Anyone who knows me will tell you that I am a humongous chicken. I don’t play horror games, I RARELY watch horror films, and I will only watch horror TV shows with the lights on. However, there is a trend in horror that has started to catch my attention. It gets deep into our deepest, darkest fears as humans, and revolves around personal identity.

The loss of identity trope manifests in a few different ways and isn’t really all that new. For years now we’ve seen all sorts of incarnations of it, from demonic possession to body-swapping, and more. In recent years though, I’ve started to notice that people have really started to dig into the horrifying nature of losing oneself.

There are multiple ways this can go, but if you want a very real example, I would suggest watching the movie Still Alice starring Julianne Moore. The film details a woman’s struggle with early-onset Alzheimer’s and presents a very real descent into a horrific illness. When it comes down to it, we are a product of our memories and our experiences. Without those memories, we become someone else, and as we lose them, the horror of it builds until we forget enough to no longer realize how afraid we should be.

Still Alice isn’t a horror movie, but it shows a very frightening reality for many people. The fear isn’t just of losing yourself, but also involves watching a loved one slowly wither away, getting further away from the vibrant spirit they once were. As a disabled man, I’ve always said that there are worse things than a physical disability, and the slow deterioration of Alzheimer’s is one of them.

In a more fantastical context, the loss of identity can manifest in artificial memories being planted, or even the creation of a replacement identity. Without spoiling too much, Season 4 of The Magicians partially involves the main cast being forced into new lives and identities, then trying to find their way back to themselves.

The reason this version of the trope is so effective is that we, as the viewer, can imagine how horrifying it would be to lose yourself. It is more horrifying though to not realize what you have lost, only to discover later that your identity was stolen from you. Sometimes the unknown is more frightening than things we can see, feel and touch.

Even Jordan Peele’s new film Us takes this idea and puts a spin on it. The concept of a family being attacked by mirror images of themselves conjures a horrific idea that you could easily be replaced without people realizing it. Personal identity and individuality are spoken about now more than ever, so the thought of that being used against us is a terrifying thought.

These are just a few examples of how one common element in cinema and television is changing the way we look at horror. Instead of only fearing that which we cannot see, now we find ourselves being terrified of a very real idea. Sometimes reality is scarier than fiction, and the idea of losing our memories, individuality, and by extension ourselves, is far more frightening than any ghost or beast could be.

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