As far as movies go, horror hasn’t usually been the most popular of genres. In fact, horror movies are currently at their most popular in decades, according to this 2017 Forbes article, which discusses the several horror blockbusters that brought in a hefty amount of dough in the past year.

Yet, as an amateur horror fan, I constantly wonder why horror is so often left in the dust (only to be polished once a year during the fall) when there are so many amazing female leads. Yes, of course, the blood and gore and guts have something to do with it, even I still hide behind an army of blankets and an armada of pillows, but bear with me.

The women in horror movies are almost always defending themselves against violent, legally insane male villains—whether it’s Sidney Prescott against Ghostface in “Scream,” Nancy Thompson against Freddy Krueger in “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” or Laurie Strode against Michael Myers in “Halloween,” and so on and so forth. Their bravery and often violent defense tactics are commendable, and that’s not only due to the fact that fighting back is impressive alone but because they’re allowed to do all of that in the first place.

Now, comparing genres is tricky business, but when you take a character like Kimberly Mills in “Taken,” or even Andromeda from “Clash of the Titans” (which is derived from the original myth of Andromeda, which also presents the classical “damsel in distress” trope), and compare them to the women in horror, it’s obvious how much more leg room they have to work with.

Sidney Prescott’s first encounter with Ghostface shows more physicalities and emotional range alone than some female leads or sidekicks in action movies. Like in the corridor scene from “Lucy,” where Lucy fights off various men by telekinetically lifting them to the ceiling due to her new mental capabilities (albeit she does fight off another man earlier in the film, but uses sexuality in order to trap him); in that scene she is allowed to fight back but she does so with no emotion and without physical violence.

Yes, you can argue she does this because of the plot but why did Scarlett Johansson have to completely detach from human emotion after accessing more than 10% of her mental capacity when Bradley Cooper was allowed to have the time of his life in “Limitless”?

Anyway, back to the matter at hand.

So, women in horror movies can be aggressive and they can defend themselves, but they’re also allowed complexity. Nancy Thompson has to deal with a disbelieving father and a mother falling into alcoholism, Wendy Torrance from “The Shining” has to battle with her husband who is slowly slipping into madness, and Sidney Prescott continuously has to work out and conquer trauma from her life over the span of four movies. Even in action-horror movies, like “Resident Evil,” it’s noticeable that the female lead is allowed a personality instead of just being a fighting machine.

The main character, Alice, does fight in every single movie, but it’s also shown how easily she develops care and love for the people around her, even though she tries to deny it; specifically this can be seen in Resident Evil: Retribution when Alice adopts a clone child (one of the thousands that were made as “test dummies”) just because the child thought Alice was its mother.

And this doesn’t only apply to slasher or action movies alone, it can also apply to characters like Lorraine Warren from “The Conjuring,” or even a villain like the infamous Tiffany, from the Chucky franchise. All of these women are allowed desires and fears and fleshed out personalities that make them relatable or intriguing or just downright fantastic.

Obviously, you can’t ignore the harmful themes in horror movies, like “sex equals death” in which it’s usually the newly “deflowered” teen girl is the target or the abuse against women that usually comes from a man. Yet, there’s something invigorating and almost satisfying (as horror movies can often be cathartic) about watching a woman take revenge against a villainous presence without needing any help.

They’re allowed that possibility, that trope of the final girl, where no one is left alive but one single person and that one is a woman who kicks major ass. This is depicted very well in the finale of “Evil Dead” (2013), where Mia kills the demon that raped and possessed her (fair warning for link-clickers, there is an exceeding amount of gore).

This is clearly a conversation that can go on for a long, long while, but let’s hope with this article I’ve been able to bring your attention to the greatness of women in horror movies. This genre is not the most popular and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why (fear being the number one make it or break it choice maker), but despite that, I encourage people to look a little closer a horror movies, because you might find a role model or a favorite protagonist where you thought you would never.

Of course, I also think media is moving down a road where horror takes its place as a steady driver instead of one that lags (especially when it comes to teenage murder mysteries, which is a conversation for another time), so I want to remind movie producers and screenwriters and etc. to not abandon these female characters.

Diversify them please, change their settings, change their roles (female villains are not bad at all), but don’t remove them from the storyline ever. Women dominate horror and while they’re not role models you’d show a five-year-old girl, they’re role models nonetheless.

Thanks, horror ladies, you rock. Please don’t ever leave us.