Am I A Sadist?!

Whether we are charmed by rom-coms, haunted by horrors or perplexed by mysteries, we all have a genre we’d binge. Some seem to make sense – I’d stick a Christmas film on every week because it makes me happy. But I’d also lose a day engrossed by heart-wrenching apocalyptic scenarios. And why is this? I’m not a sadist…

I seem to have dedicated my last three years to zombie-fueled media, excited by the peculiarity, the risk, and even the gory visual effects. I wince at the wounds but I’m fascinated by the gristly details of tendons snapping and guts spilling! I don’t enjoy the thought of suffering, sometimes I couldn’t even bare You’ve Been Framed, and yet I will fixate on the bloody jaws of walking rotten flesh.

Perhaps the idea of world-ending disasters compels our dark curiosity into the Unknown, to consider what Death ultimately consists of. While the superficial elements of rotting flesh may be a literal interpretation, zombie films translate our fears into visual metaphors: our deaths could hurt the people we love. Perhaps we cling to stories of death because it keeps us alive. Perhaps our satisfaction in the imagery of horror is not in the carnage, but the satisfaction that in that moment we are alive, with people that would miss us if we were gone.