The Nostalgia Horror Phenomenon

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Analog Horror, Mascot Horror, Liminal Horror. Perhaps the most popular horror genres in fiction right now, and they all have on unlikely thing in common: a sense of nostalgia.

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[Warrior-Of-Virtue]

One example of getting screwed by nostalgia is a particular food, usually some kind of candy, that you absolutely loved as a kid. You eventually find that food somewhere and eagerly pop it in your mouth only to find that your taste buds have changed completely over the years and fight the urge to gag.

[meekalefox]

There was a creepypasta from a while ago called “Funland” in which a guy visits an old theme park he used to visit as a kid, and his favorite animatronic, now corrupted, straight up tells him to get out and that he shouldn’t have come back. I’ve always thought of that as being an allegory for how it’s one thing to remember your past, and it’s another thing to obsess over it and want to go back to a time that just isn’t there anymore. And the main character suffered for it.

[tiffanym]

So i had a bit of liminal horror recently. I came from small town america where empty streets were the norm. I moved to a decent sized city that i couldn't afford to live and I became homeless. I was used to busy bustling streets. People walking. Cars honking. Then covid hit. The streets were empty. I felt like i was back home but it didnt look like home.

[Devalius]

It’s so oddly ironic that I got a surge of joy when you mentioned Candle Cove, because the horror of nostalgia itself has become a weirdly joyous part of my nostalgia experience. It gets me thinking about that old Creepypasta era, with all its mixed bag of writing quality, which I still really appreciate for getting me into horror.

[TheLazyWitch]

never thought i would hear his calming voice talk about freddy fazbear

[dionettaeon]

I think Among the Sleep could be another good example. The game is entirely from the perspective of an infant, where even any words you see are unreadable markings, and it's really effective at making everything likewise fantastical and intimidating. Familiar objects seem menacing in the darkness, hanging trench coats look like ominous figures, and hearing aggressive talking as just horrific, distorted noise. And unlike the usual maliciousness in most horror games, the horror in Among the Sleep is actually the trauma of a broken family through the eyes of a child.

[ElijahMeadow]

You should be an audiobook reader, your voice is very calm and talented.

[elliart]

One of my favorite analogue horrors is a new one called "Angel Hare", because... tbh it doesn't really feel like a horror. It follows a young man as he rediscovers this entity that would inhabit the main character of a children's bible show and talk to him directly when he was very little. But the interesting thing is he was never afraid of her. In fact she was kind and patient, and was implied to be the only one looking after him countless times. The horror doesn't come from her, but instead the very grounded-in-reality abuse the boy was facing in his normal life, and what the entity had to do when she was afraid he might not survive. You keep waiting for her to reveal her "true colors" as some evil trickster or something, and it never happens. I just thought that was a really cool subversion of the genre.

[lerneanlion]

Everything can be a double-edged sword, blessing and a curse, and nostalgia is not even an exception to this.

[epicdavid]

One thing about nostlagia horror i find interesting is that oftentimes, it's created by people who didn’t grow up with analog media. With creators who are young, i think they are channeling the fear of the unknown. Becuase they dont know what the 80's, 90's, was like necuase they didn't grow up during that time. Despite growing up online and having acess to content of any generation there is still a sepration from them and the culture and people of that time.

[kaylathehedgehog]

When you talked about liminal horror, I couldn't help but think of Disney World's abandoned River Country water park.

I don't know what the state of it is now, but I remember reading stories of people who were able to sneak in and seeing the photos they took. There's just something sad and rather unnerving seeing all the park equipment all messy and broken down with nature steadily taking over it.

[NicolasJRedfox]

thinking back about "where the wild ones are" it's a very cute and charming children's book, but if i remember correctly it actually was rather scary and also a little depressing (?) - like it wasn't quite as happy ending as those fairy tales usually go.

[AustinOnSugar]

"Maybe the only reason it ever felt alive is because you lived it" is a line that goes HARD.

[stephenroberts]

I think another part of mascot horror is that a lot of people find the aesthetic of objects and areas designed for small children is in some way unnatural.

Little kids look at the world differently to to adults, both in what they focus on and in their ability to notice details. Its why kid spaces are often all bright colours and big exaggerated figures with few details to confuse them. For adults however these elements seem unnatural, out of place, they don't fit an adult perspective of what the world should look like so they start to run into that uncanny valley where things don't really belong.

It's no wonder that there is a section of horror devoted to it when when there is already a large part of the population who find it creepy and unnatural even before the supernatural is brought into it.

[Daemonworks]

One of the wildest examples nostalgia horror I'm aware of is the Banana Splits movie, took a real-word mascot-suit kids series by Hana Barbera in the 60s and went full horror with it. Not a homage or reference, they just got the rights and went to town.

[rafbi]

I love smell induced nostalgia. You suddently smell something that takes you back, many times to places you can't even remember, but you know you've been there. These last few days smell exactly like the summer before graduating for me and I'm so in love with the feeling of re-experiencing that memory.

[covertcreator]

Not gonna lie, I was just waiting for you to bring up The Mandela Catalogue. I still can't believe it was made by an 18 year old dude. He's got a heck of a future ahead of him!

[ss-oqpc]

I remember years ago when I was a kid, my mother brought me to some house. I think it was the house of some friend of hers, maybe a coworker. Whoever it was, they had kids my age, and a basement full of toys. Literal piles of them up against one of the walls. Us kids were down there playing for a while, then we decided to go up stairs. The huge pile of toils against the wall was on the way to the stairs. I was the last one to leave, and as I passed the toys I heard a growling sound coming from inside the pile.

They didn't have pets.

We never went back to that house again.

[CalebTibster]

9:18 One thing you didn’t mention that I think is worth noting: Candle Cove was written by Kris Straub, the same guy behind Local 58. Not only that, many of his works are in a shared universe. For example, Kris confirmed that the channel that Candle Cove aired on *was* Local 58.

[dabo]

When I was a kid, I woke up with sleep paralysis. All I could see was that reflective shine in my dog's eyes as it peeked around the corner of my dark bedroom doorway. At the time, I didn't know what it was, and it was horrifying.