The document discusses how the horror genre established tropes of the victim and Final Girl in slasher films. Victims engage in sexuality and die as punishment, while Final Girls survive through their intelligence and lack of sexuality. These tropes also appear in the films Rosemary's Baby and Grace, where the mothers, Rosemary and Madeline, take on aspects of the Final Girl through their suffering for their children. Rosemary accepts motherhood to Satan's son, while Madeline's body is drained by her undead daughter's need for blood and flesh. Both films show how the mothers' choices determine their horrific fates of serving evil offspring.

1. Expecting The Worst: Maternity and The Horror Genre
By: Todd Peterson
The horror genre has a gruesome history of creating certain rules and character types.
Sexuality and drug use leads to the death of several teenagers at the hands of knife wielding
psychopaths. They created their own rules, which only the pure can survive. As Carol J. Clover,
the author of Men, Women, and Chainsaws, writes, “The image most of the distressed female
most likely to linger in memory is the image of the one who did not die: the survivor, or Final
Girl”1. Archetypes were created, and young women could become icons known as Scream
Queens. It is a system of thinking, especially around these female characters, that eventually
permeated into other areas of the horror genre. Even in situations outside of the slasher mold
these tropes could be seen. The mothers of Rosemary’s Baby and Grace align with the tradition
of the slasher’s Final Girl simply because their fates however bleak are ultimately determined by
their own choices.
Out of the carnage of the horror genre, arose two very different representations of female
characters. The slasher genre has allowed for the rise of the victim and the Final Girl. While both
are born from the same genre, the two characters are on very different ends of the spectrum.
Because of the dichotomies that arose from this golden age of slasher films, featuring Halloween
and Friday The 13th to name a few, it became clear that these two different characters will suffer
very different fates. The female victim of the genre is typically depicted as a young, attractive
and sexually available female. Her desire for sexual gratification is one that leads to their
eventual murder. When the beautiful and blonde Lynda of Halloween bares her breasts for who
she thinks is her boyfriend, she is soon strangled by the killer Michael Meyers. As Carol J.
Clover discusses in her essay on gender and its relationship with the slasher, “the genre is

2. studded with couples trying to find a place beyond purview of parents and employers where they
can have sex, and immediately afterwards (or during) murdered”1. Because sexuality is treated as
a teenage transgression, they must sneak around to a secluded location to commit this deed. They
become easy targets who are punished for this transgression. When discussing the formula of the
genre, Clover writes, “... The only thing better than one beautiful woman being gruesomely
murdered was a whole series of beautiful women being gruesomely murdered”2. It was a formula
that worked for the studios and for the predominantly male audience. These victims were meant
to titillate the viewer and then provide gruesome fodder to feed the audiences blood lust.
While the victims were meant to die, the Final Girl was meant to live and defeat the
killer. As opposed to following what those around her are doing, she is allowed more autonomy
in her actions. Her unwillingness to follow what those around her are doing, allow her to notice
the rising body count and is eventually spurned to action. Clover notes the Final Girl, “perceives
the full extent of the preceding horror and of her own peril; who is chased, cornered,
wounded...”3. While the victims are killed, it is the Final Girl who suffers as she defends herself.
The victims are not given a chance; however these young women after great hardship can come
out victorious. The notion is one similar to one discussed by Freud with the Madonna-Whore
complex. In accordance with sexual politics, the man places women in two separate categories:
the mother and the whore. The man loathes the women he is sexually attractive to, placing the
sexually attractive female victims in the whore category. Final Girls will fall into the mother
category, while it may not be love, the support of the audience will fall behind her. The theory
appears to be applied as a critique of out of control teenager. The misbehing teenagers are
deserving of punishment, which comes with death. Only the “good girl” deserves salvation and
life. Because of this notion one way the Final Girl is deserving of the mother category is her

3. sexual unavailability. Clover writes about the Final Girl as, “...The girl scout, the bookworm, the
mechanic. Unlike her friends....She is not sexually active”4. Unlike their victim friends, their
sexuality is much more stifled. Their intelligence is what sets them apart from their victim
counterparts. This intelligence allows her to realize the danger around her, and eventually lead
her to victory. With the prevalence of certain tropes of the slasher genre, certain dichotomies
were created. One group survives the onslaught of the killer and the others die.
However these notions could be seen in other areas of the horror genre. While not
slashers, female protagonists of most horror movies carry the similar traits of the Final girl.
There intuitive nature is one that allows them to notice the dangers while making their own
choices allowing for survival. The mothers of Rosemary’s Baby and Grace, while in different
sub-genres of horror, exhibit these similar characteristics. But the situations here are not as black
and white as those in slashers where it is either life or death. Here the situation is more complex,
and the desires of the mothers for a baby lead them to make different choices. Not ones of their
own survival, but ones for the survival of their children no matter the cost. Situations,
exaggerated in certain terms, could easily be applied to a real life pregnancy. And the decisions
these mothers make them suffer, similarly to the Final Girl.
Rosemary’s Baby offers a gothic approach to the conflict Rosemary must grapple with
during her demonic pregnancy. Set in an apartment building where a macabre past of witchcraft,
cannibalism, and devil worship still permeate the walls. This past will come to haunt Rosemary
as her pregnancy moves forward. Yet it is the very real physical aspect of her pregnancy that
could strike a terrifying chord with mothers who yearn for a child. After a surreal nightmare
where she is defiled by a monster, she wakes covered in scratches that her husband Guy says he
caused when he made love to her after passing out during a romantic evening. She soon

4. discovers and is thrilled to be pregnant, beginning her terrifying pregnancy. Early on she is
struck with an unbearable pain. Her pregnancy eats away at her health, and drains the color from
her face. While the supernatural element is ambiguous at first, the film utilizes a very real
scenario to strike fear. A representation of something very wrong with the child, and puts both in
danger. It is a situation that could strike fear into any expectant mother. But Rosemary’s desire
for a child forces her to deal with the pain. As her friends try to help, she tearfully declares she
will not have an abortion. None of them mention it as a possible solution, but she refuses to
entertain even the notion of it. It is a clear solution, but the prospect of losing the child prevents
her from taking that step. She chooses to suffer with this pain; she refuses to lose the child she
was so excited to have.
Madeline, the mother in Grace, looks at a different fear of pregnancy and the painful
choices that must be made. Here the possibility of not being capable of having children is
brought to the fore front. Madeline mentions early on her and her husband lost two children, and
that she has been taking fertility drugs. Her attempts to conceive a child lead to success and she
has been doing everything to ensure its safety such as an all vegan diet. But when a car crash
robs her of her husband, it also takes her child away. No matter what precautions can be made,
there is always a possibility a child could be lost in the womb. Robbed of her miracle child,
Madeline makes an unusual choice. According to an interview with the director the plot comes
from, “... Actual medical science that if you’re pregnant and you lose your child and labor isn’t
induced, you can carry your baby to term, and that it is a decision women make more frequently
than it is commonly discussed”5. Madeline chooses to carry her dead child to term. The Final girl
formula is transplanted into the realm of body horror, where Madeline chooses to carry her dead
child in her womb. The anxiety caused by losing her child now a constant reminder. She suffers

5. knowing that a child has once again been taken away. Suffering even more as she carries the
thing she was robbed of inside of her. It is an anxiety that could plague any mother, to lose their
child still in the womb. But to carry it to term would make that fear all the more constant.
With the death of the killer, the suffering of the Final Girl is brought to an end and they
are finally safe. However with the success of these slashers Hollywood, like their audiences,
were ready for more. And with that, Michael Meyers grabbed his butcher knife and Freddy
Krueger sharpened the blades on his gloves. These slashers quickly grew into full-fledged
franchises, pitting the Final Girls back against their adversaries or creating new Final Girls.
While the victims were dead and buried, the Final Girls must live with the outcome of the
rampages, sometimes becoming victims themselves. With the slasher, they lived on in fear of the
next attack. In Rosemary’s Baby and Grace they experience similar circumstances. Without the
sequels, the endings of these movies become bleak representations of entering motherhood. The
Final Girls have their fates placed on their shoulders. Here, these mothers have to choose what
fates and lives they will lead with their horrifying offspring. It becomes a matter of how badly
they want to be with the children they yearned for so dearly, and whether the outcome is worth it.
As the delivery date approaches, Rosemary grows increasingly paranoid of her baby’s
safety. With the satanic cult lurking around her, she begins searching for ways to save herself and
her child. It is not until the chilling ending that she realizes how involved they truly were. After
delivering her child, she is told it has died. But when she investigates a baby’s cries echoing
through the building, she finds her child with the cult itself. The child is never revealed it is her
horrified expression that hints at the monster in the cradle. It represents what the very real fear of
her pain during pregnancy, the fact that something really was wrong with her child. This shows
the very real possibility of birth defects becoming a possibility. However, Rosemary is given a

6. choice in regards to her demonic son. She is told that she could still be a mother to her child and
would not be forced to join the cult. After considering it, she goes and rocks her baby’s cradle
accepting the offer of being the mother to Satan’s son. As the cult gathers around her as she rocks
her son to sleep, it is clear that her fate will not be one of maternal bliss with her newborn.
Grace takes a radically different look at the welcoming of a child into a new mom’s life.
Here, it is a baby that sucks the life out of the figure who cares for it. When Madeline delivers
her baby, she somehow wills her baby to life. The miracle baby she had lost is brought back to
life, and she is thrilled to fulfill her role as mother. However, she quickly realizes there is
something wrong with Grace. This bundle of joy has a taste for blood. Blood she gets from
painful breast feeding sessions that wear away at Madeline. Madeline’s suffering continues when
her daughter is brought back to life. She appears exhausted and her daughter’s taste for blood
leaves her anemic, and must take huge amounts of vitamins to survive. She quickly learns that
she is in over her head, something a single mother would fear to realize. She is faced with a
choice of whether this monstrous baby should be kept. However her desire for this daughter
leads her to put her own body on the line. And as the body count rises it is clear that she made
her choice, and it is one she will be forced to live with. An especially bleak future lies ahead
when Madeline reveals that Grace needs more blood and is starting to teeth.
The mothers of Rosemary’s Baby and Grace bring the trope of the Final Girl to other
areas of the horror genre. Just like the Final Girl of slasher films, both women suffer albeit with
more complex circumstances. As opposed to the victims whose main purpose is to provide sex
appeal and bloodshed. However the fates of these women are greatly different, as the Final Girl's
is one forced on her and these two mothers choose their fate because of their kids. These mothers
become very different variations of women in horror. Not entirely victims and not entirely

7. Clover's Final Girls. Here we see how one's own choices lead to the horror they experience, and
their film's endings show how they must live with their bad choices. Whether it is a life doomed
to serve Satan and his child or a life where a woman's body becomes an undead child's feeding
ground of flesh and blood.
1 Carol J. Clover, “Her Body, Himself: Gender in The Slasher Film” in Dread of Difference, ed.
Barry Keith Grant. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1996), 80.
2 Clover, “Her Body, Himself”, 80.
3 Clover, “Her Body, Himself”, 82.
4 Clover, “Her Body, Himself”, 84.
5 James Gracey, “Exclusive: Interview with Paul Solet – Writer/Director of Grace”, Behind The
Couch Blog, July 24, 2009.
http://watchinghorrorfilmsfrombehindthecouch.blogspot.com/2009/07/exclusive-
interview-with-paul-solet.html.