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It appears that many Nightmare Fuel pages have problems, including:
1. Listing non-scary things that made the viewer feel slightly uncomfortable at worst.
2. Having spoiler tags on them (which is against the page's guidelines).
3. Listing Fridge Horror and fan theories.
And much more!
On a few occasions, people from outside the site's community have pointed out our overly lax usage of Nightmare Fuel to make fun of us, meaning that it can legitimately harm our reputation to let this go unchecked.
The TRS thread
meant for redefining Nightmare Fuel started to become a place for cleaning up Nightmare Fuel pages in general, so we may as well move these discussions to Long Term Projects where they belong.
Here are the guidelines to determine whether something is Nightmare Fuel or not.
- This is a page whose name is intended to be taken more literally than most. It's not enough for material to be scary; to truly qualify, it has to be frightening enough to legitimately unnerve/disturb the viewer, with actually being nightmare-inducing as the ultimate endpoint.
- Good signs that something IS Nightmare Fuel include if:
- It left you feeling shaken even after the credits had rolled, you turned the last page, or are otherwise done with the work.
- You have a hard time falling asleep if you think about it at night, or have a literal nightmare about it.
- You dread that episode, scene, level, chapter, or song during re-watches, and consider skipping it.
- With that said, don't add something just because it happens to be your personal phobia. For example, spiders can be scary and many people have arachnophobia, but just because a spider happens to be in the work, it does not make a Nightmare Fuel entry. It needs to reasonably be scary to someone without the phobia.
- Don't confuse tension with fear. If the hero is in trouble, but you know he'll make it out okay at the end, it's probably not Nightmare Fuel unless the threat is especially disturbing.
- Good signs that something IS Nightmare Fuel include if:
- Explain WHY the entry scared you. Try to convey your sense of fear to your readers. Avoid putting up Zero-Context Examples.
- Remember that Weblinks Are Not Examples, and neither are quotes on their own. You should explain the horror in your own words, rather than rely on others to do so.
- Don't add things that might have scared someone. If it didn't scare you, and you don't personally know anyone else who was scared, you shouldn't be adding it to Nightmare Fuel.
- Nightmare Fuel should stick to you even after you're done with the work.
- If something is initially presented as scary but turns out to be harmless, it's most likely not Nightmare Fuel since The Reveal makes the scariness vanish.
- Jump Scares are a good source of Nightmare Fuel, but not all of them automatically qualify: being startled is not the same as being scared.
- Hypotheticals are not Nightmare Fuel:
- Remember that Trailers Always Lie: a scene that is presented as scary in the trailer could very well turn out to be inoffensive in the finished work. Only add examples from unreleased works if they were especially terrifying in the previews.
- Fan theories do not belong on the Nightmare Fuel page under any circumstance. No matter how much evidence they have to support them, don't add them until they've been officially confirmed. In the meanwhile, take them to Wild Mass Guessing.
- Fridge Horror goes on the Fridge page, not Nightmare Fuel. Don't add it unless it's Ascended Fridge Horror.
- Keep in mind the work's intended audience when considering whether or not something is Nightmare Fuel.
- If something is normal or expected in the genre, it does not automatically qualify. Violence in a Fighting Series or gore in a horror movie must be especially disturbing or gruesome by the work's standards to be Nightmare Fuel.
- Remember that Kids Shouldn't Watch Horror Films. If a work is rated PG-13 or higher but would only be scary to young children, it's not Nightmare Fuel.
- The standards on what qualifies as Nightmare Fuel are especially stringent on works aimed at children and pre-teens: kids have hyperactive imaginations, so even something benign can give them nightmares.
- Spoiler tags do not belong on Nightmare Fuel pages. Much of what scares us comes from inherently spoilery stuff such as death and the unknown, so finding spoilers on these pages should be expected.
- Nightmare Fuel is an Audience Reaction, so it needs to be scary for the audience. Describing how the characters react to something scary isn't needed. Just because something scares them, that doesn't mean it scares us as well.
- Nightmare Fuel is a No Real Life Examples, Please! page. Meta-examples involving the actors, production, or behind-the-scenes incidents are not allowed.
Guidelines when proposing cleanup of a page:
- Some rules are pretty objective. If you see a Zero-Context Example, Fridge Horror, Real Life example, speculation, In-Universe reaction that isn't scary to the viewers, examples that explicitly describe themselves as not being very scary (including "mildly creepy", "somewhat unnerving", and other synonymous phrases), or examples that are just scene summaries without going into detail about why it's so scary, you can (and should) remove them immediately without coming here to ask.
- You should also strip all spoiler tags from the page. Itty Bitty Wiki Tools has a tool for that, but it can cause problems, so if you use it be sure to preview the page and thoroughly look it over.
- Once you've fixed the objective issues with the page, bring it here so we can look at the more subjective problems, such as examples that may not be scary enough to qualify. If a consensus is reached that a certain entry does not qualify, it can be removed.
Edited by Zuxtron on Aug 1st 2020 at 9:40:30 AM
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Cut since that example is a reach.
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
I found NightmareFuel.TWICE.
- The zombies of the Like OOH-AHH music video. They aren't really that scary, though.
- The place where the music video was filmed is actually a defunct amusement park by Yongma Land
.
- Also, try googling for 'yongma land'
. Some of the images can be Darker and Edgier than you think.
- Also Twice themselves explored around the park itself.
Link.
This one is explicitly described as "not really that scary". The rest is about the park where the video was filmed, not the video or song itself.
- Also, try googling for 'yongma land'
- The place where the music video was filmed is actually a defunct amusement park by Yongma Land
- The TT MV:
- The concept of the MV, is of course, Halloween.
- All the members are supposed to be ghosts.
- The setting is kinda dark when you look at it.
Link.
Halloween, ghosts, and a "kinda dark" setting aren't enough to qualify as nightmare fuel. Nothing in the video is really scary, it's your standard cute K-pop song while the members just dance in a house or pose in Halloween costumes.
- The Knock Knock MV ends with the girls losing track of time and getting locked out of the house, where it's strongly implied they freeze to death and become their ghost/costumed selves in the "TT" MV.
Link.
This could MAYBE count for very easily scared person, but I have a hard time imagining someone actually losing sleep over this.
- The Signal MV:
- The song itself seems Lighter and Softer at first, but it is about waking up a emotionless guy.
- And Mina
◊ and Jihyo's
◊ stare.
Link.
This contains a pothole to Fridge Horror, and I really don't get why this is described as scary. The pictures aren't scary at all. Here's a link to the lyrics
, it reads more like it's about a guy who doesn't get the hint that a girl likes him than someone with no emotions.
- During the group's trip to Switzerland, they visited the Thrill Walk. While most of the members were scared, they were eventually able to overcome their fear and actually enjoy it...with the exception of Dahyun. She was deathly afraid the whole time and clung on to Sana the entire walk down.
This is scary to Dahyun, not the audience.
Nothing on the page is scary at all except possibly Knock Knock (and even then it's only very mildly unnerving if anything). I think the page should be cut.
This list of examples that were recently added to The Loud House are full of ZCEs and Fridge whatnots. Several were already removed: see https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=15046601260A53602600&page=15#360
I'd like someone to inspect this list to decide which ones are kept and which one are cut.
- (cont). She actually has several physical handicaps as a result of her experiments. Keep in mind that Lisa is FOUR YEARS OLD. Also, she is quite sneaky and often lies about her human experimentations, such as changing the subject in regards to DNA samples or microchips. And let’s not forget when she and Lincoln had GLOWING BRAINS.
- Lisa’s mention of her giraffe cranium in “Friend or Faux?”. Seriously, how did she even GET that, and how would Darcy react if she saw it?
- Again in “Friend or Faux?”, Lisa can apparently talk to extraterrestrials, meaning they exist in the Loud House universe.
- (cont). Rita’s groans also sound rather menacing.
- Leni’s severed costume head in “Tricked!” is rather disturbing. Same with Luna’s skeleton makeup during her creepy musical number.
- Luan going completely psychotic every April Fool’s Day. It’s enough to make the Joker shit himself.
- Fenton is a rather scary-looking toy. No wonder Rita and Lynn Sr. hate him. Lincoln later dressing up like him is even worse.
- If Luna hadn’t gotten out of the gelatin in time, she definitely would have suffocated.
- Rita and Lynn Sr. forcing the kids to eat BUGS. Lucy later commenting on how she missed real food is certainly justifiable.
- Lucy and Haiku have been known to dig graves. Meaning they have into contact with CORPSES at eight and eleven years old.
- The real reason we never see Lucy’s eyes.
- Lucy owns a LIVE BAT as a PET.
- Leni being flung into a billboard in “Fool’s Paradise”. It’s amazing that her spine didn’t crack.
- Lana, a SIX-YEAR-OLD, doing electrical work by herself. Given that she also eats out of the garbage, this girl definitely has a death wish.
- Lucy sleeps in a coffin. With the lid shut. Let’s all hope it has air holes...
- No wonder Lincoln’s parents didn’t let him see that slasher movie. Seriously, this is supposed to be a show for CHILDREN.
- Luan getting a tooth knocked out with a baseball. Given that she’s 14 and has braces, that’d cost a lot of money to fix, and that is likely not her original tooth in the later episodes...
- Lucy turning into a vampire during one of Lincoln’s dream sequences.
- Lori’s “awkward stage” photo can come across as unsettling.
- Lori dressing up as Leni and then opens the bathroom door with tangled hair. She looks absolutely deranged. “Leni’s messed-up twin”, indeed.
- Lincoln cussing out Lori over the phone, drowned out by Luna’s guitar. And we thought LOLA had an explosive temper...
Edited by FoxyGrandpa12 on Sep 22nd 2018 at 5:26:45 AM
"Thing is, I believe that a single good movie will change your entire life." — Makima | aka Fox | he/she/they
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
The only thing here that isn't a ZCE or Fridge Horror is the first example (due to expanding on another example).
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
Any comments on TWICE mentioned above?
This was added to NightmareFuel.My Hero Academia:
- Small potatoes compared to One For All, but the ways many other Quirks can backfire are pretty disturbing. Aoyama's navel laser can damage his internal organs if he goes overboard with it, Kaminari's electricity short-circuits his brain when used at maximum power and leaves him a gibbering vegetable until he can recharge, Mineta runs the risk of scalping himself if he pulls out too many sticky balls from his head, Mina can be burned by her own acid if she uses it in excess, etc.
The issue I have with this entry is that none of these risks are really shown, except in ways that are Played for Laughs. For example, Aoyama's laser has never put his health at risk, in fact a later manga chapter shows that the "damage" to his organs is actually just making him shit himself when he uses it too much. Kaminari does go overboard with his electricity and become stupid quite a few times, but it's always used for comedy (at one point, Bakugo intentionally forces him to go past his limit so his stupidity will cheer his classmates up). Mineta has never been seen being forced to make more balls than he can take, except for one occasion which was during endurance training meant to increase his limit. I don't remember any case where Mina was burned by her own acid.
Since we don't actually see the gruesome potential consequences of these abilities, wouldn't that make this Fridge Horror?
Fridge Horror would be a better fit than Nightmare Fuel...maybe Blessed with Suck?
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
It's not Blessed with Suck because overall these characters like their powers and the upsides outweigh the drawbacks (which, like I said, haven't really come up except in scenes that are Played for Laughs) since they're only dangerous when used in excess and the limit is pretty high.
But if a mod agrees that it's Fridge Horror, I'll take it that my assessment was correct and it should be removed.
NightmareFuel.Dark Phoenix has plenty of speculations based on the trailer. And the image isn't that creepy.
Edited by Silverblade2 on Sep 28th 2018 at 10:57:20 AM
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Yeah, that looks like Fridge Horror.
I agree the image isn't appropriate. It looks more like album cover art or something like that. The image quote seems to have no association with the image. The woman in the picture looks almost serene, like she's generating the fire because she can, not because she's in agony.
Further more, the page quote is completely meaningless as far as a Nightmare Fuel page is concerned. There's no sense of nightmare fuel in that quote. It could fit on an Awesome page or a Tearjerker page or an Ambiguously Human or Humanoid Abomination page for all the context it fails to give us. I'd therefore suggest a page quote change as well.
So, regarding the entries:
Well, the page image is meaningless. This entire entry is meaningless. it doesn't explain why it's dangerous never mind why it's Nightmare Fuel.
'Judging from the shots'? This sounds like speculation based on promotional material rather than what is confirmed to happen in the work itself.
So? What do the flames represent? This entry seems half finished at best.
Well, we've got indentation issues here. Should it be combined with the above entry to make a single example? This sounds almost like Fridge, maybe it just needs to be better worded. It certainly sounds like it needs to be combined to the previous entry to create a proper example.
Well, the sinkhole says it all: this is a Fridge Horror example not Nightmare Fuel.
This seems to be character reaction, but it's another indentation issue and therefore isn't a complete entry in its own right. I'm therefore not sure what this entry is try to be or draw in.
- Erik: I’ve seen evil... and I'm looking at it now.
- Erik: You didn't come here looking for answers. You came here looking for permission.
Wait.... this page has been troping a trailer? Scrub it. It's the work that should be troped, not the promotional material.
Edited to add: I didn't read your post properly, I'd have realised it was a trailer sooner. Trailers lie to maximise interest and draw in viewers. It's no wonder this page seems to be based on speculation and Fridge.
Edited by Wyldchyld on Sep 28th 2018 at 4:50:30 PM
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
Still no comments on NightmareFuel.Twice?
I guess that maybe Jean accidentally killing her own parents might count for some viewers, if it was not written in a way that emphasizes Fridge Horror, but other than that it's all speculation.
I need help removing the spoiler tags from the Corpse Party page. It has a whopping 111 spoiler tags in it. Spent so much time stripping them but my connection was lost and I was too dumb to make a backup of the changes at that time...
With Great Power, Comes Great Motivation
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
Done. I used the Itty Bitty Wiki Tools to remove all of the spoiler tags at once.
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Wow, there's a tool to automatically remove spoilers? And here I was doing things manually yesterday...
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
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Since there's nothing but misuse on the page, go ahead. And put up TWICE's page too while you're at it.
The tool is actually a bit buggy. It removes the first set of closing brackets it finds after the initial [[spoiler: opener, which doesn't work when there are potholes under the spoiler. It also turns certain characters into garbage. So you need to go over the page afterwards, and fix the issues it makes. But if there are hundreds of spoiler tags, that's still faster than doing it manually.
NightmareFuel.Venom 2018 is yet another page for an upcoming movie padded with bad examples, speculation and fridge.
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
Removing the following examples:
- If Eddie's freak-out and Tainted Veins are any indication, the Venom symbiote is no longer just attached to him as clothes, but has taken residence inside his very body.
- And if Brock’s scream is any indication, it’s very likely that the bonding process is not particularly pleasant.
- Or it could be worse. The symbiote might already be a part of him and they're trying to FORCE IT off of him.
- Cletus Kassidy is in the movie.... CARNAGE HIMSELF is in the movie.
- Well, Cletus is in only a small portion of the film, likely The Stinger; but it just goes to show that Carlton Drake won't be the first, or especially worst foe Venom will have to deal with...
- [...]
- The worst part is that the trailer cuts to black right then, and we don't know what Venom did to the mook. All we hear is a scream.
- Considering what the Symbiote feeds on in the comics, the way it opens his mouth (theres even some drool dangling from his teeth and tongue) and how he licks the Mook’s face... one might guess.
- That all said, perhaps the most chilling implication is that this beast is the story's good guy.
- Making things worse is one of the storylines that inspired the movie. The storyline being PLANET OF THE SYMBIOTES. Meaning it's quite possible Venom and those that came with him are going to be the heralds for a full scale invasion.
Nightmare Fuel Simpsons needs a cleanup especially the examples that involve a little bit of blood like Itchy and Scrathy. When will people learn The Simpsons was never intended for kids. There are some easy keepers though like Cannibalistic Homer in the TOH episodes, though I would argue some would be more squick.
Also I admittedly added a few "Imagine if" examples to Zelda so I'd be alright with you cutting them. For Ocarina of Time I can see why people would find the Wallmaster for example scary, especially since its a disembodied hand made of zombified fingers and that noise it makes traumatized me when I was a kid and still does.
Edited by Klavice on Oct 2nd 2018 at 11:21:24 AM
NightmareFuel.Halloween 2018 again entirely based on previews and promotional material.
Previews
- For starters, the fact that an entire Nightmare Fuel page was created after the release of the first trailer shows that this movie is not holding back on scares.
- At one point, after Michael has escaped, he does something to someone's teeth, causally dropping them in-front of one of his intended victims.
- The simple fact Michael dropped the teeth in front of her for no other reason than to terrify her. A chilling reminder that Michael Myers is sadistic, alongside being a violent murderer.
- Immediately after, Michael starts trying to violently break down the bathroom stall door and unexpectedly and viciously even headbutts the door. The way Michael does this is extremely unsettling. Like he has become a being of pure rage.
- Actually, it is even worse. If you freeze frame the scene you realize that the person head butting the stall door is actually Martin. Or rather Michael is slamming Martin's head into the door to force it open. Even worse Martin's mouth is already bleeding, suggesting that the teeth Michael dropped are actually Martin's.
- At another point in the trailer one of Allyson's friends, Vicky, working as a babysitter, is asked to close the closet door by the boy she is babysitting. She tries, only to find it won't close, so she tries again...and again. She finally decides to open the door to see what is jamming it. Lo and behold, Michael is standing right inside, knife in hand, and it cuts away just as he attacks her.
- Again it gets even worse. At the 2:22 mark, for a split second, Vicky's hand is shown trickled in blood, while desperately trying to crawl towards the staircase.
- A group of journalists go to the prison Michael is imprisoned at to interview him. In the courtyard Michael is just... standing there motionless, surrounded by more visually unhinged inmates and then Martin, the lead journalist, takes the mask out of his bag (props to the make-up artists for making the it look exactly like the original one) and something causes all the inmates and a guard dog to lose it.
- While the patients are out in the yard, they seem spaced out; probably for their own safety. However it appears that Michael has been allotted extra space, more than likely for the safety of the other patients, given Michael's reputation.
- Hell, even the courtyard grounds (red and white checkered concrete) are downright unsettling.
- At one point, Laurie sees Michael at the window of a house. She levels her gun and fires at him...only to discover that was his reflection in a mirror. Michael is taunting her.
- The second trailer has some child halloweeners walking down a street and they run into Michael! Luckily he doesn’t harm them but Adult Fear probably went through the roof for most parents.
- However, he immediately starts following a woman a few yards away from him into her home with a hammer he took from her gardening shed. Michael follows her into the kitchen before killing the woman offscreen. All we hear is a scream and a loud crunch. What really makes this disturbing is that it’s very likely Michael knows where he’s going but he stopped to kill that woman for literally no other reason then to kill time.
- Next, Michael goes to a nearby house and looks at a reflection of himself through a window. A woman who suspects someone looks outside and sees no one there. Michael walks up right behind her before the screen goes to black.
- Perhaps the most chilling thing about this is that, similar to the feel of the first film, there's nothing supernatural at all about these two killings. Michael is just a madman, and this could easily be a home invasion anywhere in America.
- Also in the second trailer, a man opens a car door and finds an eyeless severed human head that Michael has hollowed out and carved with stereotypical jack o lantern designs and stuffed lights into, making a crude human jack o lantern. What’s worse? Michael is already standing behind the man by the time he realizes what he’s looking at.
- The scene where this page's picture is taken from is shown near the end of the trailer, which has Laurie getting grabbed by Michael through a door, ending with a close up of his face.
- In the first trailer it’s implied that Michael escapes and comes straight for journalists to get his mask back and kill them. However in the second trailer it’s shown that after he’s escaped he’s stalking them for sometime while they’re visiting his sister's grave. Also the fact that Michael is watching them from afar almost out in the open the way he did forty years ago with Laurie shows that his stalking skills are just as sharp as ever - and he somehow manages to go unseen in broad daylight while wearing a bright white sanitarium outfit.
Promotional Material
- In a convention, there was a display case containing a screen-used mask, the prosthetic for Michael's scarred eye, and a (prop) severed head of an unknown character from the film, who has had his eyes carved out, his nose cut off, and his mouth mutilated by The Shape himself in order to grotesquely resemble a jack-o-lantern.
- Now, in the second trailer, we catch a glimpse of it lit.
- The poster is already a little unsettling even though it's just an image of Michael's face looking downward emerging from a pitch-black background, but you when brighten up the picture, you'll then see he's actually looking directly at you
◊.
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
A few examples that I'm not so keen about from NightmareFuel.Cells At Work:
- They're the good guys, but the murderous rage of the Neutrophils can be quite terrifying to behold. Even the other cells are quite shaken to see the bloodthirsty heroes gruesomely eviscerating bacteria, then eating them.
- Killer T-Cell's unflinching brutality is also quite frightening at times, particularly when he verbally and physically attacks Neutrophil (of all cells!) for being "too soft". You can see just how much his job of killing his fellow body cells has gotten to him, and some potential Backstory Horror to how hardened he has become in having to kill his allies if need be. However, this is later mitigated by the implication that Killer T was harsh towards Neutrophil because he's secretly jealous of how well he gets along with civilians like Red Blood Cell. Of course, the Fuel is still there when you consider that his job may be why he doesn't try and get along with civilians.
- Related: Killer-T's only real relationships are with other immune cells, even if most are combative. As he constantly reminds his trainees, immune cells are expected to fall in the line of duty.
- The mood dissonance of the Macrophages' cheerful demeanor and their brutal and grisly combat style may be a little bit creepy as well.
These three examples are about good guys defending the body from infection. The second point sounds a bit like Fridge Horror or speculation. The third point is "a little bit creepy" (i.e. not very creepy).
- A few Jump Scare moments of Red Blood Cell screaming in close-up may also count as well.
Calling these "jump scares" is blatantly exaggerating things. Even if you're so easily startled that they made you jump, they're not going to haunt your dreams afterwards.
Also, I cleaned up this entry for being Fridge Horror, keeping only the first two sentences.
- Remember those tiny parasitic worms you see in documentaries? From the perspective of the body cells, they are gigantic kaiju-like monsters who destroy everything in sight. So far we have only seen the relatively easy-to-deal with anisakis, but one can wonder how other more dangerous and/or bigger parasites (like a tapeworm), would look in this setting...
- Note that the parasitic worm in episode 4 was a larval Anisakis, a mere 2mm in length (as Anisakis cannot mature in human tissue and eventually die, but not before causing significant damage to the gut lining). Compare that to a roundworm, which can reach up to 8cm (about a hundred times bigger!) or a tapeworm, which can grow as long as five or six feet, and just imagine that from the perspective of the cells...
Edited by Zuxtron on Oct 11th 2018 at 1:36:00 PM
NightmareFuel.Kitchen Nightmares is pretty bad, with the top of the page admitting it's "a bit of a stretch at times". I still think NightmareFuel.Zoom should be cut.
Keet cleanup
