by Victoria Potenza, Staff Writer

Since it is October it’s the perfect time to focus on a spooky lady killer. And what is scarier than a menstruating teenage girl, let alone one that is also turning into a werewolf? This month I will focus on Ginger Fitzgerald from the film Ginger Snaps. This Canadian horror classic is one that is near and dear to my heart. It is written by Karen Walton who does an incredible job highlighting the horrors of becoming a woman. It also has the quintessential Katharine Isabelle performance in her role as Ginger. Ginger is a complex young woman who takes up space and makes feeble men tremble in her wake. 

Ginger Snaps centers around the Fitzgerald sisters. They are considered the creepy freaks of their school, mostly due to their obsession with death. They often take pictures of themselves in bizarre and gory situations and have a pact to kill themselves together. Things begin to change when Ginger is attacked by a werewolf one night, and her sister Bridget begins to see that her sister is turning into a wolf herself. Ginger begins to rack up a body count and Bridget must do whatever she can to save herself and their town. 

Ginger begins to kill because of the insatiable appetite that grows inside of her after the werewolf attack. We see that nothing but the flesh of animals and eventually humans will satiate her. We see that she gets an almost orgasmic high after she is able to feed on her victims. It is the wolf within her that wants to feast and even if she wants to resist it is obvious that she simply cannot control the hunger. However, it is no coincidence that the people who start to die are those she dislikes. She and Bridget are involved in the accidental death of Trina, a girl who mercilessly picks on the two. She eventually kills two faculty members of her school and then sets her sites on Sam the boy that Bridget has started hanging out with. Jealously fuels her in her quest to get Sam’s attention and once he rejects her sexual advances she decides he has to die. I mean what do you expect a teenage girl to do with an insane amount of power? Use it to smite her enemies and the boys that ignore her obviously. 

One of the most interesting aspects of this film is that it does not try hard to make Ginger a sympathetic character. The majority of the film is shown through the perspective of her sister Bridget; who is younger and is covets her older sister. She wants to spend all her time with Ginger and wants to do what she can to please her and be cool in her eyes. At the same time, she can be the older bitch of a sister. She has fits and tantrums, especially after she gets her period. We see how puberty and becoming a werewolf, make Ginger change in a way that Bridget simply cannot understand. It bridges a huge gap between the duo. Ginger gets hair in strange places, she starts to dress more maturely, and she begins to have a crazy sex drive. All of this looks scary to a younger sister. Unfortunately sometimes high school girls just arent that sympathetic; they are going through a hell of a time and it often shows. 

While their relationship is complicated, it is clear that the sisters love each other. If you grew up with two other younger sisters like I did you can understand how brutal those relationships can be. But there is also a level of loyalty that always remains. Even at her worst Ginger will not leave her sister, and Bridget risks her life to save Ginger. The two are inseparable even if they cannot understand what the other is going through. Ginger can murder half the town and Bridget will still be there trying to pick up all the pieces. Sisters got to stick by each other because who else could ever relate. 

But who can understand this character better than the woman who portrayed her, Katharine Isabelle. In an interview with Den of Geeks Isabelle discusses what resonates with the character of Ginger “That’s what she’s about. She’s about fuck you, fuck the patriarchy, fuck the standard, fuck society, fuck the norm. And to me, that’s a hero.” That is a hero to me too. I can see how some people might not relate to or understand Ginger but I think if you were a little bit of a fucked up teen girl than some of this will probably ring true. There is so much anger and confusion in Ginger’s character. And when you are going through puberty it truly feels like no other living being on the planet could ever understand what you are going through. For all her faults she is a total badass. 

Ginger’s character is a tragic one. While there are two other Ginger Snaps sequels, her true story ends with the first film. Ginger and the film as a whole still resonate today. The true horrors of this movie are the horrors of becoming a woman and the real villain is the patriarchy. Ultimately Ginger does not need to be a sympathetic character because if you know what it was like to be in her shoes then you can empathize with her. And if you have not experienced what it’s like to be a teenage girl, then she should scare you. She is the ultimate monstrous feminine because she shows how dark the female experience is and she is not afraid to shove it in your face.