Ryan Reynolds’ Horror Roles: Movies & TV

Ryan Reynolds has become one of the most popular actors out there, and he’s put in some time in horror over the years, both in movies and on TV. Granted, most of his horror appearances took place before playing Deadpool finally made him an A-list leading man. It would be cool to see him revisit the genre again soon, but until then, fans have several options for how to get their fix of Reynolds either being scared or scaring others.

Reynolds, like many actors, had to put in quite a few years on the lower rungs of Hollywood before graduating to superstardom. That’s probably why he doesn’t seem to take himself that seriously, often as likely to crack a self-deprecating joke about himself as about anyone else. At the end of the day, acting is a really weird job, offering the opportunity for riches and fame beyond almost any other profession on Earth if one manages to reach a certain level, and Reynolds seems to realize that.

Without any further ado, here’s a rundown of Reynolds’ horror roles, on both the big and small screens. Despite how much Reynolds might seem horrified by it though, Green Lantern doesn’t count.

Ryan Reynolds’ Horror Roles: Movies & TV

One of Ryan Reynolds‘ first brushes with horror came via a small role on a 1996 episode of The X-Files. Airing as part of season 3, “Syzygy” cast Reynolds as high school jock Jay DeBoom, the opening victim of a pair of witches. Around the same time, Reynolds appeared on three different episodes of The Outer Limits, as two different characters. In “If These Walls Could Talk,” Reynolds is absorbed by a mysterious house, while in “Double Helix” and “Origin of Species,” Reynolds is part of a group that makes first contact with an alien race. Later on, in 2000, Reynolds appeared in the TV movie Boltneck, aka Big Monster on Campus. As one might imagine, it’s a modern day take on Frankenstein, and Reynolds plays the monster.

While 2004’s Blade: Trinity isn’t horror, it bears mentioning due to casting Reynolds as vampire hunter Hannibal King. The next year, Reynolds played the lead in a remake of The Amityville Horror, which is quite underrated and arguably betters the 1979 original. Fast-forwarding to 2010, Reynolds again played the lead in Buried, about a man buried alive in a coffin. 2013’s RIPD isn’t a horror film, but is worth noting due to Reynolds playing an undead cop assigned to protect the living from evil. In 2014’s The Voices, Reynolds played Jerry, a severely mentally ill man who’s driven to violence by the imagined voices of his pets. Finally, 2017’s sci-fi/horror movie Life casts Reynolds as part of a team of astronauts facing down an alien creature that could threaten Earth with extinction.

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