Introduction: Reimagining the Final Girl in the Twenty-First Century

Abstract

The aim of this chapter is to examine the significance of Carol J. Clover’s concept of the Final Girl and its connections to twenty-first-century feminism. This chapter expands research on the Final Girl trope by complicating the celebratory storylines of the figure à la Girl Power, which proliferated in the late 1990s and 2000s, addressing the ways in which these powerful characters continue to inspire far-reaching audiences, while also responding to the socio-political backdrop of their time. If the proliferation of the Final Girls in the mid-1970s was an effect, as it has been argued, of discourses on gender during that period, in particular within the women’s movement, then the recent resurgence of the Final Girl across a wide spectrum of popular culture forms raises questions about how to rethink this figure in contemporary terms.