Analog horror: make every damaged frame matter
A battered recording needs a history, an audience, and something worth losing. Build a short analog-horror scene around those choices before reaching for more static.
The horror diary
Classic and niche horror films, books and games, occult horror, and the art of making ordinary things unsettling.
Horror deadlines: knowing the time doesn't make you safe
DREDGE, Pathologic 2, and The Signal-Man make time frightening in different ways. A deadline becomes interesting when knowing about it still leaves a difficult choice.
The worst horror houseguests: four monsters, one spare room
A hypothetical Halloween ranking of Frankenstein’s creature, Carmilla, Count Orlok, and the Blob. Good manners count for very little when the host becomes dinner.
Stop-motion horror: let the material misbehave
Alice, Coraline, and The Wolf House offer three different bargains with physical objects. Their materials can carry a past, impersonate something lovely, or refuse to stay put.
Turnip jack-o'-lanterns: a small face with a long afterlife
A lantern, a wandering Jack, and a museum artist tell different parts of the Halloween story. Keeping those parts distinct makes the object more interesting.
Five books to read after The Thing, depending on what scared you
The body trouble, the bad company, or the place you cannot leave? Pick the part of Carpenter's film that got under your skin, then follow it into a book.
Mascot horror works when the mascot still has a job
A sinister grin only gets a monster so far. The interesting part is what that friendly face was hired to promise us.
How to paint candlelit horror without losing the color
A practical Gothic art exercise: plan one light source, keep three values readable, and let color carry a story instead of coating the room in brown.
From inherited houses to hostile machines: horror keeps asking who owns the past
A cross-media essay on Gothic inheritance, programmed control, and the limits of escape.
Cosmic horror can make a small room feel too large
A subgenre guide to scale, uncertain knowledge, and the fear that human rules are local.
When a horror building behaves like a witness
A practical guide to reading rooms, routes, and thresholds as evidence in a horror story.
The locked view: how horror makes limited access feel personal
A practical guide to restricted perspective in horror, using film, fiction, and games to show how a blind spot can become a story.
When horror retells a story, ask what the heroine is allowed to want
The White Reindeer, The Bloody Chamber, and Fatale each revisit older stories. Their differences show why a retelling’s point of view matters as much as its monster.
How to draw a folk-horror landscape that withholds its secret
A practical art exercise for turning a path, boundary, and patch of ground into a folk-horror scene—without relying on a monster in the middle of the page.
Could Sergeant Howie survive The Fog? A horror crossover with fair rules
A clearly hypothetical matchup puts Sergeant Neil Howie from The Wicker Man into John Carpenter’s The Fog and asks whether a good investigator can outlast a town’s buried history.
Horror content notes without spoilers: tell readers what they need to know
A practical guide to writing horror content notes that name the material clearly, respect different readers, and leave the plot surprises intact.
How to draw a horror map that withholds information fairly
A practical map-making exercise for artists and writers: use a title, legend, scale, and deliberate omissions to make a fictional place unsettling without making it unreadable.
How to turn a horror opinion into a video essay (without recapping the plot)
A practical outline for horror video essays: start with a question, gather scenes as evidence, name a counterargument, and end with something the viewer can see differently.
When horror games get remade, what should change—and what should stay strange?
Paratopic: Overdub is described as a remaster, remix, and sequel. Here are five useful questions for judging how a horror-game rework changes the original’s fear.
How to draw a ghost from contradictory memories
A practical horror-art exercise: build a haunting from three witnesses, one photograph, and the details nobody remembers the same way.
Carrie and the crowd: when humiliation goes viral
A source-based look at what the new Carrie adaptation changes by moving school cruelty into the social-media age—and what that shift asks horror to notice.
How to draw one-bit horror: make the missing pixels matter
A practical black-and-white horror art exercise: build a readable silhouette, use negative space, and leave one part unresolved.
If the monster cannot kill you, what is left to fear?
Horror games can unsettle without a game-over screen. SOMA’s Safe Mode offers a starting point for separating failure, attention, atmosphere, and difficult ideas.
When everybody knows the song except you: music and belonging in horror
Five ways to analyze music in horror beyond jump-scare cues: participation, refusal, memory, repetition, and the people left outside the song.
Let them have a nice afternoon: why horror needs comfort
Comfort gives horror something specific to threaten. Five ways to write or draw peaceful moments that matter without turning every kindness into a trap.
Five better questions than “Was the horror movie faithful?”
Judge a horror adaptation by what its changes accomplish. Five questions about perspective, sound, monsters, and the cost of a new interpretation.
Before adding a monster: a Milwaukee art-looking exercise
A Milwaukee exhibition offers a timely starting point for looking at uncanny art. Try three ways to build unease without adding a monster.
Your horror poster can be strange and still tell people where to go
A practical horror poster guide: expressive lettering, clear event details, strong contrast, and a phone-sized check before your Halloween design goes out.
One object, three owners: a horror prop design exercise
Design a horror prop through three owners, using repairs, wear, and conflicting habits to tell a story without a page of explanation.
Five short horror stories for people who always want one more clue
A reading path through warnings, changing pictures, dubious bargains, and unreliable explanations—with a different kind of mystery in each story.
Body horror vs. gore: the important question is who gets control
Blood describes what is shown. Body horror asks what happens when a body’s form, function, or ownership stops feeling secure.
Funny horror still has teeth: three ways a joke can sharpen a scare
Humor can expose a lie, make an impossible image stranger, or buy a monster your trust. A practical guide to using comedy in horror.
How to start a horror book club without making it a courage contest
A practical horror book-club plan: choose a shared question, set spoiler boundaries, welcome disagreement, and give quiet readers something better than a rating.
What silent horror can teach a video essayist about showing the scare
For Silent Movie Day, a practical visual storytelling exercise: build tension through framing, gesture, contrast, and timing before adding a soundtrack.
An unreliable narrator needs more than a last-minute lie
A practical guide to unreliable narration in horror: misplaced evidence, selective attention, fair clues, and why uncertainty should matter before the ending.
How to build a horror double feature that gives people something to argue about
Plan a Halloween double feature around a shared question and a useful contrast. Three pairings, practical pacing advice, and discussion prompts without spoilers.
Five haunted-object drawing prompts that start in your kitchen drawer
Make Halloween art from ordinary objects: five original drawing prompts with clear visual rules, small story hooks, and ways to keep the result readable.
Before the Halloween sale: choose a horror game by what it asks you to do
A practical horror-game guide: match your taste to investigation, survival, or uncertainty instead of buying whichever monster has the loudest trailer.
A Milwaukee sketchbook exercise: make familiar architecture a little wrong
The Quadracci Pavilion’s anniversary is an excuse to look closely at Milwaukee architecture, then turn observation into surreal art without reaching for another skull.
Why liminal horror works: the hallway forgot what it was for
Empty rooms are not automatically frightening. Liminal horror works when a familiar space stops giving you the social and spatial instructions you expect.
Five books for people who care more about the haunted house than the ghost
A reading list for suspicious rooms, difficult households, and buildings with boundary issues. Choose the kind of unease you want before choosing the book.
Occult horror vs. folk horror: who made the rules?
Occult horror turns hidden knowledge into danger. Folk horror asks what a place and its community believe. The overlap is where things get especially unpleasant.
How this journal is made
How Whimsical Woes approaches horror criticism, personal reviews, sources, spoilers, and corrections.
Let the monster keep a secret
A mythology can be fascinating. It can also explain away the very thing that made a story frightening.
How to make an ordinary room unsettling
Start with a room that works. Then give it one small reason not to.
Instructions for the house sitter
The house is easy to look after, provided you do not mistake politeness for permission.
Horror belongs in the sketchbook.
What a drawing and a good horror story have in common: the part they leave you to finish.
A room that feels wrong.
Why a hallway, a half-open door, or an ordinary kitchen can be enough.
Leave some space.
A small drawing exercise in deciding what deserves attention.
You don’t need a perfect brief.
A few useful things to send when you have an idea for a custom piece.