Monstrous Possibilities: The Female Monster in 21st Century Screen Horror

202 Pages·2022·3.483 MB·English

by  Amanda Howell, Lucy Baker

Monstrous Possibilities
The Female Monster in
21st Century Screen
Horror
Amanda Howell · Lucy Baker
Monstrous Possibilities
Amanda Howell • Lucy Baker
Monstrous
Possibilities
The Female Monster in 21st Century Screen
Horror
Amanda Howell Lucy Baker
School of Humanities, Languages, and School of Humanities, Languages, and
Social Science Social Science
Griffith University Griffith University
Nathan, QLD, Australia Nathan, QLD, Australia
ISBN 978-3-031-12843-1 ISBN 978-3-031-12844-8 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12844-8
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2022
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the
publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to
the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The
publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
institutional affiliations.
Cover illustration: Maram_shutterstock.com
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
Switzerland AG.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
In loving memory of Betty Sue Schoeneck Howell
1929–2020
who always enjoyed a good horror movie
and to Fallon, who taught us the importance of Monster High
A
cknowledgements
Stephanie Green is, as we say in Australia, a legend. Without her feedback
and encouragement, this book would not have been completed. A poet
with expertise in feminist theory, Gothic literature and horror cinema:
what better alpha reader could one ask for? Rikke Schubart has also been
a great influence on this work, through her example both as a horror
scholar and as a fan, and especially as the driving force behind the Danish
funded research network, Imagining the Impossible: The Fantastic as
Media Entertainment and Play, which Amanda was lucky enough to be a
part of from 2018 to 2021. Rikke and the other members of the net-
work—Anita Nell Bech Albertsen, Marc Malmdorf Andersen, Cristina
Bacchilega, Mathias Clasen, Stephanie Green, Jakob Ion Wille, Stephen
Joyce, Jesper Juul and Angela Ndalianis—were a tremendous source of
enlightenment and inspiration. Ideas related to Ana Lily Amirpour’s A
Girl Walks Home Alone at Night were developed during network meetings
hosted by Angela Ndalianis at Swinburne University in 2019. Collaborative
publications with Stephanie Green and Rikke Schubart also stimulated the
ideas broached here, especially the co-edited special journal issue ‘“As If”:
Women in Genres of the Fantastic, Cross-Platform Entertainments and
Transmedial Engagements’. Continuum-Journal of Media & Cultural
Studies 33(2) (2019).
On a more personal note, this work would not have been completed
without the love and support of family and friends in Australia and abroad
during the chaos of the past two years. Additionally, there are many, many
colleagues, friends and postgraduate researchers (some of whom aren’t
even fans of horror, or the Gothic) who have provided insight and
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
inspiration over the years, including David Baker, Clare Burnett, David
Ellison, Trish FitzSimons, Margaret Gibson, Jessica Gildersleeve, Sue
Hess, Maryline Kassab, Claire Kennedy, Wendy Keys, Sam Lindop,
J.S.A. Lowe, Hannah Ravell, Sean Redmond, Mark David Ryan, Agnieszka
Stasiewicz-Bieńkowska and Nike Sulway. Discussions about the Gothic,
horror, gender, otherness, monstrosity and the uncanny with students in
the courses Ghosts and the Gothic, World Cinema and Hollywood Cinema
have been important to the ideas developed here—with a special shout-
out to those fans who shared their enthusiasm for The Craft, Ginger Snaps
and Jennifer’s Body over the years.
Likewise, we are very grateful to the School of Humanities, Languages
and Social Science at Griffith University, as the idea for this book was ini-
tially developed during Amanda’s funded research leave in 2019. And,
special thanks go to our HLSS Heads of School and Deputy Heads of
School for Research, who were so supportive during its genesis: James
Carson, Sue Trevaskes, Robbie Mason and Michael Ondaatje. The Griffith
Centre for Social and Cultural Research (GCSCR) provided funds that
contributed to Lucy’s ongoing employment in 2021 and also funded the
copy-editing and indexing of this work. Centre Director Susan Forde has
long been a tremendous source of support and encouragement to research-
ers of our School. Thanks too to GCSCR’s editor, Sue Jarvis, for her
expert assistance.
As this book was written during the years of the pandemic and the cata-
strophic floods that hit Brisbane at the beginning of 2022, we must also
extend our gratitude to those many people whose names we don’t know
who worked tirelessly in service roles—in grocery stores, drug stores, hos-
pitals, delivering food and medication, keeping the ambulances running,
patrolling the rising floodwaters in our suburbs and helping with the
clean-up when the waters receded. They kept us safe and well.
Finally, we wish to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands
on which our university stands and on which this publication was com-
pleted: the Yugarabul, Yuggera, Jagera, Turrbal, Yugambeh and Kombumerri
peoples. We pay our respects to the Elders past, present and emerging, and
extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
May 2022 Amanda Howell and Lucy Baker
c
ontents
1 Introduction: The Monstrous-Feminine Protagonist in
Twenty-First-Century Screen Cultures 1
Part I Othered Mothers 25
2 Her Monster, Her Self: Amelia Sorts a Few Things Out
in The Babadook 27
3 Hungry, Unruly and Bold: A Sitcom Mom’s Zombie
Makeover in Santa Clarita Diet 45
Part II Reimagining the Girl 63
4 ‘I am That Very Witch’: Claiming Monstrosity, Claiming
Desire in The Witch 65
5 ‘Not Yours Any More’: The Monstrous- Feminine
Bildungsroman of The Girl with All the Gifts 83
6 Resistant Girl Monstrosity and Empowerment for
Tweens: Monster High and Wolfblood 99
ix
x CONTENTS
Part III From Fragments of the Old 117
7 A Badass in Bad City: The Interstitial Artist and
Monstrous Self-fashioning in A Girl Walks Home Alone at
Night 119
8 Rage Is a Monster: Lily Frankenstein Takes Back the
Night in Penny Dreadful 135
Part IV Cult Fandoms and Fan Productions 153
9 ‘We are the Weirdos, Mister’: Monstrous Performativity,
Resistant Femininity and Cult Fandoms of The Craft,
Ginger Snaps and Jennifer’s Body 155
10 From Monstrous Girlhood to Empowered Adulthood:
Melissa Hunter’s Adult Wednesday Addams Web Series 175
Index 193
A A
bout the uthors
Amanda  Howell is a senior lecturer in the School of Humanities,
Languages and Social Science at Griffith University, Australia, where she
teaches courses in screen history and aesthetics. Her research focuses on
gender, genre, screen aesthetics and cultures in a sociohistorical frame,
with a recurrent focus on horror as well as other ‘body genres’ such as
action and the musical. Her publications on the Gothic and horror have
appeared in journals such as Continuum, Gothic Studies and Genre, and
she is the author of Popular Film Music and Masculinity in Action: A
Different Tune (2015).
Lucy Baker teaches in the School of Humanities, Languages and Social
Science at Griffith University, Australia, across fields of sociology, cultural
and media studies. Her research focuses primarily on adaptations, gender
and fans. Her work has been published in journals including
Continuum, Journal of Girlhood Studies and The Journal of Fandom
Studies. Her monograph, Media and Gender Adaptation: Regendering,
Critical Creation & the Fans (forthcoming, Bloomsbury, 2023), analy-
ses adaptations and fanfic that change the gender of an original character
and looks at how fans respond to those works.
xi