Fifty Horror Clichés That Need to Die in a Fire

#3: Let's Spilt Up

  One of the best traits of Steven King's iconic novel It is the unity between the rag-tag group of friends, ironically called The Losers Club.  Even when their worst fears are depicted by the entity Pennywise the Dancing Clown, they never leave each other behind.  One life is equal to all lives inside of this rag-tag group of children, who are able to take down the entity not once but twice by working together.  Its ideology of friendship is a testament to not only the honor genre but to literature as a whole.  The Losers Club has become a strong influence for many other great friendships in literature, showing that a bond can be formed between individuals naturally without being blood related.  This is a lesson that many books have preached beautifully and one that I myself stand by when creating my own cast of characters.  For me, I would ditch a romance any day for a well developed friendship when writing my own stories.

  With It's big influence in mind, how is it then that this moral also has been notoriously ignored by many other stories, particularly the horror genre?  Apparently in most horror stories, it is a trope to split up the cast of characters during the climax of the plot.  This idea is an insultingly bad one not only on the terms of creating a realistic bond between friends, but makes no sense to the characters involved.  Basic human instinct would sensibly kick into overdrive when threatened by the presence of someone intimidating, killer or not killer.  Instead of separating from one another, the cast of characters would in normal circumstances work together to defend themselves heavily using anything they could use as a defensive weapon in the area.  In actuality, it is more likely the killer would end up either arrested or dead instead of the characters splitting up after some poor decision making.  Worse, a loyal friend in any situation would never leave their partner to die a gruesome death and even if it meant their own demise would stay with their buddy until the end came.  (That is if the friend most in danger did not force those staying with them to flee in order to give the others a chance to survive.)  In a logical sense, splitting up the cast of characters is completely stupid.

  If it is so stupid then, why is this cliché so widely used.  The answer to that is simple; cheap suspense.  A lot of horror genre writers wrongly believe that by splitting up the group of characters, they will create more suspense for the audience who will become worried about their safety.  However, this instead creates predictability due to the large amount of times the trope has been used in the same exact fashion.  The audience will always know that most of the characters are not going to survive the situation, making it frustrating to watch as they are proven right after the slaughter inevitably occurs.  Instead of impressing the audience, the writer instead unintentionally ruined their story, taking away any salvageable believability the story might have contained.

  As I have stated in the introduction of the editorial, I prefer the Walking Dead comics much more over the TV series.  Besides the comics having much better characterization, it has the sense to not fall into cliché territory as often.  One strong example of this is the trope of splitting up the group when there is danger nearby.  In the comics, a group of at least two to three people are arranged every time a dangerous situation occurs.  This is so the individuals involved have a much better chance of surviving by combining their best traits to fight off any intruding walkers.  When in a group, the survival rate for the characters is much higher, which makes logical sense considering the aspects of the situation they are trapped in.  What does not make sense is what the TV show does instead.  In the TV show, many characters are separated completely on their own for the dumbest of reasons, ranging from the inability to watch over an easily scared child for five minutes or egotism to gain control over the small population of surviving humans.  Ninety percent of the time, these characters end up becoming walker food, all because they did not listen to logic.  With this logic, characters such as Sophia who died in the show but not in the comics could have been easily saved.  It is insultingly bad writing choices on this show that make me answer on multiple occasions that I love the Walking Dead comics much more than the TV show.  The sad thing about this situation is that still even now more people prefer to watch the unpolished actions of the TV show versus the polished actions inside the comics.

  When it comes time for you to write a horror story, remember to use logic when applying the character's actions inside of the plot.  The main characters have too strong of a brotherhood to just leave each other behind.  It is the basics of all loyal friendships.  Instead of splitting up the group of characters, how about having them fight back surprisingly to take down the killer.  Just tease the aspect of the cliché being used in the story before surprising everyone by not using it at all as a genre breaker.  That or just do not use it at all.  All you really need to do to remedy the situation is to add more creativity into a usually rehashed scene.  After all, one of the horror genre's best aspects is its creative freedom for the crazy actions that can take place inside the story's plot.