When it comes to film marketing, you could boil it down, mostly, to what is the big three- the trailer, the poster and the tagline. All are art-forms in some way or another, and have their own challenges to work with and overcome. Trailers and the amount of work and thought that goes into it are still often considered underrated (which I would agree with), while posters are obvious in their art form and can easily be noticed when it is being ridiculously half-assed. But trailers and posters are the main two, as they are the most noticeable in terms of discussion; you easily come across posters and trailers and can discuss them at length or wave them off easily. Coming up in the rear mirror, though, are taglines.
Taglines have a lot in common with the posters they adorn. They have to be creative, simplistic and entice people in some way, though they do tend to fall in way of conversation or memorability. This, unfortunately, is also understandable, as it is just something that comes as a ‘subline’, so to speak, to the main attraction of the poster or even trailer. That doesn’t mean we haven’t had a ton of great ones.
So why are we focusing on horror? I honestly didn’t expect to jump back into something horror oriented so close to the new entry in Horror Posters We Love. I do try to space out article subjects and, especially with horror, sometimes pick and choose in regards to when it could be most applicable. After all, don’t want to overwork the genre leading up to Halloween month! But horror, like the posters we’ve covered, lends itself well to a certain level of creativity that some other genres may not. They can be tongue-in-cheek, straightforward, or a play off the subject, title or along with the poster as a whole.

The Evil Dead

Critic quotes are, by and large, a pretty easy and lazy choice to place on your poster. It also doesn’t help that there are instances of folks who made obviously not good products taking certain quotes from negative reviews out of context, making them seem positive. So it should go to say that if you use a quote on your poster, there better be a damn good reason, and here is the one that may have worked most effectively.
1981 marked seven years since Stephen King’s first novel, Carrie, was published. By this point, he had also written ‘Salem’s Lot, The Shining, The Stand, The Dead Zone, Firestarter and, a month prior to Evil Dead premiering, Cujo. He had also written three novels under pseudonym Richard Bachman and Carrie, ‘Salem’s Lot, and The Shining had already been adapted into live-action media. Needless to say, Stephen King fever was in full force, so who better to pay attention to (and take seriously) when it came to his words on the genre? I think what I appreciate most about his quote is that it doesn’t focus on what we usually expect in terms of horror pull-quotes, opting to focus on the originality of the film instead of how scary it may be.

Dr Phibes Rises Again

While the tagline of The Abominable Dr. Phibes was a send up of the classic Love Story line, perfectly summarizing its tongue-in-cheek attitude, the sequel takes a more straightforward approach. Though the use of crawling skin and curdling blood is great at setting its atmosphere of horror, it’s the final line that I love the inclusion of here, placing it amongst the list of horrors in a way that makes it obvious that Phibes himself is responsible.

Re-Animator

Re-Animator is usually heralded as one of the genres best from the decade, and rightfully so. It’s gory, hilarious, yet still serious enough to never lose any of the impact that it is going for. The tagline does a great job of capturing the mood of the film; horrific in its subject matter yet presented with great, dry humour.

Q: The Winged Serpent

I don't know if I can properly verbalize why I enjoy the tagline to Q as much as I do. It shouldn't really work, it seems like it's a bit too much, too wordy. Yet it works, possibly because it happens to be paired with that glorious artwork, working hand in hand to fully establish its monster movie roots. Also, that design on the Q is absolutely glorious. I'm jealous of it.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre

What is there, really, to say that may not have been elsewhere? It’s a classic, working with its title to bring forth the most brutal and shocking imagery that one could imagine. It’s an apt tagline for a movie widely regarded as one of the greatest, and most frightening, horror films ever made, and no doubt helped in the reputation the film has for its violence, which there isn't that much present in the film itself.

The Mummy

Simple, to the point and (at a time where not everything was coming to life/undead) incredibly effective in its horror. Why does the mummy come to life and for what reason? Doesn’t matter, the horror lies in the fact that it walks at all.

Creepshow

In the second ‘Favourite Horror Posters’ article, I wrote that Creepshow works so well because it perfectly embodies exactly the type of atmosphere the film itself does. There’s horror to it, but it’s meant to be more fun than anything. So it’s no surprise that the tagline would build upon that, not trying to pass off what you are about to watch as something it isn’t.

Demons

Coming from a quote in the movie within the movie, this one is great mostly for the vastness of it. This isn’t just a singular threat but one that spreads into apocalyptic proportions, with cities being our cemeteries leading to perfect imagery. It also sounds great and wonderfully over-the-top while remaining threatening.

Night of the Creeps

There ended up being quite a few choices on here that work as a great example of the film’s tongue-in-cheek humour, and this one is no different. Working with a quote from the movie (which may be a tad altered depending on which poster you look at), Night of the Creeps is a ton of fun that is a great night spent with your friends. It only makes sense that the tagline conveys that, working along with the imagery to present a fantastic representation of the good time you would have with it. It’s also better hearing it in the film, delivered by the always fantastic Tom Atkins.

Halloween

Oh, hey, we meet again. The tagline for Halloween is a classic and one that works perfectly in building intrigue within people looking at it. Who is he? There’s obviously some level of importance, like you should know who he is as it has emphasis put on it.
Not only that, it works because the act of ‘him coming home’ comes off as rightly threatening. You don’t know who he is or where he’s coming from and why, but it’s something you should fear, because bad things are going to happen.

Super Duper Honorable Mention: Day of the Dolphin

How does that happen, George C. Scott? I like to think this is followed by a shrug and an “Oops!”