Laughter in the shadows: Deepanjana Pal on horror, Stree 2 and Megan Thee Stallion

First came the frightened women, then the law-abiding victims on a quest for justice. See how women in horror have come of age. In this week’s Dee for Drama.

During the song Khoobsurat from Stree 2 (2024), one thought kept ricocheting in my head: Shraddha Kapoor’s smile wasn’t nearly creepy enough. As she shimmied alongside Varun Dhawan and Rajkummar Rao, she tossed a Mona Lisa smile to the camera.

It was probably supposed to be enticing and menacing. After all, her character was the one that got the witchy hair extensions at the end of Stree (2018). Yet nothing about Kapoor felt uncanny as she cheerfully cavorted with her