Thanks to the dominance of Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers and countless clones, the horror genre and pop culture in general reigned supreme in the 1980s. By the end of the decade, however, the subgenre had grown old and repetitive and audiences had moved on. The 1990s were mostly downtime for horror movies, and few made a lasting impression like so many in the decades before. Still, as these women show, there was enough life left in the last girl trope to make these characters unforgettable in movie history forever.
9. Marianne Hagan as Kara Strode in ‘Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers’ (1995)
In the mid-1990s, the Halloween franchise was a shell of what it was, but this fun-yet-weird entry, best known for helping launch the career of Paul Rudd and was the last film of Donald Pleasance, has one of the best final girls of the series. With the Jamie Lloyd character from the previous two films killed early on, it’s up to a little-known actress to carry on the legacy. Kara Strode is not your typical last girl. Kara is almost thirty years old and is a single mother who lives at home with her mother and her abusive father. She is having a hard time in life, but keeps going. To make matters worse, Michael Myers and the cult that took him in are after Kara’s son so that his powers can be transferred to the young boy. No biggie. Kara shows she will do anything to save her son, even against a supernatural Boogeyman.
8. Alicia Witt as Natalie Simon in ‘Urban Legend’ (1998)
After the success of scream, countless imitators followed throughout the late 1990s. This is one of the better ones, mostly because of the clever premise of a serial killer who kills based on popular urban legends. Natalie Simon is your typical last girl: young, beautiful, likeable. However, she has a dark past. Natalie is in college, but in high school, during an urban legend prank she pulled, someone was accidentally killed. Now all her friends around her are dying, in the same urban legend fashion, as if the killer knew what she was doing. Natalie is a good person, despite her tragic mistake, and as the killer strikes, we see her endangered and do everything to save her friends, including Paul (Jared Leto). A twisted ending reveals that the killer is a woman (Rebecca Gayheart), a rarity among slashers, who are out for revenge, as it was her boyfriend who accidentally killed Natalie. While technically the final scene shows the terrified killer still alive, Natalie survives.
7. Jennifer Love Hewitt as Julie James in ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ (1997)
This is the most popular of the scream clones, with a matching hip 90s cast (Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prince Jr.and Ryan Phillipe are all there). just like in Urban Legend, a killer hunts teenagers because of a car accident that killed one person. Worse, these guys covered it up and took no responsibility. This almost makes you support the killer, but Julie James’s strong and sympathetic presence, along with her girl-next-door looks, is enough to draw you back in favor of the film’s protagonists. Julie feels ashamed and regrets what happened, instead of being cowardly. But when her friends start to die, she doesn’t turn away. She is driven to find out who it is and investigates all the clues. Ultimately, she can face her attacker in a fight to the death. As in so many slashers, the dead assassin returns for a jump scare in the last frame, setting up a sequel, I still remember what you did last summerwhere Julie again emerges as the last girl.
6. AJ Langer as Alice in ‘The People Under the Stairs’ (1991)
Horror may not have been a strong genre in the 1990s, but Wes Craven didn’t get the memo, as he had several big hits in the decade. In this clever movie, a boy, Fool, (Brandon Adams) gets stuck in a house with a psychotic couple (Everett McGilli and Wendie Robie). He discovers a bunch of scary kids locked in the basement, along with a more normal, kidnapped teenage girl named Alice. She’s been locked in the house all her life, but she and Fool help each other escape. Instead of something terrible happening to her as she goes about her normal life like most last girls, Alice has experienced constant horrors almost every day, which makes her strength and will to get out that much more admirable. You don’t just want her to survive, you want Alice to live.
5. Jada Pinkett Smith as Jeryline in ‘Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight’ (1995)
One of the worst parts of the last girl trope is that the heroine is almost always white. Sometimes in the 90s there was a black woman who would make it to the end without being the last girl, like Brandy in I still remember what you did last summer or Loretta Devine in Urban Legendbut to have a black wife the last girl is something you don’t see much. Jeryline is a big exception. This movie is both fun and scary, and while it’s a bit “out there” at times, it’s kept in check by the protagonist. Her backstory is thin, but her portrayal is strong. Jeryline can take care of herself. While most of the latter girls face highly human adversaries, she must face off against demons. The fact that she comes out victorious against such seemingly insurmountable odds makes her one last girl who deserves more respect than she gets.
4. Christine Elise as Kyle in ‘Child’s Play 2’ (1990)
In the original Child’s playyoung Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent) had his mother and an agent to help him fight the evil doll Chucky, who is out to possess poor Andy. In the sequel, his mother is admitted to an institution and the agent is nowhere to be seen. Andy is worse off, now in foster care and all alone. He is rescued in more ways than one by Kyle, a tough teenage girl in his house. She doesn’t believe Andy’s stories about a doll come to life (who would?) but she cares about Andy and takes care of him. When she realizes Andy is telling the truth, she fights to save the boy’s life. The film’s climax, a fun scene in a doll factory, finds Andy and Kyle teaming up to take down the killer doll. They don’t live alone, but now these two lost and lonely souls have each other.
3. Heather Langenkamp as herself in ‘Wes Craven’s New Nightmare’ (1994)
A decade after becoming the ultimate last girl of the 1980s, Heather Langenkamp returned to the franchise that made her a star, but this time with a twist. She’s not playing her character of Nancy Thompson, who was murdered in… A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, but plays a fictional version of himself. The slasher genre was seemingly dead, but a clever premise from Wes Craven brought Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) back, scarier than he’d been since the original movie. This time, the villain isn’t actually Freddy, but a demonic entity that has taken its form in a world where the Nightmare in Elm Street movies are just that. Langenkamp gives us a bit of the Nancy we all love, while also making the character different enough to resemble herself. This time she is not a teenager. The stakes are set as high as possible, as she is now a widow, her husband murdered by the entity, and she is not a fictional heroine, but a normal person who must save the life of her young child.
2. Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode in ‘Halloween H20’ (1998)
1978, Halloween changed the horror landscape forever, making the latest girl trope something everyone knew about thanks to the popularity of its survivor, Laurie Strode. Twenty years later, after several ridiculous sequels, the franchise resets itself, removing all but the sibling connection of Michael Myers and Laurie. Laurie works here by not being a copy of the 1978 character. Now a product of trauma, she has run away from life by faking her death and moving far away to California. She has a teenage son (Josh Hartnett) which she pushes away, and drinks to face the bad memories. Laurie is weak, but when her brother returns, she decides she’s had enough of running and goes on the attack to reclaim her identity. In the end she finally kills her brother (let’s ignore the stupidity that brought back The Shape) Halloween: Resurrection), and can breathe and be itself again.
1. Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott in ‘Scream’ (1996)
Wes Craven saved the horror genre in the 1990s. There’s no greater example than this movie, which reinvented the slasher, with a meta-take first explored in New nightmare. Here the figures of speech are not only used, but shouted, ridiculed, examined and bent over. Sidney Prescott fits the latest girl trope perfectly as a virginal and timid good girl. As with many, she too faces tragedy, as her mother was murdered months before. When a Ghostface killer starts killing her friends and comes after her, Sidney gives us a performance expected for one last girl without turning into a parody. She is strong and inventive in her own way, and smart enough to outwit not one but two killers. It’s a portrait so familiar yet original that audiences aren’t tired of Sidney as the last girl, even four films and twenty-five years later.