Scary Movies not so Scary Anymore

I grew up watching horror movies from the time I could sit still. Psycho, Night of the Living Dead, Leprechaun, Poltergeist and all the others grouped in this time period were my childhood version of Disney movies. I clearly remember a slumber party that we stayed up watching Night of the Living Dead until the wee hours of the morning. We were still watching, when one of the sleeping girls woke screaming and ran through my house, and we all teased her about it for days (okay, so it was more like years). A good scare was exhilarating and highly entertaining then.

I don’t find that the case anymore. In fact, I haven’t watched a scary movie in over four years. My students always try to get me to watch this or that scary movie, but I’ve never once been tempted.

I’m not interested in adding to the ways my nightmares can wake me up with my heart pounding and leave me wide awake for the rest of the night. It didn’t use to be like this though.

After some random stranger high on drugs attempted to break into our house in the middle of the night, my anxiety of a repeat performance manifested itself into dreams straight out of the horror movies I’d watched my entire life. I no longer wanted to wake up to giant spiders hanging over my bed or form being chased by monsters with large blades, so I quit watching horror flicks. Of course with my list of experiences this year and my New Year’s goal to do the things that scare me, I couldn’t leave it be.

Scream 4 debuted recently, and I was a fan of the first three, so I figured, why not? I mean, I finally sleep through the night without waking from nightmares. Who needs sleep?

Having not watched one in so long, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I was prepared to be scared and maybe have a bad dream or two, but I also wasn’t going sit through this one by myself. I haven’t reached that level of fearlessness yet. (I’m working on it though.)

I discovered, however, that scary movies are comical. Who writes this stuff? If I hear a noise upstairs, and I know a killer is terrorizing my town, I’m not going to run upstairs to see. If I’m being chased, I’m not going to go upstairs where there is no chance of escape. I’m definitely not going to go outside, alone, in the middle of the night practically begging to be sliced and diced by a mad man. No, I would not even worry about packing my bag before leaving for an unplanned vacation.

Why can’t they write intelligent horror? Scary does not have to equal lack of common sense. Needless to say, no bad dreams, but I also have no desire to see another scary movie any time soon. Not because it’s scary, but more because it’s annoying to watch people react so idiotically. So I’ll cross it off my list of things I fear and stick to the movies I actually like. I’ve already begun my count down to the last Harry Potter movie. It's supposed to be scary with the fight to the death, but that at least is my kind of scary.