A lot of the scenarios I'm interested in presenting (via writing or commissions) flirt with the line between horror and erotica. This is not a novel overlap.
But I think the idea that's been captivating me the most for a while is the idea of "justice" as it exists in the two arts. In particular, how the need for justice corrodes and weakens the emotional impact.
Further elaboration below, because this post turned out long.
In slasher movies, it is the sluts that are given their deserved fate. Sci Fi torture boxes (The Cube, I Have No Mouth etc (the game¹), and Saw) give all the characters the backstory that lets them deserve punishment. In bad end pornography, either truly dark or more playful, it's the wayward adventurer who's inexperience traps them in their conspicuously sexy fate.
To slay the bystander in an action movie is abhorrent. This was not their call to action, the bear no guilt of agency, this was not their gamble, they are not paying for a crime. But they are paying nonetheless. That's the realm of horror and even then not in pop horror.
But is the grim fate of some bystander not the more memorable? And what does this have to do with the erotic?
Much like in horror, pornography inherits unseen cultural values. The hegemonic differences between the depiction of femdom vs maledom, top vs bottom, puritanical punishments for promiscuity, hookup apps are an open invitation for violence etc etc. Then is it counter cultural to depict unjust suffering in pornography? Is it more moral for the naughty pervert to get his² just desserts than it is for a bystander to end up in the same situation?
No. It's not any more or less moral, it's just a story. It is however, more comforting to fit into unspoken and unexamined social constructs. And it is likely more popular to agree with preconceptions on morality. Smooth and digestible. Consumable without thought.
And thus the apophatic shape of where I want to explore is rendered. The opposite of a morality play, there is nothing to learn. No virtues or universal truths are revealed. Bad things happen to people, without cause or justice and they may never recover. In fetishistic detail to summon the verisimilitude of bizarre acts that will mercifully never grace the real world. It is for dire pleasure not found elsewhere. It is harmless.
I don't want to say "good horror is queer," but I can't figure how to mince the words just right.
I don't know what to tag this, but I do want opinions on it.
¹ - There's an important change from the short story of "I Have No Mouth and Must Scream" to the video game version. All the remaining humans are given a backstory to justify AM's treatment. Nimdok's the most extreme. And it makes it weak as shit. No longer is AM's malice born out of impersonal hate, inscrutable and all powerful. Now it's punishment for what they did. Cause and effect that led the humans to hell. Thus allowing the reader to disconnect from the dread by asserting, "Well this couldn't happen to me, I would simply not kill my wife." The injection of justice does the horror an injustice.
² - And it is always a "he" because the (cis het) male pervert is not treated the same as the (cis het) female pervert.