I'm sick of jump scares in any movie. They are a lazy technique.
this post was submitted on 29 Mar 2026
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I tend to agree. But at least its expected in a horror movie. You go knowing what you're getting yourself into. It's the lack of expectation that makes it even worse in non-horror movies.
Any movie! A jump scare in a horror movie is super boring it is not horror it is not clever or ever used well. It is just boring!
I have always admired John Carpenter for working in the opposite direction. He likes to show you a scene where you gradually realize that something is wrong. When you do, you get the same adrenaline jolt as from a jump scare. Or he will show you something terrifying that is going to happen, then make you wait while watching it arrive.
I haven't watched much of John Carpenter's work, so I can't comment on this sentiment particularly, but I have always liked a psychological trick Terry Pratchett used to describe the machinations of Granny Weatherwax and her approach to stealth. (Yeesh, I need to read those books again, it's been years.)
I can't remember the exact quote and won't do it justice, but the message is something like "over time you noticed a familiar shape in the darkness, something like a coat, then you noticed what might have been a boot, then suddenly you realized she has always been there."
Sir Pterry doesn't use it in the context of horror, at least not for the reader, but I feel like it would fit that well.
Amazing quote but real quick if you haven't seen Carpenter's The Thing go do so immediately. Best horror movie in my book and wish daily I could watch it for the first time again.
Oh, I have. Good movie. Still not sure who's the Thing at the end.
Honestly part of the fun of the movie. Specifically for the ending though, by what they show, you can assume that neither of them are based on the fact they are the only 2 left. If they both were, then there would be no reason to remain disguised. If one of them was, they could simply kill the other as there's no benefit to remaining disguised. That aside, tracking who is a Thing and who isn't is not simple at all.
Is it known that Things can identify each other?
I once read a theory that the flask they were sharing was shared with gasoline or something else noxious so that whomever filled it could judge the other's reaction to determine whether they had been beThinged. (I think that was it. I read the comment a long time ago and saw the movie even longer ago so I might misremember the details.)
If that's in the movie (the gas flask) it must be a deleted scene or something because I've never seen anything like that. So Things can identify themselves and if in the correct conditions will combine to form a larger creature. Especially the conditions on the end of the movie where survival and not freezing to death are the main concerns. Another established fact in the movie is if there is one Thing and one human it will attack / consume / clone that person. Anyway, def seen it a few times, haha. You should give it a rewatch.
As far as I can recall, the theory was just conjecture, fanon, not confirmed (but neither definitively denied) by anything shown. I apologize if I misrepresented it.
Even in scary movies,
spoiler
I was really enjoying Send Help but then they threw in this stupid jump scare I can't even remember and the rest of the movie kinda sucked, luckily it was near the end.
Ugh.
Thanks for the warning.
Ope :( Fixed it.
They should just include jump scares in the movie rating so people who don't like them can avoid them. It's like listing main ingredients in menu food descriptions. I don't like mushrooms, but I can understand that others might like them included. Just let me know what dishes they're in.
I don't like jump scares, even in horror movies. I feel like they use jump scares and excessive gore as cheat codes when they can't write a decent plot.
Edit: Not that excessive gore bothers me, and it can be cool at times, but it needs to be backed up by a decent story or its pointless to me.
I can't say I agree or even recognise this as a problem with films themselves, but I'm very sympathetic as I know someone who also avoids many films because of their panic disorder. They also mostly watch at home now, unless it's something very light with minimal shocks.
Extend this to Horror movies.
Jump scares really are a fucking cop out and just tell me that the writers aren’t very creative
Amazingly though, jump scare pranks are quite popular in the low effort short videos communities.
Was this prompted by
Tap for spoiler
Project Hail Mary by chance? If so, i thought that scene was particularly bad because it was totally out of character for Rocky in the rest of the film. Two highly intelligent individuals from species trying to make first contact and one of them decides to slam itself into the barrier before announcing its presence in a non threatening way.
overall i loved the movie but that was one thing that should have been done better, or not at all.
One hundred percent spot on.