How to survive in a horror flick
October 31st, 2005
This came to me in the middle of Stephen King's It. If you were stuck in an action/horror film after 1995, what will increase your chances of survival? Here's a brief list:
Be young. Very rarely will children die or even get hurt in a horror film. With teenagers, you have an increased chance of dying (hence the genre of "teen slashers,") but that again decreases when you hit about 30. Babies have the best chances of survival. Take a concerted effort to distance yourself from other children. They're often evil(er) in large crowds (Village of the Damned.)
Be a minority. This sounds racist, but it isn't. From memory, I remember that rich white males seem to die most often. Women, especially single mothers of young children, seem to survive the best (think the Halloween series.)
Be cute and fuzzy. Puppies and kittens never die in horror movies. Even in the most unlikely situations, like Pearl Harbor, the cuter you are, the better.
Be an "even" character. Trying to be a tough guy, a complete wuss, pompous, or an expert in some field will kill you. The everyman is often the luckiest. And don't even think about having a British accent.
Drugs will kill you, but not in the way you expect. Especially when you're in college. Serial killers can smell the pot on your breath. Even the ones without noses.
Comedians are guaranteed to get it, but not so bad. The thing with comic relief in horror movies is this: it's funny when they die. Sometimes, they'll be saved so they're second to last, especially if the rest of the cast is morbid. The same rule applies to the dimbulbs of the bunch.
Skeptics: not a chance. They usually die just after realizing they were wrong.
Don't plan a trip somewhere. Usually, the one who organizes a trip to where the trouble is dies. Their deaths tend to occur late in the film, but you can see it coming a mile away.
Stay in a group. By far, the majority of horror victims are those who wander off. Morons.
Big guns help...alot. Specifically, big guns help in movies where the threat is something physical, like aliens, zombies, or Hollywood celebrities with big opinions (I try not to confuse the last two.) This may seem obvious, but you'd be surprised how often that rule is ignored. Experts believe it's because those who refuse guns are hippies (see the rule about druggies.) These times, it's a good thing to pull an Army of Darkness on the baddies.
Listen to the music. If it gets quiet, you can hear wind, or the background music plays the same few notes over and over in low key, get the hell out of the room. Stay where there's happy music, perhaps romantic stuff.
If you're the villain, sign up for a franchise. It's getting quite fashionable among knife-weilders nowadays. Shop around, and you might get a spawn of Satan-type offer.
Solving the mystery: BAD. Don't ever say something like, "Wait...I think I know what's going on. I think this is all happening becauseAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" Someone else will find out after you're dead, anyway.
Random crackpot theories: GOOD. These usually are correct. Random off-the-cuff hypotheses have clear superiority over logic and reasoning.
If you're the last person standing, you KNOW that you're safe. Everyone knows that, no matter how many of the above rules have been broken, you somehow happen to be the last living character, something is going to stop the ghost/monster/Ralph Nader from getting you. You don't even have to do much, sometimes. Just wait for someone or something else to come along.
THE CONCLUSION: It's amazing what can happen when movies are this predictable. Have a safe Halloween.
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