Ranking the five best final girls in horror history
The horror genre has always been intrinsically linked with gender. In the world of scary movies, the killer is usually male, while women are often depicted as victims. As the genre has developed over time, the role of women in horror has also shifted, and in the 1970s, the arrival of the slasher genre introduced us to the concept of the ‘final girl’.
While many iconic slashers feature male masked killers and female victims, this doesn’t mean that the women are portrayed as weak or defenceless. Using the final girl trope, many filmmakers have allowed an independent and defiant female character to fight off the killer, becoming the last person standing. These characters aren’t damsels in distress – a trope that was once popular in Hollywood – rather, they aren’t afraid to attack the killer, doing whatever it takes to remain alive.
Typically, the final girl abstains from sex and has a better set of morals on her shoulders than the rest of her peers. She is well-behaved, and because of her kind and intelligent nature, she is usually able to use this to her advantage and outsmart the killer.
However, as slashers and the wider horror genre has progressed, so has this trope. This is exemplified in Scream, where the film comments on and challenges this trope by having Sidney Prescott do things that final girls often don’t.
No longer are final girls expected to be virginal (this once seemed to suggest that, by surviving, they were avoiding punishment for giving in to sin) or perfect images of idealistic femininity. The main thing is that they walk away from the events of the film alive, having shown the killer not to mess with them.
There have been many iconic final girls that have graced our screens over the years, but here are five that remain the most influential and enduring…
The five best final girls in horror history:
5. Ellen Ripley – (Sigourney Weaver) – Alien
Although Alien is not a slasher per se, Ellen Ripley is one of the horror genre’s greatest final girls. The movie, directed by Ridley Scott, blended sci-fi and horror to create a terrifying piece of work that has since been interpreted in various ways, including as an exploration of male power. Alien sees a group on board a spacecraft get killed by a horrific creature, the Xenomorph, leaving Ripley the last member standing. She quickly proves to be the smartest member of the team, eventually defeating the Xenomorph by pushing him into space.
Sigourney Weaver did a great job of playing the character, which is remembered as one of her greatest roles. It was also her first proper film appearance, and she quickly proved herself to be a star. Staying strong in the face of adversity, Ripley is an unforgettable character that Weaver portrayed with poise and complexity, making her one of the most iconic characters in cinema history and also an enduring final girl.
4. Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper) –Suspiria
While Suspiria is not a slasher either, it is a supernatural horror. Suzy Bannion remains one of the sole survivors of the story, which sees her attend a dance school that turns out to be run by witches. Many characters are violently murdered throughout the film, such as one member of the dance school who gets hanged, while another is wrapped up in barbed wire and her throat slit. Suzy eventually discovers that the witches are plotting to use her as a human sacrifice – something she is simply not going to allow them to do.
Dario Argento’s beautiful film, illuminated in bright colours, is regarded as one of the greatest Italian horrors of all time, and Suzy is arguably one of the best final girls, even if she isn’t the first character that comes to mind when you think of the trope. Yet, she is a great protagonist, using her incredible intellect and instinct to defeat the powers that are trying to take her down.
3. Sally Hardesty (Marilyn Burns) – The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was released in 1974, helping to kickstart the slasher phenomenon that would fully bloom a few years later. The movie follows a group of teenagers who, one by one, get brutally murdered by the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface, a crazed cannibal wearing a mask made of human skin. It’s Sally Hardesty who comes out on top, escaping as the sole survivor of the terrifying massacre by jumping onto a passing truck –that’s after facing a tortuous few hours in Leatherface’s house alongside his insane family members.
She is faced with the creepy Grandpa Sawyer, who the family allows to suck on a screaming Sally’s slashed finger. Tied up in their dining room, she is almost killed when Sawyer is encouraged to hit her with a hammer. Yet, his weakness causes an argument among the family and leads Sally to secretly escape. Watching her run away and do whatever she can to get out of there is a truly cathartic sequence, as are her final moments on screen, where she laughs maniacally with relief.
2. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) – Halloween
The early years of Jamie Lee Curtis’ career saw her dubbed a ‘scream queen’ due to her frequent appearances in horror movies. Her role in Halloween as Laurie Strode is what started it all, leading her to become one of cinema’s most iconic final girls. As the daughter of Janet Leigh, who played Marion Crane in Psycho, it seemed like Curtis was born to become a horror icon, too. Luckily, she achieved that feat with Halloween, which was her first film role. As Laurie, Curtis exemplified the ideal ‘final girl’: smart, kind, and innocent.
While babysitting, she becomes the victim of Michael Myers, a recently escaped patient from a mental institution who had previously killed his sister when he was a child. He is terrifying, killing off her friends in brutal and unforgiving ways. Laurie manages to avoid his wrath, and she even manages to stab him several times in self-defence. While it is Dr Loomis who ultimately shoots Myers, Laurie is relentless in her attempts to defend herself from the basically undefeatable masked killer, making her a memorable survivor.
1. Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) – Scream
While Sidney Prescott might have emerged after everyone else on this list, first appearing in 1996’s Scream, there is arguably no other final girl as cool as her. Starting out as a troubled high-schooler suffering from the grief of her mother’s murder, she is initially hesitant to go all the way with her boyfriend, Billy, before eventually having sex with him (something final girls typically don’t do). She then finds out that he is actually Ghostface, the masked killer who has been terrorising her. She isn’t afraid to fight back, though, stating that she knows the rules of horror movies, even if she does break them from time to time.
She successfully defeats the killers with the help of Gale Weathers, something she also achieves as she becomes the target of Ghostface for several more movies. Bold and brave, Sidney can throw her fair share of punches while also thinking smart and acting fast. She’s not afraid to be vulnerable, either, showing the true depth of her character. No matter the situation she finds herself in, we always root for Sidney to make it out alive, and it is genuinely rewarding to see her in moments of peace.
