Mongo Nation

We take a look at some of the sexiest, most influential women ever to be chased around by a guy in a Halloween mask.

By Jeremy Azevedo

Say what you will about Rob Zombie, but the dude knows his horror. More specifically, he knows his scream queens, as evidenced by the cast of Halloween II.  Now some of you (or more specifically, those of you that wear your underwear on the outside of your pants and are required by law to wear a helmet when riding in a car) may be wondering what is a “scream queen”?

Well, it’s funny that you should ask, because not only am I going to tell you what a scream queen is, I’m also going to provide you with examples.

A scream queen is an actress that is known for appearing in horror movies with a certain amount of regularity. That’s pretty much it. There are many different kinds of scream queens, ranging from the innocent “last girl” to the victim, the horny teen and even sometimes the aggressor. But the one thing that they all have in common is that at some point in whichever movie they appear in, there will be a scene in which they run around screaming while someone is trying to stab or bludgeon them or whatever. Hence the name, “scream queen”. Simple enough?

Now that the definitions are out of the way, following is a list of our favorite scream queens from horror movies past and present:

Scout Taylor-Compton

Of course you’ll recognize Scout from Mr. Zombie’s recent Halloween remakes, playing the part of victim du jour, Laurie Strode. In playing the part of the “last girl”, Scout has great potential to keep working in the genre. The reasons for this are twofold: One, the last girl is generally the star of the movie. Because they are typically cute in that sort of way that allows them to play a teenager well into their thirties, “last girl” archetypes like Scout can potentially keep this role going for years to come. Second, she doesn’t take off her top, which separates her from the “horny teen” character role that usually gets killed in the first third of every horror movie. This isn’t really an ideal role to have because eventually, audiences get tired of seeing the same chick’s tits over and over and they move on to the next thing. I have a feeling that we’ll be seeing a lot more of Scout in the near future, especially since she’s going to be playing Lita Ford in “The Runaways”, which is obviously not a horror film but is still totally awesome.

Sarah Michellle Gellar

Not only was she Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but SMG (as I like to call her) has also starred in numerous horror films, most notably “Scream 2″, “I Know What You Did Last Summer” and “The Grudge”. She also played Daphne in the “Scooby Doo” movies, but I don’t think those films technically count as horror films because the ghosts always turn out to be a carnie or a creepy professor or something like that in the end.

Asia Argento

The daughter of famed Italian horror/suspense director Dario Argento, Asia Argento is the prototype for the “Suicide Girls” generation of scream queens to follow in her footsteps. With dark hair, tattoos, a propensity for nudity and a near constant sneer, Asia is instantly recognizable to American horror fans despite the fact that most of her films are in Italian. Read the rest of this entry →