10 Most Nightmarish Horror Movie Monsters
Scariest movie monsters? We have such sights to show you. If you can bear to look, that is.
Count Dracula. Freddy and Jason. Godzilla and the Cloverfield Clover. Perhaps more so than any other, horror is a genre defined by its villains. Whether those villains be disturbed humans, supernatural creatures or straight-up monsters (or humanity itself) a truly scary horror film is only as effective as its monster.
From the classic Universal monsters to slasher icons, ghosts and ghouls, horror cinema has had some unforgettable monstrosities over the years. But there's some contention as to who the scariest of them all might be. Freddy? Too cheesy, these days. Jason? What a mommy's boy. Even Godzilla is just an overgrown lizard. Which horror movie monsters really get under your skin?
Here we take a look at ten of the most disturbing monsters the genre has ever seen; the ones which not only get under the skin but dig deep - and have a good wriggle about under there.
These are the creatures and monster-men straight out of our own worst nightmares, inspired by the primal and the uncanny, tapping into some of our deepest, darkest fears. The things which go bump in the night.
10. Freddy Krueger - A Nightmare On Elm Street
The hat, the knives, the stripy jumper. In a word - iconic. No discussion of nightmarish horror movie monsters would be complete without mention of Freddy Krueger - the literal nightmare demon of A Nightmare on Elm Street.
The most human of the monsters on this list, Fred was a man once - a very bad man, burned to death by a mob of angry parents desperate for justice after the child-murderer walked free from court, thanks to a silly technicality. One molotov cocktail later, and we have Freddy Krueger, man of your dreams.
Freddy may have grown increasingly silly as the sequels went on, but Wes Craven and Robert Englund's iconic creation is one of the most iconic horror movie monsters of all time. No amount of rap CDs, Simpsons spoofs, underwhelming television series and crappy remakes can diminish Freddy's raw power, a horror movie monster for the ages.