The franchise revolves around the fictional character of John Kramer, also called the “Jigsaw Killer” or simply “Jigsaw.” He was introduced briefly in Saw and developed in more detail in Saw II. Rather than killing his victims outright, Jigsaw traps them in situations that he calls “tests” or “games,” to test their will to live through physical or psychological torture. Despite the fact that John was murdered in Saw III, the films continue to focus on the posthumous influence of the Jigsaw Killer and his apprentices by exploring his character via flashbacks.

The film series as a whole has received mixed to negative reviews by critics, but has been a financial success at the box office. While the films are often compared to Hostel and classified as torture porn by critics,the creators of Saw disagree with the term “torture porn”.^[5] Writer Luke Y. Thompson of OC Weekly argued that unlike Hostel, the Saw films actually have less torture than most in the sense of sadism or masochism, as Jigsaw believes that those who survive his methods, will be stronger people for it. He called him a kind of a (deranged) philanthropist.

The character is the primary antagonist in the Halloween film series, except Halloween III: Season of the Witch, which is not connected in continuity to the rest of the films. Since Castle, Moran, and Wallace put on the mask in the original film, six people have stepped into the role. Tyler Mane is the only actor to have portrayed Michael Myers in consecutive films, and one of only two actors to portray the character more than once. Michael Myers is characterized as pure evil, both directly in the films, by the filmmakers who created and developed the character over nine films, as well as by random participants in a survey.

The character has primarily been an antagonist in the films, whether by stalking and killing the characters, or acting as a psychological threat to the lead character, as is the case in Friday the 13th: A New Beginning. Since Lehman’s portrayal, the character has been represented by numerous actors and stuntmen, sometimes by more than one at a time; this has caused some controversy as to who should receive credit for the portrayal. Kane Hodder is the best known of the stuntmen to portray Jason Voorhees, having played the character in four consecutive films.

The character’s physical appearance has gone through many transformations, with various special makeup effects artists making their mark on the character’s design, including makeup artist Stan Winston. Tom Savini’s initial design has been the basis for many of the later incarnations. The trademark hockey goalie mask did not appear until Friday the 13th Part III. Since Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives, filmmakers have given Jason superhuman strength, regenerative powers, and near invulnerability. He has been seen as a sympathetic character, whose motivation for killing has been cited as being driven by the immoral actions of his victims and his own rage over having drowned as a child.Jason Voorhees has been featured in various humor magazines, referenced in feature films, parodied in television shows, and was the inspiration for a horror punk band. Several toy lines have been released based on various versions of the character from the Friday the 13th films. Jason Voorhees’s hockey mask is a widely recognized image in popular culture.

Bogeyman tales vary by region. The bogeyman may be male, female or both.

In some Midwestern states of the United States, the bogeyman scratches at the window. In the Pacific Northwest, he may manifest in “green fog”. In other places, he hides or appears from under the bed or in the closet and tickles children when they go to sleep at night. It is said that a wart can be transmitted to someone by the bogeyman.

Serial killers are not the same as mass murderers, nor are they spree killers, who commit murders in two or more locations with virtually no break in between. The English term and concept of the serial killer is commonly attributed to former FBI Special agent Robert Ressler in the 1970s.   Author Ann Rule postulates in her 2004 book Kiss Me, Kill Me that the English-language credit for coining the term “serial killer” goes to LAPD detective Pierce Brooks, creator of the ViCAP system.

10. Peter Jackson – Although gaining more recent and highly recognized success with the Lord of the Rings trilogy, this talented New-Zealander started off his career in a far better fashion… Over-the-top gruesome horror comedies!

Highlights – Bad Taste,
Dead Alive (Braindead)

9. Alfred Hitchcock – Really more of a thriller director than a horror one, this legendary film maker knew how to create suspense and shocks in his eerie black and white style better than most.

Highlights – Psycho,
The Birds,
Rear Window

8. Stanley Kubrick – Personally my favorite director, this directorial legend tackled every single genre. Horror, comedy, period, adult, sci-fi, war, crime thriller, epic, but in each of his movies lay a horrifying backdrop, and a scary vision.

Highlights – The Shining,
A Clockwork Orange,
2001 A Space Odyssey

7. Neil Marshall – Only recently hitting the big time, this up-and-coming horror creator produced some absolute stinkers; Boo, Cemetery gates, but has also directed some instant classics.

Highlights – Dog Soldiers,
The Descent

6. John Carpenter – Any director that bursts onto the scene with a movie like Halloween automatically gets a place on this list! He has been both influenced and heavily influential, and the only reason he’s not further down the list is that next to the amount of awesome cult movies he’s made, there’s an equally as big list of major flops.

Highlights – Halloween,
The Thing

Here is where things start getting tricky, so many directors! so little space! Here goes…

5. Lucio Fulci – Commonly referred to as ‘The Master of Gore’ Lucio never hesitates in his no-holes-barred style! although some of his movies have more blood than sense, boy are they a hell of a ride!

Highlights – Zombie 11,
The Beyond,
City of the Living Dead

4. Wes Craven – Branching into the ‘Teen Horror’ market may have slightly damaged his initial psychopathic and damaging horror movie status, but even if he now made a hundred ‘Norbit’ sequels he would still be an individual, influential genius.

Highlights – Last House On The Left,
The Hills Have Eyes,
Scream

3. Tobe Hooper – Just hearing the name ‘Leatherface’ chills me to the bone. Tobe has a great talent of creating utterly terrifying movie antagonists and has the art of gore and violence down to a tee.

Highlights – The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,
Poltergeist

2. Sam Raimi – He’s the genius behind and father to the ‘evil Dead’ series… Enough Said. This list couldn’t be made without him. he also introduced us to Bruce Campbell, the biggest B actor of all time.

Highlights – The Evil Dead,
Evil Dead 2,
Army Of Darkness

1. George Romero – ‘They’re coming to get you Barbara!’ When I was watching Night of the Living Dead for the first time I was like, WOW… His use of memorable dialogue and stylized and graphic violence make all his films instant successes, and his legend will live on for a millennium… He also made the best sequel of all time, and is the real, zombie master…

Highlights – Night of the Living Dead,
Dawn of the Dead,
Day of the Dead

Freddy is a vengeful spirit who attacks his victims from within their dreams. He is commonly identified by his burned, disfigured face, red and dark green striped sweater, brown fedora, and trademark metal-clawed brown leather glove on his right hand. Wizard magazine rated him the 14th greatest villain,^[2] the British television channel Sky2 listed him 8th,^[3] and the American Film Institute ranked him 40th on its “AFI’s 100 Years… 100 Heroes and Villains” list.^[4]

A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope (from the Greek λυκάνθρωπος: λύκος, lukos, “wolf”, and άνθρωπος, anthrōpos, man), is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse and/or lycanthropic affliction via a bite or scratch from a werewolf, or some other means. This transformation is often associated with the appearance of the full moon, as popularly noted by the medieval chronicler Gervase of Tilbury, and perhaps in earlier times among the ancient Greeks through the writings of Petronius.

Werewolves are often attributed superhuman strength, speed, and senses, far beyond those of both wolves and men. The werewolf is generally held as a European character, although its lore spread through the world in later times. Shape-shifters, similar to werewolves, are common in tales from all over the world, most notably amongst the Native Americans, though most of them involve animal forms other than wolves.

Werewolves are a frequent subject of modern fiction, although fictional werewolves have been attributed traits distinct from those of original folklore. For example, the ideas that werewolves are only vulnerable to silver bullets or that they can cause others to become werewolves by biting or wounding them derive from works of modern fiction. Werewolves continue to endure in modern culture and fiction, with books, films and television shows cementing the werewolf’s stance as a dominant figure in horror.

While even folkloric vampires of the Balkans and Eastern Europe had a wide range of appearance ranging from nearly human to bloated rotting corpses, it was the success of John Polidori’s 1819 novella The Vampyre that established the archetype of charismatic and sophisticated vampire; it is arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century,^[9] inspiring such works as Varney the Vampire and eventually Dracula.^[10] The Vampire was itself based on Lord Byron’s unfinished story “Fragment of a Novel”, also known as “The Burial: A Fragment”, published in 1819.

However, it is Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula that is remembered as the quintessential vampire novel and which provided the basis of modern vampire fiction. Dracula drew on earlier mythologies of werewolves and similar legendary demons and “was to voice the anxieties of an age”, and the “fears of late Victorian patriarchy”.^[11] The success of this book spawned a distinctive vampire genre, still popular in the 21st century, with books, films, video games, and television shows. The vampire is such a dominant figure in the horror genre that literary historian Susan Sellers places the current vampire myth in the “comparative safety of nightmare fantasy”.^[11]

In modern times, the term “zombie” has been applied to an undead race in horror fiction, largely drawn from George A. Romero’s 1968 film Night of the Living Dead. They have appeared as plot devices in various books, films and in television shows.

According to the tenets of Vodou, a dead person can be revived by a bokor, or sorcerer. Zombies remain under the control of the bokor since they have no will of their own. “Zombi” is also another name of the Vodou snake lwa Damballah Wedo, of Niger–Congo origin; it is akin to the Kikongo word nzambi, which means “god”. There also exists within the West African Vodun tradition the zombi astral, which is a part of the human soul that is captured by a bokor and used to enhance the bokor’s power. The zombi astral is typically kept inside a bottle which the bokor can sell to clients for luck, healing or business success. It is believed that after a time God will take the soul back and so the zombi is a temporary spiritual entity.^[3] It is also said in vodou legend, that feeding a zombie salt will make it return to the grave.