As horror week approaches, let’s take a look at some of these horror genres! Now, it’s important to note that the genres chosen by the mods are a reflection of Western horror genres and standards rather than those popularized in Chinese media, but several of them still have interesting parallels and contributions. For each of these posts I expect to talk about a few famous or relevant examples, then we’ll see about tying them into Scum Villain for our horror week; if I ramble a little bit, please forgive me!
Now, folklore.
In Western horror, I think that we’ll all turn immediately to Grimms’ Fairy Tales, the collection of German fairy tales that popularized stories like Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, and Snow White. Naturally, none of these stories originally had their Disney endings—while not all of the endings could be considered bad, per se, they’re quite frightening stories.
When it comes to designing a folklore based-horror for a horror fic or art piece, I personally really like the idea of dipping into creating horror from Chinese folklore. The PIDW xianxia universe really just makes it convenient to have creatures that are common in Chinese folklore like huli jing (fox spirits) that drain the energy from men, or remixing a tale such as the story of the painted ghost. If you’re a nerd for references, checking out Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio might help you find some really interesting references for tales to write about! These tales were published in the 1700s, and are full of both haunting and fascinating stories. I’ll no doubt recommend this volume again during the Supernatural day, as it covers plenty of the general supernatural and spirits alongside being a font of classic folklore.
If you got this far, then congratulations on sticking with me! If you have a favorite folklore story, I encourage you to share them with us! And if you have an idea for a story that you might love but not have the time to commit to, share those as well! We’d love to see your horror ideas.
[Aug 24-31 timeline and full list of prompts can be found here.]
