Crises of Identification in the Supernatural Slasher: The Resurrection of the Supernatural Slasher Villain

Abstract

As has been indicated earlier in this book, it is commonly accepted that the slasher subgenre is constituted of a triad of relatively distinct cycles — the classic period following the release of formative slasher Halloween (1978; dir John Carpenter); a period of rampant sequelization and repetition during the mid to late 1980s; and a resurgence in the late 1990s following the release of the extremely self-aware, semi-parodic Scream (1996; dir Wes Craven). However, another influential cycle is largely overlooked in these tripartite historical trajectories of the subgenre. At the turn of the millennium, soon after the popularity of the slasher was renewed by Scream, an assemblage of films emerged which reconfigured the syntactic mechanics of the classic slasher through positioning the supernatural as a central narrative feature. Self-consciously situated as a sincere alternative to the cycle of playfully nostalgic slashers ignited by Scream, these films employ the supernatural to embellish the ambivalent processes of identification embedded in the classic slasher: the tug-of-war for visual and narrative power between the killer and the Final Girl or Boy. Thus the supernatural slasher elaborates on the formal and aesthetic vacillation between perspectives involved in the classic slasher’s complex processes of audience engagement.