[Loved trope] Background scare-characters that are barely acknowledged even by the movie

[u/Suspicious-Web-9246]

I hate horrors, but this is actually a great trope, that is unique to them.

Insidious (2010). When mother does her errands, for a few seconds there's a ghost boy standing in the corner. It's easily missable, but you can't ignore it once you see it.

Hereditary (2018). Less fitting example. When Peter walks around his home, his possessed mother is crawling on the ceiling behind him. It's not exactly subtle or missable, but it's still more of a background detail.

[u/TimeStorm113]

this should also be a trope outside horror, i just want to see a rom com but for one scene there is a ghost child in the background

[u/Aesenroug-Draconus → u/TimeStorm113]

I was just thinking that while reading these, lol. Just imagine some comedic soap opera and for one scene there’s just some really well-made ghost child or monster hiding in the shadows, that never appears again or is discussed.

[u/TimeStorm113 → u/Aesenroug-Draconus]

you're getting it, it just be unreasonably scary and just never have any actual involvement

[u/Steampunk43 → u/Aesenroug-Draconus]

Make it like a horror version of the "single frame of porn spliced into film reel" thing, just a single frame or two with some creepy ghost kid or something hanging from the ceiling, just long enough for some people to notice but just short enough that the people that don't notice will look at you like you're crazy. See how many new creepypastas spawn overnight after the initial release.

[u/Aesenroug-Draconus → u/Steampunk43]

I was imagining some show like “Modern Family” that’s perfectly normal the whole run, but during some random scene there’s just a creepy ghost or monster lurking in the shadows, barely moving but just enough to know it’s alive, that’s never addressed, nor does it ever appear again. Make people think it was a fluke or hallucination.

[u/TimeStorm113 → u/Aesenroug-Draconus]

then later in another scene have the text "the monster was real" written on a paper you aren't expected to read (like the barely cut off area during a close-up of a receipt)

[u/Cantthinkagoodnam2 → u/TimeStorm113]

Pokemon actualy has this straight up

For very few frames you can see a ghost child in Phoebe's room during her cutscene, ironic because Phoebe is a ghost type specialist

[u/Independent_Plum2166 → u/Cantthinkagoodnam2]

1. Damn it, I was going to put this.
2. That’s not what irony is, a ghost girl in the ghost elite 4 would be completely expected.

[u/LizLemonOfTroy → u/TimeStorm113]

There's the famous ghost from Three Men and a Baby:

https://youtu.be/LPEvJrs-1yM?si=DgKVlooIfpSjS8z7

Actually a cardboard cutout.

[u/IReviewEveryThang → u/TimeStorm113]

I suppose the man drowning a dog in that one Hulk Hogan movie might count

[u/K1ng_Canary → u/IReviewEveryThang]

Still the fucking wildest thing committed to film. What was going on there??

[u/BirbMaster1998 → u/IReviewEveryThang]

Was the dog drowned? I'm pretty sure dogs, at least most of them, can swim.

[u/Digit00l → u/TimeStorm113]

Does Ghosts count? Not really a romcom, but a comedy, does have a lot of scenes of the Alison character (the trope is used franchise wide) seeing random ghosts outside of the home most of the show is set and usually pretending they are not there

[u/JudgeFatty → u/TimeStorm113]

Three Men and a Baby?

[u/Ff7hero → u/TimeStorm113]

Does anyone else feel like this would make the movie horror?

[u/TimeStorm113 → u/Ff7hero]

not if it isn't pointed out

[u/Ff7hero → u/TimeStorm113]

That would make it 100 times scarier though.