Horror's Three Fears: Gross-Out, Horror, Terror (Stephen King's Hierarchy)
Stephen King, in his nonfiction book Danse Macabre, identified three distinct types of fear that horror can evoke: Terror - the finest emotion Horror - one step down Gross-out - the fallback when all else fails This isn’t a value judgment about quality. It’s a recognition that different types of fear work on different psychological levels and serve different purposes. Understanding this hierarchy-and when to deploy each-separates effective horror from cheap scares. ...