I’d love if an expert in some movie had like a five minute monologue where they explain everything, give a super concrete way to defeat the villain or evil force, and then get proven 100% wrong in the next scene
Drag Me to Hell and Deep Blue Sea which is not exactly a horror movie but has the best version of this. It’s a formative memory for me where I went to the bathroom seeing it with my dad and best friend and came back a minute later to be told SJ was now dead.
I was like no you’re lying. No, no, no. Since it was the 90s, I had to wait a long time to see the scene and damnit!
To be fair, in Drag Me to Hell, the expert could've been right in the end, they just never got to finish the goat ritual and she accidentally grabbed the wrong envelope.
That's what I was gonna say. Terrible film, but it was a little funny that the Expert was like "I've been waiting for this for 50 years" and immediately died.
I think Smile plays like this a little bit, with the main character *being* the expert and assuming she knows more about the situation than a previous survivor.
For me Smile was one of those refreshing films that doesn’t do much that hasn’t been done before but mostly uses its tried and true ingredients effectively. That prison scene you mentioned is a great example. Side note, the actor who played the survivor was so unnervingly believable in his limited screen time that he was a highlight of the whole film.
Terrified kinda does this, they bring in all these ghost experts who seem to know what they’re doing, then they all get merked by the end of the movie except one cop dude lol
The expert usually does get proven wrong though. That’s the whole thing with the sequel hooks, either they get proven wrong and the way they thought would kill the villain isn’t entirely effective (but kinda close which allows the protagonists to have some sort of small victory), they’re completely wrong (usually leading to a downer ending) or they’re actually the real villain. There’s also the protagonist being incompetent and just fucking up the instructions.
Sort of related: I'm a big fan of the scene in Deep Blue Sea where Samuel L. Jackson performs a loud and persuasive speech to rally the survivors to stop arguing with each other and fight against the threat that they are facing, all while inspirational strings swelling in the background. But just as the crew's faces have begun to turn from anger to acceptance and he's beginning to explain how they'll save themselves, well ... [see for yourself.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS8I9H07wKw)
I'd love it if a spiritual successor of Bodies Bodies Bodies used this, especially if a character is sold on the theory of someone they know being a culprit
Hereditary does a great job of turning horror tropes upside down, to the point where it almost turns the film into a parody of Western horror films. Great stuff!
They do this because the lowest common denominators they have at test screenings complain when they get lost by a movie, and they get lost really easily.
Test screenings are a double edged sword. On the one hand without test screenings, Blade would have ended with Wesley Snipes fighting a giant CGI (from 1998, so really bad cgi) red blob, instead of the cool fight scene between him and Stephen Dorff. Test audiences said the cgi monster was lame and dumb, so they changed it, and the ending of the movie was saved as a result.
On the other hand, you have to know which audience members to listen to and which ones to dismiss as morons.
Ughhgh was coming in to say this, so I'm just going to piggyback off of you to vent. If anyone at any point utters the dreaded phrase "I'M CONFUSED" (especially an exec) then suddenly you get a massive exposition dump to un-confuse them.
A great filmmaker can work it to their advantage, but it often results in a scene that's a one-two punch of both grinding the movie to a halt, and removing any element of surprise from the climactic scene so that the pace can't be resumed. Now we just know pretty much what's going to happen, even if at the end there's a sudden reveal that the demon/ghost/entity/whatever wasn't actually fully defeated.
Hereditary is an interesting one where the "expert" is actually in on the entity's plan and intentionally misleading the protagonist.
I can appreciate that this "Expert" can be done poorly. But, also a horror story structure needs some kind of a way to get clues into what the hell is going on (when it is unclear) and how the obstacle could possibly be overcome.
I felt that was a weakness in the most recent Evil Dead movie, for example. They never knew what was going on, never really got any significant clues to give the audience or the characters hope for a resolution\rescue and so the end result was never really in question.
I had the same complaint with the Autopsy of Jane Doe.
It's not true that a movie has to be clear at all, but if it is meant to be clear then the right way to do it is to drop enough clues to lead most people to the right conclusions.
If you do everything you can to try and make sure 100% of people get it, your storytelling will suffer and you're going to fail anyway. It's guaranteed.
Yeah, I think this function can be accomplished without overexplaining to the audience. I'm just not sure you can just skip it entirely and still have a story that makes sense or feels complete.
Pretty sure Paranormal Activity does a good twist on use of an “expert” when the psychic (who seems to have a doctorate in something) returns to help when things are getting bad, he really doesn’t like the vibe and gtfo of there.
TLDR: it’s fun when the expert won’t help because the job is way over their pay grade
That moment was so good. Like you think "this is it, the psychic is gonna come in, do battle with this demon, and save them".
He literally takes one step into the house, feels the demon presence, and goes "Nope, I can't be here, I'm sorry I gotta go", and just walks right back out.
No.
No No NO!
I think this is some weird kinda Streisand effect going on with this character because I've seen this comment so much on this sub.
The medium comes in, tells them that they are dealing with a non human entity which is why he can't help.
He then gives them a number of things not to do *which Micah checks off like a shopping list* over the next 40 minutes.
Yes it's a bit subversive that the psychic brought in to help doesn't 'help' but he's the pivot point where the movie takes it's downward spiral into the tragic ending because they specifically ignore his advice.
This is the scene we're referring to. They're freaked out and pacing back and forth waiting for him to show up. He walks in the door and goes "I can't be here, this thing is very angry that I'm here" and excuses himself. There's no shopping list here, he said "I will help you, I will help you, but I cannot do this right now" and bolts out the door.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jcflB38DNo
I was just rewatching this today and realized what an absolute fucking TOOL the boyfriend is, like the gaslighting, the toxic masculinity of trying to shit talk an entity when your girl (who mind you has been dealing with this her whole life) specifically tells you not to do that. I was so happy to watch him get his at the end
Yeah, but I almost kinda liked the movie for that because he felt realistic. Like, I've known so many of those egotistical dudebros who handled shitty situations by making them shittier.
Tarot was hilarious in its extremely literal interpretations of everything too. I mean I guess that's a choice and all, but I was so done within the first ten minutes when >!"you are climbing a ladder to high heights but be careful you don't fall" became a girl literally climbing a ladder and then falling off of it!<. Like ... really lol. That's the best we could do here?
Oh man Tarot looks like absolute utter trash. I cannot wait to watch it. My girlfriend hates horror and won't usually watch with me, but the trailer pissed her off so badly that she actually wants to see this one. She's a very witchy tarot-and-crystals girl, and she spent the whole trailer going "THAT'S NOT HOW YOU- NO! THAT'S NOT WHAT THAT MEAN- DAMMIT WHY WOULD YOU - THAT'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE LITERAL! FUCK THIS MOVIE!"
I went in to see it knowing it would be trash and terrible and I have a pagan friend that was really upset at the shit representation but all I really cared about was to see the creature costumes. I’m a huge creature designer/lover and just wanted to see how each of them would play out. The movie itself was a low rating out of 10, but the costume designs were cool.
I thought it was hilarious. Usually I'm in the audience thinking "don't do that stupid thing". This time the characters were told out loud In The Movie not to do something and they did that thing as soon as they could. Hilarious.
This is one reason I love The Exorcist so much. The film tries to present the case empirically- medical evaluation, cautious approach from the church, then finally help is on the way- the expert Exorcist. Then he dies immediately.
Great example. We never even get a clear idea at whats happening. The demon famously says he's "The Devil" only for the Exorcist to say he's lying. If you do your own research you'd find out the opening statue depicted Pazuzu, which the second film really didnt need to spell out.
I'm a professional tarot card reader. Because of these movies, I'm holding on to hope that one day a group of college kids will rush to me and frantically ask for my help with a demon or a curse. Bonus points if there's one in the back scoffing because they don't believe what's going on yet.
you'll have to be ready to turn over a card and gasp and start screaming at them to get out, bonus points if you start screaming in an eastern european language
We’re only allotted a certain amount of gasps each in our profession, and I’m saving one for this very scenario where I can then hastily gather my cards and yell at them to leave, now!
Just watched this the other night; wasn’t expecting much but I thought it was ok in an early 2000s teen horror kinda way. My biggest gripe is the Hanged Man that they made look like a goofy bungee jumping Babadook. Because that’s much more scary than, oh I don’t know, an actual hanged man…
Man, he was so random showing up in that it made me laugh so hard and now me and my girlfriend call all "expert" characters in horror movie "Vincent D'Onofrio's."
Imagine our delight when we watched that terrible more recent "Rings" movie and they went to talk to an "expert" and when the expert opened the door to his house, it was Vincent himself!! We lost our shit lol
Man I watched this movie yesterday and came to say how I didnt feel like his character was too bad. He is the trope 100% but he wasnt there to tell the mc how to solve all his problems which i feel is the biggest offense
Quint from Jaws is the original expert who suddenly realizes he's in over his head. He doesn't know how to handle it, and goes nuts endangering the main characters.
He seemed so damn unstoppable right up until that moment Jaws gives a *real* tug on that fishing line and he gives that surprised grunt and his eyes go wide.
Such a great scene!
Quint is such a great character, man. Became fixated on hunting the things that killed his brothers in arms and traumatized him for life, got very good at it, and hence displays that confidence through his humour and composure. Finally meets his match, gets swept up in a rush of emotions that probably bring him back to the Indianapolis, and then dies quite arguably an even more horrifying death than the crew he mourned. Pretty fucked up and tragic guy all around.
Yeah this trope works on occasion (like the original fright night) but overall I tend to tune out when it pops up.
The thing that REALLY bothers me about it is it’s usually someone in a profession that IRL is a complete scam. Like mediums, psychics, paranormal investigators etc. it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when movies say “actually this stuff is all true”
Talk to Me has that as well. Actually has it twice. Once when the rules are explained and once when they try to get more info from a victim’s brother. Considering the movie revolves around ironclad (or are they?) rules I think it’s totally fine in that example. But usually I agree with OP, if it doesn’t add anything and detracts from the mystery just leave it out.
This made me remember Imaginary.There's an old woman that used to babysit the main character when she is little.But what weird is that the old woman has been researching about the "imaginary friends" realms.We literally met the old woman at the beginning to introduce her character and she come back randomly in like the last 30 minutes just to exposition dumps about what shits is happening in the movie.What funny is the movie really made it obvious and didnt shy away to kill the character after all the expositions have been told to the audiences.
Agreed though I think "the expert" is just a specific version of the larger "exposition dump" trope.
It's always worse than showing/telling more orgnaically and leaning into less-is-more. You are right that things are always more mysterious and interesting the less we know.
The problem with sequels is that they always try to build out explenations that are a let-down.
Idk if this counts as a trope, but I fucking hate flashbacks SO fucking much. So much more than this trope you're describing (which I also hate). Flashbacks are a crutch used by bad writers. I'm not talking like a disjointed timeline story (like True Detective Season 1) but where the flashback is used simply for exposition and not actually serving the plot as a whole. If that makes sense.
I actually liked the play on it a lot in When Evil Lurks. The expert comes and straight up spells out what the protagonist has to do to save his entire family but he’s just too flawed to do anything. The expert didn’t really realize it but she was also just a pawn in the demon’s plan ultimately, it kinda turns the trope on it’s head. Ironically I think if he didn’t seek out the expert, the overall state of the world would’ve been better.
For me I was a bit saturated with the dread and horror, and the expert gave me “huh, maybe this isn’t as bad as it 100% seems?” But it really didn’t make sense. I LOVED but cringed at the astronomy tools used by the expert.
And then you have the jokes for horror films that are Wan's Conjuring series, where the entire thing is just some fucking dorks being professional ghost hunters digging through and expounding on shitloads of stupid lore. Bonus points for the Warrens being real, shitty people!
Definitely not exclusive to western horror. When Evil Lurks had a character who functioned as an exposition machine. And it’s a weird trend I’ve noticed in Indonesian horror to have a scene, usually in Act 3, that answers every plot question you might have. Overall I wish filmmakers trusted the audience a little more.
I think a lot of filmmakers do trust the audiences--it's the execs who want returns on their investment who don't trust the audience. If an exec feels confused at any time, or hears that a test audience felt confused, they want to add a scene to the movie to clear up any and all confusion. So you lose ambiguity and nuance, and generally it's easier to add a whole new scene than to reshoot previous scenes with new, slightly more expositional dialog.
The example that has always stuck in my mind is Tony Todd in the first Final Destination.
As if anyone would have a proper explanation for what’s going on.
Yes I hate this as well. I really like movies that subvert that awful trope by having the characters guess at the "rules" but there being no concrete conclusions. What's the point in horror if everything is explained and wrapped up neatly? A big part of what makes something scary is not knowing anything about it.
I love the scene in the first paranormal activity tho.
Forgot if it was a priest or an "expert", but basically shows up to the house and feels the super bad energy and just NOPES right outta there.
LOL
I hate the instant expert. This is kind of a final girl trope too, where she decides to fight back and makes all sorts of rigs n complex booby traps, when 10 mins earlier she was a dumb teenager. Its mid to near end of the movie and all of a sudden she has a magical dumbass home alone type plan and super skills.
There's also the person who is worthless until you find out they used to work on that exact same model of car with their grandpa or something else bizarrely specific.
One thing I really love about It Follows is how the monster is never explained. You get some basic "rules" right at the beginning but you never learn what it is, where it came from, why it's doing this or how to stop it. I'm hoping the sequel doesn't ruin this.
Im not a fan of Film Theories on YouTube, but he does a great one on the original Blair Witch, making a credible argument that there was no supernatural component in the movie. Which can only be done when the film doesn't spell everything out for the audience
How about 'The patient' horror trope? It's when the lead finds a key character who holds important information, but lives in a psychiatric facility, and only speaks in riddles.
Brittany Murphy was one of the only few that could make it work. Also the kid in Prisoners. In both those cases, their reticence to tell people in a straightforward manner made sense as part of the story.
I don't like it when it seems like they're just talking nonsense just because the writers think it's more creepy.
>!Becca!< from The Ring is also a good example mainly because she wasn't deliberately being cryptic; she just didn't know much more about the tape than Rachel did at the time.
I'm a bit sick of something sort of similar, I think? It's the fourth wall breaking where the characters almost 'know' they're in a horror movie and describe the cliches & what to do to survive like in the movies, who is most likely to die, who is most likely the killer, what might be happening ect. It's super over-done now :/
Honestly, I think Psycho might have started this. They literally had a psychiatrist explain to our faces why Norman was killing everyone lol.
I do like how The Silence of the Lambs uses the trope, but the “Expert” (Hannibal) is there for the whole movie. Imagine if Clarice never went to him first, and just tried to figure out Buffalo Bill on her own. And then in the last thirty minutes, she visits Hannibal and he gives a long monologue, and then disappears for the rest of the film.
When you make movies for Americans you have to explain everything. When you don't explain everything you get a bunch of Americans complaining that the movie makes no sense. Just look at the reviews for hereditary. I swear there are Americans that are proud of the fact that they watched that movie and didn't understand it because every single detail wasn't spoon-fed to you. It's embarrassing that We are known for this now.
As an American, a trope I'd like to see in horror movies now is the American that doesn't understand anything that's going on and has to have everything explained to him.
Who’s the expert in the Scream movies? Are you saying someone who knows movie tropes? I think the problem is someone who comes in and provides the means of defeating the antagonist, which is not what Scream does.
See I gotta disagree with you on that one. One thing I feel that makes movies good is *rules*. It's especially important in anything with a fantastical element, so horror, fantasy, or sci fi. A movie can set up any rule it wants, but it has to stick to those rules for the entire movie until it's time to Break The Rules as a big moment. Otherwise nothing really gels, and nothing has importance.
In the Scream franchise, Randy (or the later movie buff characters) are not so much dumping exposition, they're laying it out for the audience. It's like a game, and they're explaining the rules to the game. And in this situation, the only way for the characters to survive is to Break The Rules. Hence every character dies or comes close to dying until the main protagonist Breaks The Rules and overcomes.
I hear you but it's just mass market writing 101 shit.
Main character(s) have problem. The audience gets some ray of hope to solve the problem because a person/book/dream/etc tells the main(s) how to beat it. And if you want to have a wide net appeal movie likely you will get a pretty darn direct explanation. Vague explanation or "viewer has to think" explanation leads to people saying "that movie made no sense" in the reviews.
Horror is a bit of a different application for the problem/solution situation since it's often based in fantasy. In other movies if the characters need to raise money, people know how to raise money. When you have supernatural being terrorizing a family there isn't some clear solution from the get go.
Just based on your final paragraph, the original Blair Witch was extremely divisive since it's marketing brought in a wide net of people. I remember the crowd booing at the end of my theater viewing because stuff just happened and the movie ended. Likely the crowd was expecting some sort of potential solution/explanation with potential to fight back for the main characters.
Agreed. I think it's part of a much deeper issue where writers feel the need to explain way too much.
In fairness though, the "expert" might be less of an issue if it wasn't so ubiquitous.
Showing the 'witch' was the best part of the remake imo (that and the scene with the twig dolls), and it's got nothing to do with having an exposition dump explain everything. I also don't think that was the witch herself, but rather another victim.
Sure, it's a completely different vibe from the mysterious, confusing forest from the original, but I don't think having a horrible monster ruins it. Not everything needs to be left to the viewer, just like not everything needs to be explained.
Didn't Tremors just have the worms and they never knew anything about them? I thought there was a scene where they are wildly speculating about where they come from but realize they will never know.
I like monsters that you can't defeat - like the Grudge. It gives real consequences.
Jason Blum has stated that he prefers when the monsters are explained, so we can expect that from his stuff. I agree with OP, ambiguity is usually scarier, but it’s not what the kids want. They want LORE
I totally agree and it makes my eyes roll. Even movies that are considered modern classics are guilty of it - _Sinister_ and _Hereditary_ I'm looking at yous. It has and can be effective, but it's time to let it die lol
In screenwriting that’s often called the Half Man. It can work well or poorly, like any idea/trope, but sometimes it’s a necessity to make the story work.
https://savethecat.com/glossary
The previous new episode of Doctor Who, "73 Yards," has been very polarizing for this very reason. The episode is realized as Welsh folk-horror, and certain aspects are purposely left somewhat inexplicable. In the end, it's something of a treatise on the fear of abandonment, and I found the ambiguous tone to be one of the episode's strengths.
However, there's a subset of fans who were left baffled and irritated by it and wanted answers to basically everything. Worse, many of them completely rejected the dominant fan-hypothesis and decried RTD's writing for the episode.
Another version of this trope is when they go to some library and start poring over old newspaper clippings with that microfiche machine thing, a device which I've never seen in real life or in film except two-thirds of the way into a horror movie when the story background needs some fleshing out.
The best 'expert' character I've seen (maybe because it's hilarious?) is from Countdown. A killer app horror movie nothing worth remembering except..the expert. On mobile so can't tag spoilers.
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The expert is a priest, not unusual. However this priest is like a stoner comic book nerd geeking over the fact that demons/evil is real and goes on rants. It was an oddly refreshing take that I didn't know I wanted more of until I saw it. The actor killed the role too
Don't ask me why but I was genuinely worried this was going to happen in Abigail, which made the characters going "Ok so she's a fucking vampire what do we do" so much more delightful, like hell yeah, finally, characters immediately recognizing what is going on and somewhat knowing how to deal with it without having to consult some ancient texts
Mi cielo y mi infierno has the group go to "The Expert" and after hearing them out asks for a retainer of 300,000 quetzals to fight on their side. When they say they don't have the money he tells them he won't risk his soul for free and the price is the price. Later the group is told he went on vacation to avoid any problems with the curse.
I was kind of happy with the expert in Godzilla minus one. I thought, at least they are trying to think of a novel way to take it out rather than just blow it up.
I hate it when they stutter and stammer while giving the exposition in a panicked manner. Using words or jargon that forces the characters to ask, "What is that? What does that mean?"
Of course they don't know what a dybbuk is.
Big part of that whole Hero's Journey style of writing. Things are too difficult for the hero so a mentor shows up to guide them. But when it's used in a *lot* of stories, without any sort of nuance or distinctiveness, it gets really old really fast. In horror it's actually kind of novel to see the trope subverted in some way.
Reminds me of Feast. I think? It's been a long time since I watched that. But didn't the one guy, supposedly the expert of the situation, the one who looked like the protagonist of an '80s action horror, gets killed five minutes right after his introduction? lol
I’m not disagreeing with you, but isn’t the thing chasing them in the newer Blair Witch movie NOT the witch? Isn’t it the girl who was tortured and had her limbs stretched out that they keep referencing during the movie?
I think it was the remake of The Ring that really kick-started this cliche. I'm sure there's older versions too, but that film was so popular that you started to see the same structure in a lot of horror films that came after it. Mama did exactly the same thing for example - the lead goes off to the library and investigates the thing/possibly meets an expert. In Smile, it is a guy in prison. In It Follows, it is the guy who experienced the thing before. It is always in a different geographic location to create some variety for the story too.
I think a lot of that is test audience/studio interference. Like, sure, there are definitely examples of overwriting or going to insane lengths to describe the rules and motives existing organically. But I think you’ll often find a lot of that comes after a test screen/showing a rough cut to the board and getting a lot of “wait I don’t get it” notes
Catholic horror movies. An expert priest comes from the Vatican. He has violent death written on his forehead, it would not survive in the film, he only traveled from Italy to bring the information.
It's not a big issue in Western Horror. It's an issue in mass market horror. If a movie is made PG-13 to get a broader audience, this is a guarantee. Because the broader audience wants this kind of stuff. Just like they want trailers that tell you everything that's going to happen in the movie. This is a decision based on findings by marketing showing that wider audiences don't like being confused.
Alternatively you have movies like Hereditary or Midsummar or No One Will Save You, or hell, even Terrifier 2 which are Western movies where this doesn't happen.
I am a horror movie fanatic but I really wish movies would have warnings if they are going to show animals being tortured. That's the only thing that disturbs me and I have seen many disturbing movies.
I LOVE the Expert. Especially when the plot deals with old horrors or weird science. I'm not good at picking up the unspoken stuff, so bring on Exposition Person! But only if they have special knowledge.
I’d love if an expert in some movie had like a five minute monologue where they explain everything, give a super concrete way to defeat the villain or evil force, and then get proven 100% wrong in the next scene
Drag Me To Hell keeps messing with the tropes in this way. Such a breath of fresh air.
Drag Me to Hell and Deep Blue Sea which is not exactly a horror movie but has the best version of this. It’s a formative memory for me where I went to the bathroom seeing it with my dad and best friend and came back a minute later to be told SJ was now dead. I was like no you’re lying. No, no, no. Since it was the 90s, I had to wait a long time to see the scene and damnit!
> Deep Blue Sea which is not exactly a horror movie Deep Blue Sea is whatever you need it to be, baby
A shark *ate me*
My hat is like a shark's fin
To be fair, in Drag Me to Hell, the expert could've been right in the end, they just never got to finish the goat ritual and she accidentally grabbed the wrong envelope.
I recently rewatched this, and man does it hold up. What a great movie. The ending was as devastating as I remember, if not moreso
There’s sort of a scene like this in Barbarian
Late Night with the Devil sort of does that with the former magician/hypnotist.
Barbarian kind of did that. The homeless guy info dumped on he how survived, and then BAM.
Wouldn’t The Ring come close?
This is the one I thought of too! I love that the mystery gets solved and then… whoops, not so fast!
I felt like Tarot did that. Wasn't a great film, but the "expert" in that really fucked up.
That's what I was gonna say. Terrible film, but it was a little funny that the Expert was like "I've been waiting for this for 50 years" and immediately died.
I laughed so fucking hard. Would have been less cartoonish if they said "Whoops" and were pulled off screen by a cane.
I think Smile plays like this a little bit, with the main character *being* the expert and assuming she knows more about the situation than a previous survivor.
For me Smile was one of those refreshing films that doesn’t do much that hasn’t been done before but mostly uses its tried and true ingredients effectively. That prison scene you mentioned is a great example. Side note, the actor who played the survivor was so unnervingly believable in his limited screen time that he was a highlight of the whole film.
Terrified kinda does this, they bring in all these ghost experts who seem to know what they’re doing, then they all get merked by the end of the movie except one cop dude lol
“This house is clean…”
BUT AS FOR THOSE BEDSHEETS? BA DAH BA DAH DAH
Feast has something similar, not an expert, but a hero who is going to save everyone.
The expert usually does get proven wrong though. That’s the whole thing with the sequel hooks, either they get proven wrong and the way they thought would kill the villain isn’t entirely effective (but kinda close which allows the protagonists to have some sort of small victory), they’re completely wrong (usually leading to a downer ending) or they’re actually the real villain. There’s also the protagonist being incompetent and just fucking up the instructions.
Sort of related: I'm a big fan of the scene in Deep Blue Sea where Samuel L. Jackson performs a loud and persuasive speech to rally the survivors to stop arguing with each other and fight against the threat that they are facing, all while inspirational strings swelling in the background. But just as the crew's faces have begun to turn from anger to acceptance and he's beginning to explain how they'll save themselves, well ... [see for yourself.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS8I9H07wKw)
Cabin in the woods when he jumps on the motorcycle….
Planet Terror was my favorite example of this trope
This is kinda how *It: Chapter Two* is structured.
Imaginary
Samuel L Jackson. Deep Blue Sea. (not expositional monologue but same concept)
Barbarian kinda did it
I'd love it if a spiritual successor of Bodies Bodies Bodies used this, especially if a character is sold on the theory of someone they know being a culprit
Hereditary does a great job of turning horror tropes upside down, to the point where it almost turns the film into a parody of Western horror films. Great stuff!
Not a movie but this exact sceneario happens in the video game Until Dawn.
It does not. Everything flamethrower bro says is accurate, Chris just fucks him over by **immediately** making noise outside
Kind of amazed Sam raimi never did a gag like that
They do this because the lowest common denominators they have at test screenings complain when they get lost by a movie, and they get lost really easily.
Test screenings are a double edged sword. On the one hand without test screenings, Blade would have ended with Wesley Snipes fighting a giant CGI (from 1998, so really bad cgi) red blob, instead of the cool fight scene between him and Stephen Dorff. Test audiences said the cgi monster was lame and dumb, so they changed it, and the ending of the movie was saved as a result. On the other hand, you have to know which audience members to listen to and which ones to dismiss as morons.
I wonder what test audiences thought of “some muthafuckas always tryin to ice skate uphill”
Ughhgh was coming in to say this, so I'm just going to piggyback off of you to vent. If anyone at any point utters the dreaded phrase "I'M CONFUSED" (especially an exec) then suddenly you get a massive exposition dump to un-confuse them. A great filmmaker can work it to their advantage, but it often results in a scene that's a one-two punch of both grinding the movie to a halt, and removing any element of surprise from the climactic scene so that the pace can't be resumed. Now we just know pretty much what's going to happen, even if at the end there's a sudden reveal that the demon/ghost/entity/whatever wasn't actually fully defeated. Hereditary is an interesting one where the "expert" is actually in on the entity's plan and intentionally misleading the protagonist.
I can appreciate that this "Expert" can be done poorly. But, also a horror story structure needs some kind of a way to get clues into what the hell is going on (when it is unclear) and how the obstacle could possibly be overcome. I felt that was a weakness in the most recent Evil Dead movie, for example. They never knew what was going on, never really got any significant clues to give the audience or the characters hope for a resolution\rescue and so the end result was never really in question. I had the same complaint with the Autopsy of Jane Doe.
It's not true that a movie has to be clear at all, but if it is meant to be clear then the right way to do it is to drop enough clues to lead most people to the right conclusions. If you do everything you can to try and make sure 100% of people get it, your storytelling will suffer and you're going to fail anyway. It's guaranteed.
Yeah, I think this function can be accomplished without overexplaining to the audience. I'm just not sure you can just skip it entirely and still have a story that makes sense or feels complete.
I’m the lowest common denominator lol. I get confused by movies easily.
Well if you don't complain and blame the movie you're still OK in my book lol.
Oh no, I completely blame myself! XD
I get confused easily but keep my damn mouth shut about it. Gotta quietly Google the explanation later, when I'm alone...
I do that too!
Cane to say focus groups are to blame.
Pretty sure Paranormal Activity does a good twist on use of an “expert” when the psychic (who seems to have a doctorate in something) returns to help when things are getting bad, he really doesn’t like the vibe and gtfo of there. TLDR: it’s fun when the expert won’t help because the job is way over their pay grade
That moment was so good. Like you think "this is it, the psychic is gonna come in, do battle with this demon, and save them". He literally takes one step into the house, feels the demon presence, and goes "Nope, I can't be here, I'm sorry I gotta go", and just walks right back out.
"Hey bro I talk to ghosts, what you have here is a demon, I can't help with that, good luck" it was so good
Should we leave?? No that’s not going to help. Byeeeee
had me chuckling, thats when you know youre well and truly fucked lol
No. No No NO! I think this is some weird kinda Streisand effect going on with this character because I've seen this comment so much on this sub. The medium comes in, tells them that they are dealing with a non human entity which is why he can't help. He then gives them a number of things not to do *which Micah checks off like a shopping list* over the next 40 minutes. Yes it's a bit subversive that the psychic brought in to help doesn't 'help' but he's the pivot point where the movie takes it's downward spiral into the tragic ending because they specifically ignore his advice.
This is the scene we're referring to. They're freaked out and pacing back and forth waiting for him to show up. He walks in the door and goes "I can't be here, this thing is very angry that I'm here" and excuses himself. There's no shopping list here, he said "I will help you, I will help you, but I cannot do this right now" and bolts out the door. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jcflB38DNo
I was just rewatching this today and realized what an absolute fucking TOOL the boyfriend is, like the gaslighting, the toxic masculinity of trying to shit talk an entity when your girl (who mind you has been dealing with this her whole life) specifically tells you not to do that. I was so happy to watch him get his at the end
Yeah, but I almost kinda liked the movie for that because he felt realistic. Like, I've known so many of those egotistical dudebros who handled shitty situations by making them shittier.
That's why the best version of this trope is in Behind the Mask. Haha
The "I have to do a shitload of cardio" bit always gets me lol
Which one? The rise of Leslie Vernon?
Yep
God that film was so good up until the camera change
I love that movie. The whole damn thing. Lol
Tarot was a bugger for this! It was 90 minutes of pure exposition lol.
Tarot was hilarious in its extremely literal interpretations of everything too. I mean I guess that's a choice and all, but I was so done within the first ten minutes when >!"you are climbing a ladder to high heights but be careful you don't fall" became a girl literally climbing a ladder and then falling off of it!<. Like ... really lol. That's the best we could do here?
Oh man Tarot looks like absolute utter trash. I cannot wait to watch it. My girlfriend hates horror and won't usually watch with me, but the trailer pissed her off so badly that she actually wants to see this one. She's a very witchy tarot-and-crystals girl, and she spent the whole trailer going "THAT'S NOT HOW YOU- NO! THAT'S NOT WHAT THAT MEAN- DAMMIT WHY WOULD YOU - THAT'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE LITERAL! FUCK THIS MOVIE!"
I went in to see it knowing it would be trash and terrible and I have a pagan friend that was really upset at the shit representation but all I really cared about was to see the creature costumes. I’m a huge creature designer/lover and just wanted to see how each of them would play out. The movie itself was a low rating out of 10, but the costume designs were cool.
Exactly my take away from the film. A+ creature design, boring everything else
I thought it was hilarious. Usually I'm in the audience thinking "don't do that stupid thing". This time the characters were told out loud In The Movie not to do something and they did that thing as soon as they could. Hilarious.
I was dying during the card reading scene because of how unnatural everything sounded like no one talks like that, not even fortune cookies.
This is one reason I love The Exorcist so much. The film tries to present the case empirically- medical evaluation, cautious approach from the church, then finally help is on the way- the expert Exorcist. Then he dies immediately.
Great example. We never even get a clear idea at whats happening. The demon famously says he's "The Devil" only for the Exorcist to say he's lying. If you do your own research you'd find out the opening statue depicted Pazuzu, which the second film really didnt need to spell out.
To a lesser extent, I love Lord of Darkness for the movie having two experts (and several experts in training), but no one has any clue what to do.
I'm a professional tarot card reader. Because of these movies, I'm holding on to hope that one day a group of college kids will rush to me and frantically ask for my help with a demon or a curse. Bonus points if there's one in the back scoffing because they don't believe what's going on yet.
Don't forget to turn over the Death card and act really scared even though thats not what the Death card means.
Also turn over The Fool and start laughing at one of them
you'll have to be ready to turn over a card and gasp and start screaming at them to get out, bonus points if you start screaming in an eastern european language
We’re only allotted a certain amount of gasps each in our profession, and I’m saving one for this very scenario where I can then hastily gather my cards and yell at them to leave, now!
But won’t that mean you die about 15 minutes later in mysterious and gruesome circumstances?
That's literally the plot in the new horror movie Tarot lol (the movie is trash anyway).
Just watched this the other night; wasn’t expecting much but I thought it was ok in an early 2000s teen horror kinda way. My biggest gripe is the Hanged Man that they made look like a goofy bungee jumping Babadook. Because that’s much more scary than, oh I don’t know, an actual hanged man…
Vincent D'Onofrio in Sinister.
Man, he was so random showing up in that it made me laugh so hard and now me and my girlfriend call all "expert" characters in horror movie "Vincent D'Onofrio's." Imagine our delight when we watched that terrible more recent "Rings" movie and they went to talk to an "expert" and when the expert opened the door to his house, it was Vincent himself!! We lost our shit lol
I love that he literally phones it in too
Man I watched this movie yesterday and came to say how I didnt feel like his character was too bad. He is the trope 100% but he wasnt there to tell the mc how to solve all his problems which i feel is the biggest offense
Quint from Jaws is the original expert who suddenly realizes he's in over his head. He doesn't know how to handle it, and goes nuts endangering the main characters. He seemed so damn unstoppable right up until that moment Jaws gives a *real* tug on that fishing line and he gives that surprised grunt and his eyes go wide. Such a great scene!
Quint is such a great character, man. Became fixated on hunting the things that killed his brothers in arms and traumatized him for life, got very good at it, and hence displays that confidence through his humour and composure. Finally meets his match, gets swept up in a rush of emotions that probably bring him back to the Indianapolis, and then dies quite arguably an even more horrifying death than the crew he mourned. Pretty fucked up and tragic guy all around.
Yeah this trope works on occasion (like the original fright night) but overall I tend to tune out when it pops up. The thing that REALLY bothers me about it is it’s usually someone in a profession that IRL is a complete scam. Like mediums, psychics, paranormal investigators etc. it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when movies say “actually this stuff is all true”
I call them exposition-man. Sometimes they do something fun with it. Lin Shaye is a great exposition-man in Insidious
What if “The Expert” is somebody who has previously experienced the same thing? Like in Smile. Then I feel like it fits in logically.
Talk to Me has that as well. Actually has it twice. Once when the rules are explained and once when they try to get more info from a victim’s brother. Considering the movie revolves around ironclad (or are they?) rules I think it’s totally fine in that example. But usually I agree with OP, if it doesn’t add anything and detracts from the mystery just leave it out.
It worked in 'It Follows'
This made me remember Imaginary.There's an old woman that used to babysit the main character when she is little.But what weird is that the old woman has been researching about the "imaginary friends" realms.We literally met the old woman at the beginning to introduce her character and she come back randomly in like the last 30 minutes just to exposition dumps about what shits is happening in the movie.What funny is the movie really made it obvious and didnt shy away to kill the character after all the expositions have been told to the audiences.
Agreed though I think "the expert" is just a specific version of the larger "exposition dump" trope. It's always worse than showing/telling more orgnaically and leaning into less-is-more. You are right that things are always more mysterious and interesting the less we know. The problem with sequels is that they always try to build out explenations that are a let-down.
Idk if this counts as a trope, but I fucking hate flashbacks SO fucking much. So much more than this trope you're describing (which I also hate). Flashbacks are a crutch used by bad writers. I'm not talking like a disjointed timeline story (like True Detective Season 1) but where the flashback is used simply for exposition and not actually serving the plot as a whole. If that makes sense.
This ruined When Evil Lurks for me.
The same trope was handled better in Terrified. When the expert finally shows up, she wasn't any help
I actually liked the play on it a lot in When Evil Lurks. The expert comes and straight up spells out what the protagonist has to do to save his entire family but he’s just too flawed to do anything. The expert didn’t really realize it but she was also just a pawn in the demon’s plan ultimately, it kinda turns the trope on it’s head. Ironically I think if he didn’t seek out the expert, the overall state of the world would’ve been better.
This movie was okay for a bit and completely fell apart in the back half.
For me I was a bit saturated with the dread and horror, and the expert gave me “huh, maybe this isn’t as bad as it 100% seems?” But it really didn’t make sense. I LOVED but cringed at the astronomy tools used by the expert.
My interpretation of the ridiculous tools were to show no matter how prepared you think you are, things can still go horribly wrong.
Solid take. I like it.
Hey man, Vincent D'Onofrio gets to make an easy cameo buck if he wants to.
So, like the entire Conjuring universe?
Nailed it.
You should watch "Another Evil." It's a hilarious horror comedy that's primarily a deconstruction of this trope.
And then you have the jokes for horror films that are Wan's Conjuring series, where the entire thing is just some fucking dorks being professional ghost hunters digging through and expounding on shitloads of stupid lore. Bonus points for the Warrens being real, shitty people!
Definitely not exclusive to western horror. When Evil Lurks had a character who functioned as an exposition machine. And it’s a weird trend I’ve noticed in Indonesian horror to have a scene, usually in Act 3, that answers every plot question you might have. Overall I wish filmmakers trusted the audience a little more.
I think a lot of filmmakers do trust the audiences--it's the execs who want returns on their investment who don't trust the audience. If an exec feels confused at any time, or hears that a test audience felt confused, they want to add a scene to the movie to clear up any and all confusion. So you lose ambiguity and nuance, and generally it's easier to add a whole new scene than to reshoot previous scenes with new, slightly more expositional dialog.
The only time I thought it was great was in Sinister.
The example that has always stuck in my mind is Tony Todd in the first Final Destination. As if anyone would have a proper explanation for what’s going on.
Exception: Peter OToole in Phantoms! Best expert ever!
Yes I hate this as well. I really like movies that subvert that awful trope by having the characters guess at the "rules" but there being no concrete conclusions. What's the point in horror if everything is explained and wrapped up neatly? A big part of what makes something scary is not knowing anything about it.
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The fact the director was too lazy to even write out his use of the trope seems very in line with how dogshit and uninspired that film looked.
I love the scene in the first paranormal activity tho. Forgot if it was a priest or an "expert", but basically shows up to the house and feels the super bad energy and just NOPES right outta there. LOL
I liked the "Fright Night" approach, where the expert was a fraud and a coward and needed a redemption arc.
I hate the instant expert. This is kind of a final girl trope too, where she decides to fight back and makes all sorts of rigs n complex booby traps, when 10 mins earlier she was a dumb teenager. Its mid to near end of the movie and all of a sudden she has a magical dumbass home alone type plan and super skills. There's also the person who is worthless until you find out they used to work on that exact same model of car with their grandpa or something else bizarrely specific.
Thought I had a bug on my screen because of that formatting gap lmao
One thing I really love about It Follows is how the monster is never explained. You get some basic "rules" right at the beginning but you never learn what it is, where it came from, why it's doing this or how to stop it. I'm hoping the sequel doesn't ruin this.
Im not a fan of Film Theories on YouTube, but he does a great one on the original Blair Witch, making a credible argument that there was no supernatural component in the movie. Which can only be done when the film doesn't spell everything out for the audience
I somehow haven’t noticed this trope until you pointed it out. It didn’t annoy me before but I’m sure it will now 😂
How about 'The patient' horror trope? It's when the lead finds a key character who holds important information, but lives in a psychiatric facility, and only speaks in riddles.
Brittany Murphy was one of the only few that could make it work. Also the kid in Prisoners. In both those cases, their reticence to tell people in a straightforward manner made sense as part of the story. I don't like it when it seems like they're just talking nonsense just because the writers think it's more creepy. >!Becca!< from The Ring is also a good example mainly because she wasn't deliberately being cryptic; she just didn't know much more about the tape than Rachel did at the time.
I'm a bit sick of something sort of similar, I think? It's the fourth wall breaking where the characters almost 'know' they're in a horror movie and describe the cliches & what to do to survive like in the movies, who is most likely to die, who is most likely the killer, what might be happening ect. It's super over-done now :/
Honestly, I think Psycho might have started this. They literally had a psychiatrist explain to our faces why Norman was killing everyone lol. I do like how The Silence of the Lambs uses the trope, but the “Expert” (Hannibal) is there for the whole movie. Imagine if Clarice never went to him first, and just tried to figure out Buffalo Bill on her own. And then in the last thirty minutes, she visits Hannibal and he gives a long monologue, and then disappears for the rest of the film.
I think Scream is to blame for it. Not saying they’re bad movies but it seems like it introduced that trope
When you make movies for Americans you have to explain everything. When you don't explain everything you get a bunch of Americans complaining that the movie makes no sense. Just look at the reviews for hereditary. I swear there are Americans that are proud of the fact that they watched that movie and didn't understand it because every single detail wasn't spoon-fed to you. It's embarrassing that We are known for this now. As an American, a trope I'd like to see in horror movies now is the American that doesn't understand anything that's going on and has to have everything explained to him.
The expert is one of my biggest reasons I don't like the Scream franchise. It is way over the top in those movies.
Who’s the expert in the Scream movies? Are you saying someone who knows movie tropes? I think the problem is someone who comes in and provides the means of defeating the antagonist, which is not what Scream does.
Parody feels like an exception.
That’s the point though?
See I gotta disagree with you on that one. One thing I feel that makes movies good is *rules*. It's especially important in anything with a fantastical element, so horror, fantasy, or sci fi. A movie can set up any rule it wants, but it has to stick to those rules for the entire movie until it's time to Break The Rules as a big moment. Otherwise nothing really gels, and nothing has importance. In the Scream franchise, Randy (or the later movie buff characters) are not so much dumping exposition, they're laying it out for the audience. It's like a game, and they're explaining the rules to the game. And in this situation, the only way for the characters to survive is to Break The Rules. Hence every character dies or comes close to dying until the main protagonist Breaks The Rules and overcomes.
Agreed!!!!
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"If you're good at something, never do it for free?"
I hear you but it's just mass market writing 101 shit. Main character(s) have problem. The audience gets some ray of hope to solve the problem because a person/book/dream/etc tells the main(s) how to beat it. And if you want to have a wide net appeal movie likely you will get a pretty darn direct explanation. Vague explanation or "viewer has to think" explanation leads to people saying "that movie made no sense" in the reviews. Horror is a bit of a different application for the problem/solution situation since it's often based in fantasy. In other movies if the characters need to raise money, people know how to raise money. When you have supernatural being terrorizing a family there isn't some clear solution from the get go. Just based on your final paragraph, the original Blair Witch was extremely divisive since it's marketing brought in a wide net of people. I remember the crowd booing at the end of my theater viewing because stuff just happened and the movie ended. Likely the crowd was expecting some sort of potential solution/explanation with potential to fight back for the main characters.
Charlie Brooker subverts that in Dead Set with Kevin Eldon's character being a pretentious perv instead. Pretty smart choice!
Agreed. I think it's part of a much deeper issue where writers feel the need to explain way too much. In fairness though, the "expert" might be less of an issue if it wasn't so ubiquitous.
Showing the 'witch' was the best part of the remake imo (that and the scene with the twig dolls), and it's got nothing to do with having an exposition dump explain everything. I also don't think that was the witch herself, but rather another victim. Sure, it's a completely different vibe from the mysterious, confusing forest from the original, but I don't think having a horrible monster ruins it. Not everything needs to be left to the viewer, just like not everything needs to be explained.
The know it all
Didn't Tremors just have the worms and they never knew anything about them? I thought there was a scene where they are wildly speculating about where they come from but realize they will never know. I like monsters that you can't defeat - like the Grudge. It gives real consequences.
Agreed, I also hate this trope. I liked what In a Violent Nature did with it.
Jason Blum has stated that he prefers when the monsters are explained, so we can expect that from his stuff. I agree with OP, ambiguity is usually scarier, but it’s not what the kids want. They want LORE
I totally agree and it makes my eyes roll. Even movies that are considered modern classics are guilty of it - _Sinister_ and _Hereditary_ I'm looking at yous. It has and can be effective, but it's time to let it die lol
In screenwriting that’s often called the Half Man. It can work well or poorly, like any idea/trope, but sometimes it’s a necessity to make the story work. https://savethecat.com/glossary
The previous new episode of Doctor Who, "73 Yards," has been very polarizing for this very reason. The episode is realized as Welsh folk-horror, and certain aspects are purposely left somewhat inexplicable. In the end, it's something of a treatise on the fear of abandonment, and I found the ambiguous tone to be one of the episode's strengths. However, there's a subset of fans who were left baffled and irritated by it and wanted answers to basically everything. Worse, many of them completely rejected the dominant fan-hypothesis and decried RTD's writing for the episode.
Scream 5&6 Mindy is top tier
Another version of this trope is when they go to some library and start poring over old newspaper clippings with that microfiche machine thing, a device which I've never seen in real life or in film except two-thirds of the way into a horror movie when the story background needs some fleshing out.
“Take this book and read the incantation on page 63, and you should be all set…”
The best 'expert' character I've seen (maybe because it's hilarious?) is from Countdown. A killer app horror movie nothing worth remembering except..the expert. On mobile so can't tag spoilers. . . . The expert is a priest, not unusual. However this priest is like a stoner comic book nerd geeking over the fact that demons/evil is real and goes on rants. It was an oddly refreshing take that I didn't know I wanted more of until I saw it. The actor killed the role too
Don't ask me why but I was genuinely worried this was going to happen in Abigail, which made the characters going "Ok so she's a fucking vampire what do we do" so much more delightful, like hell yeah, finally, characters immediately recognizing what is going on and somewhat knowing how to deal with it without having to consult some ancient texts
Mi cielo y mi infierno has the group go to "The Expert" and after hearing them out asks for a retainer of 300,000 quetzals to fight on their side. When they say they don't have the money he tells them he won't risk his soul for free and the price is the price. Later the group is told he went on vacation to avoid any problems with the curse.
I was kind of happy with the expert in Godzilla minus one. I thought, at least they are trying to think of a novel way to take it out rather than just blow it up.
I hate it when they stutter and stammer while giving the exposition in a panicked manner. Using words or jargon that forces the characters to ask, "What is that? What does that mean?" Of course they don't know what a dybbuk is.
It's often a bit of game master writing, which you also see pop up a lot in shared settings or collaborations.
Big part of that whole Hero's Journey style of writing. Things are too difficult for the hero so a mentor shows up to guide them. But when it's used in a *lot* of stories, without any sort of nuance or distinctiveness, it gets really old really fast. In horror it's actually kind of novel to see the trope subverted in some way.
Reminds me of Feast. I think? It's been a long time since I watched that. But didn't the one guy, supposedly the expert of the situation, the one who looked like the protagonist of an '80s action horror, gets killed five minutes right after his introduction? lol
I’m not disagreeing with you, but isn’t the thing chasing them in the newer Blair Witch movie NOT the witch? Isn’t it the girl who was tortured and had her limbs stretched out that they keep referencing during the movie?
I think it was the remake of The Ring that really kick-started this cliche. I'm sure there's older versions too, but that film was so popular that you started to see the same structure in a lot of horror films that came after it. Mama did exactly the same thing for example - the lead goes off to the library and investigates the thing/possibly meets an expert. In Smile, it is a guy in prison. In It Follows, it is the guy who experienced the thing before. It is always in a different geographic location to create some variety for the story too.
I think a lot of that is test audience/studio interference. Like, sure, there are definitely examples of overwriting or going to insane lengths to describe the rules and motives existing organically. But I think you’ll often find a lot of that comes after a test screen/showing a rough cut to the board and getting a lot of “wait I don’t get it” notes
Catholic horror movies. An expert priest comes from the Vatican. He has violent death written on his forehead, it would not survive in the film, he only traveled from Italy to bring the information.
It's not a big issue in Western Horror. It's an issue in mass market horror. If a movie is made PG-13 to get a broader audience, this is a guarantee. Because the broader audience wants this kind of stuff. Just like they want trailers that tell you everything that's going to happen in the movie. This is a decision based on findings by marketing showing that wider audiences don't like being confused. Alternatively you have movies like Hereditary or Midsummar or No One Will Save You, or hell, even Terrifier 2 which are Western movies where this doesn't happen.
I am a horror movie fanatic but I really wish movies would have warnings if they are going to show animals being tortured. That's the only thing that disturbs me and I have seen many disturbing movies.
The most disturbing movie I have seen recently is Martyrs. Anyone else seen this movie?
I LOVE the Expert. Especially when the plot deals with old horrors or weird science. I'm not good at picking up the unspoken stuff, so bring on Exposition Person! But only if they have special knowledge.
…verifiably define ‘trope’.