Whether you believe it or not, the horror movie genre is alive and well. But it’s villains might be lacking, as popular horror films like The Conjuring, Paranormal Activity, and The Purge all focus more on tone and concept than an actual, by-the-books villain. So, since it’s October and prime time for Halloween spooking, it’s time to look back at some of the scariest horror movie villains. For better or worse, we have them to thank. So, since it’s October and prime time for Halloween spooking, it’s time to look back at some of the scariest horror movie villains. For better or worse, we have them to thank.
Leatherface – The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Loosely based on reality, the tale of Leatherface and his entrepreneurial talents scared us most because it put us regular people at the center of the horror. Sure, the characters themselves made poor choices, but the villain is what kept us coming back.
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Now, if only one of the many Hollywood remakes of the film would stick.
[H/T YouTube, HorrorNymphs]
Freddy – Nightmare On Elm Street
OK, so there aren’t many safe places from crazy murderous psychopaths. At least before Nightmare On Elm Street we could count on sleeping as being off-limits.
Well, Freddy had something to say about that, and he inspired an entire generation to leave the lights on just a little bit longer.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips Trailer Vault]
Xenomorphs – Alien
While not your typical horror villain, the aliens from Alien were more than just creepy, they were inhuman, wild and completely our fault.
While the Alien franchise itself borders more on action than anything, horror is a close second in its genre, and it gave us one of the spookiest scenes out there. Warning: lots of drool.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips]
Samara – The Ring
Samara is one of the more recent additions to this list. And I say recent as if that means anything, as The Ring did come out over 15 years ago.
But I digress. Taking the Poltergeist phobias a step further, The Ring gave us a creepy, drowned water ghost who climbs out of a well and spider-walks up walls and out of the television. No thank you.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips]
Chucky – Child’s Play
Dolls are pretty scary on their own. Then somebody decided that possessing a doll with the spirit of a psychopath would be even scarier. They were mostly correct. The Chucky franchise borders on obscene and downright silly, but we’d be lying if the sight of creepy dolls at night didn’t prompt us to double take before a night’s sleep.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips Trailer Vault]
Pennywise – It
And the only thing scarier than dolls is… clowns! With the recent nationwide clown scare being an actual thing, sometimes we have to remember the good old days, when creepy clowns were just space demons in disguise in a Stephen King movie.
Those were good times.
[H/T YouTube, Lanaxfv]
Jason – Friday The 13th
Jason is timeless, and his character arc is actually pretty understandable. More in the sense that he’s understandably upset, not that it’s cool that he murders people. But Jason was the reason plenty of us never wanted to go to summer camp or go swimming in the lake. His motif is simple: a hockey mask and a machete, but his horror knows no bounds. Except for Jason X, that was just ridiculous.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips Trailer Vault]
Pinhead – Hellraiser
Pinhead was the first horror villain to really exploit a fear of body modification. Something with threads in many modern horror films. See: The Hills Have Eyes, Jeepers Creepers, Thirteen Ghosts, etc. Seriously, just look at his face. That’s terrifying.
[H/T YouTube, Forever Cinematic Trailers]
Everything – Cabin In The Woods
While the film’s ultimate goal was to riff on typical horror movie tropes, this recent horror comedy actually had some pretty solid spooks. The Facepeeler, Dragonbat and Ballerina were all pretty horrifying, and even the Merman, whose short story was hilarious, was pretty freaky looking.
[H/T YouTube, Blondie9150]
Jigsaw – Saw
Jigsaw holds the key to modern horror, or at least started the trend of horror porn in the last 20 years. The contraptions and games in the Saw franchise range from teeth-grittingly cringeworthy to downright unwatchable. These films are gory, but they also have a lot of heart, and by heart I mean a character arc for its main villain, Jigsaw. Again, we don’t feel bad for him though. He kills people, sort of.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips Trailer Vault]
Hannibal – Silence Of The Lambs
Taking the theme of Leatherface one step further, this unorthodox horror villain likes to kill, torture and eat people. But the Hannibal films were much more thrillers than anything, exploring mental health, instability and tragedy across the board. But hey, we liked the recent television iteration. So there’s that.
[H/T Youtube, Movieclips]
The Thing – The Thing
By itself, the concept of shape shifting is terrifying. But this classic John Carpenter film took a typical murder mystery and set it in an uncharted vista and added weird alien stuff to it. The Thing was scary because everyone went crazy first, and then we were introduced to this monster. It’s psychological horror at its finest.
[H/T YouTube, Movieclips]
Honorable Mention – Michael Myers
Michael Myers deserves a place on all Halloween lists.
Of course Halloween is a classic, but we wanted to give some other villains a shot at glory for once. That being said, we couldn’t just leave Myers off!
[H/T YouTube, Cinema Cut]
