13 Horror Movie Heroines That Kick Butt

Jay Height (Maika Monroe) in It Follows (Image via Dimension Films)

2.) Jay Height (It Follows)

Following a sexual encounter with her new boyfriend, college student Jay is pursued by a seemingly unstoppable murderous entity. Though her friends can’t see the entity, which can change its shape and appears only to “infected” individuals, they help Jay avoid certain destruction at its hands.

If the unnamed entity catches up to Jay (Maika Monroe), it will kill her in gruesome fashion. The entity will then move to the last person to have passed on the disease. So, if you are infected, you will spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder and… waiting.

Despite the fact that it only moves at a leisurely walking pace, the entity repeatedly demonstrates the awful power of its persistence. If it catches up with you, it consumes you.

You may interpret It Follows as a parable about sexually transmitted diseases. Others have presented solid evidence that it’s about life as a sexual assault survivor. Jay is now helpless in the face of her paranoia and must consider each person with some level of suspicion.

Things are not easy for Jay, even before she really comes to believe in the nature of the entity. She reports her assault to the police. To her horror, Jay discovers that her boyfriend was living under an assumed name and can’t be found. In order to track him down and gain more information about the entity, Jay must enlist the help of her friends.

Neighbors comment that Jay’s family is “such a mess”, and her encounter with her boyfriend certainly reads as assault. However, her friends soon take Jay’s claims seriously, despite the fact that they can’t see the entity themselves. At least, any friends that are doubtful – like Greg, who agrees to sleep with Jay in order to take on a “curse” he doesn’t believe exists – tend to meet unfortunate ends.