I don’t mean to condone or glorify the acts of these, disturbed individuals. The truth is serial killers are damn captivating characters, with their arrogance, creativity, and lust for blood. It’s fun to root for the villains, these deplorable cretins obsessed with death and destruction. These are the coolest serial killers who you don’t want to meet in a dark or even well lit alley. (Spoilers included)

7. Michael Myers

The featured killer of the Halloween movies, Michael Myers began his career killing his older sister. Fifteen years later he escaped his sanitarium, returning to his home town to kill teenagers especially Jamie Lee Curtis who managed to fend off the fiend long enough for help to arrive. But after every movie, Myers manages to survive gunshots, car crashes, explosions, and more to return again for more murder and mayhem.

6. Norman Bates

Alfred Hitchcock’s classic film Psycho inspired a generation to take baths. Bates suffers from dissociative identity disorder, dressing up and pretending to be his mother. He developed this to deal with murdering his mother who spent years abusing him. His classic shower murder of Marion Crane remains his crowning achievement, but anytime Bates, or his mother, were threatened, the mother took over and took care of business.

5. Dexter

Dexter Morgan is a quirky blood pattern analyst for the Miami police who moonlights as a serial killer. It’s a great synergy of employment. The Showtime TV series, based on the novel Darkly Dreaming Dexter, follows Dexter as he selects victims that prey on others but can’t be charged through the regular justice system. It’s arguably Dexter’s actions are redeemable, as he only kills people even worse than him, but ethics don’t knock anyone off this list. And with more than 40 kills, Dexter earns a spot with the best of them.

4. Sweeney Todd

Did you ever think how trusting you are of your barber? You trust him/her to not get a little snippy with those scissors and razor blades. Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, lured customers to his shop then slit their throats with his razor blades. His twisted companion Mrs. Lovett chopped up Todd’s victims and baked them into pies.

The tale of Sweeney Todd began in mid-1800s made famous recently by Stephen Sondheim’s musical.

3. John Doe

Kevin Spacey plays John Doe, the almost artistic serial killer from the movie Seven. Doe stages elaborate deaths for his seven victims based on the seven deadly sins, from force-feeding an obese man to death (gluttony) to a drug dealer and sexual predator being tied up and left to atrophy for over a year (sloth). The climax came for Doe’s final two sins where he murdered Detective Mills’ (Brad Pitt) wife because of his own envy, revealing this by sending Mills the head of his wife. Mills, consumed by wrath, shot Doe completing the seven. What a piece of work.

2. Joker

Few killers have the history of the Joker, the clown prince who plagues Gotham City and Batman with laughing poisons and some crude gunshots. The Joker has claimed hundreds of victims, including Jason Todd, the second Robin, Sarah Gordon, Commissioner Gordon’s wife, and Alex Luthor, the villain of Infinite Crisis. The Joker also paralyzed Gordon’s daughter, the first Batgirl. But the Joker’s true genius is his elaborate schemes, from his “Last Laugh” infecting super criminals with his Joker venom or stealing Mister Mxyzptlk’s reality altering powers to create an alternate reality of his own where he tortures and kills Batman every single day.

1. Hannibal Lecter

A renown psychiatrist, surgeon, and artist, Hannibal Lecter put his skills to less than productive uses. Lecter enjoys gruesomely murdering his victims and then eating select body parts with a classy manor, paring the the liver of a census taker with fava beans and a nice chianti. Lector remained in maximum security for years, helping investigators track other serial killers, playing to Lecter’s ego. But for any help or guidance, Lecter is a diabolical killer machine, ruthless and brilliant. To escape prison, he kills his two prison guards and peels the face off one of them so paramedics carry him out of the prison. All so he could have an old friend over for dinner. Now that’s dedication.