Horror on wheels: Pop-culture icons that terrify

Wed Oct 29, 2014 12:01 AM
Last update on: Sun Mar 8, 2015 01:53 AM

The Green Stig

Wed Oct 29, 2014 12:01 AM Last update on: Sun Mar 8, 2015 01:53 AM

We've covered evil tuner cars, and to keep the Halloween theme going, here's our list of the scariest appearances of four wheeled horrors in popular culture.

Stephen King's Christine

No one does American style horror better than Stephen King, and his most iconic creation yet is a 1958 Plymouth Fury possessed by supernatural spirits, a violent, destructive nature, and the ability to fix itself. What it does best is terrorize the owners and the people who dares to cross it's path, and generally act like the overly attached girlfriend of the owner.

The best scenes from Christine? Watch them here

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Jeepers Creepers

Jeepers Creepers is a clichéd horror movie with a fantastic opening sequence: an old Chevy truck tries to run down a pair of siblings on holiday, driven by a fearsome creature which is hungry for human flesh. That opening sequence has its merits mostly because of the main star: the truck. If only the actors had as much skill as that truck, we could have had a well-rounded film to complement the start of the movie.

Here's the Jeepers Creepers creepy truck chase scene.

From A Buick 8

Another supernatural car from Stephen King, “From a Buick 8” never got the same amount of attention as “Christine” did, and was never made into a film. The book, however, is somewhat a cult classic, and much more than a rehash of an old script. Recommended reading for gearheads who want a few chills up the spine.

Devil Z

While Initial D takes the crown as the most popular automotive manga/anime from Japan, Wangan Midnight takes a well-deserved second spot. Centering on a teenager who is hell-bent on restoring and street racing an apparently cursed Datsun Fairlady Z he found in a junkyard, Wangan Midnight had brilliant storytelling and depicted intense highway battles between a cursed car trying to kill its driver and other cars trying to run the Z off the road. There's evena full length movie out and its on youtube here.

Duel

Steven Spielberg toyed with the idea of a psychotic truck driver running people off the road long before “Jeepers Creepers”. Duel will leave you on the edge of your seat, inwardly praying for the survival of the protagonists. It created an entire generation of drivers who are irrationally afraid of trucks and truck-drivers, much like Spielberg's masterpiece, Jaws, made people fear sharks and open water.

Check out the Duel chase scene here.

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