Death is overrated. Few people complain about death. No one that's been there for more than a few minutes has commented on it at all. Dying, on the other hand, upsets everybody. While folks die in every horror movie, it's how they get there that's exciting. The more horrific the method of death, the more exciting it is. Movies have titles like, "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" not "Old People who Keeled Over in a Nursing Home One Fine Spring Day." Let's look at several nasty ways you might have a character die, and one to try next time you're in Canada.
First, whatever you do, have a character die of toxic epidermal necrolysis syndrome, or Stevens Johnsons Syndrome. Usually striking children, Stevens Johnsons is a rare allergic reaction to anti-seizure or immunizing drugs. In action it's the worst, the skin rashes, itches and dies. In a severe case, the victim may lose virtually all of their skin, almost certainly killing them. Even in less severe cases death may come. Stevens Johnsons attacks epithelial cells, which are found in some uncomfortable places. They live in the lining to the bronchial tubes and can kill when they die and block the airways. Less fatal are the insides of the eyelids, which have to be kept clean by wiping with a glass rod. The genitals, mostly just the urethra on men, but pretty much everything on a woman, also contain epithelial cells. Takes "not so fresh," to a whole new level. The evil blow with this syndrome, is that it can go on for days. Arrival at the hospital and the beginning of medical care don't mean salvation. Nope, your character may pass right on while your kind hearted doctor looks on helplessly.
Second, try spontaneous combustion. Don't laugh...much. As maligned as it is, Dr. Haan a British physician with waayyy too much time on his hands, spent several years putting coats on pig carcasses, lighting them on fire and watching the results. The fat on a pig will melt and run into the coat, which then acts as a wick. The resulting fire is low temperature, and long burning, much like the few credible cases of human combustion.
This is why it's so gory. If you were an old or disabled person, which most spontaneous combustion victims are, you might not be able to put out a small fire set in your bathrobe. Don't you think it's possible that you would live for a long time as your body crackled and bubbled? The arms and legs of spontaneous combustion victims often survive. Low fat body parts don't burn well. I wonder if Dr. Haan takes donations.
The third way to go is electricity. I know. It's been done before. We've heard that contact with a high power line will cook your character so quickly they splatter when he hits the ground. We all know that Florida's electric chair set two executionees on fire. Fine fine. I'm talking about Christmas tree lights, the menace of Christmas. Beginning at about 10 milliamps and running up to about 70 milliamps, the power of a Christmas tree string, electricity may not be fatal, at least not immediately, but fools our bodies. We're built to hold things. The muscles that close fists and mouths are much stronger than those that open them, so at about 10 milliamps, the muscles start getting what they think is an instruction to flex, which they do, right around whatever is shocking them. This makes for endless fun as characters, grunting and unable to open their mouths or hands, suffer horrible pain. Eventually, the heart or diaphragm will give and the character will die. In the mean time though, no one may realize your hero's in trouble. Imagine the poor exec, glued to his coffee pot, unable to call for help from the meeting next door. Or the mother clutched to the Christmas tree, shaking it slightly and screaming inside as her curious two year old toddles over. Told ya', Christmas is evil.
Freezing to death, on the other hand, is very pleasant. Not at first. But, once the shuddering and chattering teeth and begging to be let out of the meat locker are over, it gets quite nice. This is due to some quirks of the human brain. Buddhist, alcoholics and those guys who show up naked to sub zero football games have tumbled to these on their own. The first has to do with the brain center that tells you where you are. By listening to your nerves, your brain forms an exact map of where each body part is. It can even hold this image for a while with no stimulation. If you mess with the system, get it drunk or sit still to meditate, it gets confused. People feel like they're floating, drifting away, or surfing the bed as a drunk G.I. once described it to me. As the body begins to numb, the same thing happens. No signals are making it to the brain and, gradually, the brain loses track.
The other quirk has to do with a different part of the brain. Human are supposed to be 98.6 degrees. There's a little but powerful part of your brain that worries about this. It makes you sweat, shiver, flush. Funny thing. When it stops getting signal, it stops worrying about it. It reports to the rest of the brain that things are fine.
The upshot of all of this, as people freeze, is that they calm down, feel warm and start floating, all very comfortable and pleasant feeling. Yech! I would never let a character off so easy unless I could wake them back up somehow and make them suffer terrible frostbite. I love frostbite. Something about live people with dead, black fingers. Yummy.
Well, the paper's here. Got to check the obituaries and see if I missed anything. Till next time, get out there and write.
YOU ARE READING
The Gory Details (Gross)
HorrorBetween 2004 and 2008 I wrote a series of "Tips for Writers" for Nocturnal Ooze magazine vaguely about what would happen in real life if you did the things they do in movies but mostly about the gross out. I've always loved them and so have taken...
