18), depressed for unknown reasons, describes herself as "the worst thing a girl can be, a beautiful little fool", and needs her overprotective brother's support. She has given up swimming recently. George Wickham is a villain. He is charming, manipulative and cruel. He is hated by "Gigi"'s overprotective brother for unknown reasons. He is a swimming teacher.
• After episode 82, imagine the things that Gigi said to her brother's face, after she tells Lizzie that whatever Lizzie has said about Darcy doesn't come close.
• In the Pemberley spin off with Gigi, she calls George after he disappears. We know he's scum. We've seen the proof in multiple videos. But when he claims that he didn't set up the website for Lydia's sex tape, it was stolen from him, he seems so sincere and convincing.

I'd like to cutlist the page. Nothing in the video blog is scary-scary.

edited 14th Sep '17 9:16:46 AM by XFllo

• First is a ZCE. Weblinks Are Not Examples.
• The Caroline Lee generic "example" doesn't actually state what's scary.
• Knowing something's going to happen to someone is fridge. Actual events of those things happening could fit.
• Lydia's Character Development doesn't strike me as creepy, scary, or fitting the trope. Possibly sad, but this isn't Tear Jerker.
• Wickham's manipulation can maybe fit, but would need a better writeup.
• Again, Weblinks Are Not Examples.
• Gigi's entry says Fridge Horror. It's that, not this.
• If you have to imagine what someone says, it doesn't count. Either write it out and what's actually scary about it, or leave the example off the page.
• Last entry doesn't say what's scary. He's scum, and that's about it.

edited 14th Sep '17 12:22:05 PM by AnotherDuck

RE: the screaming. In writing, there's a difference between an author writing "Aaah!" and actually describing the situation. Just writing "Aaah!" isn't, on its own, scary, even though it is the character screaming. I think I get your point, but I still disagree on that.

I'll start making the other edits.

I'd also like to know if the tearjerker/NF overlap is alright or if it isn't. You commented on the disturbing vs. scary part but not the Tearjerker vs. Nightmare Fuel part.

edited 14th Sep '17 12:54:52 PM by WaterBlap

From the Dredd movie NMF page. The problem is this is a gory action flick and nothing is made to be scary or frightening. Most of this wouldn't fit to begin with being either just Adult Fears or referencing gore in a film known to be violent and gory to begin with. Want some second opinions before I do anything though.

• The three drug dealers being skinned alive and tossed to their deaths. Being skinned alive is bad enough (we even get wince-inducing glimpse of skin being sliced off), but the use of Slo-Mo means they fell for what seemed like nearly half an hour, in agonizing pain, and unable to do anything about it.
  • Slo-Mo only changed their *perception* of time, so the impact causing a sudden end to the nightmare would cause a momentary relief before death.
  • You're walking along, pushing your baby in a stroller. Two bodies fall from the sky, nearly hitting you. You look up and move just in time to have the third body land where you and your kid were just standing.
  • The results of the fall to the victims isn't a pretty sight either. They all practically turned to red mush at the rate they fell. One guy ended up as a puddle of gore, with his face and clothing being the only thing partially intact.
  • According to The Splat Calculator a fall from 1km (aka. the top floor of Peach Trees) takes about 14 seconds. With a little math, we can therefore deduce that on Slo-Mo it must've felt like nearly 24 minutes. I bet they got cold.
• The Clan Techie getting his eyes gouged out by Ma-Ma. She's doing it without anesthesia - he's fully conscious and held down by her goons - and with her thumbs. His high-pitched wails make your skin crawl, and his eyes don't look very healthy (they're red-rimmed and quite sore-looking) after they've been fitted with the cybernetic prosthetics.
• The vagrant getting crushed by the blast shield.
• Dredd's execution of the first corrupt Judge.
  • On the same note, Dredd's execution of the drug-user at the beginning; namely, firing a Hot-Shot round (read: flare) into his mouth. We get to watch his head graphically being burned from the inside out.
  • How about the Slo Mo-perspective view of Dredd shooting the gang members at the distribution-point on level 39? Flesh indenting and vibration from impact, streams of crimson streaking out of penetrated cheeks...
  • Don't forget the cleanup afterward; guy driving a mini-Zamboni cleaning up the blood, pulling a cart full of bodies, while the intercom blandly announces the food court will be reopening shortly. How often does this happen that it can be treated with such nonchalance?
• Ma-Ma. A hyper-violent, scarred-up, crazy-as-hell woman with a bias towards brutal murders and has absolutely no problem killing everyone in Peach Trees to kill Dredd. Gets worse when you realize that monstrous though she is, Mega-City One is so overwhelmed by rampant crime that no-one knows about her, and it's only her daylight murder of three dealers that finally puts her on the Judges' radar. If she'd handled things quieter, it's likely her reign of terror would have continued unabated.
• Most of the death scenes have no Gory Discretion Shot at all, leaving quite a few mutilated corpses for the audience to stare at.
  • The few ones that do aren't much better (i.e. that poor homeless guy).
• On a more mundane level, the poor kids playing in the skate park on or near level 75. The whole building is locked down, and they can't go in or out until Dredd blows the outer wall out for different reasons. Further, it's snowing and they're all wearing day clothes.
  • The mere fact that there's a skate park hanging precariously perched against the building on the 75th floor, over a loooong way down. No OSHA Compliance, indeed.
• A militarized police force acting as judge and jury empowered to perform summary execution. Based on the world they live in paper work and due process probably isn't high on the to-do-list.
  • What's more: Several of them are corrupt and don't give a damn about the small shred of justice left they're sworn to uphold.
  • Even worse. That militarized police, armed with heavy ordnance, and with legal powers to do as they please? Still not enough to make even a dent to the criminal problem in the Megacity. "Crapsack" falls short to describe the world Dredd lives on.

I haven't seen that movie, but being skinned alive for what feels like nearly 30 minutes, or having your eyes gouged out seems horrifying enough to qualify as Nightmare Fuel, though that first one would need to have the Natter condensed into one bullet point. The rest are Zero Context Examples, too general, or not scary at all.

Screaming by itself, no, that wouldn't fit, but there's more context to the example. As I said, it's not much more context, but enough to get the point across.

I think it can overlap with Tear Jerker, but it's probably rare enough that you'd have to make a good argument as to why it fits both. They're different emotions, so I'm not sure any one person can think they overlap, but we are talking about subjective tropes here. That means it can mean something for one person and another thing for another. The important part is that it's described accurately and for the trope it's on.

Exactly where to draw the line of a gory film (and I have no idea where that film is on that scale) I'm not sure, but I can say a few things.

• The skinning/falling example should be one bullet, and condensed. Seems to be at least contain more Nightmare Fuel than just regular gore. Anything to do with gore should just be removed. The NF is about helplessness, which can certainly be nightmare-inducing even for a flick meant to be scary and gory.
• The eyes gouge, yeah, that fits the trope. Don't have a problem with that.
• Crushed by a blast shield needs more context. Would toss it away as written.
• Dredd's executions first of all needs to be formatted and written properly without word cruft. That said, the drug user and the gang members seem to fit. The first bullet doesn't have context, and the last is just gore and personal values.
• Ma-Ma is a character. This is not a character trope.
• "Most deaths" is a generic "example". We don't allow those.
• The skate park example doesn't make sense to me.
• The premise and setting of the franchise is not Nightmare Fuel. That's something that would fall afoul of any kind of "intended audience" requirement for the trope.

edited 14th Sep '17 2:37:27 PM by AnotherDuck

Dredd is a straight up action film with visuals emphasizing blood and gore in general. There is scene done almost entirely in slow motion where you see bullets plowing through people and sprays of blood. The sped up scenes are plenty bloody as well. For comparison it is similar to the film "The Raid".

The only two I think would actually belong are the skinning and Clan Techie's eye gouge.

The vagrant mentioned is resting in a slot for a heavy blast door for an arcology like sky scraper building. The bad guys trigger a lock down to trap the protagonists causing the door to slam shut squishing him. It happens pretty much instantly and without comment. The judges had told him vacate earlier so it was wrong place wrong time type scene. The man isn't trapped or anything he is just ignoring the judges earlier orders to vacate and gets squished when the bad guys shutter the tower.

The very first execution Dredd has the bad guy cornered and it is pretty clear he is going to kill him and keeps him talking in a way that lets him shoot him with the flare. In context of the movie that is actually not all that bad there is a later scene where Dredd lures about a dozen or so bad guys into a trap and then kills nearly all of them with a mini-White Phosphorus munition. The very first perp not only dies quicker but the Incendiary ambush has people running around screaming as they are burned alive, falling over the railing and in general a good sized patch of area just being on fire. In the very end of the movie as big bad is falling to her death you see one of the still smoldering survivors burned red and black on his arms and head watching her fall. They play the ambush scene with music that has some harsh tone to it, pardon the pun, to put some dread into it.

First Execution Here.

Incendiary Ambush Here.

If you guys think the execution should stay and/or maybe add in the incendiary ambush let me know.

edited 14th Sep '17 4:45:12 PM by TuefelHundenIV

Looking through the Rogue One NF page, the example for the scene where Darth Vader massacres the rebels is filled with Natter. I might need some help on narrowing them all down.

• We finally get to see Darth Vader in his absolute, horrifying prime on the big screen. Crushing rebellions with the casualness of swatting a house fly is what he does. It was bad enough in A New Hope, which follows this movie chronologically - but Rogue One is a Lower-Deck Episode, so we see just how horrific he can be from the perspective of the Redshirt Army.
  • It looks like Raddus and what remains of his fleet will make it out alive and well... until Vader's enormous ship, the Star Destroyer Devastator, comes out of nowhere and rams into them. A few ships even ram into it.
  • The outcoming of this short engagement is disastrous for the Rebels (well for the unfortunate ones who didn't jump). In the beginning of the "battle", a Gallofree Transport crashes immediately into the Devastator (just imagine the reaction of its crew in their final moments), a Nebulon-B Frigate is destroyed shortly afterwards in a few shots from the Vader's Flagship and the Profundity (the Rebel's Flagship) is disabled a few seconds later. We don't see the rest of the "battle" but in the next shot on the Rebel fleet (which happens shortly afterwards), only the Profundity is present with debris around it. It can be safely assumed that the Devastator took care of them (Vader's boarding party travelling undisturbed pretty much confirms that). Keep in mind that this is the same fleet that awesomely took out the two Star Destroyers stationed in orbit of Scarif, but the Rebels are too exhausted (nearly defenseless) to take out this lone Star Destroyer and they are slaughtered with extreme prejudice for their efforts. In a very short time too. This shows Vader's absolute ruthlessness towards the Rebels when commanding a Star Destroyer and it feels like that our heroes are shot for doing good.
  • Several Rebel troopers are desperately carrying the datapad with the Death Star's plans to the Tantive IV. The corridors go dark as the Imperials board, and several Rebel troopers are caught between two blast doors, one of which is jammed. Then, without quite knowing why, they look back the way they came, at the deep shadows behind them. For a few endless moments, there's absolutely nothing. Then, slowly, the sound of Vader's incessant, nightmarish breathing becomes audible. Then a blood-red lightsaber hisses to life...
    • The build-up is delicious. No shadow in the film is as deep as the one in which Vader lurks, and for a moment all the music dies down so the viewer can hear what the Rebels hear. Just the creaking of the jammed door, and the alarm wailing in the background. And then, you hear it...
  • At this point, the camera cuts back to the rebels, as a look of dawning terror dawns on each and every one of them. For them, a monster beyond their worst nightmares has arrived, and they know that they're about to die.
  Rebel Officer: OPEN FIRE!!!
  • Vader starts to mow down his opponents effortlessly like a Force-sensitive Jason Voorhees. The ones not immediately struck down open fire and are variously crushed, slashed, stabbed, Force-choked or shot by their own deflected blaster-fire. All they can do is scream for their compatriots on the other side of the door - and with the door jammed, they can only watch as Vader wordlessly kills them all. Never has the full, terrifying force that is Vader been captured as in this scene as he becomes an unstoppable specter of death. And this all takes place in one minute.
  Rebel Officer: [banging on the door] HELP US!]
  • This whole scene is accompanied by an equally terrifying choir.
  • Not only is Vader silent, the violence is horribly effortless, with almost no movement above the shoulders while his victims are frantic. He almost looks bored, slaughtering his way through the rebels at a methodical walking pace and calmly swinging his lightsaber like a walking stick. He lets them fire off a few shots when he could have easily just disarmed them all with the Force, (which he does later) as if to say there is really nothing the rebels can do to stop him.
  • To drive home just how terrified the Rebels are, notice their accuracy. In the beginning, their shots were accurate enough to require Vader to deflect them with his lightsaber. By the end, they all go way past him because the Rebels are too scared to even aim straight.
  • One of the poor rebels is slammed up onto the ceiling by Vader—then he's sliced in half by his lightsaber. All he can do is scream horribly as he dies, and the two halves of his corpse drop onto the floor behind Vader as he continues his attack, not even looking. Even worse is that the killing blow from Vader is done with a casual backhand after Vader has passed the man, the kill little more than an afterthought.
    • If you look in the background, all the other Rebels stop immediately in horror of what just happened.
  • Of course, the last trapped rebel, accepting his inevitable death, reaches through the gap in the door to hand off the plans Just in Time, leaving Darth Vader on the wrong side of the stuck door from the plans, right? Nope! Vader slices through the door (after impaling the last trapped rebel) and proceeds to tear through the rebels on the other side as the rebel who grabbed the plans sprints away, half a breath ahead of the Dark Lord of the Sith and barely escaping with his life.
    • And very easy-to-miss is a split-second moment when a blaster shot, apparently deflected by Vader, narrowly misses hitting the fleeing rebel by only a hair (causing him to make the dramatic slip safely into the Tantive IV). Vader used a shot fired by one of the man's own doomed comrades to try to stop him from escaping with the plans, and had it not missed, the Corvette would have escaped with nothing for all the sacrifices.
    • All of which turns the opening scenes of Star Wars: A New Hope into its own massive dose of Fridge Horror - said "lucky" crewman barely escapes from Darth Vader himself... until Vader catches up to the Tantive IV. And the rest of the corvette's crew barely escaped as well - all those Rebel troopers know exactly what's coming for them. Though it's somewhat subverted when it's not Vader who kills him, but his stormtrooper goons.
  • And that's before we get into the Fridge Horror implicit in the massacre; it's just a glimpse of Vader's rampage. Never mind how many people he's butchered in similar fashion offscreen during Episodes IV and V, never mind in between films and trilogies...
  • And it also gives us an idea of the monster Kylo Ren might yet become, thirty years down the line. This is the guy he idolizes.
  • The entire scene owes a lot to Legend of Galactic Heroes, which depicts war in a very similar fashion.
  • Maybe the door didn't conveniently get jammed. Maybe Vader was using the Force to hold it shut.
  • Really, the whole final sequence shows us what it's like to be facing Darth Vader if you're not Force-Sensitive, or a hotshot pilot, or otherwise protected by Plot Armor. There's a reason most of the galaxy lives in mortal terror of him.

edited 14th Sep '17 7:45:32 PM by SithPanda16

If that's kept, it needs to be seriously condensed...we don't need a blow-by-blow account of the entire sequence.

I try to avoid those films (so I only skimmed it), but there are some things that seriously need to go. If something's described as "delicious", I don't quite trust the intent of the troper. "Easy-to-miss" is another, which basically just says, "if you look really closely, you can interpret something about this". It doesn't help that that example is also just a hypothetical, so it should be cut anyway. Same with the gushing and what someone might become.

edited 15th Sep '17 12:47:05 PM by AnotherDuck

Ok here are the cleaned up NFM entries from Dredd. I chopped the references to generic gore of the film, cleared out spoilers, cleared off the kids hanging out on the skate park hung on the buildings exterior who were never in any real danger or harmed during the course of the film, cut the bum entry as it was the consequence of him ignoring the judges telling him to leave and was a quick instant death. The generic executions are usually just a quick head shot unless they are killed during a gun battle. The corrupt judges are all killed in combat.

I rewrote the first example referring to killing of the three drug dealers condensing most of it and cutting the cruft. I made some changes to clan techies eye gouging. I rewrote the flare execution as it was effectively a ZCE stub. It now has a better description of the scene with some additional details.

• Ma-Ma's gang catches three rogue dealers on their turf and decides to make an example of them. Ma-Ma orders them skinned alive and thrown from the top floor of the buildings atrium 200 floors up. Ma-Ma's Lieutenant, Kay, suggests they be dosed with the drug Slo Mo before throwing them off. The drug would artificially prolong the suffering during their fall to the bottom floor by altering their perception of time to a fraction of what they would normally experience.

• Clan Techie getting his eyes gouged out by Ma-Ma. She personally gouges his eyes out with her thumbs without any medical aide or anesthetic while he is forcefully held down by some of her goons. His high-pitched wails make your skin crawl and his cybernetic prosthetic replacements after the fact appear red rimmed and sore.

• Dredd's very first execution involves him firing a "Hot Shot" flare into the open mouth of a criminal holding a woman hostage. The mans face and head are brightly lit in a reddish hue as the flare quickly burns him to death from inside his mouth and face and then his head. He collapses slowly to the floor with his face partially charred and a puff of smoke gushing from the back of his head.

This look good to you folks?

edited 16th Sep '17 9:31:28 AM by TuefelHundenIV

Some grammatical things, like "Orders" being capitalised, a "whil" lacking an 'e', and "Ma-Ma" being written differently (assuming it's the same character). Possibly more. On the whole it's good, though.

Ok cleaned those up. Unless there was something else I will make the switch and link back to here in the edit reason.