6 Years Before ‘Weapons,’ Austin Abrams Met an Even More Horrible Fate in This Haunting Horror Adaptation

The newest role for Austin Abrams in Weapons doesn’t give him a happy ending as the drug addict James. He is dead set on getting money for his next hit, and he wanders directly into the epicenter of the movie’s strange, unsettling plot twists. James lasts a lot longer than viewers might expect, but he soon gets claimed by the evil at large in Weapons. Among the other horror roles for Abrams, he doesn’t get to be a survivor, but none of his on-screen deaths have been as horrible as what happens to him when he meets one of the creepiest scarecrows you will ever see in 2019’s Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark.

Austin Abrams Plays an Ill-Fated Bully in ‘Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark’

After seeing director Zach Cregger’s horror hit of 2025, you may feel the urge to put together a post-Weapons watch list. Paul Thomas Anderson‘s Magnolia is credited with influencing Cregger’s take on an ensemble cast and the epic scale of the story told. Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is another entry that could be added. Although not hand-picked by Cregger, it’s a more horror-focused option with similarities to Weapons in bringing you to another Pennsylvania town where witchcraft targets the youths in the community. Loosely based on three collections of short stories by Alvin Schwartz and Stephen Gammell‘s notorious illustrations, the 2019 film adaptation brings the monsters from a cursed storybook into the lives of unsuspecting teens.

One who gets a deadly encounter is Tommy, played by Abrams. While death and paranoia grip the town of Maybrook, Pennsylvania, in Weapons, the autumn vibes are not so cozy in Mill Valley, Pennsylvania, in Scary Stories. Tommy is the leader of a pack of jocks who harass Stella (Zoe Colletti) and her friends. A cruel, racist bully, Tommy brings none of the laughs that Abrams does as James in Weapons. The sneer on Tommy’s face when he wants to be intimidating shows just how much joy he gets from being cruel. He inadvertently causes his fate when he locks Stella and her friends inside the abandoned Bellows house, an infamous place in town with a dark history, and Stella finds an old book of horror stories written by a suspected witch. From the pages comes one of the most famous monsters from the original Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, and it has Tommy in its sights.

Harold the Scarecrow Will Haunt Your Dreams

One of the most talked-about parts of Weapons is Amy Madigan’s Aunt Gladys, who is behind the missing children. The old woman is a witch seeking to rejuvenate herself with them, and she becomes one of the scariest witches in modern horror. The red wig she wears and the smeared makeup on her face are a weird mix of clown and crone that turns her into the stuff of nightmares. She preys on Maybrook, but it’s not any safer over in Mill Valley when the first monster that is set loose is the bloated, bug-infested Harold, a monstrous scarecrow that favors scaring humans more than birds.

In the 1991 third book, Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones, two farmers vent their hatred onto the straw-filled Harold, before realizing the scarecrow is coming alive. An attempt to escape fails in the end, with the implication that one of the farmers has been killed when the other notices that Harold “stretched out a bloody skin to dry in the sun.” The short horror story is a metaphor for abuse, which the 2019 film pays tribute to by turning the tables on Tommy. The tormentor becomes a victim in a haunting scene that takes place in the middle of his family’s cornfield.

Late at night, there is nothing but the rustling of the stalks as the bully gets lost in the rows of corn. No matter where he walks, he comes across Harold, until one more attempt to get out, and he finds the scarecrow’s post suddenly empty. Hurrying away only brings Tommy directly into Harold’s path. The scarecrow can only walk, but he relentlessly goes after the teen, and when the distance closes in, Tommy’s death is not left off-screen like in the book.

‘Weapons’ Doesn’t Have the Body Horror That ‘Scary Stories’ Does

Of his horror roles, Austin Abrams was Ron in Seasons 5 and 6 of The Walking Dead, who shoots Carl (Chandler Riggs) in the eye before getting stabbed and left to be surrounded by Walkers without showing him being devoured. In Weapons, Aunt Gladys’ favorite spell is using a hexed stick to control the minds and bodies of her victims. Of course, no one would want to have this happen to them, but it’s far more comedic than horrifying when James is beaten down by Josh Brolin, again and again. Meanwhile, Scary Stories might have a PG-13 rating, and Tommy’s death is bloodless, yet neither diminishes how disgusting and horrific it becomes. Harold uses a pitchfork to impale the bully, a wound that infects Tommy with a body horror transformation. Straw emerges out of places it shouldn’t, from under his skin and out of his ears, and yanking it out produces more of it. His eyes sink in while he gags and chokes on the straw spilling from his mouth.

Tommy’s body turns against him, changing him into a scarecrow that will soon be left to take over Harold’s place in the cornfield. Another curse might take over Austin Abrams in Weapons, but Tommy’s demise feels closer to the absurdity of the campier Evil Dead installments. In 2019’s Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, it creates an inventive, body-horror death out of the ambiguous final line of the original short story. On the page and on the screen, Harold sure doesn’t like bullies.