Our Halloween crushes, part two: the final girls who fought back

Horror movies taught us a lot of things: don't split up, don't say "I'll be right back," and never trust a house that's suspiciously cheap. They also gave us some of our first crushes on women who didn't need saving. Here are four final girls who made us root a little harder.

Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, Halloween

John Carpenter's Halloween came out in 1978 and set the template for every slasher that followed. Jamie Lee Curtis played Laurie, the responsible babysitter who turns out to be the toughest person in Haddonfield. Smart, quiet and armed with a coat hanger when it counted, she made "the nice girl" the hero.

Heather Langenkamp as Nancy Thompson, A Nightmare on Elm Street

In Wes Craven's 1984 classic, Nancy figures out the rules faster than the adults and starts setting traps for Freddy Krueger in her own house. Heather Langenkamp played her as the girl next door who decided she was done being scared. Every guy who saw it wanted her on his team.

Adrienne Barbeau as Stevie Wayne, The Fog

Carpenter's 1980 ghost story put Adrienne Barbeau in a lighthouse radio booth with a smoky late-night voice, warning the town about the glowing fog rolling in off the water. Cool under pressure and impossible not to listen to. If you had a late-night radio crush in the 80s, this is probably why.

Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott, Scream

Craven came back in 1996 with Scream and a heroine who knew all the horror rules and still had to survive them. Neve Campbell's Sidney was smart, sarcastic and done with everyone's nonsense, and she became the final girl for a whole new generation of VHS renters.

The Radazoid take

What these four have in common is grit. None of them were the loudest person in the room, and none of them waited around to be rescued. They figured it out and fought back, which is more attractive than any wardrobe department could ever manage.

Also, for the record, every one of them had better survival instincts than the guys in their movies. The boyfriends in these films had one job, and somehow it was always "go check the noise in the basement."