When Devon Sawa was announced as the host of this year’s FANGORIA Chainsaw Awards during the “First in Fright” panel at San Diego Comic-Con, show director Michael Varrati said it best. “When you consider the likes of Final Destination, Idle Hands, the Chucky TV series, and beyond, it’s undeniable that Devon’s resume in genre is unimpeachable. He’s part of modern horror’s DNA.” He continued by saying, “For an awards ceremony that also feels like one big Halloween party, you need someone who can be the ultimate Halloween party host. Devon’s history and love for all things fright more than prove that he’s the right person for this scary soiree.”
Based on replies to the show’s trailer drop on social media, horror fans definitely feel the same way. For more than 30 years, the FANGORIA Chainsaw Awards have celebrated the year's most outstanding achievements across horror film, television, and gaming, with fans around the world voting to choose the winners. This year’s show debuts on Sunday, October 25, 2026, at 9:00 p.m. ET (6:00 p.m. PT), exclusively on Shudder.
This year, my wife Harmony and I were honored to be asked to appear in the Chainsaw Awards, something that was filmed before I joined the Fango team full-time, and provides tangible evidence to my internet-illiterate mother that, “Yes, my job writing about horror is actually real and how I make a living.” But something happened when I realized that appearing the year Devon Sawa hosted the Chainsaw Awards meant there would be permanent documentation of a man I’ve been a fan of my entire life (Now and Then hive, our time is now) saying my name! Out loud!
I fangirled out.
When you work in this industry and interview celebrities regularly, you get desensitized to famous faces. Hell, I interviewed the man (virtually) for Season 3 of Chucky at my former job, and I was completely normal and professional about it. So why the hell did learning Devon Sawa would be introducing my wife and I’s segment of the Chainsaw Awards make me short-circuit and regress to a squealing teenage girl?
Well, it’s because Devon Sawa isn’t just a talented actor I’ve been a fan of for decades; he’s a formative pillar of my love of the genre. Just like FANGORIA Magazine was all those years ago, when I begged my friend’s older sibling to sneak me their copies to read when the adults weren’t looking.
As a millennial, Casper was obviously a huge deal to me. But as a lesbian, Devon Sawa saying “can I keep you” to Christina Ricci’s Kat Harvey didn’t have the same effect on me as it did on the rest of my friends during childhood sleepovers. If anything, I wanted to be the one saying those words to Christina Ricci. (I’m telling you, Now and Then changed my damn brain chemistry.)
Final Destination, however, changed my life.
I consider it a great privilege to have grown up with parents who never banned me from watching horror movies. My mom is a die-hard Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street fanatic, so Michael and Freddy were in such an annual rotation that I can barely remember a time when I didn’t know who they were. And I love them, I do, but I’ll never be able to separate them from the fact that, like The Beatles, Bon Jovi, and The Cure, my mom liked them first.
At this point in my life, I undoubtedly know more about both slasher franchises than my mom, but those are still her guys. I learned about The Scream series from late-night trailers while I was watching MTV instead of going to bed at a reasonable hour, and my friends’ older siblings saw it in theaters when I was too young to see R-rated movies in person. So while I also love Scream with every cell in my body, the series has never felt like it belonged to me either.
But Final Destination? That was my Holy Grail.
Devon Sawa’s portrayal of Alex Browning has stuck with me forever, and I rewatch the Final Destination franchise more than any other, without question. When the sequel was announced, I was elated, because I finally had a horror franchise that felt like mine. I discovered it and fell in love with it on my own, and Alex’s fight against the death and destruction coming for him and all of his friends was deeply relatable. “That’s who I would be in a horror movie,” I thought. “I would be Alex Browning.”
If there is any hill I will die on, it’s that Final Destination is, by law of averages, the best horror franchise we have. Only one movie is wack? (Sorry, it’s The Final Destination). One of the best entries is number SIX?! This franchise lacks heavily marketable or merchandisable horror icons, relying instead on the terrifying premise that death is always coming for us and giving us characters we actually care about.
None of that happens without Devon Sawa’s incredible, heartbreaking, heroic performance as Alex Browning, a character who inspires us all to fight the forces of the universe when we feel like they’re trying to take us out.
Idle Hands missed me until high school because the film hit when I was only in fourth grade, and my local video store didn’t have a copy. Tragically, I only got my hands on it after Blockbuster put them out of business and became my go-to spot for finding weird stuff I’d never heard of. Sure, Seth Green had become a favorite of mine around this time, but I rented the movie because it starred my guy, Devon Sawa. It remains an all-time favorite.
After his self-imposed hiatus from the industry, he came back with a vengeance, shaking off his teen heartthrob image by throwing himself into complex, unconventional roles. Luckily for us, that meant he dove into the horror genre and became one of our most beloved Scream Kings. And it's not just the quantity of his roles; he's also really, really good at what he does. There's something so effortlessly lived-in about all his performances, and his clear love of horror makes them even better. He understands the genre's power and why people love it, and his commitment to treating every horror movie, regardless of budget, with the same caliber of talent we know he can deliver speaks volumes about his dedication to his craft.
Devil’s Den, The Exorcism of Molly Hartley, Hunter Hunter, Death Rider in the House of Vampires, Black Friday, Consumed, All the Lost Ones, Heart Eyes, and Don Mancini’s insistence on inventing new ways to kill him off in every season of the Chucky TV series have allowed him to take up permanent residency in the hearts and minds of horror fans everywhere. We even put him in danger on a Fango cover. His appearance on Twisted Metal made me shout with joy at my TV, and now a new generation of witchy teens is getting introduced to him through Coven Academy. He’ll appear in the next installment of the Return of the Living Dead franchise, and you can bet your ass I’ll be watching it the second it’s available in November, just because he’s in it.
And I’m well aware that since he’s hosting the FANGORIA Chainsaw Awards and I’m writing this article on FANGORIA dot com, there’s a non-zero chance he’ll see this embarrassing diatribe. But honestly? I don’t care. Devon Sawa hosting the awards this year is cool as hell, and I think it’s ludicrous that I’m expected to pretend it’s normal. It's not normal. He's a bona fide horror icon, one of the most talented actors currently working today, and he's hosting our show? If I'm not freaking out with excitement, how can I expect any of you to? Either you love Devon Sawa, or you have terrible taste. Sorry, I don’t make the rules.
But I do still check my tray tables for stability before every flight… just in case.
