Decisions, decisions, decisions. Are they bad? Yes. Do we love them? Also yes.
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00:00Some are done with good intent, and some are done out of pure stupidity, but there is no
00:04denying that the decisions made by some horror movie protagonists leave much to be desired
00:09either way.
00:10Choices are a big part of how a plot can unfold within a movie, and in no genre is this more
00:15apparent than within horror.
00:16One small wrong decision can lead to a cascade of other events that, more often than not,
00:21are catalysts for a particular character's downfall.
00:23And that's what we're going to be talking about today, as I'm Jules, this is WhatCulture.com,
00:27and these are 8 exact decisions that doomed horror movie protagonists.
00:318.
00:32Urinating on the Tree – Mark Midsommar
00:35Many, many mistakes can be identified in Midsommar, but the most stupid decision that solidified
00:40the fate of Will Poulter's character Mark is that of urinating on a sacred tree.
00:44Midsommar is a folk horror film by Ari Aster that came a year after his directorial debut,
00:49Hereditary.
00:50He took a different angle with Midsommar, deciding to use overexposure and bright lighting
00:55and horror.
00:56And we're invited along on a trip with a group of college friends who are writing their
00:59thesis on this particular Swedish community, and immediately a few of the characters are
01:03shown to have questionable levels of intelligence.
01:05Mark, the most arrogant of this group, decides to urinate on a tree on the very first day
01:09of the friends being in the community.
01:11This angers multiple people, but most specifically one gentleman that later on in the film takes
01:15much pleasure in Mark's death.
01:17Of course, Mark and the rest of the group were very much brought to Sweden by their
01:20Swedish friends to be sacrifices, so their fate was kind of predestined to a certain
01:24degree anyway.
01:25However, this very much solidified his fate.
01:287.
01:29Saving the Children – Lee, A Quiet Place
01:32A Quiet Place was a fantastic break into the genre for dynamic duo Emily Blunt and John
01:37Krasinski, and they certainly did not disappoint with their creative aptitude.
01:41A story centred around familial relations and the importance of these, the audience
01:44follows the Abbott family who have recently lost a young son, to the creatures that now
01:48dominate this post-apocalyptic world who hunt purely based off of sound.
01:52It's clear just how much this family loves one another, and at no point in the film is
01:56this more apparent than the film's final few moments that sees Lee sacrifice himself
02:00in order to save his remaining children from being killed.
02:03He lets out a gut-wrenching scream that, after 90 minutes of very minimal dialogue, and the
02:08dialogue that is present being extremely quiet, comes as a harrowing shock to the audience.
02:13Moments after doing this, the creatures descend upon Lee, and we have to watch as his children
02:16witness their father being killed, and knowing that the end of his life was caused by them.
02:226.
02:23Shaming Ganouche – Christine, Drag Me to Hell
02:26Sam Raimi's Drag Me to Hell was a fun addition to the supernatural horror sub-genre, and
02:30although lacking in actual scariness, it did manage to provide a relatively well-rounded
02:34plot and twist in its final few moments.
02:37Protagonist Christine finds herself head-to-head with a fellow colleague for a big promotion
02:41at her workplace as a bank loan officer.
02:43She meets Ganouche, an Eastern European lady who is looking for another extension on her
02:47mortgage to stop her house from being repossessed.
02:49However, moments earlier we learn that Christine has been told by her boss that in order to
02:53be in running for the promotion, she is going to need to prove that she can make difficult
02:57decisions.
02:58This particular difficult decision comes in the form of rejecting her mortgage extension
03:01request, which results in Christine being ambushed by Ganouche in the parking lot shortly
03:05after, and the old woman cursing one of Christine's buttons that she rips from her coat.
03:10As you can imagine, the remainder of this film is Christine trying to find ways to lift
03:13the curse that was put upon her, and serves as a lesson to those who act in their own
03:17self-interest.
03:185.
03:20Stranger Danger – Lorna, Hostel Part 2
03:23The Hostel franchise leaves very little to the imagination in terms of gore, hence its
03:27role in moulding what is now known as the sub-genre of torture porn horror.
03:32After the slow start and trajectory of the first movie, audiences hoped for a more fast-paced
03:36and to-the-point plot that relied more on gore than actual storytelling substance, and
03:40Eli Roth very much delivered.
03:43Following a similar plot to its predecessor, Hostel Part 2 sees a trio of friends, Lorna,
03:47Whitney, and Beth, all go off to Slovakia with a friend who tells them of a fantastic
03:51spa retreat.
03:52The audience then returns to the hostel from the previous movie, and soon enough, odd things
03:56begin to happen.
03:57During a party that the four women go to, Lorna is seduced by a gentleman who claims
04:00to have good intentions with her, and despite her friend's warning, she decides to go with
04:04him.
04:06The man indeed does not have Lorna's best interest at heart, and not before long she
04:09is hung upside down in a chamber before being split open from navel to throat.
04:154.
04:16Taking a Shortcut – Hutch, The Ritual
04:18So The Ritual is a fantastic addition to Britain's repertoire of every five years or so just
04:23coming out with a half-decent horror film.
04:24It follows the holiday of friends Phil, Hutch, Luke, and Dom, who all go hiking in the Swedish
04:29mountains to honour the memory of their late friend Rob, whom Luke blames himself for the
04:33death of.
04:34Of course, there are tensions within the group as the audience comes to learn that Luke was
04:37present at the moment of Rob's murder in a robbery turned murder at an off-licence.
04:42The rest of the group try their hardest not to blame Luke for Rob's death, but it's
04:45clear that some of them still do.
04:47One friend, which seems to blame Luke more than any of the others, is Dom, who sprains
04:50his ankle very soon into the hike.
04:53This simple injury when paired with being in the depths of a Swedish forest spells trouble
04:57for the group, however it's only when Hutch suggests that his friends take a shortcut
05:00through the dense undergrowth that the trouble really begins.
05:03One main takeaway of this film would be, do not stray from the path you know is safest.
05:073.
05:08Breaking the Rules – Amanda, Saw 3
05:11The Saw movies are well-known for their tricks and intricate games, and in no film within
05:15the franchise is this more apparent than in its third instalment, Saw 3.
05:19By the end of the film, it's a well-known fact that John Kramer is a gentleman with
05:22a rather devious side and a hankering for players of his games to stick strictly to
05:27the rules laid out in front of them, and despite knowing this, Jigsaw's apprentice Amanda
05:31seems to believe that she's exempt from this rule.
05:34After battling for the entire movie to keep Kramer alive by kidnapping a surgeon, Amanda
05:38apparently forgot that she too is being tested by Kramer, despite him actively telling her
05:43this.
05:44Her death is brought about by her own recklessness and unwillingness to abide by the rules of
05:47her predecessor.
05:48We can hardly say that seeing her death on screen was not at least a little bit satisfying,
05:52as by this point in the franchise Amanda had made her presence known in the worst possible
05:57way.
05:58Overall, Amanda's downfall comes from not doing the one thing that Kramer warned her
06:01of months earlier, play by the rules.
06:042.
06:05The Handcuffs – Veins – The Descent Part 2
06:08The Descent Part 2 divided fans of the predecessor as to whether or not it was A, good, and B,
06:14necessary.
06:15However, one thing that fans could agree on was that it was refreshing to see a sequel
06:18that wasn't based around an entirely new group of people and new plot.
06:21The sequel created the perfect synthesis of old and new, which fans everywhere could at
06:25least acknowledge was a good start.
06:27Not so much a protagonist, but still a very relevant member of the cast, is that of Veins,
06:32who is a police officer assigned to the missing persons case of the group of female cave explorers
06:36from the first film, yet we soon discover that he believes the sole survivor of the
06:40expedition, Sarah, is the reason behind the woman's disappearances.
06:44Due to this belief, Veins actually handcuffs himself to Sarah while down in the caves in
06:49an attempt to stop her from running away.
06:51This decision is obviously quite an awful one, as soon after the two find themselves
06:54in a life-threatening situation that results in Veins' arm having to be chopped off so
06:58that Sarah can survive, leaving the officer to plummet to his death off of a cliff.
07:031.
07:04The Benefit of the Doubt – Aaron Kreepe
07:07This found-footage flick is an immaculately crafted film from start to finish, and what
07:11makes it even more impressive is the lead duo's ability to hold the attention of the
07:16audience despite only having the two men on screen for the entire movie and never introducing
07:20any more characters.
07:22This on-screen dynamic is to die for and reaches a true precipice in the film's final
07:26act.
07:27It's abundantly clear that Joseph is a strange individual, and that he has an unhealthy obsession
07:32with Aaron.
07:33Joseph gives Aaron multiple reasons not to trust him, and this is only further solidified
07:37by his increasingly unnerving behavior even after Aaron leaves Joseph's house.
07:41Which should've spelled the end of the filmmakers' discomforting ordeal, right?
07:44Well, after receiving threatening items in the mail from Joseph, Aaron still decides
07:48to give his odd counterpart benefit of the doubt and entertains him when Joseph asks
07:52for the two to meet in a public place, which in theory should have secured Aaron's safety.
07:56However, this decision of Aaron to still go and see Joseph is fatal, and ends up with
08:00an axe being struck firmly through his head as the audience can do nothing but watch in
08:04horror from a camera angle that is set up from the inside of Aaron's car.
08:08And there we go, my friends.
08:09Those were 8 exact decisions that doomed horror movie protagonists.
08:12I hope that you enjoyed that, and please let me know what you thought about it down in
08:15the comments section below.
08:16As always, I've been Jules, you can go follow me over on Twitter at RetroJ with a zero,
08:20or you can swing by Liv and Let's Dice where I do all of my Warhammer Battle Reports and
08:23streaming outside of work, and it'd be great to see you over there, my friends.
08:26But before I go, I just want to say one thing.
08:29I hope you treat yourself well with love and respect.
08:31That is a decision that will not doom you, my friend, because you are a big ledge and
08:34you deserve all of the best things in life like love, happiness, and success, and don't
08:38let anyone or anyone else tell you otherwise, alright?
08:40I want you to go out there and smash your life goals today.
08:43I believe in you.
08:44As always, I've been Jules, you have been awesome, never forget that, and I'll speak
08:48to you soon.
08:49Bye.