Why do horror story character never seem to just walk away?

[Zontar]

Now I won't pretend I've seen every horror movie or game or story out there, but of those I have seen this seems to be much more common then it should be.

Typical example of what I'm talking about: person/couple/family moves into a house. House is haunted. Thing in house tries to kill them or just torments them. Characters decide to fight whatever it is instead of just leaving. Characters either win, die or end up thinking they've won before dying at the last minute.

Now, the thing in, in a good number of these cases all the characters had to do was just walk away.

If there's some ghost/spirit/demon attached to the house or some object, just walk away, it's not like they can come after you in most of these stories. Hell, burn the place down while you do, it may not kill them but it will sure distract them while you tun away.

Now I know some stories give a reason for that not being able to work, but most don't even entertain the idea. I think horror movie characters should take some friendly advice and just walk away.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Eh, lazy writing, yeah. Not that hard to come up with a reason, but most don't bother.

 

[Keoul]

Because then there wouldn't be a story!

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Well for a haunted house it tends to be that the family doesn't actually believe in it being haunted, and just paid a shitload of money for the house so of course they don't want to just up and leave because a few weird things happened.

I mean seriously, if you dropped $300,000 for a house how keen would you be on just moving out and abandoning it because you hear some weird noises and had a weird accident happen to you?

 

[davidmc1158_v1legacy]

Because then there wouldn't be a story!

Exactly! Think of how boring the movie would be if people were sensible!

 

[Auron225]

Because they're stupid, stupid people. Or cause the writers can't figure out a good enough reason to address it so they don't bother and hope the audience won't notice.

A lot of the time it seems to be morbid curiosity - "What's going on here? I have to find out!" even to the point of lunacy.

 

[Loonyyy]

Genre's filled with cliches that get re-used without much thought. Hence why people always split up to search the dark house/woods when there's a killer on the loose, why teenagers stop to have sex and do drugs whilst some manifestation of sexual puritanism butchers them, and why people move into houses that are insanely creepy, and then they stay there.

It's already been said, but it's just laziness on the part of writers. It's not hard to deal with these things or handwave them. This is the only place for them to go. They actually leave. They're split up unintentionally. They actually want to be there (And that can be creepy as fuck). It's why Scream was so popular. There are swathes of horror movies that made it to the cinema and the public consciousness that are lazy as shit and filled with cliche.

 

[Lilani]

Horror stories that do it right at least address it in some way, like making them trapped in the situation. Some stories trap them from the beginning, but others lure the character in and then ensnare them. And the stories that do THAT right lure them in with curiosity about something that seems benign enough, and then trapping them just as soon as they realize they should get away.

But yeah, the bad ones are just lazy or thoughtless writing.

 

[BathorysGraveland2]

I like the way it's done in Evil Dead. You try to walk away... and you get raped by the fucking trees. Even the goddamn foliage comes alive to keep you from leaving. Something like that is a pretty cool way of doing. Or the scenario in which someone the protagonists care about is captured, so they can't very well just leave them to their doom. There are ways in making it all make more sense.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

As others have said: Because otherwise there'd be no story. Horror, suspense, or even just drama are often created through seeing what would unfold after a chain of unfortunate (or fortunate) events.

For example: How short would Episode Four - A New Hope have been if the crew of the Devastator had shot down C3-PO's escape pod? How dull would Pitch Black have been if they'd landed on that planet during any of the 21 out of 22 years when that planet didn't go into eclipse? How many 007s would we have gotten through if every villain who has ever captured a Bond had just shot him in the head rather than strapping him to an overly-contrived torture device?

Although I will say this, OP - If you find yourself getting annoyed at these cliches in the horror genre, you need to watch 'The Cabin In The Woods'. I'm not going to go into why, but please just trust me. Give up 90 mins of your time to a random Internet recommendation and I promise you won't be disappointed.

 

[happyninja42]

Because if they left, the movie would be like 15 minutes long, and would end when they say "Fuck that!" and turn around and leave.


Though some movies lately have actually taken that into account, and had the evil thing follow the victims, so that no matter where they go, they have to deal with this thing.

 

[PainInTheAssInternet]

I just slagged on Alien so I may as well balance it out here.

They're on a spaceship with no method of escape other than forcing it out the airlock or taking the emergency shuttle. They can't go back to sleep because they'll just be sitting ducks. They don't have much of a choice but to confront it.

 

[Something Amyss]

Horror stories that do it right at least address it in some way, like making them trapped in the situation. Some stories trap them from the beginning, but others lure the character in and then ensnare them. And the stories that do THAT right lure them in with curiosity about something that seems benign enough, and then trapping them just as soon as they realize they should get away.

But yeah, the bad ones are just lazy or thoughtless writing.

Unfortunately, a lot of these stories rely on ridiculous things like "no cell reception."

Now, I live in a rural area and there are places with no cell reception, but judging from horror movies 900% of America has no cellular signal.

I mean, you can justify a horror movie. People will often act with short term thinking, people don't always go to the police in the real world. The biggest problem is these movies do it so inorganically. It's like they're written by people who have only observed human behaviour from a distance.

 

[Gorrath]

snip

If you can stand the low budget, found footage genre Grave Encounters actually did a pretty awesome job of explaining why the characters didn't bolt at the first sign of real trouble. It's not a great movie, but it is pretty decent and worth a watch on Netflix if ya have it.

Mostly though it's as others have said: lazy, cliche writing.

 

[happyninja42]

Unfortunately, a lot of these stories rely on ridiculous things like "no cell reception."

Now, I live in a rural area and there are places with no cell reception, but judging from horror movies 900% of America has no cellular signal.

I mean, you can justify a horror movie. People will often act with short term thinking, people don't always go to the police in the real world. The biggest problem is these movies do it so inorganically. It's like they're written by people who have only observed human behaviour from a distance.

Yeah, the cell reception thing could be easily fix in-universe, by having the supernatural entity mess with electronics when it's manifesting or nearby. That way, if the phones don't work, you can say the entity is blocking it. Very easy fix for that problem that is rarely used.

 

[Unsilenced]

If the writing is good, the character will have some clear motivation that requires them to face the spooky scary stuff. Maybe they're stuck in with it and have to accomplish something before they can go. Maybe there's some reason that they sought out the spooky scary to begin with.

Either they're not trying to leave because they have a mission (you need to save the damsel! You must retrieve the macguffin!), or leaving somehow requires a confrontation (you need to restore power! There's only one lifepod! You have to get to the control room!)

Of course, this can also become kind of absurd, as there's only so many variations of "go press the button in the spoopy room" a game can do before it starts getting silly. There's also the possibility of preventing escape via contrivance (I.E someone is stopping you or you just have really bad luck), but after the 6th rescue helicopter gets blown up that can get a little old too.

The problem is that in a horror game, the hero has to be facing something they're not prepared for and that they know is more powerful. Combine this with the fact that most horror stories spring for the everyman protagonist, and it becomes really hard to write a good reason for Joe Shmoe to even get near the spoopy scary, let alone stick around it and not, like, call in the army or something.

 

[Mangod]

Because if they left, the movie would be like 15 minutes long, and would end when they say "Fuck that!" and turn around and leave.


Though some movies lately have actually taken that into account, and had the evil thing follow the victims, so that no matter where they go, they have to deal with this thing.

Granted, having the "evil thing" follow them can also be incredibly stupid if done poorly. Take for instance, Jaws: the Revenge. [http://www.jabootu.com/jaws4.htm]

 

[HardkorSB]

Typical example of what I'm talking about: person/couple/family moves into a house. House is haunted. Thing in house tries to kill them or just torments them. Characters decide to fight whatever it is instead of just leaving. Characters either win, die or end up thinking they've won before dying at the last minute.

Now, the thing in, in a good number of these cases all the characters had to do was just walk away.

If there's some ghost/spirit/demon attached to the house or some object, just walk away, it's not like they can come after you in most of these stories. Hell, burn the place down while you do, it may not kill them but it will sure distract them while you tun away.

How easy is it to just move out of a recently bought house?
Unless you're wealthy, you probably have no money at this point and leaving the house means homelessness.

 

[Erttheking]

I hear that's actually a good selling point for Silent Hill 2 (Only started playing it recently) There's nothing stopping James from getting the fuck out of dodge and running straight back home to cuddle in his room with a blankie and a cup of hot chocolate. But he stays because his wife is there, and it's heavily implied that he's suicidal/ wants to punish himself for what he did. It works into his character and creates a sad man who feels guilt and wants to be absolved. Via atonement or death.

Mostly crappy writing though, but if the writing is good the character will have a reason to stay there like James. Or simply be like Amadna in Alien Isolation in that she's trapped and that her entire motivation is to get away.