Talk:The Dreamer/@comment-1070010-20140818181218

Speaking about Secret's idea since it seems to have been removed from the comment section:

Calling the "Shadow-Force" the "Nightmare-Force" wouldn't empower beings like Phobia or Fear in the same way that having a Shadow-Force doesn't empower beings such as the Secret of Darkness, Violet's Shadow, or every demon of Hell. Secret merely brought up the idea due to how the Shadow-Force functions within the Dream. A Nightmare can wake you, as the Shadow-Force is trying to do. In keeping in lieu with the idea of a Dreamer Multiverse, calling it the "Nightmare-Force" makes sense.

In fact, both names make sense in their own ways, and I imagine different beings from different backgrounds in our canon would refer to it in different ways. Shadows and Nightmares tend to go hand-in-hand, really.