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8 Great Revenge-From-Beyond-The-Grave Moments
Like Tormented’s teen, this lot have time to kill...
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Suicidal teen revenge drama Tormented arrives in cinemas today.
It’s the tale of Darren Mullet, an asthmatic lad seen as a target for his school’s bullies.
But when the popular types take their pranks one step too far, a terrible revenge is wreaked.
It’s a well-trod story path, so we thought we’d dig up some favourites…
To actual death.
The payback: Luckily for Eric, he’s led back from the dead by the titular bird, and becomes a righteous Goth-ish clown-faced agent of vengeance, picking off the gang one by one.
Most satisfying revenge moment: Draven tracks down knife-wielding killer Tin Tin (Laurence Mason) in a dark alleyway.
After a brief bout of hand-to-hand combat, Draven catches ones of Tin Tin’s knives, pins him to the wall with it, kills him, nicks his coat and leaves his calling card - a crow silhouette – painted with the dead man’s blood.
Next: Spawn
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But he strikes a deal with a rubbish CG-looking devil (voiced by Frank Welker) to work as Satan’s enforcer.
Once back on Earth, he battles with his evil side to deliver justice on his killer.
Best revenge moment: Mr Spawn crashes a swanky party being thrown by Wynn, intent on returning the Hell-bound favour.
We get a proper look at his swirling, lethal cloak and chains as he threatens his old boss.
Sadly, it’s at this point that he discovers Wynn has his own deal with the devil, which means Spawn will have to find some other way to off him. A great moment from a rubbish movie.
Next: Robocop
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But his human side wins out and he tracks down Boddicker and co.
Best revenge moment: In the climactic final battle with Boddicker, the metal lawman has been trapped under some falling metal junk.
But despite Boddicker trying to kill him (again), he unleashes the metal spike he uses to access computers and stabs Clarence in the neck.
Next: Kill Bill
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The film: A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)
The death: Freddy Krueger is known as 'The Springwood Slasher'.
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His favourite pastime is slaughtering ankle-biters with a razor-sharp finger-glove accessory.
When a judge releases him back into the community, anguished parents corner the pre-school caretaker in his boiler room and burn him alive.
The revenge: One thing the lynch mob didn’t count on was Krueger becoming a demon, who, with his scarred visage, knife-glove and cheery red-striped jumper, stalks his victims in their dreams.
He even has his own theme song/nursery rhyme. In your face, Jason Voorhees!
Best revenge moment: One of his early kills – where he murderlises Tina Gray (Amanda Wyss) in her dreams, implicating her boyfriend Rod taking the fall for the murder.
Cue the haunting image of a girl being dragged up a wall and to the ceiling, all the while being cut open by invisible blades.
There are better ways to wake up in the morning.
Next: The Gingerdead Man
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Nutso killer's ashes are packed off to his mum (E Dee Biddlecome). Turns out she's a witch who mixes the ashes with magic gingerbread spice.
The concoction is sent to a bakery run by… you guessed it… Sarah, who bakes it into a giant gingerbread man, for some reason.
The gingerbread man then comes back to life. He's not happy.
Best revenge moment: Cackling with pure Busey madness (caked in awful monster gingerbread-man make-up), the nasty dough demon slices off his mum’s finger and shoves her in the oven.
Mmm… Baked goods.
Next: Creepshow
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The film: Creepshow (1982)
The death: Cheated-on husband Leslie Nielsen buries his wife and her lover (Ted Danson) up to their necks in sand on his private beach - below the high tide line.
He takes great sadistic care to abandon the pair on different parts of the beach, positioning TV monitors so they can each watch the other drown.
The revenge: The offed lovebirds re-appear as seaweed-clad, watery-voiced zombies, chasing Leslie around his big posh beach-house.
"I'll shoot you dead!" he threatens.
"You can't shoot us dead," they (reasonably) retort. "Because we're already dead!"
Best revenge moment: In a fiendish twist of fate, the salty undead adulterists take their killer down to the beach and, umm, bury him up to his neck and, errrm, watch him drown.
Effective but unimaginative.
Next: Carrie
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The film: Carrie (1976)
The death: Picking up the prom-queen prize, telekinetic teen Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) suffers a serious sense-of-humour failure when prankster John Travolta dumps a bucket of pig's blood over her.
She uses her special think-powers to burn down the school and kill most of her peers, before running home to her mentalist bible-bashing momma who stabs her.
The revenge: After the mayhem, Carrie's classmate Susan drifts in to the cemetery and, to woozy visuals and lilting music, places flowers on Carrie's grave...
Best revenge moment: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGH!
(Forward to 2:22)
James White is a freelance journalist who has been covering film and TV for over two decades. In that time, James has written for a wide variety of publications including Total Film and SFX. He has also worked for BAFTA and on ODEON's in-cinema magazine.
