The Black Guy Dies First: Black Horror Cinema from Fodder to Oscar

Black filmmaker Jordan Peele’s Oscar-winning film Get Out signaled the mainstream horror cinematic arrival of Black actors and creators on their journey from bargain-basement projects and stereotypical bit parts, explains media studies scholar Coleman (assoc. provost, Northwestern Univ.; Horror Noire: Blacks in American Horror Films from the 1890s to Present) and entertainment journalist Harris (creator of BlackHorrorMovies.com). Chronicling the treatment of Black characters in horror movies, they name names and mark milestones of groundbreaking, innovative Black writers, directors, and performers who set the scenes for bold, unapologetic for-us-by-us Black cinema to produce horror projects that increasingly revolve around Black people in front of and behind the camera. They place the 1968 film Night of the Living Dead and the 1967 Spider Baby as ahead-of-their-time cinema with Black characters that undermined social mores of violence, sexuality, and general decorum and inspired entire subgenres within horror.