Taking in a wide range of film, television, and literature, this volume explores 21st century horror and its monsters from an intersectional perspective with a marked emphasis on gender and race. The analysis, which covers over 70 narratives, is organized around four primary monstrous figures--zombies, vampires, witches and monstrous women. Arguing that the current horror renaissance is populated with willful monsters that subvert prevailing cultural norms and systems of power, the discussion reads horror in relation to topics of particular import in the contemporary moment--rampant sexual violence, unbridled capitalist greed, brutality against people of color, militarism, and the patriarchy's refusal to die.
Examining ground-breaking films and television shows such as Get Out, Us, The Babadook, A Quiet Place, Stranger Things, Penny Dreadful, and The Passage, as well as works by key authors like Justin Cronin, Carmen Maria Machado, Helen Oyeyemi, Margo Lanagan, and Jeanette Winterson, this monograph offers a thorough account of the horror landscape and what it says about the 21st century world.

Natalie Wilson is a gender studies professor at Cal State San Marcos in San Diego, California. Her blogs include Dead Ends and Professor, What if.

Table of Contents


Acknowledgments

Preface

Introduction: Monster Matters

1.¿Staying Woke in an Undead World

Section 1: Lurching Engagements with Gender, Race and Class

Section 2: Eradicating Rape Culture ­Zombie-Style

Section 3: The Hopeful Apocalypse and the Zombie Child

Section 4: Undead Conservativism: "Legitimate" Zombie Rape and "Necessary" War

2.¿Draining the Imperialist White-Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy

Section 1: The Rise of the Vampire Activist

Section 2: ­Post-Traumatic Vampire Disorder

Section 3: Ethical Vampirism

Section 4: Viral Vampires and Dystopian Futures

3.¿Wicked Good

Section 1: Revising Witch History

Section 2: Patriarchy Be Damned

Section 3: ­Post-Millennial Fantasy and Fairy Tale Witches

Section 4: Conjuring Retribution

4.¿Woman, Thy Name Is Monster

Section 1: Gothic Monstrosity in Feminist Guise

Section 2: Get Out of My House! Banishing Systemic Monsters

Section 3: Gendered Discontent in 21st Century Creature Features

Section 4: Medusa Figures in ­Post-Millennial Horror

Conclusion: The Monster's Tools

Chapter Notes

Bibliography

Film and Television Series

Index