Is "Lovecraftian" an overused term and how do we replace it?

Only overused when it applies to aesthetics not themes. Lovecraft themes are about insignifigance, madness, uncaring universe. Aesthetic can be anything but many people think sea monsteras and whatnot are Lovecraftian without also considering themes. The people who know Lovecraft will ignore those people and it really doesn't matter in the long run.

The overarching theme of being nothing in face of an uncaring universe is quite literally (as in, from literature) equivalent to what has come to be the word "Lovecraftian". It's not quite the same as "hopeless" and also not exactly what we mean when we simply say "insignificance". Kind of like being forgotten is different from falling into oblivion.

Perfect usable in this sense. But it is indeed overused if you refer to monsters and such as that just because they have eyes on their tentacles. Bloodborne would be a good example. It's not "Lovecraftian" if the monsters care so much about you as to attack, defend themselves, etc. The true great old ones in that game, must remain unseen.

That's like people using "Kafkaesque" to refer to magic realism

Many of our words are derived like this; why should Platonic stand the test but Kafkaesque fail to mean anything?

>there are scared people in a story and it's set in the early 20th century
>it's "lovecraftian"

The term has all but lost meaning

>story has big towering structures
>it's Lovecraftian
>story has diluted spacetime continuum and different dimensions
>it's Lovecraftian Cosmic Horror
>story has jelly monsters
>Lovecraftian
>story has a scholar protag
>Lovecraftian
>story has a minority villain
>Lovecraftian
>story is set in New England
>Lovecraftian
>characters speak proper English
>Lovecraftian

make it stop

Weird Science Fiction

Betty Gilpin, Entertainment Weekly shoot

>Its a take on Heart of Darkness

I'd like to craft some love on those teats.

Right one looks like she's batshit insane.

there's something definitely Dagonic about their faces. probably some fish in their ancestry.

I feel like it serves the same purpose "Lynchian" serves when people discuss film. In the latter case it serves to denote something surreal by someone who does not have a lot of exposure to surreal cinema and thus they filter everything through the lens of someone who is ostensibly a Hollywood director who plays in to (or at least tacitly supports) his own self-styled mythos.

How do you replace it? Read more books. Watch more movies. Use them as a conduit to form your own ideas.

Kafkaesque got popular because of Breaking Bad, but no one actually knows what it means

MOMMY

i want milk

I knew I recognised the blonde one.

She's the chick I'd definitely fuck on top of my dead wifes grave on American Gods.

Three of these are fine. Just shorthand. Pack a lot of information for the letter count.

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stop reading lovecraft.

spoopy sounds gud

wrong picture desu

...

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still a great pic lol

>he actually reads stuff written by a racist

How the hell did you take this picture with your camera blocked.

I would like to succ dem tiddies if you know what I mean.

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why?

nigga what

/tv/ get out

1) Yes.
2) "Spooky"

Nothing should be called lovecraftian unless it directly uses his works/ "mythos". The terms people should use are cosmic horror, gothic horror, psychological horror, weird tales etc etc. Nobody calls high fantasy " tolkienian" since everyone knows he didnt invent it either (albeit obviously popularized the pop culture depictions of dwarves, tall elves etc etc)

Lovecraft did much less, but he also has much less competition so every pseud has an easy time categorizing everything as "lovecraftian" if it has aliens without being sci fi

Lovecraft shits on Tolkien in terms of originality though so they're not comparable.

Is this where I pretend that cosmic horror isn't synonymous with Lovecraftian for nearly everyone at this point?