Capitalist Realism and the Death Drive in Analog Horror and “The Nixonverse”
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20249229 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Dylan Henty (0009-0002-8853-5765, York St John University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 6 |
| Pages | 78 |
| Publication date | 2026-06-08 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Humanities (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2076-0787 • E-ISSN: 2076-0787 |
| Publisher | MDPI AG (PUBLISHER • IT) |
| DOI | 10.3390/h15060078 |
| OpenAlex | W7163902677 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 13 |
‘Analog horror’ is a subgenre of internet and media horror, beginning c.2015. Its texts use late 20th-century analogue technology as a locus of horror, both narratively and aesthetically, expressing contemporary technophobia and existential anxieties of the first quarter of the 21st century, using a deliberate and anarchic a-historicity to represent concerns surrounding techno-capitalism and its attendant ‘polycrisis’. This irreverent attitude to historical cause and effect, and technological progress, in subgenre texts such as “The Nixonverse” by creator Eve Casanas represents our modern-day conflict between the digital, techno-capitalist online world, and the corporeal crisis events affecting the real world. This diametric in analog horror expresses the central tenet of Mark Fisher’s concept of ‘capitalist realism’, the idea that capitalist ideology makes it appear that there are no viable alternatives to capitalism. In analog horror narratives, analogue–digital hybrid technologies channel techno-organic monster-figures, with the helplessness of the individual and/or groups to defeat these monstrosities being expressive of this capitalist realist impression that capitalism cannot be overcome, and its polycrisis avoided, enacting fantasies of societal destruction to alleviate this suspended state of anxious helplessness, in the tone of Freud’s ‘death drive’ wish fulfilment fantasies
Capitalism · Existentialism · Hollywood · Ideology · Learned helplessness · Realism · Gothic Literature and Media Analysis · Psychoanalysis, Philosophy, and Politics · Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |