Welcome to the Horror Trope Retirement Home, where overused horror cliches (hopefully) go to live out there rest of their days, far away from the public eye.

In 1998, Ringu – the awesome and influential Japanese cursed-VHS-ghost movie – was released. In the above picture, you can see what happens to anyone who watches the aforementioned tape. They die with an expression best described as “mid yawn” frozen on their faces. Honestly: look at that picture and tell me you don’t immediately hear Sloth bellowing, “hey you guys!” By today’s standards, it’s downright quaint if not borderline silly – but at the time it was terrifying. As far as I can tell, this is the first time this sort of specific visual pops up in horror movies. A few years later, in 2002, an American remake was released, and this is what the victims in that version looked like: (more)