Monday, April 11, 2011

The Rules of Slasher Movie Body Counts



[JPX] It's not clear to me that anyone is even reading the blog these days but JSP sent me this funny article that's well worth your time, so if you're out there with nothing to do check it out!

From slate, The slasher flick will take yet another stab at the cineplex next week when Scream 4, the latest installment of the 15-year-old franchise, hits theaters.

As any fan of the series knows, slashers—that '70s-born genre about sociopaths wielding pointy objects and punishing teen fornicators—follow a particularly well-honed set of rules: The killer is usually male, coitus is usually interruptus, and only the virginal "final girl" will survive. That formulaic nature extends to sequels as well. As the series' resident film scholar Randy noted the second time around, "There are certain rules that one must abide by in order to create a successful sequel." Rule No. 1? "The body count is always bigger."

Is that really true? We decided to examine the relevant data. Here's a chart (splatter plot?) graphing body counts in slasher films by franchise and year of release. (Technically, the Saw films aren't slashers—they're torture porn—but we've included them for reference. You can see a spreadsheet with our compiled data here.)

Read the full article here

2 comments:

50PageMcGee said...

they left out a telling example, which is "rob zombie movie that isn't a reboot."

applying the equation to devil's rejects...

B = 2n+12(Z-R)+2c+2S+3

B = 2(1) + 12(1-0) + 2(0) + 2(0) + 3
B = 2 + 12 + 3
B = 17

were there 17 people that died in devil's rejects?

maybe not -- that might be why this didn't get included.

50PageMcGee said...

i think that last bit makes me dave foley in the who's on first? sketch from the kids in the hall.

Salem's Lot 1979 and Salem's Lot 2024

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