But how? What kind of direction do you take? You’ve already come up with a really sinister and dark concept, and you want to execute. How do you take it? What tone do you want? How do you work the concept into the beefy bits? Well, have a look right here, my pretties.

You can choose between the following lovely subgenres for your story! Knowing what sort of story you want to write will help you focus your tone and help you make a more cohesive experience for the reader. The Dark Genre relies a lot on this because it is the connection to the readers that is essential for any really good dark fic.

- Horror
Horror is rather straightforward. Bad things happen to bad ponies and they die or get hurt. The focus of the story will be based on the emotional connection to the one who is suffering, and the story atmosphere plays an important part in guiding the feelings of the reader.

Some horror stories have the protagonist make it out at the end alive. Or they die. Or in fact, no one might die at all. It’s actually all fine. The point of it is the focus on the trails and experiences of the character we follow, and in that, making a story with great description is key. If you’re one who can abuse this well, this sub-genre might be your style.

Horror lends itself to the 1st person viewpoint as well, ala Lovecraft, which allows a more close identification to the reader.

The bulk of the story is comprised of the experience, so plot can be shallow and no twists are necessary, but sometimes appreciated.

- Suspense
Suspense is a kind of story which relies on the tale. Unsettling things happen, strange things, that lead the character and reader to question reality and sensibilities. Suspense, as the name suggests, keeps the reader suspended in an area where they’re not really sure what’s going on, and in that, they feel uncomfortable.

These kinds of stories rely a lot on misdirection and plot churn, and focuses on the narrative. Being able to take a ton of factors and points and weave them into a story is the goal, and usually the character experience isn’t as important as the revelations at the end.

Stories in the suspense category focus much more on the plot, and plot cohesion, and almost always has a twist or ambiguous ending. Think of endings like in Inception, which was suspense/action. Mind-fluttery at its best.

- Psychological
Dark Psychological stories take place in two flavours. Psychological Horror or Tension. The former has been grouped into ‘horror’ generally as it contains much of the same concepts, that is, focusing on a personal decline of a character, except that it has to do with a character’s mental condition rather than a physical strain.

If horror were torture, regular horror would be 1000 cuts, and psychological would be Chinese Water.

The second type, in tension, is meant to create anxiety in the reader by presenting a scenario in which there is no good outcome, and plays upon the black and white nature of morality. The story would attempt to put the reader in moralistic lock, and will rely on three (perhaps more) ideals that will just make them uncomfortable. You can utilize the power of the paradigm shift, cognitive dissonance, or the impossible choice.

Alternatively, you can also bother readers by presenting scenarios they know for sure are coming, but have no way of preventing or changing, but are stretched out in a way to prolong the sense of fatalism.

The idea thusly is to target the reader directly. This requires the author to tie down the subject matter that he wishes to approach and use it in an effective way to bother the reader.

Psychological tense stories are like Saw 1. Everything else in the series is what we call ‘rubbish’.

- Fable
Fables are stories like fairy tales, Aesop’s stuff and other things like that. They seek to teach a lesson based on a key concept, which is apparent through diagnosis of the text. The stories are usually straightforward, has a bittersweet and/or happy ending, and focuses on teaching that one single lesson through the use of a simpler story.

Most fairy tales, of the Grimm type, fall into this category.

The fun in this is in the telling, so the creativity will focus on the presentation of the story.

Fables tend to be written around the lesson, so the story itself will tend to be shallow, straightforward, and have no twists or catharsis. Fables also tend to be very direct in their telling, and are far more loose in mindcanon.

A side spin of this genre is the Myth/Folk Tale, in which a concept is explained through the story. “Why does the sun rise?” “How did the Leopard get its Spots?” In such tellings, the idea of character cohesion and narrative logic is abandoned for the creative elements of the story itself. These stories usually allow writers to tell a tale explaining the birth of an idea or concept using existing characters as placeholders. It’s fast and loose with this one!

- Comedy
Yes. Dark Comedy. It’s everywhere and you don’t even NOTICE it. Ever watch a show called Shawn of the Dead? How about Edward Scissorhands? Even most works by Shakespeare were dark comedies, but he called them ‘tragic’ because he has to be special. Stupid, stupid Shakespeare. Thinking he’s better than us. Comedy fics in the dark genre is something that transcends the properties of all other subgenres. Comedy attemps to subvert the norm by making fun of the concept, and treat serious situations in a flagrant light.

The humour in a dark comedy may not necessarily be ‘ha-ha’ funny, but rather awkward and strange.

This can make comedy horror some of the hardest but most rewarding to write. If you like poking fun at convention, or being silly, or if you’re a sarcastic guy who pokes fun at the wrong things, then Dark Comedy might just be for you. You don’t even really need a thick story, a twist, or anything, but Comedy tends to focus more on the character relation to the reader. and their enjoyment in the scene building.

- Shipping
The Dark ship genre is another strange one that might be hard to pull off but rewarding in the end. It imposes on the dynamic of a broken relationship or imposes on love or trust born from strange circumstances. Perhaps it is a Bonnie and Clyde type love tied by crime or murder, or perhaps it is the family dynamic which is expressed in eerie and strange ways. Addam’s Family, anyone?

A further way to express the dark ship is to note the methods of achieving the goal of love. It might not be natural, and therefore not genuine, and usually it might end up badly for everyone involved, especially if themes like coercion or magic is involved. Elements of the Stockholm Syndrome, or magical donkey heads would work well here!

The Dark ship fic would focus more on elaborations of the dichotomy between characters and be highly focused on character development. The story is secondary to the character arcs. Dark ship stories (romance or otherwise) usually end in bittersweet tragedy.

-Clop
Dark clop? DARK CLOP? What is this strange and magnificent beast, you ask? It’s dark clop. It’s the forbidden, sick, twisted and yet mystifying clop. BDSM is regular clop. Zombie nom sex is dark, especially when everyone’s enjoying regardless.

You can abuse the concept to extend itself into concepts of rape, extreme fetishes, or other things, all meant to probe the darker areas of pleasure, but in an indirect manner. You can also make it bizarre and surreal, and have the poon itself tied into things that aren’t normally meant to be enjoyed. (Pleasuring oneself with a cactus, for example)

Or you can just have strange odd poon like vampire or werewolf stuff, or things like addiction or pleasure derived from things that aren’t meant to cause pleasure.

Dark poon lends itself naturally to dark comedy, shipping and clowns.

A good example of this genre in one of these interpretations is the movie ‘Bad Biology’ in which a girl with seven um... cootch buttons has to keep finding new ways to keep herself pleasured, eventually running into a man who has a monster penus which can detach and rape women. He has to keep injecting it with depressants to keep it from getting out of control. They get together because of their strange circumstances, and weird things happen. And yes, despite all this, it is actually a comedy. Watch this movie at your own risk.

- Shock/Gore
Cupcakes. 'Nuff said.

-Clowns
Because Clowns.

If you have any other questions, arguments, thoughts or even genres I'm missing entirely, feel free to leave a message at the bottom.

Woo, it's up!