glumshoe:

Honestly one of my biggest pet peeves in fiction is when monsters are malevolent for no reason. Is it “evil”, or is it just hungry and vicious? If the monster is a dangerous animal with no ultimate evil goal, what are its motivations and why is it hellbent upon menacing the heroes?

I found the last Jurassic World movie unwatchable because the behavior of the predatory dinosaurs was so unrealistic. Why are they hurting themselves and endangering their lives to attack the humans? If it is merely hunger, why are they ignoring freshly dead, easily available meat in favor of chasing humans through dangerous obstacle courses? If it’s the hunting instinct, why is it so much stronger than every other instinct of self-preservation? Are they sick? Are they rabid?

I just. Ugh! Unless an animal is portrayed as intelligent enough to want revenge, is influenced by supernatural powers, or has some useful plot reason for wanting to kill anything and everything it can without care for its own life, I don’t buy it. It’s not scary to me. It’s stupid and frustrating and I sit there waiting for the big reveal that mind control or demons are responsible.

On the other hand, antagonists that are genuinely mindless – like non-sentient robots, alien terraforming programs, or weird diseases – are much scarier to me because of their lack of malice or reason.