Introduction: Culture Wars Revisited: Navigating the Ideological Landscape in Post-2010 Social Horror

When Jordan Peele’s Get Out made its big-screen debut in 2017, it was met with instant, widespread praise among worldwide audiences for its creative blending of horror conventions and social commentary. As part of the horror film trend commonly known as “social horror” (Heba 1995; Kronja 2016), Get Out championed the filmic representation of sociopolitical ideologies in the United States at a time when horror codes and sociocultural issues acquired recognized critical distinction. Parallel to current divisive sociopolitical disagreements, contemporary horror movies are emerging as a reproduction of what dominates popular culture and the current political framework: culture wars.