Thoughts on Absurdity, Surrealism, and Cosmic Horror
I feel like I gotta define absurdism real quick here. Absurdism is normally used for humor but sometimes horror. It is very different from something simply being fantastical. Its when something doesn’t make sense and isn’t explained. In stories with magic, magic would be some random force that does things and obeys certain laws and has conventions, absurdism doesn’t. In fantasy, the stick can create fire because its a magical wand with the purpose to do so. In absurdism, the stick just randomly combusted in the Arctic. Orcs are fantastical, Orcs with modern-day glocks in the 1500s is absurd.
I feel like surrealism is a kind of ‘pretentious’ ‘genre’ while Absurdity is associated with cartoons/comedy and Cosmic Horror is a kind of ‘trendy’ kind of horror. Like all ‘genres’, these can be done badly.
Bad absurdism is Lol XD random humor. Its a bad movie where people didn’t think too deeply on the logic. Bad absurdism is typically unintentional or done without much thought. “You know I really hate clowns bananas and CAR HORN haha!!!” Good absurdism would be slapstick cartoons, but if you want something more horror-oriented then @/Bog-leech’s Burgrr Entries. Most aburdism, even horror, will probably have comedic elements.
Bad Cosmic horror is fucking “It has many eyes and tenticles and ohh I can’t describe it.” Its the average Nosleep or scp writer trying to do cosmic horror but only understanding the parts, not the reasons. Although I like The Magnus Archives and its concepts, I feel like the goal its doing of cosmic horror falls flat when you find out the reason for the creatures, which the fact the entities have an explicit reason/origin point shows the problem.
For surrealism, its not really a title most just apply to their story, and bad surrealism would be surealism that fails, but if I can’t identify if the story is surreal I can’t apply the surrealism title, so I technically haven’t seen bad surrealism, as I cannot just go to an author and ask if this was made to be surreal or not. House of Leaves is great surrealism.
Now, although Lovecraft is normally attributed to cosmic horror, but I feel like Dante Alighieri is one of the originators of this surreal sort of concepts. Dante’s Paridiso, in fact, is cosmic horror without the horror. Its cosmic admiration. God is especially described as surreally perfect and omnipitent but instead of fear Dante is filled with the love of god and the love of Beatrice. Something incomprehensible is not to be feared, but to be worshipped.
Now as mediums go, these topics ofc vary from which mediums hold it the best. For Stageplay, while the Starkid musicals are comedic (absurdism) and have stereotypical cosmic horror things, aren’t quite surreal or have that certain feeling. Cats is probably closer to surrealism as the veiwer is just confused, which is a good thing. I want more stage plays with a focus on absurdism and surrealism. I know you can have absurd practical pieces, Meow Wolf’s art exhibitions exist. Now I don’t know many stage plays, so maybe there’s obscure absurdist plays out there.
Radio dramas/podcasts. Now I don’t mean audiobooks I mean stories where its like you’re listening to a conversation. Great for in-universe stories like the kind of Surrealism, Welcome To Nightvale. Unlike books though, you do not have the feelings described, except for maybe how The Magnus Archives does it.
Comics. God I love Cucumber Quest (Absurdism)
Text-based! Whether its Nosleep Hfy Royal Road ao3 fanfic with basically oc blorbos an author from 1967 with ten million awards surrealism and Cosmic Horror is typically very good when in written format. Its because you have to imagine it, its onky described and not just how it looks but the feelings of the protagonist, in House of Leaves the book format elevates the story (Although My House.wad is good imitating it in video game format). Sometimes hard-sci-fi books feel surreal because the author has eight PhDs in physics while you never went to college so your stupid idiot brain gotta try to comprehend it, which I actually enjoy? Its one thing to say ‘I can’t explain it’ its another to explain it and the reader’s like ‘Huh?’ I love you Clovkwork Rocket, but alas I am not smart enough.
Animation. Oh my oh my animation. Underrated in Cosmic Horror. Absurdism meanwhile is early animation. Cartoon logic is just absurdism and oh fuck its beautiful nothing makes sense why does everything can have a mouth why can you punch a phone and the other caller will recieve the punch why is gravity a suggestion why is everyone so squishy I don’t know but dang is it beautiful.
Video games: Another kinda underrated medium for surrealism! Superliminal and Control are great at showing absurdism/surrealism in their format.
Anyways I almost always prefer the strange vs the explained, or maybe the explained that’s so complicated it basically is the strange. I will always prefer Spec Bio aliens vs ‘Animal but humanoid’ aliens and I’d (probably) prefer a Jean Jacket vs Spec Bio aliens.
Now, live-action! I only remember three live-action surrealist movies (that aren’t comedies) and that’s Nope (Maybe not surrealist but god I love the alien design) The Mist, and Annihilation. Hardly remember The Mist but Annihilation will always twirl in my head its so good. (Does Night of the Comet count? Its pretty absurd in some parts so Imma count it. Love Night of the Comet.)
Anyways random though rambling done.