6 Iconic Horror Moments That Came Later Than You Think

There are few traditions more sacred in cinema than the horror film sequel. The first film is haunting, refreshing and groundbreaking, and now that it’s made a ton of money it’s time to repeat its success until the wheels fall off. With particularly long series, some of the elements that made them famous converge a bit. Were they preinstalled from the start, or did they show up somewhere along the way and audiences just accepted them as gospel?

What aspects are in the original recipe and what were added later to spice things up? It’s time to address this question in relation to iconic parts of six long horror series – parts that may look like basic text but were actually added a little later.

The famous walk of Frankenstein’s monster

The Frankenstein films were the bread and butter of the golden age of universal horror, with two fantastic films directed by James Whale (Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein,) an extremely solid twist with Basil Rathbone (Frankenstein’s son) and then a rapid descent into cheaper, chunkier endeavors. Boris Karloff, who played the titular monster in the first three films, delivers a thoughtful, tragic performance, so it’s a little odd that the iconography that survives is that of a man with his arms raised shuffling clumsily through castle sets .

This character-defining image wasn’t actually set until the final moments of the fourth film, The Ghost of Frankenstein. (Brief synopsis: The monster’s brain, played here by Lon Chaney Jr., has replaced his brain with that of his sneaky sidekick Ygor, played with raw malice by Bela Lugosi. This allows him to talk and scheme, but thanks he’s pretty much instantly blinded by a medical mishap.) The monster spends the last few minutes of the strip groping around and then, in the sequel, Frankenstein meets the wolf manHe emerges with outstretched arms.

In subsequent films, no one mentions that he is now blind, whether in his wolfman fight or House Frankenstein or Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein. So the Frankenstein walk that would set the timeframe not only didn’t happen until the end of the fourth film, but is part of a plot that no subsequent film could remember.

Jason’s hockey mask

Image: Paramount Pictures

If there’s one item on this list that has gone down in the annals of horror trivia, it’s this one. In the first Friday the 13th, it’s Jason’s sweater-wearing mother, Pamela, who commits the murder. Jason eventually shows up in the second film, but he’s wearing overalls and a hessian sack over his head. Only in the third film does he steal the ice hockey mask from a comic relief figure and decide This is to keep the look. Since then, Jason has been irrevocably attached to this particular mask, which represents the slasher genre as a whole.

It’s still important to address, however, as that ubiquity takes away from how radical Jason looks Part 2. Lanky and unkempt, Jason feels more like a guy who would actually hang out in the woods outside of summer camp than the brand name he would become. The relative lack of a machete is also fun Part 2 – Jason’s general toolkit is quite diverse here, and the weapon he uses in the climax is a My bloody valentine-like pickaxe.

Godzilla as a good guy

Image: Toho

When Godzilla appears in the original 1954 film, he is the incarnate atomic nightmare. It’s the death and mass devastation of nuclear holocaust that comes to life in the form of an unstoppable creature that can neither be understood nor reasoned as it threatens Japan with blazing hellfire. And then, in the 1955s Godzilla raids again, it’s mostly about wrestling with another monster and knocking things over. This first sequel would set the stage for much of the future Godzilla movies – Godzilla is the heavyweight champion of the kaiju division and one ready to take on any challenger.

Although Godzilla has fought other monsters, that doesn’t mean that there was a role reversal at the moment when something else wanted to take down. In the first four films, Godzilla is a definite asshole, less a defender of Japan and more the country’s terrible landlord who comes to evict all new monster tenants. In the third film, King Kong is given the unspoken moral superiority, and in the fourth, Mothra and her cubs symbolize the beauty of nature, while Godzilla symbolizes the beauty of how things look when they’re on fire.

Only in the fifth film Ghidorah, the three-headed monsterthat Godzilla, now forced to band together to battle an alien dragon, actually switches to hero mode. And the change doesn’t come without a hitch – one of Mothra’s larvae from the last film has to ask Godzilla to be friendly for a change. Going forward, the big lizard just has to hope that Japan has forgotten the whole “I have become death” phase.

Freddy Krueger’s one-liner

Image: New Line Cinema

Freddy Krueger, the dream invading villain from Nightmare on Elm Street Series, has always been a little scoundrel. From the start, he loved torturing people, and after that Freddy’s revenge, it is clear that he also has a keen sense of irony. Does a character care about bikes? Freddy will crush them with a wheel while yelling “BETTER PUMP THE BRAKES!” A character with a drinking problem? Freddy spears her with a toothpick and dumps her into a giant martini while winking at the audience, “DRINK RESPONSIBLY!”

you have the idea

However, not always on this scale. Freddy’s embrace of puns really became a defining part of his personality with him dream warrior, the third movie. Almost every Freddy kill here comes with some sort of pun or one-liner, making him equal parts slasher icon and late-night host. It’s a natural fit since actor Robert Englund is one of the few horror stars who is experienced at every stage of his character’s development.

Pinhead’s name

Image: entertainment film distributors

Pinhead is one of those hole-in-one horror designs – no notes needed. It’s instantly iconic, which makes it all the more interesting that no real name was associated with it when it joined the pantheon of Freddy, Jason, and Michael. In the original novel by Clive Barker he is nameless, The heart of hell, and the first film refers to him as “Lead Cenobite,” a nickname that probably wouldn’t look good on posters. Barker later refers to him as “Hell Priest” as he really disliked the name Pinhead.

Where did Pinhead come from? It shows in the credits of the grossly underrated Hellbound: Hellraiser II, but the first time someone calls him Pinhead is in the third film and the name is kind of a joke. But it stayed, and thankfully in the 2022 reboot movie, the character managed to regain some dignity. (They are now known simply as “the Priest.”)

Leatherface’s name

Image: Bryanston Distributing Company

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2 is a mind-bending dark comedy and hilariously brutal slasher film that takes everything that might seem subtle in the original and cranks the volume up to deafening levels. In short, it’s beautiful and realizes that you can’t really top the ghastly macabre of the original. Returning director Tobe Hooper doesn’t try, and allows his favorite clan of cannibals to devolve into free-ranging self-parody. He also names them: the Sawyers. Got it?

If you only saw the original which was released 12 years ago Part 2, and that name sounds unfamiliar, and for good reason — nobody really has a name in the first film. The sequel’s “Bubba Sawyer” is only referred to there as “Leatherface,” and oddly enough, the “Cook” (or “Old Man,” as he’s called in the script) asks Leatherface, “Why didn’t you wait for Bubba?” seems to refer to his hitchhiking brother. If you’ve never heard it, I don’t blame you – it’s barely audible over all the shouting.

But that brother is never referred to as “Bubba” again in the 1974 original, as the name was passed down to Leatherface himself from the sequel starring the now-deceased brother named “Nubbins” Sawyer. Well, it could just be that the chef called him “bubba,” as in “your brother,” which is a common Southern slang, but it’s funny in the context of the broader series. The Sawyer surname carries over into the third film, but in the fourth the family is now known as the equally explicit Slaughters. Look, it’s America’s most valuable chronicle of carnivorous Texans. That’s important.