Dig in to something spooky (or silly) with The A.V. Club’s Halloween streaming guide
With Halloween falling on a Monday this year, only the most hardcore revelers, and those of us with little monsters to take trick-or-treating, will be strapping on yet another costume and heading out into the night on All Hallow’s Eve proper. As for us, we’ll be turning off our porch lights, curling up with that big bowl of candy we bought “for the neighborhood kids,” and trying to frighten our hangovers away with some scary movies. Here are some horror titles recommended by The A.V. Club and recently added to streaming services, if you’d like to join in:
Netflix is currently the most popular of streaming services—it’ll surpass cable in subscription numbers by next year, according to some studies—and it’s also the one making the biggest push in terms of original programming. If for some reason you’ve never heard of this Stranger Things phenomenon, there’s always that. On a more low-profile note, there’s I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House, which debuted Friday and comes with the endorsement of The A.V. Club’s own A.A. Dowd. Beyond that, Netflix’s new October offerings are unfortunately light on horror. Its back catalog does contain a handful of stone-cold horror classics (Hellraiser, Re-Animator, Jaws), although it’s a better bet if you’re looking for new horror movies, of which Hush, We Are Still Here, Housebound, The Nightmare, and They Look Like People—the last of which was featured in today’s 24 Hours Of Horror marathon—are all solid bets.
New on Amazon Prime this month, you can relive your childhood nightmares with the film adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Witches (1990), which would make for a thematically consistent, if tonally confused, double feature with this year’s horror hit The Witch, also currently streaming free on Prime. (Rosemary’s Baby recently started streaming on Prime as well, speaking of all them witches.) You could do the same with Troll Hunter and Troll 2, if you like, although the variable there is more one of quality. And speaking of Halloween thrill rides, Final Destination is also new on Amazon, and free for Prime members.
This month Hulu added the original The Amityville Horror, as well as Pontypool, The Blair Witch Project, Room 237, and Poltergeist II and III. You’ll have to go to HBO Go/Now for the original 1982 Poltergeist, though. And if camp is more your style, HBO Go is also currently streaming Eight Legged Freaks and Snakes On A Plane, which would make for a fun double feature. (They’ve also got John Carpenter’s Ghosts Of Mars, if you prefer your camp of the more unintentional sort.)
Shudder, meanwhile, has the most extensive selection of horror films, seeing how it’s an all-horror streaming service and all. The Legend Of Boggy Creek, recently recommended here on The A.V. Club, was added earlier this month, as was Takashi Miike’s totally nuts and highly recommended The Happiness Of The Katakuris. And while they’re not new to Shudder, Tourist Trap and Them, both featured in our Horrors Week content, are available as well. And if you stay awake until tomorrow morning, November 1 marks the exclusive streaming debut of the remastered Phantasm on Shudder, as well as sequels Phantasm III and Phantasm IV.
Meanwhile, if TV is more your thing, Robert Kirkman’s Outcast recently became available for download on iTunes after an exclusive run on Cinemax, Shudder has the A.V. Club-recommended French mini-series Beyond The Walls and the complete series of Tales From The Darkside, and American Horror Story seasons 1-5 are currently streaming on Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. Meanwhile, Netflix and Hulu have The X-Files, while Netflix has its more old-fashioned but equally charming predecessor, Kolchak: The Night Stalker.
So, yeah, if you look over all these options and still watch #Horror, that’s on you. Happy Halloween!