The 10 Most Memorable “Reveal” Scenes in All-Time Scary Films

For the entire film, you have been wondering who Ghostface is. Of course, the standard order would be that the killer would be unmasked, and you might think, "Oh, okay, that makes sense." But with Scream, it turns out that not only is the boyfriend Sidney just slept with not dead, but he is also Ghostface.

The extra kicker is that he's not the only killer. When Billy Loomis says, "We all go a little mad sometimes," quoting Norman Bates in Psycho, then to have Stu Macher, using the Ghostface voice, say, "Surprise, Sidney." is an extra deep twist of the knife.

One of the scariest lines in horror is delivered with such childlike enthusiasm, "Hi, I'm Chucky! Wanna play?!" After Karen Barclay realizes that the doll Chucky has no batteries inside, this reveal is chilling.

It upends all normalcy of her life and tumbles her character into a world where she has no idea how this could be nor what she can do to stop Chucky.

The simplicity and resulting logical conclusion make this so effective—that moment when you realize that powers beyond anything you could imagine are at work. All of this is because you see a space where batteries should be, and they aren't.

One of the most mindblowing reveals ever came at the end of Sleepaway Camp. You become invested in the story and the trials of Angela after she faces rejection and mockery at every turn.

However, the audience feels for her. So the shock is complete when Angela is revealed to be Peter, her brother who was thought to be dead but instead was raised as a girl, standing nude and revealed as the killer. There's nothing quite like in the annals of horror.

The film has two reveals, both as shocking as the other. First, after seeing the bodies of her dead friends and being stalked by an unknown killer, Alice finally thinks she has been saved when Mrs. Voorhees arrives.

Instead of relief, she feels only terror when it becomes clear that Mrs. Voorhees is the killer, who then attacks.

Alice is forced to kill Mrs. Voorhees and boards a canoe, where she wakes to find a rotted arm of Jason Voorhees trying to drag her from the boat. It is just a dream, but the disturbing conclusion is that no one ever found Jason's body.

Hereditary, directed by Ari Aster, could be considered a film with the most shocking reveals in one go. First is the car accident where Charlie is beheaded after discovering that she has accidentally gone into anaphylactic shock.

Annie becomes aware that her mother is the leader of a coven dedicated to bringing a demon to Earth. The father, Steven, bursts into flames.

Annie becomes possessed by a demonic force who decapitates herself, and Charlie is revealed as King Paimon. You can argue who the true champion of reveals is in horror, but Hereditary is a serious candidate for the sheer number of shocks.

John Carpenter's The Thing is another wild ride where the surprises come fast and furious to the audience. Once things get rolling, the tension and the bombshells never stop.

The reveal of the sled dog as an alien monster bent on absorbing every other dog in the kennel, the crew finding Bennings being absorbed and destroying the half-human hybrid.

The most eye-popping moment is the defibrillator scene bookended with the head spider growing legs and starting to crawl away as the Norris thing tries to escape. The moments are so astonishing that screams, disbelief, and one of the most famous lines in horror history are the only appropriate reactions.

The ending of The Mist is such a turn of the screw that the film actively made people angry after watching it. However, after the survivors have fought bravely to survive, the despair that leads David Drayton to shoot his companions to give them a merciful death is understandable.

But as Drayton walks a few feet and finds that, had he waited, they all would have been saved, is one of the most appalling cinematic gut punches.

Stanley Kubrick's The Shining was not what the novelist Stephen King intended it to be. Unlike the ending of Darabont's version of The Mist, King was very unhappy with Kubrick's film.

But it is, without a doubt, a slow-building psychological horror film about the ravages of abuse in familial relationships and madness in an isolated and haunted setting. There could be a few interpretations of what happened and criticisms of Kubrick's story tack.

But almost everyone agrees that Wendy Torrance's flabbergasted discovery that her husband Jack hasn't been writing this whole time is the epitome of a heartstopping reveal. Likewise, Shelley Duvall's reaction is one of the most remarkable pieces of acting in horror.

This South Korean film is filled with mystery until the end, when the true nature of the killer is made known, as the mistakes that Jong-goo made are apparent.

The brutal murders committed on their families are bad, but when the demon reveals himself and starts to take photos of his latest victim, the audience's breath is taken away. It's a truly nightmarish scenario with no escape.

There is more than one fright in Alien, but the "egg" scene is a walk in the park compared with the infamous "chest-burster" scene, which is made even worse because the crew is having dinner when it happens.

The gruesome appearance of the baby Alien is one thing, but the horrified and natural reaction of Veronica Cartwright's Lambert kicks the scene up to another level of terror. Cartwright was not told what the scene would entail, so her appalled and petrified moans are not acting.

Her realistic and panicked emotions draw the audience further into the film, making it one of the most perfect revelations in horror history.

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