Was thinking about this after reading a few bleakbox stories and realizing they somehow take the enjoyment out of the torture.
And I began to wonder where the line is; what makes Sadbox sublime and Bleakbox depressing?
I suspect it is the fact that most proper Bleakbox neglects much input from the fluffies, it is far to close to actual animal abuse wherea Sadbox uses more of the fluffie perspective and saccharine treacle.
Ironically, if one were to take a Spoosh or Wolfram (the Elder Gods of Sadbox) comic and just write it as a text post, it would be closer to Bleakbox.
They rely on the expressions of the fluffies.
Thoughts?
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I mean, that makes sense. Sadbox can have elements of hope, a bittersweet ending, etc. It’s full of emotion, passion, despair, you name it. Bleakbox happens when the world is rife with tragedy, and the characters have gone numb. It’s dystopian.
That, IMO, is the essential difference between the two: the capacity to feel. In bleakbox, even relief at the end is gone.
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A lot of people have made bleak stories under “bleak box” but IMO it needs that extra bit, the humans also have to be miserable. “Take the fun out of torture” is honestly the best descriptor the banality of it all taken to it’s extreme that’s bleak box. Gardel is the best at this, the story “Routine” story is exactly what I’m talking about
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Sadbox acknowledges that there are lights outside the darkness. Aww, but they’re not for you. Hehe.
Bleakbox is the soul crushing acknowledgement that there was never any light. Only darkness. Unending, eternal darkness.
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The System is also an exceptional example.
In sadbox, the sorrow hits but there was the possibility of hope. In bleakbox, everyone human and fluffy alike are in a spiral where the endpoint was a given and you’d be a fool to think otherwise.
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I think that must be it…
In my own works, I try to go pretty hard, but I see it as the happiness is required in order for the suffering to really hit.
It must be a rollercoaster, so you need the heights or else there is no kinetic energy at impact.
Bleakbox seems to just be a never-ending downward slope.
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I like that.
There must be that possibility of happiness, always just out of reach, but always taunting as it slips away.
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Good stuff!
I have read some of Gardel’s work, IMHO it hits or misses.
That one is a hit.
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I remember @Za arguing there’s only four boxes - hugbox, abusebox, sadbox and weirdbox.
Initially I argued and fought valiantly for the inclusion of bleakbox. I love those soul crushing stories. But at the end of the day, I agree with him. Those four boxes make up the axis of all stories we create (take it with a grain of salt, will you).
What I see bleakbox as now, is an extra label to slap on your stories. A flavor packet to any of the four boxes - hopeless, constant downward slope into inevitable tragic ending. But it’s not an actual box itself.
A sadbox that isn’t just sad. A heart-wrenching moment that implies the deep gravity of the situation. An event had just happenned that made fluffies sad. But as they mourn the event itself, they fail to notice the gravity of the situation. But we don’t - they’ve been doomed. The entire herd will inevitably die a pointless death after prolonged suffering. A sadbox bleakbox story.
A moment of respite and a brief chance to love your little ones. Mare and her babies gleefully displaying their love for each other. But it’s winter, and while it’s not outright stated, it’s heavily implied they will not survive the cold, long dark. Is it sadbox? Or just hugbox bleakbox?
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The last one sounds more like an example of impending doom to me, in a hybrid box I like to call Bittersweetbox.
And I disagree with what Za said. While there might be a case for Bleakbox being a sub-box of Sadbox, Horrorbox and Neutralbox are most certainly their own boxes.
“Horrorbox” is just wierdbox
But it also has shades of Abusebox, and usually isn’t played for laughs like Weirdbox is.
That’s why it’s an axis, or maybe like four scales. Horrorbox is weirdbox with shades of abusebox. Neutralbox is just neither of the boxes on scale, or they’re too low to classify as anything. That’s just flavors of the four main boxes, all of it.
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But where does Bleakbox lie on that axis? It doesn’t have shades of any other box; it only has shades of Sadbox, yet it’s distinct in its lack of feeling. To me it can’t be anything but an extra cold variant of Sadbox.
It doesn’t lie on that axis.
Four main boxes are like four elements.
Sub-boxes like horrorbox or neutralbox are the result of mixing four boxes together.
Bleakbox is a flavor that can be applied to any main- or sub-box. It’s about removal of any hope, about making the story depressing in its bleakness.
I disagree that it could be added to Hugbox or Weirdbox. Weirdbox especially, since I can’t see any conceivable way to make that depressing. It would be too ridiculous to take seriously.
Adding it to Hugbox would turn it into what I like to call Bittersweetbox (closest tag is just “bittersweet”).
And adding something like that to Neutralbox seems like it might tip the scales into not being neutral. But then again, Neutralbox is quite versatile.
Horrorbox and Abusebox, though? Yeah, I could see that. Wolfram has tons of both Abusebox and Sadbox works that are Bleakbox, now that I think of it, and tragic horror is certainly a thing.
Well, fine - maybe you can’t add it to everything. But slighter version of weirdbox could still get bleakbox patch slapped on them. It’s the matter of naming things, and I agree about Bittersweetbox. It still fits my idea:
You have two elements you classify stories with - box scale and flavor patches.
You can assign levels of each main box (sad, hug, neutral and weird) to every story you make. These result in like… sub-genres - weird + abuse can be called a weirdbox abusebox story, or just horrorbox, like you said.
After that, you can patch them with flavors. Like bleakbox patch, which could be applied to any story as long as you’re able to pull it off. A hugbox or hugbox + sadbox story with bleakbox flavor = bittersweetbox.
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Horrorbox is just weirdbox. Even if you call it a mix of abuse and weird, which is only sometimes true, it’s just a mixture. It’s not its own box.
Neutralbox is the lack of a box, and thus doesn’t count as a box despite its name.
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Why does everything need to be its own box? Bittersweet box is just hugbox/sadbox. It doesn’t require its own label.
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I still think it’s a subgenre at least. Horrorbox is usually played straight, while Weirdbox is played for laughs usually based on absurdity.