If This Were A Horror Movie, I’d Die First

A while back, in critique group, we got onto the topic of tropes. I’m not sure how we ended up in horror movies since none of us present were horror writers, but there we were comparing the group members to the cast of a horror movie.

We decided unanimously that I’d die first.

It’s not that I’d do something foolish like open a door at the end of a spooky hallway after I separated myself from my friends. No, it’d be something unavoidable and tragic.

Why is that? Remember, we were talking tropes at the time, and I’m:

1) A double minority

2) Happily married

3) The mother of well-rounded kids

It’d probably be just after I show everyone a picture of my smiling family that something would come along and take me out.

What about the rest of my group?

Well M would have been the one to kick off the curse/free the evil/summon the spirits because she’s the youngest. She’s also guaranteed to die because she’s a minority and a lesbian.

Horror movies are often ageist, so K would only get a blip in the movie because he isn’t a hip teen-to-30-something. But it’d also spare his life. He’d be the dad sending the rest of us off to go out into the world, denying the danger we’re all telling him about is real.

J would also only get a quick scene, either the harbinger farmer in the field staring silently at us as we passed, or the gas station attendant who is well aware of the vampires lurking about. But J has a beard, so it’d probably earn him a bigger role than K, but it doesn’t guarantee his survival.

D would be the heroine. She’s white and blonde and right there in age between M and me. She’d live to the end of the movie and probably put an end to whatever threat that killed the rest of us off. Her fiancé, however, wouldn’t make it. They’re getting married later this year! So exciting, but also doom worthy in a horror movie.

Let’s just say I’m glad that isn’t real life. It improves my chances of living to an old age, and trust me, that’s what I aspire to. And just to keep things safe, I’m not going to carry around a picture of my smiling family…

Would you make it to the end of a horror movie? What would get you killed off or excluded from the cast? What are some of the tropes you often see in movies and media?

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