The Final Girl Support Group

by Grady Hendrix

In this age of Glocks and AR-15s, of pipe bombs and high-capacity magazines, the arsenals of our movie monsters seem quaint. Teddy and his machete stalking campers in Summer Slaughter, the Babysitter Murderer with his butcher’s blade, the masked killers of the Stab franchise and their hunting knives. Why do they chalk up such low body counts with these crude implements when they could mow down dozens of victims with a semiautomatic rifle? Why do their weapons become increasingly baroque in later installments: curling irons and ice skates, menorahs and outdoor grills? The reason is simple: we need to believe death has meaning. Each murder must be unique, each victim must meet his killer one-on-one, each slaying must be given an appropriate amount of screen time. The real violence of a child entering a school cafeteria and spraying bullets at random is too cruel. It reduces human beings to a body count; it robs life of all individuality. It is the ultimate statement that we cannot abide: death is devoid of meaning, and it will swallow everything in the end. Against that nihilism, the violence in a slasher film is a comforting blanket drawn up against the chill of the infinite moral void of reality.