Alec Sears | December 3, 2021

2021 Stephen King Scream Job Winner

Designer by day—Stephen King stan all the time

The challenge was simple: watch 13 Stephen King movies by Halloween; track your heart rate, sleep schedule, and how many jump scares you get during each film; win $1,300. And after thousands of applicants staked their claim as to why we should choose them for this dream job, one applicant channeled her Stephen King fandom to stab steal our hearts—you’ll understand why.

Ashley LaBossiere is a graphic designer and illustrator out of Atlanta, GA. She thoroughly enjoys all things true crime and horror, especially when it comes to Stephen King. Her art Instagram account is aptly named @constantdesigner – an ode to King’s “Constant Reader.”

Ashley’s wife, Destiny, and two dogs, Emmy and Riley, joined her for most of the movie watching. From the It remakes to The Shining and Doctor Sleep, there was no shortage of spooky King adaptations for Ashley to, we guess, enjoy? You can find her journey through each of the 13 movies on her personal Instagram @ashley_elayne. So how did Ashley handle the challenge? Watch for yourself!

Nothing scares Ashley—except for Pennywise

A self-proclaimed night owl and lover of horror, Ashley powered through the Stephen King movies in a two-week span. It didn’t matter who she was watching the movie with, she always enjoyed her time. “I loved the challenge,” Ashley said. “It honestly was more difficult than I originally thought it would be, but totally worth it!” But was it difficult because of how scary it was? Not for Ashley! When asked about her reactions to the movies and her mood throughout, she said, “There were only three movies that really made me jump the whole time…I never felt super stressed at any point. If anything, they were definitely a way to unwind.” Pennywise had other plans, though, making Ashley jump out of her seat a total of 24 times between the two films. “Pennywise in It: Chapter Two is absolutely the most terrifying monster out of all 13 movies. There’s something specifically devious about him in that second chapter.”

Results by the numbers

• While it is no secret that the It movies topped Ashley’s list on scariest films, two other movies made the graphic designer jump quite a bit throughout: Creepshow and Pet Sematary, with seven jumpscares each. Maybe she just had to hold her breath like Ted Danson did in the Creepshow short “Something to Tide You Over.”
• You can guess by now that Pennywise was her scariest villain out of all thirteen films, but Annie Wilkes from Misery was up there too. Kathy Bates’ Academy Award winning performance leaves us on the edge of our seats. But we don’t think she’s obsessing over you, Ashley, so we think you’ll sleep well tonight.
• Though Ashley only had two nightmares in the span of thirteen different nights, the one that stood out to her was the one she ended up burning down her own kitchen. Makes sense, considering she watched Carrie the night before.

Ashley provided plenty of interesting information about which Stephen King films were the most frightening and which one’s were essentially duds (we’re looking at you, Children of the Corn with OUR creepy eyes). Nevertheless, a true horror and Stephen King fanatic got to live out her dream, which might be considered a nightmare to others: stay up late for two weeks watching Halloween movies and eat a bottomless pit of popcorn. “I definitely ate more popcorn over that two-week span than I have in my entire life.”