Gather 'round for a spooky story, where two roads diverge in a haunted wood. One, to the "hot girls only" section of Spirit Halloween. The other, to a well-worn couch for yet another Halloweentown rewatch. And let me just say, both are valid.
With age comes wisdom, health insurance, and changing plans. With time, latex costumes became fleece pajamas. But one thing that hasn’t changed in decades is our collective Halloween watchlist, and by no means should you skip the Halloweentowns, Nightmare Before Christmases, and Twitches (one and two)—but, we do have some notes. We gather before you today not to hasten your spooky streaming, but to expand it.
Here are 10 new movies and shows that are must watches for Halloweek.
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
Director Nia DaCosta picks up where Danny Boyle left off, taking us deeper into a postapocalyptic Britain where the infected are no longer the only things worth fearing. With Ralph Fiennes returning as the eccentric Dr. Kelson and Jack O'Connell leading a particularly disturbing cult, The Bone Temple suggests that even after the world ends, humanity will still find new ways to make things worse.
Backrooms
Inspired by director Kane Parsons’ viral internet horror phenomenon, A24’s Backrooms turns endless fluorescent-lit hallways, empty rooms, and the unsettling familiarity of office carpeting into a waking nightmare. Suddenly, a mandatory all-hands meeting doesn’t sound so bad.
Buddy
Director Casper Kelly, the mind behind Adult Swim's viral Too Many Cooks, finds something sinister in the relentlessly cheerful world of 1990s children's television. In Buddy, a group of children becomes trapped inside a television program hosted by an orange unicorn whose insistence on happiness takes a violent turn. With Keegan-Michael Key voicing the nightmare-inducing mascot and Cristin Milioti starring, you'll never look at your childhood favorites the same way again.
Carrie
Prom season has never been particularly kind to Carrie White. Fifty years after Sissy Spacek made the role iconic, Mike Flanagan revisits Stephen King's misunderstood teenager in a new Prime Video series starring Summer H. Howell. This time, the cruelty extends beyond the school hallways and onto social media, giving Carrie's infamous revenge story a distinctly contemporary edge.
Clayface
More Mike Flanagan ahead, as DC takes a detour into body horror with Clayface. The flick follows a struggling actor whose desperate pursuit of Hollywood success takes a grotesque turn, giving one of Batman's more unusual villains a distinctly disturbing origin story. In an industry obsessed with appearances, losing your face might be the ultimate career setback.
Crystal Lake
More than four decades after Friday the 13th introduced one of cinema's most notorious killers, A24 returns to Camp Crystal Lake to explore the tragedy that started it all. Linda Cardellini stars as Pamela Voorhees, a grieving mother whose son's drowning sets off a disturbing chain of events in a seemingly quiet New Jersey town. The eight-part Peacock prequel shifts the focus from Jason's familiar killing spree to the woman whose grief helped create a horror dynasty.
Hokum
Severance star Adam Scott trades corporate paranoia for supernatural terror in Hokum, the latest nightmare from Oddity director Damian McCarthy. Playing a horror novelist who checks into a remote Irish hotel to scatter his parents' ashes, Scott finds himself caught up in the legend of a witch haunting the honeymoon suite. Apparently, checking out early isn't an option.
It Ends
Gen Z's quarter-life crisis gets the horror treatment in NEON's It Ends, a surreal road-trip thriller from first-time director Alexander Ullom. Following four friends who accidentally turn onto a highway with no apparent exit, the film transforms the familiar anxieties of postgrad life into a literal road to nowhere. Think The Twilight Zone meets the existential dread of being 23 and having absolutely no idea what comes next.
Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story
Ryan Murphy's Monster franchise finally has its first female lead. Following seasons dedicated to Jeffrey Dahmer, the Menendez brothers, and Ed Gein, Netflix heads back to 1892 for The Lizzie Borden Story, starring Ella Beatty as the woman accused of one of America's most infamous axe murders.
Obsession
Director Curry Barker takes the familiar horrors of unrequited love to their logical, supernatural extreme in Obsession, following a hopeless romantic whose wish for his crush to love him back comes with some deeply disturbing consequences.
Other Mommy
Jessica Chastain stars in Other Mommy, an adaptation of Josh Malerman's Incidents Around the House, about a young girl terrorized by an entity determined to take her mother's place. The film turns an ordinary family home into a deeply unsettling battleground over who, or what, gets to be Mom.
Resident Evil
Hollywood's latest video-game adaptation comes with a particularly gruesome pedigree. From Barbarian and Weapons director Zach Cregger, Resident Evil stars Austin Abrams as a medical courier whose seemingly routine delivery lands him in the middle of a zombie outbreak in Raccoon City.
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma
I Saw the TV Glow director Jane Schoenbrun returns with Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, starring Hannah Einbinder as a filmmaker determined to revive a forgotten slasher franchise. Gillian Anderson plays the original film's elusive star, whose involvement sends the production in some unexpected directions.
Widow’s Bay
Fresh off a historic 14-win sweep at this year’s Emmys, Apple TV’s Widow’s Bay has officially become the most-awarded comedy series in a single season. The horror-comedy stars Matthew Rhys as the mayor of a remote New England island determined to turn his struggling community into the next Nantucket, despite locals insisting the place is cursed. Turns out, the supernatural rumors aren't exactly helping the tourism campaign.
If your spooky season continues through Christmas, we’re adding more to your watchlist.
The Body
Catholic guilt? Meet Catholic horror. Netflix's The Body follows a rebellious high-school dance team whose initiation ritual goes spectacularly wrong, leaving the girls with prophetic visions and their entire town in a supernatural panic.
Streams on Netflix November 11
Victorian Psycho
Maika Monroe stars as a governess with some rather unconventional extracurricular interests in Victorian Psycho, adapted from Virginia Feito's novel. Set at a remote English estate, the gothic thriller follows a string of grisly disappearances that suggest the household's newest employee may be hiding more than a few secrets. Good help really is hard to find.
Yellowjackets
The wilderness is finally letting go of its favorite dysfunctional soccer team. Yellowjackets returns for its fourth and final season, bringing the teenage survivors back to civilization after months of cannibalism, cult rituals, and increasingly unhinged survival tactics. With Melanie Lynskey, Christina Ricci, and Hilary Swank among the returning cast, the Paramount+ thriller is gearing up for one last reckoning
Streams on Paramount+ November 20
Werwulf
Following the success of Nosferatu, Robert Eggers reunites with Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Lily-Rose Depp for Werwulf, a brutal medieval horror film about a cursed peasant whose transformations threaten to expose him to a royal hunting party. With Willem Dafoe also joining the cast, Eggers is taking the werewolf genre back to its folkloric roots, stripping away the Hollywood clichés in favor of something far more primal.