Summary

• Many horror movie duos are the heroes of their story, such as The Conjuring franchise's Ed and Lorraine Warren, real-life paranormal investigators portrayed by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga.
• The dynamic between humans and the supernatural is key to many iconic horror movie pairs. For example, Let the Right One in features the friendship between Oskar and Eli, a young boy and a vampire, which is central to the horror and emotional depth of the film.
• Like many horror movie pairs, The Silence of the Lambs showcases the morally opposite pairing of Clarice Starling, an FBI agent, and Hannibal Lecter, a cannibalistic murderer, creating one of the most iconic horror duos in movie history.

The most iconic horror movie duos prove that terrifying movies don't need an ensemble cast of survivors to make an impact. At the start of the first era of Hollywood horror movies, the focus was mostly on the monsters — whether Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, or the Wolf-Man, the victims were never as important. However, in later years — especially when the slasher genre grew in popularity in the 1970s and 80s — the Final Girl and hapless teenagers dying to an axe murderer made it almost as much about the victims as the killers, even if it was just to see how they died.

However, many of the most popular and iconic horror movies focus on duos rather than large groups. The most iconic horror movie duos don't only include pairs of survivors going up against terrifyingly insurmountable odds though. There are many duos that pair a victim with the terror that's stalking them, and many more that are tag-team killers putting an ensemble cast of survivors through hell on earth. Many duos are either responsible for (or victims in) the best horror movie kills of all time too, further adding to their notoriety in the genre.

20 Ed & Lorraine Warren

Vera Farmiga And Patrick Wilson, The Conjuring Franchise

One of the most successful horror franchise of recent years is The Conjuring Universe which started with the 2013 original from which the franchise gets its name. The main Conjuring movies are based around real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga). The movies are loosely based on their real investigations, and the couple as presented in The Conjuring have become an iconic horror duo of paranormal investigators. While spinoffs like The Nun and Annabelle were received well, it is when Ed and Lorraine Warren are together as a duo in the central Conjuring movies that the franchise is at its best.

19 Oskar & Eli

Kare Hedebrant And Lina Leandersson, Let The Right One In

There are two movies based on Let the Right One In novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist. The original, which used the book's title, is from Sweden and played very closely to the source material. In this movie, a young boy named Oskar lives with his mom when he notices a man and her daughter move in next door to their flat. What he soon learns is that the girl is Eli, a vampire, and the man is not her father but her familiar.

Eli saves Oskar from bullies, and they grow close until young Eli decides that he will become her new familiar. Their friendship is as important as the horror of the movie. The American remake Let Me In was also received well, but the original remains the most acclaimed.

18 Hannibal Lecter & Clarice Starling

Anthony Hopkins And Jodie Foster, The Silence Of The Lambs

Not every horror duo is a pair of morally good characters. In the case of The Silence of the Lambs, the duo of Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter are moral polar opposites, yet they remain one of the most iconic in movie history, much less horror movies. Clarice Starling was a young FBI agent trying to figure out the identity of a serial killer named Buffalo Bill. To get into the mind of a serial killer, she interviewed cannibal murderer Hannibal Lecter in his prison cell. The two had a confrontational relationship that developed into something deeper as the movie ran on. Both Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster won an Oscar for their performances.

17 Pearl & Howard

Mia Goth And Stephen Ure/Alistair Sewell, X And Pearl

Two of the biggest surprise movies of 2022 were X and Pearl, which came out months apart. Set decades apart, both starred Mia Goth as Pearl, with the story focusing on her husband Howard and their attempts (and failure) to contain Pearl's murderous impulses. In the first movie, X, they were an elderly couple who turned out to be slasher killers, targeting young adults shooting an adult movie on their property.

While Pearl and Howard were memorable in X, when their backstory was told in Pearl the pair truly came to life. With the younger Howard now played by Alistair Sewell, Pearl elevated the modern horror duo to potential genre icons, as it showed how and why Pearl became a serial killer and why Howard would do anything to protect and serve his bride. A third movie is coming called Maxxine, though this one is unlikely to contain Pearl and Howard.

16 Jack & David

Griffin Dunne And David Naughton, An American Werewolf In London

One of the best werewolf movies ever made arrived in 1981 with John Landis's An American Werewolf In London. What is most interesting about this horror duo is that one of them died early in the movie but stuck around anyway to torment his friend. While David and Jack are backpacking through Yorkshire, a werewolf attacks them, kills Jack, and seriously injures David.

However, David is bitten and is going to turn into a werewolf. As a result, Jack is left walking the Earth until David dies, so he spends the rest of the movie trying to get David to take his own life. The movie is a beloved horror-comedy, and the relationship of cursed duo David and Jack is a big part of its legacy.

15 Tucker & Dale

Tyler Labine And Alan Tudyk, Tucker & Dale Vs Evil

Tucker & Dale vs. Evil is a horror comedy that subverts the entire genre. The film sets itself up like a typical horror movie set in the woods, with a group of kids headed out to the wilderness where it looks like they might end up stalked by Deliverance-like slasher villains. When they find the completely innocent protagonists of the movie, forest-dwelling hillbillies Tucker and Dale, it becomes clear that the seemingly obvious plot is Tucker & Dale Vs. Evil's central conceit.

Like viewers, the kids assume that Tuck and Dale are deranged slasher killers, though the audience quickly realizes that the horror duo are just two harmless forest-dwellers who are at their cabin for a relaxing time. When the kids decide to be proactive and fight the two, accidents start happening, and the kids start dying. The horrified reactions from Tucker and Dale make each and every death even better.

14 Adam & Eve

Tom Hiddleston And Tilda Swinton, Only Lovers Left Alive

Jim Jarmusch is one of the most credible indie filmmakers of the last 30 years and in 2013, he directed a horror dark comedy called Only Lovers Left Alive. The movie is a vampire story about two ancient vampires named Adam and Eve, played by Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton. This horror duo has been married for centuries, but when the movie starts, they live across the world from each other. However, when Eve realizes that Adam is becoming suicidal, she tries to show him there is still something to live for. The movie remains a bizarre vampire movie, but it is well worth the watch thanks to the leads' chemistry.

13 Millie & The Blissfield Butcher

Kathryn Newton And Vince Vaughn, Freaky

The horror duo of Kathryn Newton and Vince Vaughn made Freaky one of the best modern body-swap movies. In a horror-based reimagining of the central premise of Freaky Friday, a teenage girl named Millie Kessler ends up hunted by the aging serial killer, The Blissfield Butcher. However, something happens and the two end up switching bodies.

This is where the brilliance of Freaky comes from, as Vince Vaughn ends up playing a teenage girl who tries to convince her friends of who she really is. At the same time, Kathryn Newton does her best Vince Vaughn impersonation as The Blissfield Butcher uses his new teenage girl body to keep on killing. The body-swap antics of Freaky and the pair doing impressions of one another make them a hilarious horror movie duo.

12 R & Julie

Nicholas Hoult And Teresa Palmer, Warm Bodies

2013's Warm Bodies is a romantic zombie horror movie that follows a zombie named R (Nicholas Hoult), who has regained the ability to think and rationalize. When he sees a human girl named Julie, he remarkably decides to save her rather than eat her, though he does drag her back to his 'home' in an abandoned airport. The two develop a dangerous relationship, especially since Julie's father is a major force in hunting down and killing all the zombies.

What makes Warm Bodies work is R and Julie growing together as they set out to find a possible cure for the zombie apocalypse. While Warm Bodies 2 never arrived to adapt one of the novel's sequels, R and Julie remain one of the best horror movie duos thanks to their unconventional romance and proof that it's not only R and MA-rated titles that stand out in the genre.

11 The Frog Brothers

Corey Feldman And Jamison Newlander, The Lost Boys

One of the most popular vampire movies of all time is the 1980s classic The Lost Boys. The movie stars Corey Haim as a young boy whose family moves to a new town with their grandfather after his mom gets divorced. While he isn't happy about moving there, it gets worse when he realizes there are vampires in this town and his brother is a target. This led to the arrival of the Frog Brothers (Corey Feldman and Jamison Newlander), two young men who work at a comic book store and fashion themselves vampire hunters. This horror movie duo steals almost every scene in which they appear and have some of the best Lost Boys quotes in the movie.

10 Brigitte & Ginger

Emily Perkins And Katherine Isabelle, Ginger Snaps

The Fitzgerald sisters really did have each other’s back throughout Ginger Snaps, even in the face of a supernatural crisis that turned one of them into a werewolf. Ginger Snaps is a Canadian horror franchise that’s a female-led take on the myth of werewolves. Ginger is Brigitte’s older sister who gets bitten by the beasts of Bailey Downs and slowly transforms into a werewolf. Though Brigitte comes up with a serum cure to help her battle the effects of lycanthropy, Ginger initially refuses it, hoping for a full transformation. An allegory for puberty, the sister's relationship is what carries this movie and makes Ginger Snaps work so well.

9 Lydia & Beetlejuice

Winona Ryder And Michael Keaton, Beetlejuice

Neither are they a couple nor are they even friends, but the horror duo of Lydia and Beetlejuice from Beetlejuice remains an iconic couple in the realm of horror, cosplay culture, and movie history. This is largely due to the chemistry between Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder, both of home gave career-defining performances in the Tim Burton movie.

When a pair of ghosts attempt to rid the home of the family by calling on Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton), daughter Lydia (Winona Ryder) ends up in his sights, and he wants to marry her, so he can re-enter the human world. He nearly achieves his goals too, and Ryder's performance as the overly macabre Lydia plays perfectly against the bombastic antics of Michael Keaton's Ghost with the Most.

8 Shaun & Ed

Simon Pegg And Nick Frost, Shaun Of The Dead

The Cornetto Trilogy is built on the bromance between the characters played by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, and they all started in the horror movie Shaun of the Dead, a zombie comedy where Simon Pegg plays Shaun and Nick Frost his slacker friend and roommate, Ed. The two have developed a co-dependent relationship and end up relying on each other to survive the zombie apocalypse while Shaun tries to find and save his girlfriend. This horror duo had one of the best fictional friendships of any movie — even after the zombies were defeated and Ed had become a zombie himself, Shaun kept him around to play video games, the sign of a true friend.

7 Gale & Dewey

Courteney Cox And David Arquette, Scream

Ghostface would surely still be at large if not for the dynamic duo of journalist Gale Weathers and her cop boyfriend Dewey Riley. Though Sidney Prescott has quite a few differences with Gale in the first movie of the franchise, they grow quite close over the next few films. Gale and Dewey became a sort of surrogate family to Sidney as they were always looking out for her, and that brought them closer. The mellow, idealistic Dewey is kind of a contrast personality-wise to the fierce, go-getter Gale, and it’s made for fascinating on-screen chemistry all the way until Dewey finally died in the fifth movie in the franchise.

6 Morticia & Gomez Addams

Various, The Addams Family Franchise

In any iteration, spooky soulmates Gomez and Morticia Addams are among the best and most iconic horror movie duos — and are perhaps the best whose movies are suitable for the whole family. Gomez and Morticia’s love story is a romantic arc that’s truly timeless and inspirational. However, their profound and incredibly public passion for each other doesn’t take away from the fact that they are dependable and caring parents. The ‘1991 live-action Addams Family starring Raul Julia and Anjelica Huston as Gomez and Morticia also presents a surprisingly realistic depiction of marriage, showing that it can be hard work even for two people are so very in love with each other.

5 Tallahassee & Little Rock

Woody Harrelson And Abigail Breslin, Zombieland

Zombie movies have provided viewers unpredictable duos over the years, both in horror movies and TV shows, but Tallahassee and Little Rock from Zombieland are among the most unexpected and endearing. While Colombus and Wichita’s narrative goes the usual romantic way, the zombie slayer Tallahassee develops a bond with the 12-year-old Little Rock as they are among the few survivors of a zombie apocalypse.

They quickly realize that they need to stick together in order to make it out safely, and Tallahassee who’s also mourning the death of his son Buck is naturally drawn towards Little Rock and looks out for her. Their relationship takes on a somewhat father-daughter dynamic, though far more reluctantly than even Joel and Ellie in The Last of Us.

4 Mina & Jonathan

Winona Ryder And Keanu Reeves, Bram Stoker's Dracula

While duo Vlad and Mina are also noteworthy in Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 vampire movie, it's Mina and Jonathan Harker’s story that proves the most captivating. Francis Ford Coppola luckily stuck by Bram Stoker’s text which depicts Jonathan’s love story as a direct contrast to Dracula’s obsessive, toxic obsession over Elisabeta/Mina. Mina may have been Elisabeta’s reincarnated avatar, but she only wanted to be with Jonathan, and he is equally committed to her. In fact, Mina helps Jonathan cope with his trauma after he escapes Dracula’s castle, and they even get married in Romania.

3 Susie & Helena

Tilda Swinton And Dakota Johnson, Suspiria

Like most of Luca Guadagnino's film, the relationship between this horror movie duo is difficult to define but still incredibly captivating. In 2018's Suspiria there is a very odd, supercharged dynamic between Helena Markos (Tilda Swinton) and Susie (Dakota Johnson), who Helena views as the next vessel of their next Mother. However, Suzy turns out to be Mother Suspiriorum, who wants to purge the coven of elements that threaten the ecosystem. Susie and Helena have a vaguely sexual, tense, and volatile energy between them throughout the movie, and it becomes a major plot device in the second half of the film.

2 Chris & Rod

Daniel Kaluuya And Lil Rel Howery, Get Out

This horror movie duo gets surprisingly little screen time together, though this is partly because of the many thematic layers in Jordan Peel's 2017 thriller Get Out. Rod is the outsider’s perspective throughout the movie, essentially the voice of the audience who’s screaming internally trying to warn Chris against staying at the Armitage house. Most of their exchange is in text messages, but if not for Rod, Chris would definitely have died at the hands of Rose.

Rod basically pieces the clues and seeks help from authority and when his fears are laughed off, he himself goes to help Chris without any backup, which also makes for a really edgy climax for the film. Get Out had an alternate ending, but the one in the final cut is the only one that worked out well for both Rod and Chris

1 Needy & Jennifer

Amanda Seyfried And Megan Fox, Jennifer's Body

The unlikely and intense friendship between the socially awkward Needy and the popular Jennifer is what makes them such an iconic horror movie duo. The 2009 movie doesn’t explain how and why these two are such good friends, or why Jennifer doesn’t hang out with more popular kids. But their relationship is definitely a lot more intense than an average teenage friendship. The events of Jennifer's Body relies heavily on their dynamic as it builds towards the intense climax, and without the performances of Amanda Seyfried and Amanda Fox this surprisingly progressive 00s horror film wouldn't be remembered anywhere nearly as fondly.