My Heart Is a Chainsaw

The contrast between justice and revenge serves as a key theme throughout My Heart Is a Chainsaw, particularly through Jade’s analysis of the relationship between the final girl and the antagonist of a slasher movie. Jade’s “Slasher 101” extra credit papers to Mr. Holmes affiliate the antagonist of the slasher with the notion that justice is equivalent to revenge: “[He] comes back to dispense his violent brand of justice, and he’s not listening to excuses or apologies because there’s not one single one that could ever be even halfway enough, his mission is carving and he’s not stopping until he’s stopped” (33). The antagonist kills to avenge a past wrong, allowing the audience of the film to root for the bad guy as well as fear him. However, Jade argues that within the ethics of the slasher film, revenge is not sufficient to enact justice. She sees the final girl as a necessary culmination of the antagonist’s quest for revenge, the consequence that the killer deserves after enacting violent justice. She writes that “he thought he was the one in charge. Wrong. He was fashioning his own death. He was building the perfect killing machine” (48).