Barb of ‘Stranger Things’ and 12 Other Amazing Fan Favorite Characters Killed in Horror Movies

01 Ben – Night of the Living Dead

The one thing that George A. Romero has always successfully done is inject powerful and unmistakable social commentary in his films. If you trace the steps of the first three pictures in his Dead franchise, you’ll really, really begin to understand Romero’s ulterior motives. The man wasn’t just making movies, he was making social statements, many of which still ring true today.

Watching Night of the Living Dead for the first time, most of us had no idea what Romero had planned. Especially what he had planned for Ben, the strong-willed, determined and intelligent hero of the film, who just so happened to be black.

In the early morning hours after the sudden zombie outbreak of Night of the Living Dead, we see Ben, our lone survivor cautiously scoping out the landscape outside. He’s rightfully frightened by the idea that more shambling corpses may await beyond the battered walls of the farmhouse he’s holed up in. What he never stops to concern himself with is the gang of gung ho white officers and local white volunteers who’ve come together to kill the zombies.

He should have been concerned with those rednecks, as they mistake Ben – from a distance – as a zombie trapped in a house. They execute the man without so much as a second thought, and reality’s racial allegory bowls the viewer over in devastating fashion. The thoughtlessness on the part of the locals is unreal… and the message Romero sends home about the society we live in is nothing short of repulsive.

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