Revenger Girl Spotlight: Debbie

revenger girl: a female slasher who is motivated by revenge for wrongs committed against herself or her loved ones. usually pursues the original slasher who committed the initial wrongdoings.

The Revenger Girl: Debbie

The Song: The Homecoming Queen’s Got a Gun by Julie Brown

Weapons of Choice: Gun

Plot: Oh, homecoming. The teen glamour, glitter and gold.

And…a homicidal teenage queen? Well, yeah. In Julie Brown’s world.

Julie is at her homecoming, singing praise for her BFF Debbie, who’s Homecoming Queen:

It was homecoming night at my high school
Everyone was there it was totally cool
I was real excited I almost wet my jeans
Cause my best friend Debbie was Homecoming Queen

The crowd was cheering everyone was stoked
I mean it was like the whole school was totally coked or something!

Stoked is SO my favorite word.

Everything seems peachy keen until Debbie whips out a gun and starts to kill off cheerleaders, the Math teacher, and the Glee Club (though as Julie notes, ‘no big loss’).

Drats! Julie is appropriately horrified:

God, my best friend’s on a shooting spree
Stop it Debbie, you’re embarrassing me!

Finally, the cops shoot Debbie in the ear and she goes down. Julie runs up to Debbie and asks her why she did what she did.

Debbie replies that she did it for Johnny. Then she, like, dies.

Julie looks at Debbie's dead body quizzically.

Then she asks: “Johnny? Well, like, who’s Johnny?”

Double drats! Looks like Debbie’s revenger girl moment for Johnny is for moot— cause no one knows who Johnny is!

Good or Bad?: I can’t even imagine what you readers are thinking (I’d like to know though.) I just did all those movies and now I’m doing a comedy song?

Well, yeah! Julie is pretty explicit in her descriptions of Debbie’s killing spree:

Debbie’s smiling and waving her gun
Picking off cheerleaders one by one
Oh, Buffy’s pom pom just blew to bits!
Oh no! Mitzy’s head just did the splits!

I mean a cheerleader’s head got blown open! That’s pretty fucking awesome.

Not just awesome…awesomely hilarious!! Ahahaha…ha.

It's too bad we don't know more about Johnny. Is he alive? Dead? Maybe he's a cat? Either way, I hope he appreciates Debbie's little revenger girl spree!

So I say good! Who says Revenger Girls only stick to the silver screen?

Plus you gotta admit, this video is pretty awesome:

My kind of chick flick

I love Twilight. I love the books, and I love the movie. I've already seen the film three times, including a midnight showing where I may very well have been the oldest person that wasn't a parent escorting their daughter. Twilight, in my mind, is pretty fucking cool.

Which is why I'm extremely happy that the film grossed $70 Mil in it's opening weekend.

For weeks leading up to the film, I read countless articles that seriously--SERIOUSLY--questioned if girls could make this movie a box office breakthrough.

Seriously.

I guess I can understand why--I myself thought the idea of "moving pictures" was a myth until I saw my first "movie" last August. And at first my feeble female mind couldn't grasp the concept. I thought Satan had finally taken over my soul.

Oh, God, I thought in horror, who will marry me now that Satan owns me?

But seriously. What the hell critic people? You get paid for those hard hitting insights? Jesus Christ.

I told myself that once the movie grossed a bajillion dollars I would issue out a BOO-YAH! to all those critics who doubted the power of girl.

And so...BOO-YAH!

Now articles are speculating on the future of chick flick films. Twilight has shook things up and now regular chick flicks are, like, TOTALLY in peril.

But I don't really give a shit about regular chick flicks, cause I fucking loathe most chick flicks. Most. Not all.

The reason? Most do not speak for me. I am not obsessed with getting married. I am not obsessed with finding my Mr. Big. I don't want to be super glamorous. I don't drink Cosmos.

What do I love as a film going girl?

Head explosions. Sam in Sixteen Candles. Buffy. Hatchets to limbs. Blood gushing out of wounds/walls/the floor. Zombies. Pitch black humor.

And Naked David Naughton.

Now I know that there are movies that have all these things. But I want these movies to be so god damn plentiful that they get stamped with a label like 'chick flick'.

We can call them...I dunno, sick chick flicks. Oh fuck that sounds like some drama where the girl is dying. I dunno what we'll call them. (Suggestions?)

They will include:

1. A leading lady equipped with an ax, sassy comebacks, and an awkward romance with a hot guy.

2. A head explosion. You don't have to explain it, just let it happen.

3. Pitch black humor that makes death seem so incredulous that you let a shaky laugh come out; and then later when you rewatch it, you laugh out loud at the sheer balls to wall nature of it all.

4. A quirky 60's girl group song like this:



5. A naked man. IS THIS SO MUCH TO ASK? I see titties all the time in horror flicks. I wanna see cock.

Now that would be my kind of chick flick. Or sick chick flick, ha! Maybe that name could work. I'll have to sleep on it.

Revenger Girl Spotlight: Brenda

revenger girl: a female slasher who is motivated by revenge for wrongs committed against herself or her loved ones. usually pursues the original slasher who committed the initial wrongdoings.



The Revenger Girl: Brenda

The Movie: Savage Streets

Weapons of Choice: Bow and Arrow, Bear Traps, Lighter and Flammable Material

Plot: Many times, while watching this film, I found myself screaming that this movie was the greatest fucking thing I’d ever seen. Sassy teenage girls? Mundo cussing? Preppy bitches? A guy on FIRE? Linda motherfucking Blair? This movie and I were meant to be together.

Brenda is just your average tough girl that wears sunglasses at night, cusses a fuckton, smokes a fuckton, and loves her sweeter than sweet deaf and mute little sister.

Brenda and her posse are sauntering the streets one night when they local punk rock assholes almost run Brenda’s sister over. Brenda, pissed to the nth degree, decides to jack their car and take it for a little joy ride. This pisses off the punk rockers quite a bit and they decide to exact revenge by raping Brenda’s little sister and killing one of Brenda’s BFFs. What the shit, assholes? She steals your car for 20 minutes and this is your fucking reaction?!? Well, Brenda decides that the punk rockers are going to pay for their crimes--with their lives. Asshole one, meet these arrows in your face. Asshole two, meet this bear trap on your face. And asshole three, you're on fire! :O

Good or Bad?: LINDA BLAIR! I mean, good! As I said before, this movie and I were meant to be together. Part of the charm of the film is the badass performance given by Linda Blair. She’s almost like the proto Buffy, but with more cussing. And no vampires.



Also, did I mention that one of Brenda’s kills features a guy on fire? I know I did, but it’s worth saying again. The image of a man completely consumed by flames is such a rarity in film--and the result is usually hilariously over the top. The fire victim always manages to stumble around for a good 3 minutes before crashing through something. And the punk rocker in Savage Streets is no exception (he crashes through a window).



It’s such an undignified Looney Tunes death fit for this asshole of epic proportions.

Next Time on Revenger Girl Spotlight: It was homecoming night at my high school...

Current Horror Hottie: David Naughton

I would totally marry his naked werewolf ass.

Said ass I would marry.



Bonus: His BFF is a zombie!

Film Screams! AHHHHH!

I feel like blogging again today. Why, you ask? Well...

1. I have blog regret. I went a whole month without posting! I am super lame.

and 2. I don't have to go to work tomorrow! Uh, yay! No workies means more bloggy.

Although I should blog more in general. This blog is neglected. This needs to change!

I'm going to do a couple of separate posts here. This one is mostly PinkRaygun article plugging. Last month my life was CONSUMED by Film Screams at the Film Streams art movie house. Film Screams was a horror film series that spanned the month of October and showed various horror films from across genres and time. It was exciting, and made even more so by the fact that the final film of the series was Evil Dead II, one of my all time favorite horror films. And I finally got to see it on the big screen, yay! I almost exploded in the theater.

Anyway, if you want to read my coverage of the films in that series you can check 'em out here:

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Bride of Frankenstein
The Innocents
An American Werewolf in London
The Raven
Evil Dead II

Revenger Girl Spotlight: Lila

revenger girl: a female slasher who is motivated by revenge for wrongs committed against herself or her loved ones. usually pursues the original slasher who committed the initial wrongdoings.




The Revenger Girl: Lila

The Movie: Mantis in Lace

Weapons of Choice: Meat Cleaver, Screwdriver, Hoe

Plot: It’s fun to sum up this movie in one sentence. ‘Go-Go Dancer takes LSD and then kills some dudes while hallucinating about bananas and cantaloupes.’ I never thought such a movie could exist, and yet it does! And what a weird delight it is.



This movie also made me realize that I have a high tolerance to sit through bullshit to get to the gore. ‘Cause this movie is no Revenger Girl flick. It’s not even really a slasher flick. It’s a 60’s titty flick. There’s a lot of go-go club time and even a totally random sex scene that has nothing to do with the plot of the movie and features characters that you never see again!! You remember that porn movie that David of An American Werewolf in London watches with his dead friend Jack? Yeah, Mantis in Lace is a LOT like that movie. Which means it’s hilarious, really.

But amid all the bouncing boobies, there is a Revenger Girl story. And a rather unique and bizarre Revenger Girl story to boot, which makes me wish that the movie would’ve focused less on the titty and more on the kill-y, cause Mantis in Lace would’ve made a great horror flick.

So what to say about our dear Lila, the Revenger Girl? Well, she’s a go-go dancer. She has cool dresses. And she hates fruit, especially bananas.

When Lila’s not at work, she allows herself to be easily seduced by the patrons of the go-go club. She takes them back to her home (an abandoned warehouse with a mattress on the floor) drops some acid, has some sexy time, starts tripping about loathed bananas, then hacks her lovers to pieces. She stashes the body parts in cardboard boxes, dumps them out into the world, and then heads back into work.



At this point she probably sounds more like a crazy girl than a revenger girl, and I’ll admit, she may very well be more crazy girl. But some of the men she seduces have a very low tolerance for her ‘free girl’ antics. One, a psychologist, tries to psychoanalyze her lifestyle and impose structure on her life. He eventually meets the receiving end of a meat cleaver. While Lila is hacking him to bits, you hear the angry echo-y voice of her father telling her to be good and eat her vegetables, god damn it! So there’s obviously some revenger girl rebelling going on here. And then after he’s dead n’ stuff, she laughs and says “You look so funny like that!” which fits the mark of ‘revenger girl throwing sassy comebacks at her victims.’

And later, there’s a clearer cut revenger girl kill. An impatient fuck who is going to get the sexy but just can’t wait ten fucking minutes while Lila does her weird “seductive” private go-go dance, starts to throw her around the room. He meets the receiving end of a garden hoe, while Lila envisions cracking open a cantaloupe instead of his skull. Trippy.



Good or Bad?: I really love cheap, totally campy films. I realize that this may not be everyone’s bag, but I figured an early warning was in order, because you’ll find me praising a lot of movies that may not be everyone’s cup of tea. I won’t ever approach the film from a strictly critical standpoint, and judge the movie without any biases. The reason this won’t happen is because I’m a geek. And I geek out to really cheap, totally campy films.

So now that I’ve written all that: Good or Bad? Good.

Like I said before, this movie isn’t really a Revenger Girl flick. But the Revenger Girl, Lila, is the reason you must see this film. I mean, for fuck’s sake, she has trip outs about bananas. Bananas!!! Motherfucking BANANAS! Not to mention the dark humor that pervades the whole slasher lifestyle of Lila. The box on the hill with the arm poking out. Lila’s comment that one of her victims looks funny hacked to bits.

And did I mention the bananas? Motherfucking bananas.

Next Time on Revenger Girl Spotlight: Linda. Fucking. Blair.

Revenger Girl Spotlight: Linda

This post kicks off my favorite sub-genre of slasher films: The Female Revenge Flick, or what I like to call Revenger Girl Movies.

So what exactly is a Revenger Girl film? Picture a slasher film. Now picture that slasher film's final girl. Now imagine the final girl doing more than just surviving. Imagine her turning the tables and slashing the slasher.

Voila! You have a Revenger Girl!

In my brain, a Revenger Girl is a female whose been wronged in some way; be it to her own person or to someone close to her. These girls all approach their revenge differently. Some are afraid, some are determined, some are insane, and some are tripped out on LSD (okay, maybe there's just one like that, but there is one). But they all have one thing in common: they refuse to be beaten down by some crazy killer and they're bent on revenge for the injustices commited against them.

Revenger Girl films are usually straightforward and sometimes hard to stomach, but they hold a powerful message of a girl's strength against crazy killers with axes. And they prove that it doesn't always take a slasher to wield one.

So welcome to my first post about Revenger Girls! I'll be covering a variety of different girls in different mediums; film, TV, comics, etc. I'm also always on the lookout for Revenger Girl media, so if you know of any, holla back girl! (Did I just type that? Well, I'm too lazy to backspace since I just typed all this junk after it.) I love discovering new Revenger Girls. And I'm very open to anything having a Revenger Girl, because I know very well that they don't always just stick to slasher-y type films.

Case in point: my first Revenger Girl, Linda from Faster, Pussycat! Kill, Kill!.

For those who haven't seen the film, you may be wondering "Well, who's Linda?"

This is actually Varla.
If you were thinking of this lovely lady, you'd be incorrect. (Although she is awesome in the movie.)

This is Linda:


Yep. Her.

Faster, Pussycat! doesn't really seem like a revenger at first. At first, it seems like a cross between superboob exploitation and some sort of feminist scare film (freethinking, freewheeling women are DANGEROUS!!)

But then little sweet Linda bursts onto the scene, a teenager with a Frankie Avalon boyfriend who likes to drag race. She's clueless and bubbly next to the wild vixen go-go dancers, and I for one was extremely annoyed by her dutiful girlfriend persona.

Then the wild vixens make it worse--they off Frankie boyfriend and kidnap her to keep her quiet about the murder. Bubbly dutiful girlfriend now morphs into hysterical mourning girlfriend. And I am even more annoyed.

I should have seen the Revenger Girl signs. But I was so impressed by the wild, wonderful lifestyle of the vixens that I didn't really give a flying fuck about Linda and her sobbing self. I was all about the vixens getting what they want, when they want it!!

Then at the end, it finally hit me.

Varla (the head vixen) is fighting (and killing) Linda's male companion. Linda decides to take a stand against this crazy lady and she does--she runs Varla over with a pickup truck.

Man, was I bummed about awesome Varla's death! She was only doing what she wanted, sheesh! So what if dead bodies stacked up in the process?

At this point, I was beyond annoyed at Linda. And to make it worse, after killing Varla, she ran out of the car in complete hysterics at what she just did. Her male companion (who she saved by running over Varla by the way) tried to calm her down.

"You saved my life...so stop crying," he said.

Linda hiccuped and nodded tearfully. "I guess I saved my own."

Blink. Ka-wha?

And with one line I see a side of this movie I didn't even realize.

Yeah, the story of female vixen power is great. Cower in fear men, bwahahahaha! Ahem.

But I didn't realize there was a whole Revenger sub-plot going on as well, with Linda! I guess it's easy to miss when you're busy yelling "AWESOME" at the antics of the other women.

And really, Linda's story is so classic revenger girl. Her boyfriend is killed right in front of her. She is kidnapped and subjected to forced drug use to keep her sedated. She gets leered at by a creepy old grandpa. And then when one of her friends is about to bite the big one, she kills the woman that killed her boyfriend.

I'll admit, the "I guess I saved my own (life)" line won me over. But it is a great fucking line. And a great, simple way to make a sobby mess into a Revenger Girl, in my book.

So, go Linda. You may not have been all WILD and SEDUCTIVE but you still got the power, my dear. You still got the power.



Next time on Revenger Girl Spotlight: we talk about that LSD Revenger Girl I hinted at above! Oh, yes. It is badass.