Halloween may not technically be the first slasher film, but it’s definitely the most influential. Michael Myers makes a terrifying adversary, from his navy coveralls to his expressionless mask. The style and aesthetics of the Halloween franchise informed a new generation of films that sought to build upon the elusive masked serial slayer.
Some of these films fail horribly in their attempts to contribute new narratives to the genre, instead generating imbecilic villains who lack the nuance and artistic merits of their predecessor. This list pays tribute to 10 such masked dopes in horror movies, all of whom inspire more giggles and scoffs than screams.
Iced (1988)
The next time you’re invited to the opening of a new ski resort five years after you watched your close friend perish in a skiing accident, you may want to decline. In this cheesy take on the slasher film, a masked assailant dressed like a skier stalks and slays a group of people on vacation at a new ski resort.
Instead of slippery slopes or avalanches, these snow bunnies are up against a goggled madman with extra-sharp ski poles. It seems their invitation to the new resort was really a way to lure them in, and the camouflaged killer in winter wear is ready to enact revenge for their dead friend.
Star Time (1992)
When Henry Pinkle’s favorite sitcom, The Robertson Family, is canceled, he attempts to take his own life by jumping off a bridge, but he is saved by an older man named Sam. Sam gives Henry a babyface doll mask and a hatchet, instructing him to engage in a murderous rampage in order to give his life new meaning.
Sam, as it turns out, is just a figment of Henry’s imagination, and he suffers a nervous breakdown as a result of losing his favorite television program. In addition to perpetuating problematic stereotypes about people struggling with mental illness, Star Time also drops the ball on establishing any genuine fears or scares.
Smiley (2012)
Smiley tries to capitalize on the new terrors that exist in the Internet age. In the movie, n urban legend is circulating about a demented killer who has mutilated his own face by stitching up his eyes and carving a permanent smile where his mouth used to be. You summon Smiley and his new forever mask by saying, “I did it for the lulz” three times while participating in a Chatroulette-style webcam service.
Of course, when unbelieving Ashley does the deed and summons Smiley, she soon realizes he’s much more than a myth. However, the movie is so ridiculous the audience could care less about what happens.
Valentine (2001)
In this early aughts teen horror film, a group of women is taunted by a person in a Cupid mask who leaves strange messages and gifts for them. When one of them is murdered, the rest of the women realize they are up against a former classmate they terrorized in grade school, a boy named Jeremy Melton.
SPOILER ALERT: As it goes in silly slasher movies, the killer is in fact Jeremy, but he assumed a new identity as Adam, the current boyfriend of the film’s protagonist Kate. Played by Angel himself David Boreanaz, Adam/Jeremy underwent extensive plastic surgery after receiving a severe beating at a Valentine Day’s dance. Now, it looks like Cupid is ready to draw blood with his special arrows.
Deadly Dreams (1988)
When Alex was a child, his parents were slaughtered by someone disguised with the face of a real wolf. As a young adult, he continues to have dreams of this wolfen killer, and they get more and more intense. Soon, the beastly figure starts to appear when Alex is awake.
As the lines between reality and fantasy blur, Alex tries to figure out what really happened to his parents and why he’s being visited by this masked figure in the present, a figure that looks like a botched taxidermy experiment.
The Greenskeeper (2002)
A game of golf has deadly consequences in this film about a struggling scriptwriter whose friends convince him to throw a big party at the country club he’s set to inherit. As they’re boozing and partying, a person cloaked in a groundskeeper’s uniform and a beekeeper’s mask starts taking them out one by one.
The plot gets real Shakespearean after it’s revealed the uncle of the scriptwriter, Allen, has been scheming to steal his inheritance for a long time. Then Allen’s deformed and maimed father, long thought dead due to a mysterious explosion, arrives in the picture to make this tale about the horrors of landscape maintenance even more confusing.
Billy Club (2013)
Another cautionary tale about sporting, former members of a little league team are besieged by an evil umpire carrying a spiked baseball bat. When the men were boys, they heckled one of their teammates, Billy, after he caused them to lose an important game.
Billy didn’t handle the criticism well and went on a murderous rampage, killing two players and the coach, before being institutionalized. Taking a plot point straight from Halloween, adult Billy escapes from his asylum to finish what he started. He doesn’t plan to stop until he strikes out all of his former teammates.
Night Of The Dribbler (1990)
In this long-lost Canadian horror film that wasn’t released until 2009, a disgruntled water boy decides to butcher his school’s basketball team because the coach won’t let him play. The teen gets creative and hides his identity under a very early ’90s tracksuit. The icing on the cake is his mask: a smiling jack-o-lantern meant to look like a basketball.
The Night of the Dribbler is the ultimate spoof of the slasher genre, combining courtside styles with high school comedy tropes.
Kill Game (2018)
Kill Game is an entirely unoriginal slasher revenge film about a group of privileged, popular former high school students who harbor a secret: a prank they pulled at a pool party resulted in a male student’s death, and they covered up the murder by claiming it was an accidental drowning.
Now, in the present, they’re being executed by a slayer in, of all things, a Marilyn Monroe mask. What’s the assassin’s motivation? What’s their identity? Does anyone care?
The Funhouse (1981)
Despite being responsible for one of the most formidable masked slayers of them all, Leatherface, director Tobe Hooper’s concealed killer in this subpar film is just a deformed carnie in an oversized Frankenstein mask.
The Funhouse is full of awkward and disturbing explorations of sexuality, formulaic kill scenes, and unnecessary gore. All the creepy carnival vibes and atmospheric pacing a film like this could maintain are ignored in favor of hokey and uninspiring action.
