This February, Midnight Social Distortion will be celebrating Black History Month by honoring Black horror characters, in particular Black horror survivors, throughout the twenty-eight day period. Each day will feature one black male and one black female survivor in horror and sci-fi to bring light to the positive, albeit still problematic, black champions of representation in horror. Some disclaimers first: obvious spoilers ahead, and not all horror survivors will be featured this go round, but will appear in later posts down the line.
Jillian Hope Hodgson (Maria Sten)
Character Arc:
When Jillian’s husband Tom introduces a new door that suddenly appears in their basement, she had no clue that not only was she connected to it, but that it’s about to change her life in a drastic way.
Already suspicious that her new husband is cheating on her (and let’s face it, Tom really wasn’t making matters any better), Maria grew angrier and angrier feeling that everyone around her was either lying or disregarding her feelings. To keep her mind off things, she tried to open the mysterious door behind the first unknown door. When she does, Jillian inadvertently (and literally) unlocks her self-consciousness, or rather, her anger manifested in the form of an imaginary friend she had as a kid: Pretzel Jack.
Talk about being a loyal friend to the end, the murderous Pretzel Jack went after everyone who pissed Jillian off, including Tom, who surprisingly dodged the kill happy creation twice. Luckily her next door neighbor Ian knew exactly what was going on and revealed that Jillian is not the only person who can literally create things with her mind, but that he can do the same and has mastered the act to a science. He offers to help her get control of Pretzel Jack before Tom strikes out the third time.
But despite Ian’s good intentions, he had a nefarious hand in Jillian’s dilemma the entire time. When this is revealed, the show amped up the gore, as well as a complex twist leading to a superb bloody, yet satisfying finale that is one for the record books.
Fun Trivia
Jillian joins Channel Zero: No-End House‘s Jules as the only two black women to survive the Channel Zero series.
Final Thoughts
Seeing a successful black couple be the centerpiece of an intricate, well-crafted horror narrative was exhilarating as fuck. Jillian was a perfect lead/final girl; constantly going through various emotions, and never really having time to just breath through it all. And when she finally did take time to relax, the game switched up on her big time, forcing her to seriously deal with her cache of demons to save not only herself, but her marriage as well. There’s so much imagery and symbolic seeds and keys strewn throughout the six episodes of Channel Zero: The Dream Door, they may I have to return to one day to unbox. Hopefully sooner than later, but Jillian is a true final girl and perfect entry into the Hall of Black Horror Survivors.
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