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When thinking about Scream Kings, some names that come to mind might include Robert Englund, Bruce Campbell, and Bill Skarsgård. These actors have truly embodied some special characters that stay in a horror heart until the end of time. But what about Kevin Bacon? Bacon has been a mainstay in the horror genre since 1980 when he helped to kickstart the Friday The 13th franchise. Cult favorites like Tremors and Flatliners as well as more recent horror films like They/Them and You Should Have Left remind us that Kevin Bacon is a Scream King who doesn’t get the appreciation he deserves.
His First Time
Bacon’s first horror role presented itself with Friday The 13th where he played Jack Burrell, a camp counselor who is headed to Camp Crystal Lake for the summer to have some fun and set up the camp for the incoming attendees. One of the most notable kills in this film is Jack’s. He is killed while smoking a joint by getting an arrow stabbed through his neck from front to back. After Friday The 13th, Bacon starting raking in the horror roles. His next most popular role came from Tremors, playing Val McKee, who is desperate to get out of his boring town. Right before he skips town, McKee discovers and fights off evil human flesh-craving worms that were burrowing underground. Tremors became a cult classic among horror lovers everywhere because of the combination of horror, comedy, and even western genre tropes.
From there, Bacon kept slashing his way through roles. Flatliners, exploring the age-old question of what happens after death, has him playing an atheist who keeps everyone around him grounded during strange experiences. In Stir Of Echoes, he plays a man plagued by hallucinations of a dead girl and other alarming visions. To keep up with versatility, he switches gears in Hollow Man, where he becomes violent and monstrous after figuring out how to turn himself invisible.
After a brief hiatus from horror, he returns in 2015 to take the role of FBI Agent Ryan Hardy on the show The Following. In The Following, Hardy comes face to face with a cult leader whose ultimate goal is to exact revenge on Hardy for arresting him years prior. In 2016, he stars in The Darkness, where a man and his family are plagued by a poltergeist. The two most recent films we have from Bacon are You Should Have Left and They/Them. You Should Have Left shows Bacon as a man who experiences haunting and sinister sights in a vacation home with his family triggered by his past transgressions. In They/Them, Bacon plays the owner of a conversion camp where he tortures LGBTQ+ youth into changing their identity or sexuality.
A Number of Versatile Horror Roles
It’s likely that your brain doesn’t go to Kevin Bacon when thinking about profound horror actors, but it should. Looking at the most popular actors in the genre right now, the majority of them are known for playing one role, but playing it very well. While they’ve been in many other films, we predominantly know stars like Robert Englund and Bruce Campbell for their roles as Freddy Krueger and Ash Williams, respectively. Kevin Bacon is up there in number of horror films that he has starred in, and each of those roles are wildly different from film to film.
Instead of being typecast into one character, Bacon shows range from victor to villain to victim across the board in horror. Because of his long and diverse career in acting, his knack for horror gets swept under the rug when it should be placed on the mantle in plain sight. There aren’t many other actors who have played such diverse roles in different horror films, but he keeps coming back for more.
What’s Next for Bacon in Horror?
Since our beloved star seems to be making a run at the horror genre again, some confirmations and rumors have started to spread about what he will do next. The Hollywood Reporter confirmed that we will get to see Bacon starring in the remake of Toxic Avenger. According to the same report, we will see Bacon returning as the villain of the remake. Referencing the great Robert Englund again, there have also been some rumors that Kevin Bacon is the obvious choice to play Freddy Krueger in A Nightmare On Elm Street franchise’s eventual reboot. Bacon seems relatively keen on taking the role should it be offered to him, and we can only imagine what type of dastardly villain he would become to embody Freddy.
Kevin Bacon is a veteran of film and a star that makes us trust the quality of film that we are about to watch. He is such a national treasure and pillar in film that the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon theory became a fun parlor game. The concept of this game is similar to six degrees of separation, where we are able to make connections to anyone in six or fewer steps, but with Kevin Bacon being the main connection to connect other celebrities. Even though he has received roles in mainstream popular films, he still finds time to come back to his roots and accept roles within the horror genre. Despite some of the films he’s been in not being up to par, we can still trust that he will deliver his best to any role he is given, whether its small town hero, invisible martyr, or bigoted camp owner. That range and diversity in roles across his horror career are what makes Kevin Bacon seriously underrated when ranking Scream Kings.
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