Mercy Black is a visual creepypasta that scared the crap outta me. Which horror author had to sleep with the lights on last night? Yup, this one.Usually when we watch horror movies, either Jay or I have predicted the ending before we’ve made it halfway. Not this one. Mercy Black kept us guessing until the very last moment. Literally.
Finally, a shock ending in a horror movie that actually came as a surprise!
All we know about Mercy Black when it begins is that the main character, Marina Hess, is being released from a fifteen-year stay in a mental institution after stabbing her friend as a child. When she was first admitted to the hospital, the young girl blamed "guardian angel", Mercy Black, for her actions. Now an adult and ready to face the outside world, Marina understands the schizophrenia she was diagnosed with. It's time to go home and, well, you know that always goes well...
The thing I love most about Mercy Black isn't the number of times I jumped like the big, fat wimp I am (five), or even how many times the blanket got pulled up over my head (twice), but the fact that the surprise jumps and scary monsters weren’t what kept me up all night. Mercy Black is much more sinister than that.
Too often, horror movies are created under the assumption that landing the right sting in the right place is enough to terrify audiences. It really isn’t. (Don’t get me wrong, though. Mercy Black certainly does that.) To truly frighten a viewer, you have to get inside their head, stomp around a bit, tag the wall, and fuck off in a hurry. How does Mercy Black accomplish this?
Mercy Black forces you to question the concept of reality. It gives you two opposing truths and asks you to decide which one is fact. Just when you’re convinced you know which is which, it pulls the rug out from under your dumb ass, laughing as it tells you both are true.
That’s what I found terrifying about this movie, the uncertainty -- not a so-What-the-Hell-happened-then uncertainty but a do-I-even-know-what’s-real uncertainty. I love that Mercy Black doesn’t force a truth on the viewer. It doesn’t jump out and in its best Nelson voice shout, “Ha ha, you were wrong!” Instead, it looks deep into your eyes without blinking and says, “Dude. What if we’re all right?”
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