What is your threshold for disturbing content?

[NellieVP318]

I'm not into horror stuff, but I slightly more into the thriller stuff rather than horror. I know watching stuff like Squid Game that I had to close my eyes to some deaths of it because it got very disturbing. Oddly, I can stomach the whole first game of that series but I can't for some of the others. If the whole media is in animation, it depends. Things like dog killing in Jojo Bizarre Adventure did bother me a bit but at least I understood why it was there only to make the bad guys look bad. It made it easier to watch but it was still awful.

I prefer more psychological straight up horror/thriller a bit more. As for my current stories, I do dip into dark themes but I do think I hold back much on it. I know I'm capable writing it but at times I chose not to for a variety of reasons.

[NickRowler]

I think it depends.

I am not a fan of hyper violence or body horror. I tend to like horror that focuses more on psychological or social issues. I am not a fan of action movies mostly because I think the gore is gross and people fighting for long periods of time is boring. Watching people get hurt can also make me super depressed and it will sometimes trigger intrusive thoughts. This is why I usually try not to watch shock horror because I do not want PTSD-like thoughts after watching a film.

On the other hand, I think I have a higher tolerance then most people for medical stuff especially with skin. I sometimes like to learn about different skin conditions and look up pictures of them. I also didn't find the scene in the new Candyman with the beehive skin disturbing.

I also tend to be OK if it is less realistic. Like in Danganrompa or Drifting Classroom. Or stuff like Superjail where it is so ridiculous you can't take it seriously.

[DasIstWunderblyat]

So far, I'm kinda on the same boat with OP
To add, if it's real life or a recreation of a real life event, I'd find it more disturbing than fiction.

[UrMom]

HOWEVER- I really despise when the entire story is just characters suffering. I need a bit of a balance of bad and good things happening to want to see the character get to a better place. Just watching someone suffer in agony in a story for so long makes me miserable.

Lmao! It's a good thing you've never read my comic. While it gets better later on, right now it's all "Wow, this sucks."

Honestly, as a reader, I don't really have a threshold. I can even handle really messed up rl stuff in portions. There are some things I will think are gross in a "that's unnecessary" kind of way, but in those cases I like to delve a bit into the person behind it. Half the time it's a kid, but sometimes you get particularly eccentric people who just like to make loud statements when arguing something. (It could also just be someone with a fetish or venting trauma.) At the end of the day it's none of my business, and I'm not particularly bothered by it, but it's still fun to get more context for particularly gnarly fiction.
Admittedly I am one of those types who seeks out disturbing content to push my threshold, but it's more of a control thing than a cute "Can I Stomach This?" challenge. Although it is fun to psychoanalyze the "artistic" choices behind the disturb stuff, sometimes you find really interesting things from delving into the deconstructive discussions on such media.

Speaking of, since you brought up 'A Serbian Film'. A while back I found a video and some discussion on the deconstruction of the movie, they had some interesting viewpoints, talking about how it's a visceral criticism of the porn industry. They also did analyses of the shot compositions, and what the director was trying to say with them. While I can't find it now because this was all before Youtube cracked down on mature videos, and the discussion was probably 10 years ago now, it did make me see the movie from a different perspective. Also, minus the gross stuff, I do think some of the shots look pretty good from a technical standpoint.
Not saying this to get you, or anyone, to watch it. I just saw the title drop and had to go on a tangent. Personally though, I think 'Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom', 'Slaughtered Vomit Dolls' and 'Nekromantik' are more stomach churning. Saw those movies once and I'll be fine never seeing them again.

Now that I think about it the one theme I can't handle is upsetting pet related stuff that isn't cartoonishly over the top, and clearly involving stuffed "stunt doubles". Like, even the most vanilla "Pet got separated from owner and can't understand" stuff is too upsetting, although it's worse if you hear about inhumane behind the scenes practices. I used to love Milo and Otis, but upon hear about what they did to the cats and dogs to make the movie what it is, I can't bring myself to feel even remotely alright about it. (Thank you for destroying my childhood, Lindsay Ellis! x'D) Similar with hearing about messed up stuff happening to children and adults behind the scenes of a film, but I'm ashamed to admit that I'm particularly invested in pets.

As a creator it really depends on what I want to make. I like edgelord shock value stuff when that's the point of the story, I also like sexualized Grindhouse style of horror, and gross out for the sake of gross out. I guess if it doesn't fit in with the themes and context of the story then I won't add it in, also I probably won't ever be able to do dark, or remotely challenging non-andromorphic animal stuff.

[jaylutes]

For me, I can't handle anything where animals, women and children are hurt.

[darthmongoose]

I have a relatively low threshold for what I'll put up with. My line is usually: "Did it feel like there was a point? Or did it feel like the creator just enjoys depiction of suffering for the sake of it."

I've made it through some fairly brutal stuff. I watched Old Boy, I've played The Last of Us, I read all of "A Song of Ice and Fire" and watched the first few seasons of Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead, The Boys etc. So I can manage that level of "Disturbing" where it's still kind of mainstream and the core genre isn't necessarily horror. Stuff like Madoka, End of Evangelion and the old Fullmetal Alchemist anime I can cope with.

But I don't like stuff like Saw, Human Centipede etc. And I hate Titus Andronicus (Which at least I'm not alone in, the play is so bad some scholars have debated if Shakespeare even wrote it).

So I think we can all agree that the fate of Nina in Fullmetal Alchemist is really disturbing. It's disturbing and awful... but it's important for the story because:
1. It establishes that yes, horrible things can happen to anyone in this series. Children and cute animals are not exempt, so you should absolutely buy into the stakes here.
2. People can and do use alchemy for truly awful things in this series, and an alchemist can become so obsessed with power, status and knowledge that they destroy everything precious to them (a lesson that Ed, with his tendency towards hubris, needed to truly internalise).
3. It hints that something in that country's administration is kind of F'ed up and that alchemists are maybe not given the oversight they should... or are perhaps being nudged towards evil on purpose.
4. It clearly reinforces that anything in alchemy that seems miraculous and impossible probably had some kind of terrible price behind the scenes.

I didn't enjoy it, but I wouldn't think the series was improved without it. It was disturbing and shocking in exactly the right way and used for the right reasons, and for that reason, it's become a really memorable part of an excellent series.

Grave of the Fireflies isn't a fun movie to watch. At all. It is a harrowing experience, but that's the point. It's based on a man's real experiences as a child in postwar Japan, and it depicts the horrors of the damage done by the war, the callous disregard for human life that can come about when people are poor and desperate.

Human centipede though is like.... I don't get it? I don't get the appeal. It's like somebody had a disgusting, nonsensical idea and made it just to be disgusting? (And then tried to make up a bunch of stuff about it being a critique of fascism or something to justify making it...) I'm not interested in that. The suffering needs to have a real point and feel like it fits the message and themes the story exists to explore.

[UrMom]

Grave of the Fireflies isn't a fun movie to watch. At all. It is a harrowing experience, but that's the point. It's based on a man's real experiences as a child in postwar Japan, and it depicts the horrors of the damage done by the war, the callous disregard for human life that can come about when people are poor and desperate.

Aw man, that was such a sad and gorgeous movie! While they're not quite as pretty, 'Barefoot Gen' and 'When the Wind Blows' are in similar camps. The former was also made by a survivor of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, with some of the visuals being taken from his memory of the aftermath. The latter being a Soviet nuclear attack on Britain, shown from the perspective of an elderly couple. They all have the same feel to them, but that's probably due to how they relate to real life events, and are meant to show how devastating their affects were.

I can't say this for everyone, but when it comes to me fiction like 'The Human Centipede' is appealing because it's pretty obvious it's just wants to be gross. (Don't know anything about the Facism thing, sounds like something a rando made up to justify their enjoyment of the movie.) If it's fake, no real people got hurt in the process, and the director is just messing around, I don't see a problem in enjoying it as something dumb. Personally I prefer the Child's Play sequels or Nightmare on Elm Street sequels in that aspect over 'The Human Centipede' because they're more hammy, or 'Tusk' (Which, if I remember right, was making fun of 'The Human Cenipede'.), but that's my general viewpoint when consuming gross or disturbing for the sake of being gross/disturbing stuff. The only question I ever ask is "Was this fun to watch/read in some compacity?", if the answer is 'yes' that's all that matters.

Of course I'm not saying this to try and convince you to enjoy that stuff, or change your viewpoint on it, I just wanted to share why I found it appealing.

[bloodstained.skies]

I laugh while watching those gore movies becasue they're so ridiculous​ The only good series are "Hostel" (it has some plot and interesting ideas) and "Man behind the sun" (based on real events, horrifying lesson about history)

I always try to keep gore/violence as realistic as possible. For example during war, a lot of brutal things happen and I want to show it because people have to understand that war isn't just "brave good guys fighting bad guys". What's more, it has to have some purpose for the plot and characters. It has to imapct the whole story, not just the reader

[powerplantanimations]

For me, I try not to give myself a threshold. When writing horror I feel like it's important to include stuff that makes you throw-up or scared. It can't be an enjoyable experience for the writer, it has to be uncomfortable.

I dunno if people will agree with me, but there's just something unsettling about seeing an artstyle you made or someone you've teamed-up with draw stuff you don't like to see. On a mental level, it's like seeing your child do horrible things like kicking dogs.

That said, I do plan on including some horror in That Stick Figure Isekai down the line (there's an entire storyline where I challenge myself to do bodyhorror with stick figures). But I've really been wanting to experiment with "implication horror". Ever since I saw an episode of Lupin where Goemon sliced this dude's arms, without showing it and having the camera angle being placed in a way where it's still ATTACHED to him (while having the guy cry in this real unsettling way like "this is my life now"), I was like "I want more of that".

My stories seem hopeful, but horror is a big element since being in a dark place in real life often seems hopeless, which is why it feels so great when the heroes just triumph

But for the stuff that usually scares me..., I can't stand small holes, dolls, clowns, sweet wholesome dainty women dying in the most brutal ways (Akira/GTAV) (I can take literally everyone else but this is the one group that disturbs me and I dunno WHY), death that comes out of nowhere (like characters you EXPECT to have plot armor) (for example, there was a movie my parents watched where this lady was looking into this guy's eyes and then all of a sudden she's just covered in his blood). Demons are another thing, although that's real life. In fiction I have yet to see a story where they've been portrayed in a scary fashion.

[NickRowler]

Aw man, that was such a sad and gorgeous movie! While they're not quite as pretty, 'Barefoot Gen' and 'When the Wind Blows' are in similar camps. The former was also made by a survivor of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, with some of the visuals being taken from his memory of the aftermath. The latter being a Soviet nuclear attack on Britain, shown from the perspective of an elderly couple.

That's not really the point of When the Wind Blows. It's a film criticizing the UK government on their propaganda that would advocate for "Duck and Cover" method of dealing with nuclear bombs. The film is sort of a dark satire of a couple following all the steps of a pamphlet they used to hand out to people during the time.

Edit: I believe they have people talking about it in the BBC docu-series Animation Nation.

[UrMom]

Well, that shows how dumb I am. Lol

[powerplantanimations]

Btw I SERIOUSLY need to rewatch Ghibli films. I remember watching Grave of the Fireflies (the one I watched the most) as a kid hearing it was disturbing/sad and I was like ".... am I missing something? I know the context but...". I felt like a jerk for not feeling something out of it lmao.

[NickRowler]

No your not dumb, I don't know how many young people or non-UK people were aware of those things. It's still an anti-war film with a dark subject matter. They also made fun of it in the Iron Giant (which in a US example)

[OohitsEli]

Man, it's weird but for gore I can tolerate literally anything, and I mean literally anything at all but I draw the line when it comes to body waste (urine, feces, etc.) and SA/ CSA. I just can't stomach those 2 things at all despite being fairly numb to typical violence of any kind.

[UrMom]

Btw I SERIOUSLY need to rewatch Ghibli films. I remember watching Grave of the Fireflies (the one I watched the most) as a kid hearing it was disturbing/sad and I was like ".... am I missing something? I know the context but...". I felt like a jerk for not feeling something out of it lmao.

Nah, sometimes certain fiction just doesn't resonate with someone. It could be lack of experience leading to trouble with empathy or sympathy, maybe the imagery was too over the top for you and thought it was silly, it could have not hit right for you personally, or it could be you just see them as fictional characters. (Which they are, but some people can't put themselves in character's shoes because of that.) There's nothing wrong with you for not feeling anything.

No your not dumb, I don't know how many young people or non-UK people were aware of those things. It's still an anti-war film with a dark subject matter. They also made fun of it in the Iron Giant (which in a US example)

Lol I don't know what counts as "young people" in this context, I remember seeing videos like that as a kid... I don't remember if it was seen as a legit thing, or a piece of history. Honestly though, I didn't look up 'When the Wind Blows' in any way whatsoever, and watched it at face value. So it is kinda dumb on my part since I should be putting in the effort to research, especially when I already talked about how I like researching context behind certain films.

[BoomerZ]

Made by people that don't understand duck and cover...

[GumshoeComix]

I can handle most horror, so guess my threshold is pretty high.

its when kids getting hurt that I tend to feel not so good.. Even then I can only think of two movies that stick with me on that and that's Mysterious Skin, (AMAZING movie, not a horror! but watch with extreme discretion!) and Split which both gave me PTSD episodes.
And I can't even say i draw the line there cause i watch movies and read comics with those topics all the time. I WRITE a story about it :v !!

Gore on the other hand I have no issue with unless its like, the skeleton from the poltergeist which is a real corpse.

[goatbat]

I think I'm a bit different in tastes to some horror movie watchers as like, Human Centipede First Sequence is fine w/ me but Misery, which is considered to be like mainstream basic horror, makes me a bit sad. It's kinda hard to differentiate why certain horror movies don't really hit barrier between 'disturbed, but interested and inspired' and 'too sad and uncomfortable to enjoy it as an artistic experience.'

Though, I did very much slow down on horror movies some time after quarantining, so I don't actually know for sure if my comfort level now is the same as it was in college.

I did have a s/o who did not like horror stuff at all & was too creeped out by them, but was not sad or bothered at all by fictional characters dying or going through hard times. I think everyone just processes these things differently, which is interesting.

[AxemanRifflord]

I don’t think I’m any more extreme than anyone else here. I remember going from “Oh cool, Tetsuo: The Iron Man is on the third tier of the disturbing movie ice berg. I’ve seen that. Guess I’m officially a horror nerd.” to “Why is Tetsuo: The Iron Man even on here? It’s just stop motion robot dicks taped to guys screaming. That film does not deserve this.”

On the other side of the coin, Invincible. I started reading it when I was in middle school and followed it until it’s conclusion while it was still being published. It’s one of my favorites and I was glad to see it get a burst of attention from the show.

When I first heard someone say “Invincible is a great show, but I can’t recommend it.” I could swear I almost had an aneurism. Until I realized they were referring to the gore.

Oh yeah. I distinctly remember hoping my parents wouldn’t see it when I first got into it. (And then I caught my dad skimming through it and he was chill).

Still, it was humbling to see that this aspect of something I love that I’ve taken for granted is a legitimate issue for people.

[system]

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