Dying is Easy, Comedy is Hard

The old saying goes, “Dying is easy, comedy is hard”. That is one hundred percent true, which you may not realize until you actually try and be funny.. While I think that the supernatural and humor are a natural pair, it can be trickier to balance than you might imagine going in.

For one thing, almost nothing is more personal than humor. What you find funny and what I find funny varies wildly, and you need to look no further than the television to confirm this. Many people enjoy the top rated comedies, or whatever sitcom you can find on your TV at this moment, and odds are if you turn it on right this second you'll be greeted by a sitcom in syndication (or an infomercial, which is its own kind of comedy). A lot of people find Modern Family or Family Guy hysterical, and yet there are almost as many who would rather poke hot needles in their eyes than suffer through an episode. It's not only content – it's style and taste (or lack thereof), timing, a dozen different things. Where you might dislike certain kinds of horror, there's less variation within that dislike. It usually just comes down to genre with horror – you might dislike gorn (also known as torture porn) but like slasher films, or vice versa, or maybe you like it all, but hate CGI. As personal as scares are, there's something about humor that makes it much more unique and revealing.

If that's where the problems ended, you could color me a happy writer. But of course it's not as simple as that. Beyond the problem of humor being highly subjective, there's the problem of balance. There has to be a happy medium between the humor and the horror. For instance, if the horror is too violent or, well, horrible, you throw the reader right out of the scene, and there's just no way to laugh. One way to handle that is through being vague about the violence, or approaching it as slapstick, but that's easier to do on film. I'll point you to the fabulous “hand fight” scene of Evil Dead II. Almost impossible to capture on the page, but hilarious on screen. At the same time, if you make everything a joke, there's no stakes, and therefore no horror. You've made a children's story with bad words.

Since I'm writing a comedy horror series, I find myself thinking about these things a lot. Horror – and certainly the paranormal offshoot of it – is a natural for comedy. And yet juggling all these things – the amount of violence, the type of humor, how you frame a scene – can feel a little overwhelming. Am I hitting the target, or am I missing it entirely? Is it funny, or is it just kind of weird? Is my editor going to kill me? Okay, to be honest, no matter what genre I'm writing in, I assume my editor's going to kill me. I give them so much work to do, I should praise them all here and now for being wonderful, patient people. (I do appreciate you, I hope you know that, and I'm not going out of my way to give you work. It just seems that way.)

I wanted to end this little bit of meandering by giving you tips, but truth be told, I would like to hear from you. What do you, as a reader, feel about horror comedy? Do you like it? Hate it? Is it too tricky to pull off? If you're a writer, have you dabbled in the genre? Even if you haven't written in horror/comedy, I'd just love to hear from the comedy writers.

Just to end this little rant with something beyond questions, I'm going to name three of my favorite horror comedies, in no particular order: Evil Dead II, Shaun of the Dead, and Dead/Alive (also known as Braindead). (All, you may note, with a paranormal bent.) If you've seen any of these films, what do you think works? Is there something in particular that didn't work for you? Or do you think horror and comedy should stay in their respective corners? I have to admit, I'm dying of curiosity.

-Andrea Speed

How Horror Snuck Up On Me When I Wasn’t Looking

Okay, up front I will fully admit to being a chicken shit when it comes to the things that go bump in the night.  I was the kid that could not watch horror movies at slumber parties or else I ended up crawling into my parents’ room in the middle of the night to sleep on the floor.  Of course that might have something to do with being scratched by a cat during a critical scene in Nightmare on Elm Street.   I swear I never had a normal night’s sleep again until we moved out of state and I managed to convince myself that Freddy Kruegar was still looking for me in Ohio.  I told myself that as long as I never watched another Elm Street movie I would be safe in Maryland. 

"Dagon" Todd Shearer



As much as horror scared me, I have to admit that I was drawn to it, fascinated by it.  I kept going back for the thrill of fear.  I even watched The Children of the Corn in a barn surrounded by cornfields.  When we lived in that little rental for a month with no TV, my sisters and I re-enacted out horror movies to keep ourselves entertained.  When my mom would demand that we be quiet because she worked nights, I would tell them romance stories with their favorite leading men.  Looking back now, I think I was predisposed to a mix of romance and horror at a very young age even though I loved to read fantasy books the most.  Weird right?  Most of the stories I wrote then had a both a love interest and some strange demonic entity.

Then I became friends with my future husband who introduced me to role-playing and the absolute freaky horror of Call of Cthulhu.  It’s a game based on the mythos of H.P. Lovecraft who has influenced many horror aficionados over the years.  It’s a game that really doesn’t have a happy ending.  In my experience you can count on your character ending up one of three ways by the end of a campaign: (1) dead; (2) insane then dead; or (3) just insane. 

Every time he brought out the Cthulhu books we would all shiver before the games even started.  And I’ll never forget the smile he had on his face whenever he asked us to make a sanity roll.  He smiled like that often.  And every time you failed a sanity roll, your character lost a few more marbles.  I loved the way that he could set the mood.  It seemed effortless to me.  I loved watching the characters’ descent into madness, struggling to hold onto any normality that they could as they fought to survive.  And I loved knowing that it was a hopeless fight for my characters.  (The characters at least had the comfort of believing they had a fighting chance.  The players knew better by the 2^nd damn game and that was part of the thrill.)



"Hounds of Tindalos" James Wolf Strehle



Which brings me back to what really scares me.  I can handle serial killer movies like Scream or I Know What You Did Last Summer or When a Stranger Calls.  Those movies never kept me up at night, because the killer could be defeated.  The characters at least had a fighting chance that eventually the bad guy would be overcome and there would be a few survivors.  It’s the Grudge or The Exorcist that really scared the hell out of me.  Situations where no matter what you do, you’re screwed.

If you had asked me when I was younger if I’d ever write stories with elements of horror in them I would’ve said hell no, not realizing that I already was.  I like taking perfectly normal characters living normal lives and thrusting them in unnatural situations to see how they cope, like Jacob in my vampire trilogy.  In my latest story that I’m currently editing, Dean is on his way home when he is murdered and now his ghost has to help his lover Andrei find the killer.  I wanted to write a story that not only included paranormal elements, but the personal horror of having all your dreams shattered with one bullet.  I wanted to see how Dean and Andrei would overcome their demons and move on.  Here’s a little excerpt:

“Dean, you can’t stay.”  Andrei closed his eyes, swallowing convulsively.  “Please, I know it doesn’t make sense.  And maybe one day I’ll have the chance to explain it to you, but you’ve got to leave me behind.” Andrei gathered what reserves he had left and slowly straightened and turned in his chair.

Dean stood behind him, his warm hazel eyes grave as they stared at each other.  He looked so vital and solid.  So goddamned fucking real.  He could be selfish and let Dean stay, and god, at first it would be wonderful, until it became obvious that Dean was like an old time LP caught in the same skipping loop over and over again.

Andrei blinked rapidly.  “Why are you here?  Is it to be with me?  Is it to help you find your killer?”

Inexplicably, Andrei heard the sound of a bird singing; a songbird of some kind, cheery and bright with the promise of sun filled days.  Then far off in the distance a baby began to cry, the sound rising and falling, melding with the bird into strange kind of melody.

Andrei opened his mouth to ask a question, but the fierce look of concentration on Dean’s face stopped him.  A picture appeared in the middle of the air, fluttering to the floor.  Frowning, Andrei scooped it up and saw a little girl with dark hair and smiling eyes.  “Is this one of the kids that Justin was talking about?”

Dean shook his head slightly and a line appeared between his brows.  A dozen more pictures fell, all of different little girls with dark hair, all about the same age.  “What else can you tell me?” Andrei asked.

More pictures began to litter the floor, pictures of babies, of robins, pictures of slim white men in trucker hats, ads of camper trucks.  More and more pictures fell, striking Andrei’s face and the back of his head; crying babies, laughing babies, until Andrei thought it would never end.

“For godssake Dean, stop it!”

The pictures vanished and when Andrei looked up, Dean was gone too.

Who else has a love/hate relationship with horror?  Tell me why you like or don’t like it as a genre.  And if you have a favorite movie or story share that too.