10 Horror Movie Monsters Who Make You EAT Your Words

4. Splinter Fungus -- Splinter (2008)

The premise for Toby Wilkins' Splinter does not make for the best elevator pitch: a viral-monster horror creature from outer space takes over a filling station. Oh, yeah, and the alien is a splinter, as in an actual splinter like you get in your finger. Well… kind of.

When Seth and Polly (Paul Constanzo and Jill Wagner) get carjacked on holiday, the last thing they expect is to become part of an alien parasite infection. And yet, when the car gets a flat tyre, Seth, Polly and their abductors Dennis and his drug addict GF Lacey (Shea Wigham and Rachel Kerbs), wind up at an abandoned filling station, where little spiky shards of something are infecting people and using them to murder and multiply.

The petrol pumps and shop are soon teeming with infected hosts, all controlled by the splinter monster – turns out, some kind of animate fungus – and it’s largely down to Seth and Polly to make sure this thing doesn’t get any father. But how does Wilkins sustain an 82-minute picture with a non-speaking, unmotivated splinter as his antagonist? By giving it the ability to animate individual body parts, including the now-iconic Thing-like severed hand, of course.