Search SFE    Search EoF

  Omit cross-reference entries  

Encyclopedia of Fantasy (1997)
Serial Killers

Tagged: Theme.

Real Serial Killers represent a late-twentieth-century nadir of human stupidity, and thus are the antithesis of fantasy. Fictional Serial Killers who are carriers of the toxins of Horror have some small place here. Also, whether we like it or not, the image of the Serial Killer has gained iconographic status well outside horror, as in the Psychological Thriller.

Dracula is a serial killer, and most books or movies about Vampires are about serial killing. The paradigm Serial Killer is of course Jack the Ripper, who is rarely a figure of fantasy interest, though some version of the man can be found in Gaslight Romances like Kim Newman's Anno Dracula (1992). Jack is a paradigm figure because unseen, indulgent in splatterpunk excesses of sadism, uncaught, has a rough Trickster wit (as has Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs [1988] by Thomas Harris [1940-    ]) and is chased fruitlessly by the law. Barbara Hambly's Those Who Hunt the Night (1988) is dependent on these characteristics. Other Serial Killer novels with some fantasy interest include James Herbert's Moon (1985), Dean R Koontz's The Bad Place (1990), Simon R Green's Shadows Fall (1994) and Poppy Z Brite's Exquisite Corpse (1996). The Hellblazer comic (1988-    ) by Jamie Delano and others, with John Constantine as created by Alan Moore, features encounters with Serial Killers.

Movies which make play with Serial Killers are frequent. Those of fantasy interest include the Kolchak Movies, Don't Look Now (1973), Eyes of Laura Mars (1978); Cat People (1982), the Nightmare on Elm Street series, Lady in White (1988), Barton Fink (1990), Nightbreed (1990) and Candyman (1992). [JC]



x
This website uses cookies.  More information here. Accept Cookies