10 Worst Monsters in Movies, Ranked

Here is an awful aggregation of the worst monsters to ever disgrace the silver screen. “Worst” in some cases can simply mean the worst-looking (early CGI, we’re looking in your direction), and in other examples, worst can refer to dollar store prosthetics or the ridiculousness of the plot elements of certain monsters’ stories. Either way, here are the worst cinematic chimeras ever conceived, each one more monstrously atrocious than the next.

10 Space Vulture in 'The Giant Claw' (1957)

In a time before advanced special effects, it’s easy to mock the poorly-constructed creatures created for film that were meant to evoke fear. It’s also worth noting, that people scared a lot easier back in the good ole days, as there weren’t a lot of monsters to compare to (save, of course, for Nosferatu, which birthed the first cinematic version of a vampire, which is still terrifying to this very day). So, when one takes a look back at The Giant Claw, it should be viewed with a large grain of salt, obviously. All that being said, man, this thing is just so stupid looking.

Directed by Fred F. Sears, The Giant Claw is centered around a massive vulture that came, for some reason, from outer space. The extraterrestrial buzzard is a claymation/puppet entity that attacks and eats most people in its path. Look, the artists probably tried their best to make this thing look horrifying; they just failed on every level. It’s goofy, tremendously fake, and even seems a bit crossed-eyed in numerous shots.

9 Nightbeast in 'Nightbeast' (1982)

For a large sub-set of B monster movies, the creatures devised are a parody of other films and are intentionally made to produce laughs instead of gasps of terror. The films that feature such “monsters” should really be classified as comedies and nothing more. One of the first classics to do this was the aptly named Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, and in later years, the mostly hilarious The Gingerdead Man. However, every once in a while, there comes a movie of this nature that is just so corny, or low-budget, or poorly designed (and in some cases, all three), that it needs to be called out. Nightbeast is just such a movie.

The story of Don Dohler’s Nightbeast…really isn’t much of a story at all. An evil alien crash lands in Maryland, and then goes on a killing spree, utilizing its laser gun that vaporizes people, naturally. The construction of the night-beast (by future FX maven John Dods, whose later work would include Poltergeist III and Alien: Resurrection) is laughable, at best. It looks like a mutant, hungover iguana.

8 Zombified Sheep in 'Black Sheep' (2006)

There is a large swath of animal-based horror movies, where the monster is simply a normal mammal, reptile or fish that broke bad. Classic examples of where this was done effectively include Cujo, Crawl, and of course, Jaws. So, the question is raised: when does this formula fail? Why, in none other than the New Zealand film Black Sheep (not to be confused with the hilarious Chris Farley movie of the same name). The titular sheep of this flick are actually more like were-sheep, who have undergone ferociously feral, zombie-like transformations due to a genetic engineering ploy gone wrong.

Now, the concept here isn’t that awful, and yes, this is another attempt at humorous parody. What lands director Jonathan King’s wooly work on this list is the mere fact that it isn’t just going for laughs; it’s actually trying to scare the audience. This is a thoroughly unsuccessful effort, given the fact that the sheep mostly come off as fluffy and fairly cute throughout the whole endeavor.

7 Octaman in 'Octaman' (1971)

One of the main factors that make Octaman so truly abysmal is simply the concept behind the film: a radiated octopus mutates and develops the ability to walk on land — it then fully anthropomorphizes for some reason and wants to kill everyone in sight. Director Harry Essex’s film is not a stab at humor, it’s a full-fledged effort to scare. The issue is that octopuses are not scary. Like, at all. In fact, many people find them adorable…or at least tasty.

The Octaman costume was created by future special FX whiz, Oscar-winning Rick Baker, which is especially baffling. Perhaps due to budget constraints or Baker’s inexperience at the time, the outfit that the actor has to wear looks like a cross between a puppy's chew toy and an old mattress.

6 The Snowman in 'Jack Frost' (1997)

Jack Frost, the snarky snowman of the snowy debacle Jack Frost, almost didn’t make this list because he's kind of funny. Still, an anthropomorphized snowman that comes off looking more like a cushy white teddy bear than anything actually threatening needs to be addressed.

The character Jack Frost was created after a not-so-nice guy became “genetically fused” with snow…y’know…frozen water. He looks like a mascot for a deranged Canadian curling team and pops off some of the worst word-play known to man (“I’m the wizard of blizzard!”). While some viewers enjoyed director Michael Cooney’s film and found Jack Frost to be amusing, the ultra-cheesy dialogue combined with the “frozen plush doll” gone wrong costume is just too awful to endure.

5 Mansquito in 'Mansquito' (2005)

Mansquito presents a fairly absurd premise combined with an equally silly depiction of the main character. The story is a tried and true, simple one: a convicted felon is subject to radiative mosquitoes. Ergo, an insect-man hybrid is now on the loose, wreaking havoc and flitting around, in director Tibor Takács not-so buzz-worthy film.

The costume of the mansquito is actually not that horrible. Not to rag too much on woeful, terribly executed CGI, but it's every CGI scene in this movie that totally ruins the rest of the film. The mansquito costume is rather clunky, but hey, as a half man-half bug crossbreed, it gets the job done. It’s just the times when the mansquito needs to morph or “fly” that the CGI is broken out, and it’s in such a stark contrast to the costumed figure, that all one can think about is an early 90s screensaver gone awry.

4 Sharktopus in 'Sharktopus' (2010)

The sharktopus in Sharktopus is a hot-mess-opus. Yes, this film debuted on the Syfy network, which for years had already been synonymous with cheesy CGI chimeras, poorly-conceived storylines, and amusingly campy dialogue. However, the actual sharktopus is so horribly designed that it pushes the boundaries of what’s acceptable to show to an audience. The plot of Sharktopus also makes the plots of the Sharknado franchise look like the collected works of William Shakespeare. The creature was a genetically spliced amalgamation of a shark…and an octopus — designed by the military, of course. Somehow, though, it escaped, and just wants to devour and destroy humanity.

The concept of Declan O’Brien's Sharktopus isn’t really all that horrendous in theory; the utter clumsiness of the CGI here though, is what makes this thing so unforgettably appalling. It actually looks like what someone would digitally sketch up if they wanted to pitch the idea for a movie…not the actual movie.

3 The Blob in 'The Blob' (1958)

The premise behind director Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr.’s The Blob is really a great one: some gelatinous goo comes from outer space, dines on some human flesh, loves the taste, and then grows larger with each delicious serving. It's a classic. Hence, the 1988 Chuck Russell remake was a fun and truly frightening film, if for no other reason than the blob was veiny, revolting, and looked like a living thing. The reason the original makes this list is that the first incarnation of the blob was essentially a large dollop of strawberry jelly.

The original blob moved so slowly (most likely because it really was just some leftover preserve) that it seemed near impossible not to outrun it. It’s just a gooey glob of red donut spillage. Even future superstar Steve McQueen’s casting couldn’t detract from the fact that the blob itself wasn’t interesting at all, and its appearance onscreen was amorphous and flat.

2 The Goblins in 'Troll 2' (1990)

Attempting to capitalize on the success of a cult favorite, Troll (hey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus was in it), the distributors of this debacle renamed it from Goblins to Troll 2. The new nomenclature though could not save it, as this Claudio Fragasso-directed fiasco fails on every level. However, none of the cinematic atrocities in this excrement show were as bad as the goblins themselves.

The goblins in this work of cinematic refuse not only aren’t scary in the slightest bit, they resemble clunky, out-of-work mall elves with heads made out of paper mache. Forget the fact that they are vegetarians and need to turn humans into vegetation before they can consume them (if there’s some sort of environmental lesson here, we’re not getting it), the actual goblins are just so aesthetically dumb and amateurish that it’s impossible to be frightened of them in the least or take them seriously in any context.

1 The Ape in 'A*P*E' (1976)

When a film has widespread success, and spawns a multitude of sequels and reboots, there will inevitably be imitators of the original. This is to be expected. Often far, far inferior to the originals (the giant Gamera lizard was thought to be a pretty direct rip-off of Godzilla), some of these ersatz versions can have a redeemable quality here and there. And then…there is A*P*E.

Director Paul Leder’s A*P*E is obviously a knock-off of King Kong — but a collection of actual primates could’ve made a better film and physical monster than this piece of A*P*E. This movie takes the “Guy in a Guerrilla Suit” trope and tries to pass it off as an actual, irony-free feature-length film. It is awful throughout its 87-minute runtime, but no moment jumps the shark more than when the ape…fights a shark (equally, horrendously constructed). All in all, the rubbery ape outfit looks like a Spirit Halloween leftover, and when the ape flips the bird, we collectively want to do the same thing, right back at the screen.