The Best of the Bad Guys: Art the Clown

Hey everyone, I’m Mike, and today, we’ll be talking about something horror fans across the globe have been discussing amongst each other in our blacked-out bedrooms since Terrifier 2 graced the screen a few years back. Should Art the Clown at this point, or ever be mentioned alongside the biggest names in slasherdom? Names like Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, Freddy Krueger, Leatherface, Ghostface, and Pinhead? Today we’ll take a look at just why the answer is a resounding yes. Or at the very least will be. When it’s said and done. Welcome to ‘The Best of the Bad Guys’. Where we celebrate the best of horrors worst villains on a case-by-case basis.

For starters, we’ll talk about the main arguments that Art isn’t a horror icon already. 

Let’s start with longevity. Some of you folks are no doubt angrily typing as you read this that Art simply hasn’t been around long enough to earn the title of horror icon. Well, put down your finger guns for a moment and remember that Art has been around for over a decade already! First appearing in the anthology horror film All Hallows Eve in 2013. 

For comparison, at that point in the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise? Freddy had already been through a whopping seven films. Jason had already taken Manhattan. Jigsaw was already in 3D. Most of even the best horror franchises were already on their way out. Art is just getting started. Imagine if Terrifier 4 and possibly 5 continue this trend. It’s possible we still haven’t seen the best Terrifier has to offer. Where the pendulum usually starts to swing in the other direction.

Since his first appearance in All Hallows Eve, Art’s had three dedicated films, with two of them defying expectations at the box office in the Terrifier trilogy. With at least a fourth on the way. Maybe a fifth. Even though creator and director Damien Leone will likely wrap up his story there, there’s nothing that says another creative team will never pick up Art’s tiny hat for their own take on the character. Or that he’ll return to it later in his career. It happens with all of them. Hell, if Dimension Films owned the franchise? The Weinstein’s would just give an Egg McMuffin to a bum on the street to make a direct-to-video sequel. Just to keep the rights in-house. 

And don’t forget the inevitable remake. 

The point is, there’s no end to how long the Terrifier franchise could terrify. 

I will admit the one thing all these horror icons have going for them that could exclude Art, is that their first film landed them on the scene as undeniable classics. I think Terrifier is great. But it doesn’t carry the status of A Nightmare on Elm Street, Scream, Halloween, and the like. Hell, it didn’t even get a theatrical release initially. Art had to work his way and his budget up. But this is why I consider Terrifier 2 Art’s The Dark Knight; Introducing a game-changing hero in Sienna, where the former had upped the ante with Heath Ledger’s portrayal of the Joker. 

Now, let’s compare some other areas where Art stacks up against his peers. 

Though the franchise is so much more than that, the first thing we think about when we think about the Terrifier franchise is the kills. Those sweet, “scrub my eyeballs with bleach and call the therapist. We can forget Mom for a little while. We have a whole other bag of issues to discuss… No one kills like Art the Clown. Call me crazier than Vicky in the attic pleasing myself with a shard of glass, but I think it’s solidified. Art is the most gruesome killer franchise horror hath ever witnessed. 

Michael loves his post-murder arts and crafts. Freddy can do things in your dreams no other killer could ever compare to (though we’ve proven Art can start some shit in dreamland too, so don’t count out the future getting wicked there). Jason has some hilarious and inventive brute-force murder death kills, of course. But there’s simply no one as brutal as Art. So we can put that baby to bed. To stand unequivocally above all in any category on the Mount Rushmore of horror is certainly worth paying attention to, right? He hasn’t just killed well. He’s made an expectation out of it. He’s created his own tradition. 

Starting with an unforgettable moment in his very first feature film. A kill that I call “The Vagi-saw”. The moment Art brought that chainsaw down into that orifice, things changed. Each upcoming sequel would inevitably be expected to have a dismemorable moment like this. Hopefully topping the previous entry. To this point they have. In Terrifier 2, art maims, dismembers, and literally peels the skin off a teenage girl before rubbing her wounds in bleach and salt. Like some kind of even more satanic Guy Fieri. In Terrifier 3, Art as Santa Claus brings back the chainsaw and inserts it into a man’s rectum. Which, is both a visual representation of what happens to our bank accounts during the holiday season….and a franchise that has done something only the most legendary of franchises could. Build its own tropes.

In the same way that James Bond films have their over-the-top opening action sequences, Terrifier has at least ONE scene guaranteed to make you squeal in disgust. Saw had their gross-out traps, Scream has its killer reveals, and Terrifier has at least one centerpiece of truly depraved dismemberment in each entry. Art doesn’t stop there. Almost every kill in the last two films has been original, visually impressive, and worthy of putting your fork down and thinking about your sins for a while. Art has carved out his very own niche when it comes to the death of his victims. In a genre that thrives on it. 

“But it’s all gore and no story!” folks who have never seen Terrifier 2 or 3 will shout. This leads us to our next reason for Art’s entry into the top tier of horror icons….his fantastical and ever-expanding lore.

It doesn’t even need to begin until his third on-screen appearance in Terrifier 2. Because a clown that looks like that, makes faces like that, and does depraved things like that to people’s nether regions is scary all by itself. For at least a while. Leone and crew knew this and let Art’s essence waft over the audience just long enough to start asking questions: “Wait, this isn’t just some guy in a clown outfit who snapped one day when he found out guac was extra? Oh, no. Well, what the ever-f*ck is he? Where does he come from? Who is going to stop him?”

and a legend begins to unfold…

Most horror icons have a great backstory. But it isn’t necessarily a requirement. The lore of Ghostface for instance lies in its ever-changing motives and revolving door of humans behind the mask (though one could argue it all originates from Maureen Prescott being kind of a tramp); We all know Jason’s backstory with his mommy. 

For my money, the best horror backstories are those that leave their mystery boxes open. Even deep into their sequels. The questions that still to this day surround Michael Myers are what make him so appealing. Why did a random suburban kid just snap one day and become an unstoppable murder machine? When Rob Zombie tried to answer that mystical question with a shrug and a trailer park breakfast, it became infinitely less interesting. 

I think the masterful gambit of a horror franchise composer is in their ability to, with every installment, give us a few answers, while asking a few more questions. Something Leone and company have done in droves.

Not only do fans of the Terrifier franchise hang on to each new installment with bated breath and a barf bag in hand, but to be enlightened by the next step in its ever-evolving story. We’re learning with each film a bit more about what Art is, what his intentions are, and where all this is going. Where are we heading with all the obvious references to the good and evil in religion? Not to mention the intrigue surrounding his sidekicks in The Little Pale Girl and Victoria. Terrifier 3 managed to add a demonic depth to the character of Vicky, while also leaving us with more questions to explore. Even the Terrifier ride itself has an intense and mysterious backstory involving multiple murders, according to the Terrifier 2 Novelization by Tim Waggoner. 

What does it all mean? Terrifier is asking more new questions and creating more lore for its franchise than many others did at this point. Instead of trying to recapture the magic of its original film, it’s forging ahead into new territory. And is doing so dangerously. This isn’t a franchise we can expect to copy and paste things that have worked in the past to make a quick buck. It’s making slasher horror feel dangerous again. Something franchises like Halloween and Scream once did in their respective debuts. 

You’ll notice I haven’t even begun to mention all the world-building and questions that surround Sienna and her father. Because that my friends, is the next point in my argument that Art is well on his way to cementing forever horror icon status: His final girl.

A main adversary is a must for an iconic horror villain. A victim-turned-heroine who overcomes all odds. The antithesis to the darkness of the villains we came to watch do murder. Without likable characters to root for we’d just be a bunch of sick fucks watching the innocent be slaughtered. Or sitting through Halloween Resurrection again. 

I’m going to say something bold. I believe, even with just two film appearances under her belt, Lauren Lavera’s Sienna has already cemented herself as one of the best final girls in slasherdom. 

Complete with her own badass synth music, (a wonderful throwback to A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors) we’re introduced to Sienna crafting a Halloween costume based on a character her artist Father made for her before his untimely passing. We quickly find out that she’s a good daughter, sister, and friend. She’s not an awkward church mouse afraid of human contact. She’s not just a sweet popular girl who happens to be dating the school douchebag only is somehow too dumb to notice it. She’s not walking around trying to convince us she’s Sarah Connor. She somehow escapes tired conventional final girl genre tropes without ever seeming like she’s trying. She’s both relatable and a natural badass. She even has a cool reason to wear a kick-ass costume.

She’s also not just another supposedly helpless teenage girl….

While waxing philosophical about horror icons with a friend the other day they asked “Who would win in a fight…. Jason Voorhees or Batman?”. And the question made me laugh because, of course (at the risk of angering some of you) the answer is Batman. One of the gaping holes of reason in our favorite slasher franchises comes from the paradox that we’re watching supernatural forces from the deep do battle with dumb teenagers….and often losing. If Laurie Strode, who is frightened by the sound of Pop Tarts finishing up in the toaster can defeat Michael Myers…..what chance would he have against Batman? I’m not trying to cast poor aspersions on my favorite films of all time. It comes with the territory and we see ourselves in our underdogs overcoming the inevitable. I get it, and it’s great and I wouldn’t change a thing. 

I’m simply stating that Sienna is a breath of fresh air in more ways than one. While it hasn’t been fully divulged to us yet, she’s definitely of a power that serves the final girl’s purpose in a different way. As silly of an idea as it was, how fun was it to watch Tina Shepard and her telekinetic abilities square off against Jason at the end of The New Blood? I can’t escape the feeling we’re seeing something with Sienna that takes that idea and gives it the audience time to grow into it in a realistic way. 

So we have our kills (top-notch), our lore (ever-expanding), and our final girl (a lovable badass). What else makes Art stand out? His personality. 

While Michael and Jason are silent and only emote physically (sometimes unintentionally hilarious in the best of ways); Freddy and Chucky both have the propensity to be hilarious in their dickishness; Pinhead will dress your ass down like some kind of BDSM Shakespeare….on and on. A prerequisite for a truly great slasher should be that they have a distinct personality. And Art is again his own man. 

He doesn’t speak (Although a particular scene in Terrifier 3 seems as if he may be speaking through Victoria. Another piece of interesting lore) but by God, does he ever emote. He’s downright hilarious at times. Or downright terrifying in an instant with a simple drop of his facial muscles and stare that could burn a hole through adamantium. 

Though actor Mike Giannelli did a more than admirable job as the character in the aforementioned All Hallows Eve, there’s no doubt actor David Howard Thornton has breathed a unique life into this character and made it his own. His physical comedy in moments like when he runs into a room excited like a child on Christmas and holding the salt has made him the Jim Carrey of horror in my eyes. 

And that’s why I fully consider Art the Clown a full-blown horror icon at this point. 

It’s funny to me, we horror fans are often longing for the days of old. When slashers were taking over the box office and Freddy Krueger was on MTV. But in a world where an unrated horror movie just broke box office records, folks are protesting at the theaters, and Art and Sienna even just rang the bell at the stock market? It makes me think of when Andy from The Office said “I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them”. Because we’re witnessing the birth of a horror icon right now. 

A couple of the previous episodes of The Best of the Bad Guys can be seen below. To see more, click over to the JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!