Welcome to the Creepy Kiki, PRIDE’s weekly dissection of all things that go bump in the (gay) night. This is the first installment in a series celebrating queer horror, so join us each week for more stories that chill, thrill, and unapologetically kill — with flair.
Director John Hughes was one of the defining voices of the 1980s. He was the architect behind some of the most enduring archetypes of the teen comedy genre. But what if you took some of his most influential work, like 16 Candles, Pretty in Pink, and Some Kind of Wonderful and tossed them in a blender with some red dye and corn syrup? What you’d end up with is Fear Street: Prom Queen, the latest entry in Netflix’s oh-so-queer horror franchise that debuted with a trilogy of movies and dominated the summer of 2021.
This new entry, set in 1988 between the events of the first two of those films, introduces us to a new cast of doomed characters just days away from their senior prom. At its (bloody) heart is Lori Granger, who in typical form for the franchise’s fictional town of Shadyside, comes from a family that seems cursed with violence. By her side is her horror-loving, pot-smoking, and very queer-coded best friend, Megan Rogers, played by out actress Suzanna Son.
Suzanna Son as Megan Rogers and India Fowler as Lori Granger in Fear Street: Prom Queen.
Alan Markfield/Netflix
Against all odds, Lori finds herself nominated for prom queen. The only thing standing between her and coronation is the “wolf pack” — her school’s group of vicious, popular girls — oh, and an axe-wielding maniac, picking off the would-be prom royalty.
It’s a perfectly ’80s setup for a slasher movie, and the film takes full advantage of finding delightfully gory ways to slice and dice through its significant body count. But what really makes this a must-see for queer fans is Megan, who is an amalgamation of classic '80s (and '00s) sidekicks Duckie, Watts, and a whisper of Janis Ian; and that Son helps infuse the character with the kind of queer-coding that would also have been period appropriate.
Suzanna Son as Megan Rogers in Fear Street: Prom Queen.
Alan Markfield/Netflix
This film marks the actress's freshman foray into the horror genre, having first broken out in her Gotham Award-nominated role in Sean Baker’s Red Rocket, followed by a scene-stealing performance as Chloe in HBO’s The Idol.
But her road to becoming a scream queen might just have been predestined. “My birthday is the day before Halloween,” she jokes to PRIDE. “The nurses at the hospital were actually dressed up like witches, and I think that's so funny. It's something that's followed me.”
It may have awakened something in her as well. Son credits starring in Fear Street for turning her into a fan of the genre — but that first came with conquering a fear of her own. “I was pretty nervous to do Fear Street,” she admits. “I had never screamed in public. I had never run on screen before. I was very self-conscious. So, in a way, it was like boot camp and it also made my love for horror so much stronger.”
The Killer, India Fowler as Lori Granger and Suzanna Son as Megan Rogers in Fear Street: Prom Queen.
Alan Markfield/Netflix
The secret to a good scream? Son, who’s also a lifelong piano player with her first album debuting soon, says it's the same as singing. “You don't know what sound is going to come out, and if you don't commit, and if you're not a little bit relaxed, it's gonna sound like crap,” she explains. “You really just have to just throw yourself away.”
She has plenty of opportunities to show off those pipes in Fear Street, as she’s stalked through the halls of Shadyside High by a masked killer. Her newly found love of horror is also something she’s been sharing with her wife, talent manager Ana Bedayo. “She was really scared,” says Son.
Son, on the other hand, has dived into the deep end of the genre and isn't looking back. “I'm good to go. I will watch Sinners on shrooms in IMAX, and my wife is freaking out and I have to console her while I'm on shrooms, which is crazy,” she says. “So if that gives you any bit of the dynamic, she's such a chicken, but I love her so much because she will watch all of the horror [movies] with me, and I'll just maybe I'll watch it first, and then I'll have to tell her there's a jump scare coming.”
Her new passion for the genre has lead to her discovering film like Nicolas Pesce’s The Eyes of My Mother, a psychological horror entry about a young woman’s emotional detachment growing into violent behavior, which Son says she connected with in a surprisingly profound way, “It's so sad, and there's something about it that reminds me of my childhood, which is so fucked up, just like the way... I don't even want to get into it, but, yeah, there's just something nostalgic about it,” she shares. “It's also a beautiful film. All the trauma aside, it's stunning... that changed my life, actually. It was like, horror can be beautiful.”
Like many queer folks, Son has found a refuge in the horror genre, and the catharsis it offers in a world where reality can feel quite scary. “Feeling those feelings in a safe place, on my couch with my wife, there's something nice about [it], that life isn't so scary anymore,” she explains. “I can go to that place and be scared when I want to and when I'm in control of it.”
Not only has the horror genre offered a safe space to process feelings of fear, but it’s also been a place where queer audiences have seen themselves reflected, either subtextually in films like A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge or textually as in Miriam Blaylock in The Hunger — or, more recently, in a multigenerational lesbian love story central to the Fear Street trilogy.
India Fowler as Lori Granger, David Iacono as Tyler Torres and Suzanna Son as Megan Rogers in Fear Street: Prom Queen.
Alan Markfield/Netflix
Like most of the queer viewers who tuned into that three part saga of sapphic love and human sacrifice, Son was a fan. “No notes! Honestly, I just love a love story that isn't all about sadness,” she says of Prom Queen’s predecessors.
While the new film falls more into the subtextual column, queer fans will likely pick up on the loads of queer coding in the film — as unintentional as it may be. Son shares that director Matt Palmer (Calibre) intended the dynamic between Megan and Lori to be “platonic love”; we'll leave it up to the audience to decide what they see. If they end up viewing the dynamic through rainbow colored glasses, well, they’re in good company. “It was how I interpreted the page, really,” admits Son. “I saw all these words on the page and, yeah, they just felt so real. I don't know how to put it. I just felt the friendship and the kinship, and I have lost some best friends before, and it was reminding me of that feeling.”
Suzanna Son attends "Fear Street: Prom Queen Shadyside High Senior Prom '88" immersive experience hosted by Netflix at The Fonda Theatre on May 18, 2025 in Los Angeles, California.
Photo by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images for Netflix
While Fear Street: Prom Queen might be Son’s first foray into horror, it won’t be her last. Next up, she’s starring in the upcoming season of Monsters, which will focus on famed serial killer Ed Gein, whose crimes inspired some of the most iconic queer villains in horror history, including Silence of the Lambs’ Buffalo Bill and Psycho’s Norman Bates himself. While Son can’t say much about her Monsters role, including the name of her character, it's one she admits she “mourned” when she had to say goodbye to them.
Son seems destined to be a figure in queer horror history, and we can’t wait to see what she conjures up — while safely peeking out between our fingers, of course.
To see PRIDE's interviews with the Fear Street: Prom Queen cast, check out the video at the top of the page.
