Someone recently asked for a list of my favourite dire-logue, those inspired insights by characters created sometimes by clever scribes but more often the consequences of hopeless screenwriting and dreadful delivery from the actors.

So, here are the first facepalm verbal tics, in this edition celebrating characters who adorned the colours of one Captain Obvious – like this guy…

ABSURD (1981): (Examining a hacked up corpse) “I’m no doctor but I don’t think it looks good.”

THE BABY DOLL MURDERS (1992): “With a serial killer there’s always a pattern: he hates his mother, he hates his father, all women are whores…something!”

BLACK CHRISTMAS (2006): “I’m really not OK with any of this… I mean, buying a Christmas present for a serial killer?”

BLOOD CULT (1985): “We do not need serial killers on this campus.”

FALLEN ANGELS (2002): “Cutting the power, cutting the phonelines – he’s planned ahead.”

THE FOREST (1982): “I don’t know about splitting up, it’s not usually a good idea.”

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 2 (1981): “Axes, knives, saws – they can all be dangerous.”

HACK-O-LANTERN (1987): “Ever since my dad died on Halloween night, this day really seems to affect [my mom].”

NEW YEAR’S EVIL (1980): “He’s mutilated the breasts of most of his women, that’s a common characteristic of a psychopathic killer.”

SCALPS (1983): “Defiling the graves of the dead will only anger their souls.”

SPLATTER UNIVERSITY (1984): “The killer is obviously a psychopath and cannot be reasoned with.”

URBAN LEGEND (1998): “It’s like someone out there’s taking all these stories – and making them reality!”