10 Film & TV Serial Killers We Can't Help But Love

7. Sweeney Todd - Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street

Sweeney Todd, Stephen Sondheim's interpretation of a penny dreadful serial killer. And to be fair, he pulls out all the stops. Todd is a maniacal barber, who kills his enemies by inviting them in for a shave and then slashing their throats. Is there a way to make this worse? Of course. He has a deal with Mrs Lovitt, who uses the human remains to bake into her meat pies that become a neighborhood favorite. Yummy. But Sweeney Todd also has a tragic backstory. When he was a younger man, he was falsely imprisoned by a magistrate who coveted his wife, and was sent away on a prison ship for many years. While he was gone, the magistrate raped and humiliated his wife, driving her to insanity, and raised the couple's infant daughter as his own. So while Sweeney Todd can't be totally absolved of his crimes, it's hard to feel sympathetic towards the victims who were complicit in the magistrate's evil acts.