Fantasy vs Urban Fantasy – my take.
Urban Fantasy in general is a supernatural story set in a recognizable city – that’s the ‘urban’ part. Chicago has been popular for the genre, and so has New Orleans, LA… but it can happen in any city, like Providence, RI.
Urban Fantasy stories tend to focus more on noir-style investigations; there’s often a lot of action, humor, and sometimes some spice. Urban Fantasy definitely seems to be the home of sexy vampires. The tone is also lighter, more focused on solving the mystery or finding the relic, etc., and the good guys pretty much always win, even if it’s at a cost.
Dark urban fantasy is a similar setting: a recognizable city, a world of supernatural forces, but it leans much more into horror. The environment is grittier, the city is often a character, and the story often calls out the decay, the rot around the edges. If there are vampires, they tend to be of the more ‘bitey’ variety. In my experience, happy endings are rare.
The characters tend to be very different, too – urban fantasy protagonists like Harry Dresden or Mercy Thomspon are clearly the ‘good guys’-they pretty much always make the right choice, even if it’s detrimental to themselves. In dark urban fantasy, the characters are often morally gray, cynical, or traumatized, reflecting the much darker, more horrific world they inhabit. My characters on the Providence Supernatural Crimes Unit are police. Still, they bend or break the law frequently for what they consider ‘the greater good’, keeping the truth of the supernatural away from the public.
I’ve often thought of the difference between Urban Fantasy and Dark Urban Fantasy in Sci-Fi terms, for some reason. Urban Fantasy is Star Trek – it is crisp, clean, utopian. Picard always makes the right choice. The Prime Directive is sacred. Dark Urban Fantasy is Star Wars. It’s dirty and gritty; everything looks used and broken. Even the ‘good guys’ killed how many people while blowing up various Death Stars? The Mandalorian is the newest hero in the Star Wars ranks, all shiny in his armor, and he literally cuts a guy in half with a door 90 seconds after he’s introduced. And not even the guy he was after. Picard would never do that. Morally gray.
So that’s my take; I’m sure there are 1000 more opinions out there, but I consider my Providence SCU series Dark Urban Fantasy because it leans a lot more into horror and the darkest corners of Providence, and my characters are great, but they’ve all got secrets; they’ve all got a dark side, and that’s why I love writing about them.
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