What was your gateway into horror?

[rogueslayer452]

There was this question I saw being circulated around asking what was your first horror movie you watched that got you into the genre, and I thought about it and honestly it's a tie between Scream (saw the beginning of at a sleepover in junior high) and I Know What You Did Last Summer (was on television when I was visiting a relative for Halloween), as I do believe it was around the same time frame. I remember those made a big impression on me specifically. Also because I know that I was interested in seeing I Still Know What You Did Last Summer when it came out in theaters because of Brandy who I knew from Moesha and loved her music, and actually I saw the film several times in the theaters because I became a bit obsessed with it.

I do think they were definitely influential enough to be the biggest gateway for me to look for more movies like those, I would go to the video rental store and look for horror and I was intrigued by the horror movies coming out whenever I saw previews of them on TV at the time. A lot of them were of the slasher category and b-movie types, and many quite underrated, imho. But yeah, I do believe it really took off from there.

(Of course, if you really want to go even further back I guess you could trace me interest in horror to all the nightmare fuel that I watched and was exposed to as a kid. Anything that was weird and bizarre and slightly unnerving I was fascinated by. I mean, Gremlins and Gremlins 2: The New Batch are among my top favorite childhood movies, and they are classified as horror-comedy, so y'know, it was definitely a early personal taste that just naturally evolved overtime.)

Comments

[elizalavelle.livejournal.com]

Both Scream and IKWYDLS were big ones for me too in the genre. I didn't really watch slasher movies etc. from the 80s. I was also a big X-Files fan back in the day and while that's not a movie that probably was a gateway for me as well.

I liked scary things as a kid and at the same time was terrified by them yet refused to stop watching. So things like Return to Oz made a big impression on me.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Return to Oz was another childhood favorite for me, as well. Definitely a massive influence since it was very nightmare fuel-ish. I had a lot of those kinds of things growing up, now that I'm thinking about it. Then again, though, a lot of 80s and 90s stuff was very dark and weird and had a lot of nightmare fuel.

[elizalavelle.livejournal.com]

Absolutely the stuff I grew up on seems to be a lot darker than what's out there for kids today. Not sure if it's better or worse but it certainly affected my tastes as an adult.