The Psyche of Grimdarks... Or "What's Scarier: The Story or He Who Wrote It?" · 6:30pm Nov 1st, 2014
DISCLAIMER: Despite the subject of this blog, in accordance with FIMFiction's NSFW policies, I will not describe specifically nor post any links to any such stories.
Also, I know it's the day after Halloween, but I had this written and intended for it to be posted on the 31st of October. Just call it belated and let's move on.
Grimdarks.
If you have the good fortune to not know what this means, then I apologize for destroying your innocence. A grimdark is just as it sounds, a subgenre of fanfiction (though whether or not this is limited to just fanfiction, I have no idea) that takes its subject matter to a darkness matched only by slasher and gothic horror stories. What sets it apart from other stories with the Dark tag is that, while most Dark-genre fics usually involve content and elements that might be described as “unsettling” at best, grimdarks take that philosophy to its logical extreme, often depicting, in graphic detail, gory torture/death and psychological horror.
Based on my earlier attitude, you might have come to the conclusion that I personally do not like grimdarks, in which case, you are correct. Now I can see at least a few of you reading this thinking to yourself…
Ah, lighten up, man. So you don’t like stories where the characters die a bloody death. Grow a spine.
Well, actually, it’s not the content alone than bugs me. I watch Bones, for Celestia’s sake, and the deaths they depict in some episodes do make me cringe.
For me, it’s not just content, but context. I prefer to have context within the stories I read. This is why I don’t like reading a lot of shipfics; with the exception of a handful, most of them are written simply because the author likes the pairing (with specifics ranging from “It’s cute” to “It’s funny”). Grimdarks, by that same token, seem to be written because the author wants the characters to go through whatever mentally scarring events he has written for them.
Granted, when it’s boiled down, the sole reason for any author, fanfic or otherwise, to write something is because they want to put it down on paper, but for fics like these, that seems to be the only thing they do with them. When I say I want context in my stories, I don’t mean I want to know why the characters do what they do; that’s all in the control of the author, even if you believe that a good character will “write himself.” Context, in this instance, refers to what the author does with what they write. Once the characters go through this moment, what will it mean for them in the end? What sort of things will this story say about the world the characters are in?
When it’s all said and done, what will be the point?
Grimdarks pretty much have no point.
At least, not on a surface level.
I’ve always thought to myself why people would take such normally kid-friendly premises and twist them into something that even Edgar Allen Poe would hesitate writing. The answer I came up with was a question: "What if?"
For this analysis, I’m going to use two grimdarks that are infamous within the brony community:
1. Cupcakes: Pinkie Pie brutally murders Rainbow Dash for the former’s cupcake recipe, all while maintaining her otherwise cheerful attitude.
2. Rainbow Factory: A story that supposes that rainbows are made by draining the color forcefully from the bodies of pegasus foals who failed their flight exams.
(For the record, I have not actually read these stories, but I know enough about them for this general analysis of their genre. That said, if I’m wrong about either of these, I apologize.)
Now, when I say that the reason for writing a grimdark is to answer, “What if?” I don’t mean answering a question about the plot. “What if Pinkie made cupcakes from ponies?” is not a contextual question. But “What if Pinkie’s chaotic nature was taken to its darkest extreme?” is.
Grimdarks do twist the world of MLP (and other works, let’s face it) into something far more sinister than the show would ever become. But the way I see it, the most popular ones, at least, do so by twisting something to the point where one can still recognize its true form. Pinkie’s attitude in Cupcakes is not at all like the actual show, but one can make the argument that the mentality behind the deviation is similar. It’s also worth mentioning that Cupcakes Pinkie is just “Party of One” Pinkie on steroids, further adding to this idea of a sort of uncanny valley effect (just look it up; this is becoming longer than it needs to be already).
Rainbow Factory, however, isn’t as grounded in MLP lore and conventions, but still has some slight roots behind it. In “Sonic Rainboom,” Pinkie licked a bit of liquid rainbow and complained it was too spicy, even for her (and that’s saying something for Miss Hot-Sauce-on-a-Cupcake). I’m not saying that this scene was the sole source for Rainbow Factory, but I hardly think it wasn’t a factor. The “What if?” here comes less from taking a general element to an extreme and more from the scene itself: “What if there was more to this particular moment that we realized?”
When I say grimdarks stem from “What ifs?” I mean that they answer questions about the world of MLP if taken to a darker, more sinister place. You still won’t catch me reading these stories, however; context may be fine if there are some deeper reasons for writing them, but if I have to think about it while on a walk around the school track, it just doesn’t work for me.
Happy Halloween!
I agree with most of these points. Its true that most if not all fanfics are made due to what if statements. Some authors don't hold any malicious context in their stories. I know a few, me included who wanted to write a dark fic out grimdark just to see if they could. Some do it because the description skill needed is high enough to challenge them.
But that's not to say everyone has intentions looks that. Some authors just want to write characters die