It is HANDS DOWN my favourite time of the year: Halloween!
And while I know there are those grouches who believe South Africans shouldn’t be celebrating, I don’t care because I am all about the spooky life,Baby.
Keen to join me in being scared witless this October? Here are my Superfans’ Top 5 Picks to watch this Halloween:
MONSTER: THE ED GEIN STORY
Screening giant Netflix and TV master of horror Ryan Murphy (American Horror Story) join macabre forces for a third time in their popular Monster series, this time with the focus on Ed Gein, notorious killer, grave robber and necrophiliac.
Charlie Hunnam firmly sheds his hunky persona, so deeply ingrained in the public’s memories with roles in Β King Arthur: Legend of the Sword and Sons of AnarchyΒ , to fully get under the skin (pun intended π) of one of the 20th century’s most notorious murderers and it’s eerie.
Like the first season of this series, with Evan Peters portraying Jeffrey Dahmer, watching Hunnam inhabit the crossdressing, deranged, sadistic man who inspired countless Hollywood movies including Psycho, Texas Chain Massacre, and others, is difficult and far too realistic. I am a horror fiend and even I have to occasionally pause when the skin flaying gets to be too much.
The illustrious Laurie Metcalf (Lady Bird, The Big Bang Theory and Roseanne) stars as Gein’s infamous controlling mother, while a well-rounded cast adds to the ghoulish and gore-filled allure of this show.
Dexter: Resurrection
Praise the Full Moon: our favourite Dark Passenger has risen… again.
Yep, that ridiculously handsome Michael C.Hall once again slips into Dexter Morgan’s skin and lizard brain to continue ridding the streets of serial killers, paedophiles, rapists etc., and this time he is doing it in my favourite city: New York!
After being shot in the snow by his son Harrison (Jack Alcott) in Dexter: New Blood in 2021, Dexter miraculously survives and runs away from his old friend Angel Batista (David Zayas) during a routine hospital visit. What follows over the season is action-packed, bloody good fun as our lovable anti-hero infiltrates a serial killer club, run by billionaire Leon Prater (the insanely good Peter Dinklage of Game of Thrones fame), and picks them off one by one.
Beside the truly terrifying and terrific guest star line-up – Uma Thurman, Neil Patrick Harris, Krysten Ritter, David Dastmalchian and Eric Stonestreet – Resurrection is a return to what made the original Dexter series (up until Season 4 anyway) such a compelling watch. The twists are unexpected, the lore is respected and there are such great cameos, it makes this show feel nostalgic and fresh at the same time.
Hall’s performance is incredible, using all of his theatrical and musical training to help Dexter simulate humanity. The fact that I find him even more dangerously attractive, nearly 20 years after the original series, needs to be studied. Having James Remar back as Harry, Dexter’s dead dad and ghostly guide, is so good too.
Dexter: Resurrection is available on Showmax.
Casper
For a bit of a palate cleanser and a trip down memory lane for us ’90s kids, turn to the classic Casper live action film on Disney+.
Starring Christina Ricci (Yellowjackets and The Addams Family), Bill Pullman (yes, Lewis’s dad and the only American president – thank you Independence Day- that we recognize) and a cameo by Devon Sawa (the star of the Final Destination series, Chucky and Heart Eyes) as a living Casper, this was one of the most popular kids’ movies in 1995.
Casper the Friendly Ghost welcomes Kat (Ricci) and her dad Dr Harvey (Pullman) into the sprawling mansion that he and his uncles haunt, though the good doctor is there to exorcise them. Through a series of misadventures, one cool Halloween party and the aforementioned Sawa cameo that had 9-year-old me and millions of other pre-teen girls worldwide swooning, Casper, his uncles and the Harveys find friendship and a spookily happy ever after.
FINAL DESTINATION 1 TO 5
Speaking of the Final Destination series, Prime Video is satisfying all of your seemingly impossible death scenario fantasies by streaming all five of the first films this October!
While Sawa kicks off the series with a stunning turn as Alex Browning who’s premonition prevents countless deaths by plane crash in film 1 and is seen again in a twist that will have your jaw-dropping in film 5, this franchise ups the ante for just how sadistic the Grim Reaper can be when you are on Death’s list.
See for yourself the films that have scarred us Millennials to the point where we refuse to drive behind a truck carrying logs on a highway, do not trust rollercoasters and think twice about getting laser eye surgery.
THE CONJURING: LAST RITES
Well, it had to happen sometime: the beautiful Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga are hanging up their crucifixes as real life demon and ghost hunters Ed and Lorraine Warren in the final (for now) The Conjuring film, Last Rites.
Now playing at a Ster Kinekor near you, this eighth film in the Conjuringverse (which include the Annabelle and The Nun films), sees Ed and Lorraine, joined by their now adult daughter Judy (Mia Tomlinson) and her boyfriend Tony (Ben Hardy), assist the Smurl family who have unknowingly invited a demon into their home, in late 80s Pennsylvania.
The effects are horrifying but the scares aren’t as big as they were in the original film. Still, if you are wanting to get out and mingle with the living on Halloween, book your tickets!
Got any recommendations for me to watch? Drop a comment below or slide into Superfans’ DMs on Instagram and Facebook.
