By the end of the 80s teen slasher movies were literally hacking themselves to pieces following a tried and tested formula: a tragic event leaves someone mentally scarred, several decades later said person returns on the anniversary of the incident or public holiday, local teens start dropping like flies in a variety of different ways by a shadowy masked figure, the authorities prove useless, one girl (or sometimes a boy) is forced into a showdown with the killer, the killer is unmasked throwing all relative red herrings aside, The End. Everyone is familiar with the formula but this is because it works so well – there is a certain comfort in knowing the slasher guidelines. More
