Horror that is seen or the unseen horror....

Lon Chaney as seen in The Phantom of the Opera...

What is more horrific....seeing that which terrifies you most, or imagining what terrifies you most though you cannot see it???

There are varying degrees of terror in any manner of horror flick...everything from the most gruesome, gory, flesh-destroying monster to the psychological torturer bent on crushing a person from the inside out.

The success of the horror genre is its ability to terrify individuals to the point of panic. The best horror brings the strongest of us to tears. The fear is palpable, the sweat is real, the blood pressure spikes and plummets, you have to remind yourself to breathe. Your heart pounds as if you've just finished a marathon, gasping, you are left reeling, trying to pull yourself back into the reality of the non-horror world.

If you're lucky, the return is uneventful, peaceful even, a wondrous reminder that your own life is not, in fact, a horror film. You go about your daily activities just as you did before watching/reading the latest in the world of horror.

And yet, there are others whose return to pre-horror life isn't so easy. They hold the horror inside, replaying, reliving in their mind the images/feelings that terrified them. They need more than a deep breath to clear their minds of what has invaded. For these people, the best in horror are the pieces/movies that stick with them days longer, weeks longer even.

So, this begs the question...which horror enthusiast are you? The one who needs constant exposure to enjoy the heart-racing episodes, or the one who only needs occasional reminders of horror as the mind is overflowing with all manner of ghosties and ghoulies........

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