Gus Riggs is the main antagonist in The Tripper.
Biography[]
As a boy, Gus lived out in the woods with his lumberjack father Dylan and his ailing mother. He also had a strange obsession with Ronald Reagan.
One day in 1967, Gus is watching a news report on TV of Reagan railing against the environmentalist movement. Meanwhile outside, Dylan faces resistance from a group of tree-hugging hippies who will not allow him to clear the forest, despite how he needs the money to buy medicine for his wife. A standoff between Dylan and the hippies ensues, following which the disturbed Gys takes a chainsaw to the neck of one of the protesters, getting taken away by law enforcement for doing so. Some years later, however, Gus ends up being released due to Reagan shutting down several mental institutions during his reign as president (which included the institution Gus got sent to).
Several years later, in 2006, a group of friends - Joey, Ivan, Samantha, Linda, Jade and Jack - are driving through the woods to the American Free Love Festival (a modern-day Woodstock festival) for a weekend of debauchery. During the journey, the group stops at a gas station to pick up supplies, only to run into a group of older hooligans, who begin threatening them. A fight ensues, which sees Gus (who was there at the store with them) breaking the arm of one of the hooligans.
Meanwhile, Frank Baker, the organizer for the event, is preparing for the festival, despite local police officer Buzz Hall reminding him that a girl had died at the one held the previous year. The festival begins anyway, but one festival goer gets killed by an unseen figure after wandering into the woods by himself. The next day, Linda and Joey head off into the woods by themselves to have sex, only to be ambushed by the hooligans with paintball guns. Suddenly, Gus appears, dressed like Ronald Reagan, and murders all five of them.
Back at the festival, the headless body of an older hippie (killed earlier by Gus) is found hanging from a tree. Buzz quickly orders the festival to be shut down, and tells the attendees to go home, much to the chagrin of Baker. Since Joey had the keys for their van, Samantha goes off looking for him, only to find a car belonging to her abusive ex-boyfriend Jimmy (whom she thinks has been following her over the past few days). Frightened, she flees back to the van, only to find that Jack and Jade have been murdered. Jimmy suddenly appears, holding a gun to Ivan's neck. Samantha confronts Jimmy, accusing him of murdering the others, but then Gus appears and kills Jimmy and Ivan, upon which Samantha flees.
Meanwhile, Buzz, believing Dylan Riggs to be the killer, heads out to his shack, where he finds Dylan seemingly cutting up the bodies of the murdered victims. A chase begins, but it quickly ends after Dylan accidentally falls into his own punji stick trap, killing himself. Elsewhere, Gus begins pursuing Baker, but he manages to escape by hiding in an outhouse toilet. Gus then goes back to chasing after Samantha, when Buzz appears and shoots him down, seemingly killing him. Suddenly, Gus pops back up, but Samantha is able to beat him down again with a hammer, knocking him out. She then demasks Gus, revealing his identity.
The next morning, Samantha is escorted away from the woods by law enforcement, although Buzz learns that Gus's body wasn't found where it should have been. Meanwhile, Baker re-emerges from the outhouse and wanders off into the woods, where Gus suddenly appears and murders him with a chainsaw.
Victims[]
- Angry Protester - Chainsaw to neck
- Flashback Festivalgoer - Chased through woods, face ripped open
- Old Woods Hippie - Beheaded with axe
- Ginger Nudist - Hung from tree by ankles, disemboweled
- Trucker Muff - Just say neck snap
- Joey - Hand cut off
- Trucker Hank - Chopped to death with axe
- Trucker Tyler - Stabbed in... dick? Oh gut, then disemboweled
- Linda - Stabbed 5x in stomach
- Jack - Postcoital carve up
- Jade - Postcoital carve up
- Jimmy - Chest chopped 4z with axe
- Ivan - Splashy strobe light axe chopped
- Dylan Riggs - Impaled on his own pitfall trap
- Festivalgoer #1 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #2 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #3 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #4 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #5 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #6 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #7 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #8 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #9 - Hacked and slashed into various states of red
- Festivalgoer #1 - Killed offscreen, found dead
- Festivalgoer #2 - Killed offscreen, found dead
- Festivalgoer #3 - Killed offscreen, found dead
- Frank Baker - Chainsaw bifurcation
Trivia[]
- Adult Gus is played by Christopher Allen Nelson, a make-up artist who also played Officer Francis in Halloween 2018.