Tatiana Maslany — the first Canadian to win an Emmy in a major dramatic category for acting in a Canadian series — has been on a roll in 2025. Earlier in the year, the actress received much praise for her performance in the Stephen King adaptation, The Monkey. Now she is back with another scary flick: Keeper. Her latest film, which premiered on November 14, was also directed by Osgood Perkins and seems destined for box-office glory.
Maslany made a name for herself for portraying multiple clones in the sci-fi thriller television series Orphan Black, a role that earned her numerous accolades. She would later be cast in the MCU TV show, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, playing the central character Jennifer Walters, aka She-Hulk. While her TV work is great, Maslany can also be considered a horror movie icon, not only because of her latest work, but also because she has starred in five other movies in the genre before, making it a total of 5.
Here is a ranking of Tatiana Maslany’s horror flicks, from least to most scary.
5
‘Diary of the Dead’ (2007)
During a zombie outbreak, a group of film students from the University of Pittsburgh (including the girlfriend of one of them, played by Tatiana Maslany) journeys across Pennsylvania. Along the way, they stop at a ravaged hospital, an unsafe family home, and an Amish farm. As the horrors are unfolding, the group leader, Jason Creed (Joshua Close), continues to be obsessed with filming, never caring about the welfare of his friends. What will become of this group in Diary of the Dead?
George A. Romero directed Diary of the Dead, and if there is one person audiences can always trust to handle a zombie movie, it is him. Methodical and precise, the legendary filmmaker analyzes each scene into its minute components — a door slowly shutting, an arm bleeding slowly — and gathers all the fragments into marvelous seamless units. Romeo wants you to live inside every physical event in this found footage film, not just marvel at the bizarre nature of it.
However, the film is hardly scary. There are no memorable chases or attack sequences. Even though Maslany makes us care (notably in a scene where she wrongly believes she has been bitten), she doesn’t appear on the screen long enough. If only the other characters were half as interesting as hers (Mary), the Romero flick might have had a chance at being a classic, but the best that the rest can do is act bewildered throughout the proceedings. Interestingly, Quentin Tarantino, Guillermo del Toro, Wes Craven, Simon Pegg, and Stephen King all lent their voices as newsreaders in the film.
4
‘Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed’ (2004)
After the death of her sister Ginger in the first film, Brigitte Fitzgerald (Emily Perkins) uses monkshood extracts in an attempt to block the effects of lycanthropy that transformed her sibling into a werewolf. She is soon captured and locked up in a youth rehabilitation center, where the staff members believe she is suffering from drug withdrawal. There, Brigitte befriends Ghost (Tatiana Maslany), a reclusive girl fascinated by monsters. As the two grow closer and plot an escape, a male werewolf stalks Brigitte. But is Ghost really who she appears to be in Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed?
Maslany is the standout cast member in Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed, and she deservedly won Best Supporting Actress at the Fangoria Chainsaw Awards. One scene where she scratches her skin while locked in a sensory deprivation room will haunt you for a while. A few prank scares also exist, but you’ll struggle to find more unsettling elements or scenarios.
The film is heavily reliant on slow-burning dread and the anguish that comes with withdrawal, rather than the kind of gore we are used to seeing in popular werewolf movies. The werewolf is mostly kept off the screen, with only its presence being implied. Additionally, the choice to base most of the events inside the rehabilitation facility deprives the movie of the joys of outdoor spaces that often help build dread in traditional creature features.
3
‘The Messengers’ (2007)
Following a traumatic incident, the Solomon family relocates from Chicago to remote North Dakota, hoping for new beginnings. But they don’t get the respite they hoped for in The Messengers. Teen Jess (Kristen Stewart) struggles to adapt to the rural surroundings, while her younger, mute brother Ben (Evan Turner starts seeing ghosts. Soon, Jess also starts seeing the ghosts, but their parents don’t believe them. Only the hired hand, John Burwell (John Corbett), seems willing to help. Tatiana Maslany stars as Lindsay, the daughter of the ghost family that was murdered by their patriarch.
Once again, Maslany only appears for a few minutes. Even so, she almost steals the film as an unlucky and innocent child who is much too close to the action. The intensity of the opening scene is no less shocking for being so believable. In it, Lindsay is dragged by her feet across the wooden floor into the basement. She crawls and screams desperately, leaving nail marks as she attempts to resist. As this happens, her brother witnesses the horror.
Maslany’s performance is full of raw terror. We can feel her physical struggle and anguish. Unfortunately, The Messenger never tops this scene. For the rest of the running time, we are treated to predictable jump scares and the usual sounds. This kind of plot has also played out before in numerous haunted house movies. It’s quite surprising that Sam Ram chose to attach himself as a producer.
2
‘The Monkey’ (2025)
Based on Stephen King’s 1980 short story of the same name, The Monkey stars Theo James as twin brothers, raised by a single mother (Tatiana Maslany), who discover their late father’s old wind-up drum-playing toy monkey in the attic, unaware that it harbors a curse. Whenever it plays its cymbals, horrific, random deaths (similar to those of the Final Destination franchise) follow. Their efforts to discard it fail, leaving them in a real dilemma.
The Monkey has lots of humorous moments, but it is super disturbing, too. The adaptation’s signal moment comes in the first act, which uses a highly familiar location (a restaurant) and the usual tension tricks (point-of-view shots, menacing background noise) as prelude to a horrible moment where the nanny to the brothers accidentally gets decapitated by the chef.
Even though Maslany’s talents are underutilized (she’d have benefited from more arcs), this is as good as Stephen King adaptations get. You’ll have little to complain about when you are done. But why isn’t there any award buzz? The decision by many organizations to exclude it from competition has resurrected the debate over the neglect of the horror genre when it comes to handing out statuettes.
1
‘Keeper’ (2025)
In Keeper, Liz (Tatiana Maslany), a fun-loving writer who is afraid of commitment, joins her doctor boyfriend Malcolm (Rossif Sutherland) for a romantic getaway at his family’s remote cabin. When he suddenly departs for the city and leaves her all alone, she encounters an otherworldly entity that appears to mimic voices and distort reality. What’s really happening?
Events in Keeper don’t unfold as smoothly as they normally do in good horror movies, but there are tons of unsettling moments. Director Osgood Perkins shot the film quickly while work on The Monkey had halted due to the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes, so the plot deficiencies can be forgiven.
The film feels refreshing because there isn’t an overstuffing of jump scares that’s normally associated with isolation incidents. Instead, Perkins blends internal psychological struggles with the lingering supernatural trepidation. We thus care for both the haunting and the protagonist’s mental health.
- Release Date
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November 14, 2025
- Runtime
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99 Minutes
- Director
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Osgood Perkins
