Horror Lexicon #6: The Tour of the Dead
While dissecting what
he called “Dead Teenager Movies,” the great movie critic Roger Ebert once came up with a pretty
funny joke. I’m paraphrasing a little,
because I don’t remember the words exactly.
But the joke went something like this: “How do you know when a Dead
Teenage Movie is over?”
“The same dead teenager turns up twice.”
Turns out, this was a pretty apt observation. Though I don’t share Ebert’s disdain for the Slasher movie format, it’s undeniable that “The Tour of the Dead,” as I term it, has become a de rigueur component of the sub-genre.
In the so-called Tour of the Dead – universally set during the final act -- the resilient Final Girl flees from a terrifying mad-dog killer (usually masked), but the bloodied and savaged corpses of her friends and associates begin popping up in her path...sometimes quite violently.
The sudden re-appearance of these murdered characters provides both authentic jolt scares for the audience, as well as horrifying obstacles to the character…
“The same dead teenager turns up twice.”
Turns out, this was a pretty apt observation. Though I don’t share Ebert’s disdain for the Slasher movie format, it’s undeniable that “The Tour of the Dead,” as I term it, has become a de rigueur component of the sub-genre.
In the so-called Tour of the Dead – universally set during the final act -- the resilient Final Girl flees from a terrifying mad-dog killer (usually masked), but the bloodied and savaged corpses of her friends and associates begin popping up in her path...sometimes quite violently.
The sudden re-appearance of these murdered characters provides both authentic jolt scares for the audience, as well as horrifying obstacles to the character…
