Since 2009, I’ve watched 462 films, 155 of which have been in the horror genre. There are some real gems in this collection: Evil Bong, Bloodz vs. Wolves, the entirety of the Ghoulies franchise, Mom, Harpoon: Whale Watching Massacre – I could go on. In late 2015, I started tracking data on when and how characters die in horror films, with the intent to use it on some future project.

This is that future project. My home-grown data set examines when and how characters die in horror films, which I’m going to use to create a series of blog posts focusing on how death works in horror films. Tentatively called Death in Numbers, this series will examine horror films using data visualization.

In this post, I’m going to examine three questions:

Which monsters kills the most people? What can murder indicate about a franchise or a lead villain? Do minority characters tend to die first in films?

Let’s examine examine the first question:

Which group of movie monsters kills the most people? The number of characters that die per film varies quite a bit. Pinhead and his affiliates kill about 140 people in Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth. In contrast, only two people die in Critters 3 (Featuring Leonardo DiCaprio (Yes This is the Full Title, I Swear)).

But who kills the most overall? The chart below plots the cumulative deaths in a franchise over its overall running time, highlighting specific franchises. The steeper the line, the more aggressively a franchise kills people. Please note that the chart also contains other franchises plotted in gray, including The Ghoulies (31 dead / 4 films), Thankskilling (20/2), Gremlins (8/2), Get Out (7/1), and Bill Zebub Productions’ magnum opus: Antfarm Dickhole (12/1):

(BETTER RESOLUTION)

In 9 films, characters from the Hellraiser franchise kill the most people. But the deaths in Hellraiser come in fits and starts – most of them come from a single scene in Hellraiser 3: Hell on Earth where Pinhead murders a packed night club. Voorhees and other killers in Friday the 13th tend to kill much more consistently throughout their films. In fact, if you look at the slope of both lines, it looks like Friday the 13th would eventually overtake Hellraiser if both franchises were given a few more films (not that Hellraiser needs another film after the abomination that was Revelations. I would take a sequel to Hellraiser: Hellworld, where sexy, mmorpg-addicted teenagers arelured to a party in the woods. Did I mention that the mmorpg is Hellraiser-brand?). Digression aside, you could make a case for either franchise to contain the most death.

What influences a franchise’s kill count? A franchise’s kill count is influenced by several factors, including the personality and goals of its antagonists, the target demographic of the film, and the genre of the franchise. By using the plot above, which charts the cumulative number of deaths in a franchise over its running time, you can start to create some narratives around why these killers kill like they do. I did this, below, highlighting a few standout franchises.

Character Personality. Characters like Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers tend to out-kill their more discerning counterparts, like Lubdan (Leprechaun) and Pinhead (Hellraiser). Even if you include Hellraiser 3: Hell on Earth, where Pinhead kills about 120 people in a night club, Voorhees and Myers kill more people per film than either Pinhead or Lubdan (though this chart doesn’t show it because Pinheads kills are lumped in with all of the other characters from Hellraiser). This is because Lubdan tends to pursue revenge on specific people for stealing his leprechaun gold, and Pinhead pursues specific people who either summon him or who escape from Hell. Myers and Voorhees are indiscriminate killing machines, so it makes sense that they would be more prolific killers.

Characters like Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers tend to out-kill their more discerning counterparts, like Lubdan (Leprechaun) and Pinhead (Hellraiser). Even if you include Hellraiser 3: Hell on Earth, where Pinhead kills about 120 people in a night club, Voorhees and Myers kill more people per film than either Pinhead or Lubdan (though this chart doesn’t show it because Pinheads kills are lumped in with all of the other characters from Hellraiser). This is because Lubdan tends to pursue revenge on specific people for stealing his leprechaun gold, and Pinhead pursues specific people who either summon him or who escape from Hell. Myers and Voorhees are indiscriminate killing machines, so it makes sense that they would be more prolific killers. Target Demographics. Companies market films like Critters differently than they market films like Hellraiser and Friday the 13 th . Critters is intended for a young-ish audience. The Critters only average 4 kills per film, despite being billed as an unstoppable, extraterrestrial, species-annihilating menace. But, instead of wiping out humanity, The Critters are outwitted by a town bumbling Midwesterners and an alien who looks like David Bowie while causing minimal damage. Contrast this to Hellraiser, a franchise marketed toward adult horror fans, which contains darker themes, is more willing to kill bystanders and minor characters (in some cases multiple times), and contains more graphic depictions of blood and gore. Hellraiser has more death in it because it’s geared for a more hardcore audience than Critters.

Companies market films like Critters differently than they market films like Hellraiser and Friday the 13 . Critters is intended for a young-ish audience. The Critters only average 4 kills per film, despite being billed as an unstoppable, extraterrestrial, species-annihilating menace. But, instead of wiping out humanity, The Critters are outwitted by a town bumbling Midwesterners and an alien who looks like David Bowie while causing minimal damage. Contrast this to Hellraiser, a franchise marketed toward adult horror fans, which contains darker themes, is more willing to kill bystanders and minor characters (in some cases multiple times), and contains more graphic depictions of blood and gore. Hellraiser has more death in it because it’s geared for a more hardcore audience than Critters. Atmosphere/Genre. Adding a second genre to your horror film can also create opportunities to focus on story elements that aren’t death or murder-related. The Mangler is a mystery film that examines a series of grisly deaths involving a laundry press in Maine. It contains 6 laundry-related deaths, most of which come after the end of the mystery, when the haunted laundry press grows legs and goes on a rampage. Leprechaun and Critters both lean heavily on their comedy elements, so they don’t need to kill as many characters to get by. In contrast, Halloween and Friday the 13th are slasher films at their core – while they do contain comedy and mystery elements, they lean heavily on murder to fill the time. Death is even more pronounced in the Final Destination franchise, where the film’s monster is the inevitability of death itself. It would make sense that these three franchises, Final Destination, Halloween, and Friday the 13th, which lean more on their horror elements, would contain more death than their split-genre counterparts.

With that out of the way, let’s examine our second question:

Do minority characters die more frequently? Most people have heard the horror trope that the black guy always dies first. This trope is so prevalent that, in The Mangler 2, a malicious computer virus haunting a prep school tells a young black man that “the black guy always dies first” before scalding him to death with fire sprinklers (important note: despite the hackneyed joke, that young black man died 4th, after a janitor, a porn addicted paraplegic teacher, and an alcoholic dorm mom).

I have 61 films in my data set, which is a solid sub-sample of the horror genre. Using this information, I’m going to look a bit deeper into whether the black guy dies first frequently enough validate the trope. Spoiler alert: the black guy rarely dies first.

Out of 61 films, black characters only die first in 3 films – Leprechaun in the Hood, Leprechaun Back 2 tha Hood, and Gremlins. I would rule out Leprechaun in the Hood and Leprechaun Back 2 the Hood, because both films have majority black casts, so it’s not that the black guy is dying first, it’s that a black guy is dying first. Which leaves a single film where you can genuinely say that the black guy dies first: Gremlins.

Using this visualization, I’d like to offer 3 observations/hypotheses:

There aren’t many minority characters in these films to begin with. It’s not possible for minority characters to die first if they aren’t cast in films. Most of these films feature overwhelmingly white casts – the only exceptions are Leprechaun in the Hood and Leprechaun Back 2 tha Hood. I will give a shout out to Halloween: Resurrection, which features one of the blackest casts outside of the hood, due in part to the presence Busta Rhymes and Tyra Banks. But to my point, if you’re not given the opportunity to be in the film, you won’t die first.

It’s not possible for minority characters to die first if they aren’t cast in films. Most of these films feature overwhelmingly white casts – the only exceptions are Leprechaun in the Hood and Leprechaun Back 2 tha Hood. I will give a shout out to Halloween: Resurrection, which features one of the blackest casts outside of the hood, due in part to the presence Busta Rhymes and Tyra Banks. But to my point, if you’re not given the opportunity to be in the film, you won’t die first. Film makers may be avoiding killing black and minority characters early. Minority character deaths appear to be more prevalent later in these films. This might suggest that film makers are avoiding killing black characters early. I have no idea what would motivate this, aside from the desire to discredit the trope.

Minority character deaths appear to be more prevalent later in these films. This might suggest that film makers are avoiding killing black characters early. I have no idea what would motivate this, aside from the desire to discredit the trope. The “black guy always dies first” may just be a product of a few popular films. A black teacher died first in Gremlins, which is a well-known film. A cursory Google search also indicates that black characters die first in Scream 2, 300, and Aliens. While I’m not sure where the trope originated, it is getting reinforced by an occasional blockbuster. Early minority deaths may be uncommon, but people notice when they happen due specifically to the trope, which creates a cycle where it’s occasionally reinforced.

A bit of background on my data. in Late 2015, I wrote a series of articles called Horror Cuts for a now-derelict humor site called The Union Forever. In Horror Cuts, I tried to fuse horror films, data analysis, visualization, and listicles. I would watch horror films, keep track of how and when people die in an Excel spreadsheet, and then produce an edition of Horror Cuts. I did this for 5 franchises (articles are NSFW):

To write these articles, I kept a data set on how and when characters die in horror films. This data set is available if you’d like it.

Conclusion. Thank you for taking the time to read this article. If you have any horror-related that you would like me to answer with my data, please let me know! You can reach out on Twitter or leave a comment on the article. If I like your question or feel like I can answer it with the data, I may feature your question in a future edition of Death in Numbers. Alternatively, if you’re interested, you can reach out to me for a copy of the data at lifeinnumbersblog@gmail.com.

Depending on the response I get to this article, I may add additional film franchises to the list. There are plenty of franchises that I haven’t included yet, including A Nightmare on Elm Street, Child’s Play, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Scream, and Alien.