Since the second half of the nineteenth century, it is possible to make a distinction between two gendered tendencies in Swedish Gothic that are both identified with the gender of the writer and the gender of the fictional protagonist. Furthermore, it is possible to distinguish between what Anne Williams calls a Male formula and a Female formula in terms of plot, narrative technique, gendered point of view and use of supernatural elements. However, the formula is not the same as in Anglo-American Gothic. Although some Swedish women writers portray imprisoned and victimised heroines, they are not as confined and perpetuated by male tyrants as Kate Ferguson Ellis claims them to be in ‘feminine Gothic’ originated from Ann Radcliffe's stories. Nor does the Swedish version of Male Gothic expose a plot of masculine transgression of social norms and taboos. Thereby, it does not fulfil that kind of Male formula that Diana Wallace, Andrew Smith and others have identified as Anglo-American Male Gothic from Matthew Lewis onwards.

Both the Male and Female formulas of Swedish Gothic revolve around the devious Nordic wilderness. Many stories by Swedish male writers and film directors are set in a hostile landscape and revolve around the male protagonist's meeting with an alluring female being, sometimes a creature from Swedish folklore. At the same time as she represents untamed nature, she also demonstrates that forces of nature are dependent on female agency. In that way, the Swedish version of Male Gothic confirms a recurrent motif in today's EcoGothic that Elisabeth Parker calls ‘Monstrous Mother Natures’ or ‘the She-Devil in the Wilderness’. In the female version of Swedish Gothic, women writers explore gendered concept of the Nordic scenery and its mythological creatures. Since the late nineteenth century, they have employed the formula of Anglo-American Female Gothic to communicate gendered issues, and since the millennium, a female subgenre of Gothic stories has emerged, in which the female protagonist is both persecutor and prey. Instead of being a victimised heroine, the female character develops supernatural powers or exceptional knowledge of magic. In addition, in today's many stories targeting young female adults, the protagonist is often a witch or a collective of witches, who is assigned to participate in an ongoing struggle between good and evil forces in nature in order to save the world.