A Childhood Love of Horror Reflected in Horror Movie Marathons
I've enjoyed horror films, TV, books - all kinds of horror-related mediums - for as long as I can remember. It's tough to pinpoint exactly where my interest began, but I tend to focus on books and movies, being the first spark that got me started. Spooky lore, ghostly apparitions, threatening monsters, curses, haunting mysteries - there were so many concepts that captivated me, even if I had to conquer my childhood fears as I explored it all! Certainly, a love of the Halloween season and learning about folklore piqued my imagination as well. My family and I didn't live too far away from Sleepy Hollow, New York so that classic tale and its many iterations always fascinated me.
What's always been curious about this topic is that my interest in all things horror did not come from my family - it was mostly an organic discovery on my own and then eventually influenced by friends. My love of horror started small but kept persistently growing as my awareness of different kinds of entertainment mediums broadened.
Diving Into the Written World of Horror
I fondly remember poring over the Goosebumps books from R.L. Stine - I had nearly every single book in the series, each colorful paperback alphabetically organized on the bookshelf in my childhood bedroom. Some I enjoyed more than others - especially where the characters were experiencing something truly scary or threatening. Eventually, I graduated to the iconic Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. These three books really got under my skin in the best way possible. For kids’ books, they were very disturbing – I remember being morbidly fascinated by a story called Wonderful Sausage, which was a distillation of a Sweeny Todd-like story, but involving a butcher slaughtering townspeople to turn into sausage. Another called One Sunday Morning was very morbid, where a woman wakes up, running late to church, and once she arrives, she realizes that the congregation around her is all dead. As she tries to flee, the undead people tear at her clothes, and she barely escapes. There were many stories that I was obsessed with – and I bought another set of paperbacks for our collection just last year so I could relive them all over again. The disturbing black and white illustrations that accompanied each story were profoundly eerie and unforgettable - many of them are still seared into my brain to this day and made each story incredibly vivid. These stories were based primarily on American folklore and urban legends told in other countries too, all reworked to be palatable for younger readers. I definitely remember thinking some of the tales seemed older and familiar somehow and not just made up completely by the author. Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is a timeless collection of horror classics that I hope never fades. I know other horror short stories resonated with me too - even children's tales like the Taily Poe - a beautifully illustrated and simple, yet VERY creepy story that was unforgettable for me. For a story with only limited words, and kid-friendly illustrations, the story conjures a sense of impending dread that somehow made me want to read it repeatedly.
I also enjoyed some of the spookier stories from John Bellairs, which I often found to be unnerving but also exciting, with compelling mysteries and lore that made me want to read more of his work. When it came to books, something about horror stories seemed to pull me into foreboding worlds, offering a spooky, thrilling escape from reality. I continue to consume the horror genre as an adult, constantly seeking out new horror stories and delving into modern classics from Stephen King, Joe Hill, Nick Cutter, and Paul Tremblay - just to name a few. There are so many incredible horror authors that constantly push me to keep up with the latest in literary horror. I make it a point to keep track of these on my book list. Any time I set foot in a Barnes and Noble, I'll find myself drifting towards the horror section to see if anything spooky and new jumps out at me.
As much as I loved (and continue to adore) horror in written form, from an early point in life, I sought out scares and thrills in other mediums. My fascination with horror couldn’t be contained to only one entertainment format - it just wasn't possible - I needed more!
Discovering a Love of Horror Films
Horror films, for me, have been a favorite genre for a long while, but it didn't start with the classic films like Halloween or The Exorcist. I actually trace my fascination with cinematic horror to spookier and creepy kids’ films, even if more atmospheric and spooky visually, without being explicitly scary. There are some great classic family-friendly films with a spooky Halloween aesthetic, and those were certainly gateways to horror for my younger self. Beetlejuice, Ghostbusters, Nightmare Before Christmas, and even Poltergeist were all awe-inspiring to me - though Poltergeist probably freaked me out far and away more than others! It’s the entry-level horror film for kids ready for something scarier, and it was utterly terrifying to me at the time – one scene, in particular, involving a clown toy coming to life and terrorizing one of the kids in a bedroom certainly led to a few sleepless nights for me. I had more than a few nightmares as a kid from a few of these films, but I was always curious to see more - I guess I figured I could survive the nightmares or become brave enough to the point where they no longer fazed me. Even if a film wasn't strictly terrifying, I always loved to embrace anything mildly spooky, funny, and entertaining.
Then there are the Alien and Predator franchises - not every film in these franchises is strictly horror, but elements of the first Alien and Predator films introduced me to fascinating and horrifying alien creatures that I became enamored with - and absolutely still am today, to the point that I have a solid collection of Alien toys and figures; some of them reside on my desk. While many of these films leaned more into action than full-blown horror, the first Alien film really inspired me to consider how different kinds of genres could offer horror experiences. A lonely crew, deep in space, trapped on board with a terrifying creature that's hunting them down one by one…there's a reason why Alien is considered a defining film that spawned an entire subgenre of science fiction horror. That film got me to appreciate unique stories where the intersection of horror and science fiction creates something magical and pushes the limits of how genres are defined. I eventually started to see scarier films at friends’ houses, especially starting in middle school – and though I started with PG-13 movies since my parents weren't exactly eager to let me watch R-rated horror films as a kid, I did watch my fair share of them regardless. Lots of these films likely desensitized me a bit. I remember being terrified of The Ring and classic films like Child’s Play, Children of the Corn, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. The Ring had amazing scares for its time, particularly a creepy girl crawling out of the well, and Child’s Play has many unnerving moments with Chucky running around a room with murderous intent. A Nightmare on Elm Street was nightmare-inducing for me as a preteen and had a few eye-popping bloody moments, particularly the bedroom death scene. I didn't delve into all of the classics as much as I would have liked back then. However – even the classics I did see that made an impression on me, I didn’t watch anywhere near enough.
As I got older, I continued to explore other kinds of horror franchises, and this was especially true in high school - The Descent from 2005 was very memorable during that time - an unnerving tale of a group of friends who go spelunking somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina, and after getting stuck deep in an unexplored cave system, they realize they are far from alone - in fact, the monstrous creatures they have to fight are adept at moving quickly, hunting, and seeing in the dark. In college, I'd often spend fall Florida evenings at the start of the semesters checking out the latest Paranormal Activity films or the latest Saw franchise film with groups of friends. Those two franchises were running strong then and provided plenty of jump scares, gore, and intense scares, even if not every film was brimming with creativity. I relished those opportunities to delight in a new horror film with friends, and even if it was terrible, we could laugh and poke fun at it afterward over drinks or a late-night meal.
Exploring The Horror Genre’s Takeover of TV
The horror genre has executed an impressive takeover of television in the last decade or so, and it’s been thrilling to experience it. The television medium offers a long-form method for spooky horror shows to delight audiences with effective storytelling, and there have been so many renowned shows in the last decade building massive popularity – I loved seeing this evolution and experiencing it as a dedicated horror fan. I did enjoy a few scary shows as a kid, too – particularly Are You Afraid of the Dark and Tales from the Crypt, but back in the day before the era of streaming, or even DVD box sets of TV shows, I'd look to watch them whenever I could, but it was very sporadic - I just wasn't able to watch them sequentially. I do remember being freaked out by a few episodes of Are You Afraid of the Dark, however. The main element that I loved about horror shows was the anthology format - where each episode could stand on its own and provide a compelling story. Of course, a full season of a horror storyline getting fleshed out was also ideal for me. As I got older, I would watch other kinds of horror shows, and even after college, content like American Horror Story was fun to dive into. The Walking Dead was another that I gravitated towards, along with Hannibal and, more recently, The Haunting of Hill House. The new Chucky show is also on my watch list. Horror television has come a long way in the last decade, which is delightful – audiences resonate with spooky and compelling storytelling that touches different fears, cultures, legends, folklore, and so much more. Although I don't always keep up with the latest horror shows as of 2023, I try to keep a few on my radar and add to my TV show watch lists. The list is always growing, and my challenge is prioritizing!
Falling Away from Horror and Forgetting
When I met my wife Erin in 2012 and moved in together a few years later, I found myself losing touch with my love of horror. Horror is not a genre that she loves at all, and in the early days, we wanted to experience things together, big and small - so I accepted that we'd check out other movies or binge different kinds of shows. I would still leap to see a few standout films, like The Witch in 2015, but by and large, I went through a 'horror drought' - not seeing many spooky films or shows. Despite Erin not being a horror fan, she closely followed the excellent show Hannibal with me - it was a surprising exception, even with how brutal and scary the show could get. She was intrigued by the mystery the show offered with its eerie storyline, and both the characters and writing were extraordinarily compelling - I agreed! As the years went by, and I found plenty of other kinds of movies and shows to enjoy, I had a nagging feeling that I was missing out on a key part of entertainment that had always been a passion of mine. I knew I had to figure out how to make room again for my passion for horror. And that's when I decided to dive headlong into horror movie marathons in October.
Designing the Ultimate Horror Movie Marathon Approach
By 2017, I came up with an idea that was a game-changer for me - one that propelled me back into the spooky realm of horror. On a whim, I decided I would do a horror movie marathon for October that year. I saw this as the perfect opportunity to catch up on some newer horror films that had eluded me and check out some past films I might have missed - from old classics, newer franchises, and lesser-known indie horror movies. I used my Letterboxd profile to organize my plans, creating a list of ideas after extensive research on Reddit and a variety of horror blogs and film enthusiast sites - what started as a whim quickly morphed into an intensive investigation to turn over every rock to find excellent horror films that had eluded me. I still use Letterboxd daily to track all my movie-watching activities, especially prioritizing all the best films I have to watch.
To watch the many horror films I discovered, I usually focused on films I could stream, especially Netflix, Hulu, and HBO Max. For some more lesser-known titles, I had to dive deep into obscure streaming sites or settle for an on-demand rental as a last resort, but identifying the films worth seeing and hunting them down was part of the fun - and that included prioritizing which films were going to be a slam dunk, versus which were a bit dubious, and may not be worth the hype. To appease Erin, much of my marathon was more portable. I'd watch some on my laptop with headphones or late at night on the TV - I was very committed to making this concept work and seeing how many films I could squeeze into October.
How Each Horror Marathon Expanded in Scope
The first horror marathon of 2017 was only 12 films, but most were very enjoyable, as I had done a ton of research to pick the best I could find. I knew I had to continue, and wanted to challenge myself to see even more films the next year if I budgeted my time carefully. By 2018, I was doing even more research and planning, and I ended up watching 30 films for that October marathon - which was astounding to me. I didn't think I could top this, but kept upping the ante each year. By 2021, I watched 65 total horror films. I didn't get all that much sleep, but still kept up with my job and a fairly regular schedule, though that seemed to be my upper limit. For 2022, my horror marathon focused on a list I created of over 130 options. I ended up watching 52 total films. I couldn't beat my prior year's grand total, but still was amazed I could watch that many, given how chaotic my life had been that season. For 2023, I had a similarly endless list to choose from, but with other massive priorities in life dominating my time – including my wife being pregnant with our first child – I aimed lower, watching 38 films – not too shabby! I only disliked a few of the total that I watched in October 2023, so that made the experience even more enjoyable. Thinking ahead to the October horror marathon for 2024 and taking care of a newborn, I’ll be lucky if I even hit ten films. If I can watch at least a handful, I’ll consider that a resounding success.
What's So Appealing About a Horror Movie Marathon, Anyway?
Executing these horror movie marathons has become one of the things I love most about the Halloween season. I relish the thrill of discovery and broadening my horror horizons. Since the 2020 pandemic, I have been writing reviews of each horror film I watch, so even if I watch a disappointing horror film, I take solace in the fact that I can write a highly critical review and have some fun with it as I rage against a particularly crappy film. There has been such a resurgence in horror film content, as so many creators who are active in the space are crafting unique stories, and studios are willing to commit to horror films, as they tend to be lower-budget and extremely profitable. Horror marathons help me stay connected to that spooky world, and it's the perfect thing to enjoy when the weather gets cold, leaves start to turn brilliant auburn colors, and the fall wind howls outside on (hopefully) chilly late October evenings. Even if, in upcoming years, I can only do a handful of films during the month, I will still do my best to keep my little horror tradition going in October. Though I don’t consider myself a horror expert, there's always more to discover across the vibrant horror genre. I hope to push the limits of discovery and take my interest in the genre to new heights!
Here are all the lists of horror marathons I've done below, and check out my 2023 list to see which films I enjoyed during the most recent horror marathon. If you are thinking of delving into a horror marathon, I heartily encourage it! If you do, I hope you can get some value from my past horror movie lists- there are plenty of great films on my lists that can get you started down the path of curating your very own horror movie marathon.
Check out my list of favorite horror films - I'm still adding to this periodically!
Explore all the horror films I’ve seen from each horror marathon I’ve done:
