When seen in their iconic films, the slashers and killers of horror movies are all business, slicing, dicing, dismembering, etc. Okay, so many of them clearly have fun doing it, but they still work hard to showcase their craft.
However, these kings of carnage keep finding work once the cameras are off. Horror legends pop up in weird places, making cameo appearances or being fully involved with other projects. It is always a joy to see a recognizable face, or lack of face, or mask, show up in other media. Here are 10 fun guest appearances by some of horror’s best killers, stalkers, and terrorizers.
Jason On The Arsenio Hall Show
Instead of sending someone from the cast or crew out to promote the eighth Friday the 13th film, the studio did something way more interesting. They had the character of Jason Vorhees go on The Arsenio Hall Show. Jason came out and sat down and then did nothing else, for a full interview slot.
Arsenio proceeds to ask a series of questions, some serious and some funny, only to be met with silence on all of them. The joke starts funny, but after a few questions, the whole thing gets kind of surreal as it just keeps going. It would have made much more sense to send a teen along too, and release them onto the stage when the energy got too low.
Candyman On MTV’s Scream
While this one is technically a stretch, as the character isn’t the same in canon, it still goes far beyond homage and lands somewhere in a grey area similar to the Freddy in Will Smith’s bop of a song. In Season three of MTV’s television iteration of Scream, Tony Todd plays a hook wielding killer. Sound familiar?
His appearances are brief but the connection is unmistakable, as Todd is responsible for a crucial kill early in the season. What makes this appearance even cooler is that he faces off with Ghostface directly, pitting his hook hand against his knife. If only the show had been more memorable, so this cameo could have gotten the attention it deserves.
Chucky On WCW Monday Night Nitro
In an appearance that was baffling to horror fans and wrestling fans, the serial killing doll from the Child’s Play series showed up on the popular professional wrestling show to taunt and terrorize one of the wrestlers.
When Rick Steiner came to the ring to do an interview with “Mean” Gene Okerlund, he was almost instantly interrupted by Chucky, who proceeded to insult the both of them for seemingly no reason other than because he loves to be mean to people and they happened to be the ones out there when he arrived. After the slander, Chucky made sure to promote his upcoming film, of course.
Freddy’s Fresh Prince Collab
Freddy Krueger, the dream world serial killer, with a burnt face and claw hand, yes that Freddy, has had multiple appearances in music videos. There is one where he is defeated by the power of Dokken’s rock and roll and the infamous one where he raps a full verse in a Fat Boys song.
The Will Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff song Nightmare on My Street gets to hog the spot on the list only because it was lost for nearly thirty years, and now that it is finally available, everyone deserves to see it. In a song that would be destroyed after Lionsgate sued for infringement, Smith runs and raps about Freddy, who is after him for the entire video. Only in this iteration, Freddy looks like a Nightbreed extra in a Grease cosplay. Honestly, the weird knockoff Freddy just makes the whole thing even better.
Hack/Slash Crossover Specials
The hit comic series Hack/Slash follows a young girl and her brute bodyguard as they hunt supernatural slasher killers. The series plays with the tropes of the film genre and is great for horror fans. If that isn’t enough, the series has had a handful of famous film characters pop in for specials.
There have been crossovers with Chucky, Reanimator, Victor Crowley from Hatchet, The Crow, and both Jason and Dexter at the same time. The writers understand the icons they are including and create interesting narratives for them to take part in. Plus the fights they get into are consistently insane.
Mortal Kombat Features Horror Icons
Mortal Kombat being owned by Warner Bros opens up a lot of potentials for guest stars to show up in the game. They started by including Freddy as a DLC character back in 2011. In the game’s wacky canon, Freddy appeared in the thunder god Raiden’s dreams, then joined the fray soon after.
Since then, they’ve given up on trying to justify anyone’s inclusion and just throwing cool characters into the game when they can. Mortal Kombat X featured a xenomorph from Alien, the alien hunter from Predator, Jason Voorhees, and Leatherface. The newest game adds Ash from The Evil Dead, Spawn, and The Terminator.
I Know What You Did On Saturday Night
When Jennifer Love Hewitt hosted Saturday Night Live to promote the upcoming I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, she was confronted by the hook-handed fisherman that stalks her and her friends in the films.
As she prepared to be slaughtered live on stage at a comedy variety show, Love Hewitt was shocked to find out that the murderer was willing to accept her apology and forgive her, because he was inexplicably falling for her. The two then went into a duet of Don’t Go Breaking My Heart. Oh, how I miss the 90s.
Horror Icons In Dead By Daylight
Following in Mortal Kombat’s footsteps is the survival horror game Dead by Daylight. The multiplayer game challenges a team of four survivors to escape from one killer. The game became massively popular and still keeps growing. One part of the growth is its addition of famous film killers.
Players can control Michael Myers, Leatherface, Ghostface, Jigsaw, Freddy, and even The Demogorgon. What makes this game beat out MK other than its impressive selection, is that instead of a fighting game the gameplay truly revolves around avoiding and surviving these killers, until you get to play as them and it revolves around… well, you know.
Freddy Versus Jason Official Weigh-In
Before their major crossover film in 2004, Freddy and Jason both had a series of press appearances, but this one was the clear highlight. In Las Vegas of all places, the two supernatural murderers had a professional boxing style weigh-in followed by an official Q&A.
The panel was one-sided, with Jason staying silent after every question. Freddy, on the other hand, was offensive, angry, and rude to most of his questions askers. He also took every opportunity he had to trash talk Jason until the whole thing blew up with them trying to fight then and there. It was a strange but awesome event that is unlike any other film promotion.
Ash Versus Everyone
A ton of horror icons have had wild encounters through comics, but none can hold a candle to Ashley J. Williams of the Evil Dead franchise. He secures the comic book spot on this list for going above and beyond the obvious matchups.
Ash has fought with horror legends like Freddy and Jason, but he’s also fought with anyone else copyrights will allow, having limited runs with Xena: Warrior Princess, Herbert West of Reanimator, Sam Raimi’s other hero Darkman, and even the icons of the Marvel universe when they were zombified.
