Basic Trope: Darkness suggests impending doom or horror.
- Straight: Bob walks into the dark. After walking for a few minutes, he's stalked and killed by a monster.
- Exaggerated: Bob steps into the dark and the monster instantly kills him.
- Downplayed: Bob walks into a semi-lit location. He's stalked and killed by a monster after a long, nasty fight.
- Justified: The monster has good night vision and Bob doesn't.
- Inverted:
- Bob walks into somewhere lighted, and, after a few minutes, he's stalked and killed by a monster.
- The dark helps Bob sneak past the monster safely.
- Subverted: Bob walks into the dark and gets progressively more nervous, especially after hearing noises ... but the noises come from Alice, who came out to make sure he got to his destination safely.
- Double Subverted: ...Then the night gets darker, and Bob notices Alice seems to have too many legs and longer and sharper nails and teeth than he remembers.
- Parodied:
- The monster wasn't even there when the light was on, but when Bob turns it off, it appears.
- Darkness is the monster.
- Zig-Zagged: Bob comes out of a dark room showing no apparent fear, but then admits he saw something that scared him deeply in there. Later, he goes back into the same room and comes out with a bloody wound. And then later, he goes back in fearlessly, to kill whatever it was that injured him.
- Averted: Dark and light are equally safe/dangerous.
- Enforced: The author is scared of the dark and wants to show how bad it can be.
- Lampshaded:Bob: Never go into the dark. Dark means doom.
- Invoked: Emperor Evulz takes out the lights before attacking, to make his foes more afraid.
- Exploited: See Invoked.
- Defied: Bob brings a flashlight with him everywhere.
- Discussed: "If Bob goes in there, he's dead. I'm not coming with him."
- Conversed: "Stupid horror movie characters. Always cluelessly walking into dark rooms."
Back to Darkness Equals Death. Be sure your flashlight works...
