Who Are the Scariest Characters of All Time?

I still contend that it was rarely my fault but for whatever reason I find myself engaged in much fewer Internet arguments than I did a few years ago. Part of that is because we are post-pandemic and all of the opinions on how that should have been handled ( if it was real at all…) , partly because of where we are in the election cycle and mainly because I just don’t care to engage with those that refuse to consider any viewpoint but their own preconceived notions.

That’s not to say that I’ve given up on online discourse whatsoever, it’s just moved to the nerdier corners of Quora and similar sites where the threads revolve more around which post apocalyptic futures are most likely to come true and which figures from different pop culture universes could beat up who.

One of those debates recently concerned who the scariest characters of all time were, across all mediums, with an attempt made to create a definitive top ten list. If you are judging me right now I totally understand it but it was much more interesting than you might think and I also spent some time that night talking sports so there’s that.

There were the all time greats, the Draculas, Frankenstein’s Monster and Mr. Hyde. Nobody can argue with Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers making the list. I’ve got Pinhead, Leatherface and Candyman on mine but if younger folks want to go with Annabelle, Ghostface and Jigsaw I can certainly see the case to be made. Pennywise the clown was brought up often while the more sophisticated among us made the case for Randall Flagg, The Man In Black from the Stephen King multiverse.

Maybe I was trying too hard to come up with somebody from comics or maybe I was just influenced but my kid’s costume plans for Halloween but I remain convinced that it is ridiculous how little backing I received for the inclusion of The Joker.

He’s one of the most famous villains in all of superhero mythology, a psychopathic nihilist with no clear motive other than to sow chaos. He’s the pop culture embodiment of Carl Jung’s theory of “the shadow”, that hidden part of ourselves that we deny until one bad day causes it to break free. One of the most famous of his many misdeed happens in “The Killing Joke” where the Joker tries to prove this very point by torturing and maiming Commissioner Gordon’s daughter in front of him. In “A Death in the Family” he murders the second Robin, still one of the most controversial Batman stories of all time. He once had his face surgically removed on purpose and pinned to the wall of Arkham Asylum as a symbol of his rebirth as an even crazier person. There’s a lot more.

Maybe he’s not an elite level horror icon but I think the case can be made for at least some consideration. If nothing else, there are enough different iterations to make him a top ten Halloween costume.