Character development

[Dr. Briggs]

I know not everyone watches horror for this, but I enjoy it in every genre when writers put some effort into showing how the events of one film mold them. Lots of horror is known for having static stereotypes throughout, but by no means is this always the case; in just about every Saw film the characters go through some great change, as do most home-invasion subgenre films (That's usually a big point).

...It's even more special when development is done within franchises, although many new writers seek rather to make characters consistant or recapture the flavor of the original films. IMO this is done to a point in the Nightmare on Elm Street series, though many say this is just due to writers making Freddy jokier and jokier as the movies went on. More examples include the Evil Dead films, the Child's Play series, and the Phantasm movies.

Any of you have favorite twisting progressions of characters within films?

[Friday The 13th]

I do like me some Character Development!
I like how in the F13 Remake, Jason has more of a though process...

[Dr. Briggs]

You know, even in the old ones Jason kind of had some character development throughout the films; he was portrayed as more of an ignorant child in part II, who only learned of killing with his mother's death, but that changed and he became a sort of psychopathic hillbilly with III (For one thing, we never see him "defend" his mother after part II, and many times he kills people who aren't even near the camp starting I think with the store-owning couple from the start of III).

By IV Jason has pretty much changed into a death machine, and in VI onward he's a full-fledged "boogeyman" (His heart is shown as something pure evil in JGTH, which wasn't exactly the vibe we got before IV >.>).

[FreddysFingers]

28 Days Later - The main character goes through a dramatic character shift; from being a very scared person to actually going all out and turning into a badass. I think it's one of the more prominent examples of character development in horror.

The films of Cronenberg often play with it's characters. Brundle (The Fly '86) goes from a very brilliant, somewhat shy and really nice guy to a conceded, douche and then at the end he comes full circle and realized what he has done. I think another one could be Videodrome.

Day of the Dead - more of zombie character progression.

[Friday The 13th]

You know, even in the old ones Jason kind of had some character development throughout the films; he was portrayed as more of an ignorant child in part II, who only learned of killing with his mother's death, but that changed and he became a sort of psychopathic hillbilly with III (For one thing, we never see him "defend" his mother after part II, and many times he kills people who aren't even near the camp starting I think with the store-owning couple from the start of III).

By IV Jason has pretty much changed into a death machine, and in VI onward he's a full-fledged "boogeyman" (His heart is shown as something pure evil in JGTH, which wasn't exactly the vibe we got before IV >.>).

Your right he has developed over time