Spooks and boos, haunts and frights, no matter what kind of scare, humans seem drawn to it. We seek out scares, either by jumping from planes with nothing more than a glorified blanket tied to our backs, or from the safety of our homes with a XXL bucket of popcorn with extra butter in our left hand. Either way, there’s a growing sentiment that the frights of tonight are nothing like the scares of yester-year. 

With horror movies especially, there’s a sensationalized love for the past greats and ‘cult-classics’ from decades ago, whether they be ghastly snuff films or cheesy slasher flicks, the older the better. Most people think that Hollywood doesn’t make horror like they used to, and if you only looked at the big box office hits, they’d be right. 

Jefferson Taylor Davis, or simply JT, says “They lost all the creativity in the 2010’s, and it became a lot of PG-13 horror movies with a lot of jump-scares.” To his point, examining the modern catalog of horror movies it’d be pretty easy to agree. 

There are eight Conjuring films. That feels extremely excessive, and no matter what the jump-scares tell you, The Conjuring series isn’t a case of exemplar horror, and they’ve long left the “based on true events” territory they once danced in. But that isn’t to say old horror movies didn’t have duds either. They did, and they were numerous. Nearly every Nightmare on Elm Street isn’t good horror, Jason X exists and the less said about the later entries in the Child’s Play series the better. I still have nightmares about The Seed of Chucky. 

Each time frame has greats as well. From Poltergeist, to The Shining, there’s plenty of old horror movies that up the ante and make you think. And nowadays, there’s practically a whole studio that has horror hit after hit that smacks you in the face with philosophy and horror! A24 has produced cult classics from Hereditary to The Witch to, more recently, Talk to Me. 

But there are some that will argue that horror movies do not have to be good. Well- quality films are normally better than something subpar, but doesn’t junk food has its place in society? There’s enjoyment to be had in quick “meals” that don’t require much thought. Sure, horror movies that challenge the regime with inventive scares and thought-provoking spooks are amazing, but if every single horror movie bashes its head against established tropes we’ll run ourselves ragged trying to keep up with it.  

Jefferson Davis continued his previous statement, saying, “…that’s not to say there haven’t been some modern good ones like Hereditary and Wrong Turn, which I like.”

Entertainment burnout is a real thing, so films like The Conjuring, Jason X, and… The Seed of Chucky, for all their faults, are still valid films. Maybe not good films! But valid nonetheless.