The Haunting of Hill House, and The Best Haunted House Tales For A Creepy October

By AARON SAGERS

With the new horror series The Haunting of Hill House, viewers settling for some “Netflix and Chill” time may instead be in for “Netflix and chilled to the bone.”

The 10-episode series, which hit the streaming service last Friday, begins 26 years with the Crain family who encounter supernatural threats in an old mansion. As the story switches between 1992 and 2018, the show follows the Crain father and his five adult children (including the skeptical paranormal author son), and their younger selves. Over the course of the show, they dig up the past, face down specters, and their own personal ghosts.

Based on the 1959 classic of the same name by Shirley Jackson, the updated Haunting of Hill House varies quite a bit from the original, but is nonetheless a faithful adaptation in spirit. It is a downright scary longform horror show that puts character drama at the forefront. 

As much as you should check out the decidedly creepy show, the source material is a must-read, and remains the best haunted house stories of all time.

But it is certainly not the only good story for a literary adventure to catch your breath, and tingle your spine. 

With that in mind, read ahead for the best haunted house tales to keep you creeped out for the rest of October. 

The Haunting of Hill House (1959)

By Shirley Jackson

The old manse Hill House has a bad habit of killing off inhabitants – so, of course it seems like a good idea (very bad idea) for occultist and paranormal investigator Dr. Montague to bring some folks along for a stay. Although phenomena begin as merely unsettling occurrences, the house is feeding off Eleanor, the sensitive waif, and getting stronger. As much as I love The Shining, I think even Mr. King would allow me to say Hill House is better, and a work of genius. The Haunting, the 1963 film based on Jackson’s story, is also pretty great, but not near as exceptional as the novel.

Netflix's Stranger Things trailer channels '80s supernatural, Spielberg goodness

A recent article from The New York Times found Netflix viewers typically binge a series in chunks of about two hours a day, completing a season in a week or so. But by the looks of the original series Stranger Things, I might need even less time.

In the new trailer that dropped this week, Stranger Things appears to be a supernatural/sci-fi show that's part 1980s valentine and Spielbergian pastiche. And I need it in front of my eyeballs now. 

There's not a lot to decipher from the trailer -- which poses more questions than revealing the entire plot, thankfully -- but we know a young boy is being pursued by something (alien? monster? monster alien?) and goes missing. His mom (Winona Ryder!) appears to get no help from the local police. And when the boy returns, he's ... different. He may not be the only kid to be changed, either. 

What else do we see? Kids on bikes! Weird telekinetic trickery on lightbulbs! G-men in containment suits! 

Stranger Things comes courtesy writers/directors/co-showrunners Matt and Ross Duffer, who also worked on Wayward Pines. I'm loving everything I'm seeing so far, and can't wait to binge this sucker when it drops July 15, 2016.

The official synopsis

A love letter to the supernatural classics of the 80's, Stranger Things is the story of a young boy who vanishes into thin air. As friends, family and local police search for answers, they are drawn into an extraordinary mystery involving top-secret government experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one very strange little girl.

Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, Natalia Dyer, Cara Buono, Charlie Heaton, and Matthew Modine.

Newly Released 'Daredevil' Character Poster

Season one of Marvel's Daredevil will premiere with thirteen one-hour episodes in 4K on April 10, 2015 at 12:01 AM PT in all territories where Netflix is available. Now, for your viewing pleasure, they've released a character poster featuring; Foggy Nelson, Karen Page, Matt Murdock, Claire Temple and Wilson Fisk. To get a better look, I cropped each character so you can check them out a little better (after the jump).

Synopsis:
Blinded as a young boy but imbued with extraordinary senses, Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) fights against injustice by day as a lawyer, and by night as the Super Hero “Daredevil” in modern day Hell's Kitchen, New York City.

The cast includes:
-Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock / Daredevil
-Vincent D’Onofrio as Wilson Fisk
-Rosario Dawson as Claire Temple
-Deborah Ann Woll as Karen Page
-Elden Henson as Foggy Nelson
-Vondie Curtis Hall as Ben Ulrich
-Scott Glenn as Stick
-Ayelet Zurer as Vanessa Marianna
-Bob Gunton and Leland Owlsey
-Toby Leonard Moore as Wesley

'Hemlock Grove' reaction: 'Jellyfish in the Sky,' 'The Angel'

BY DENISE PURVIS

What will you be doing this Memorial Day weekend? Well, while a marathon of new Arrested Developments seems like (and is) a good idea when the entire season of new eps hits on Sunday, some of you horror-minded folks should finally get around to checking out Eli Roth's bizarro werewolf show Hemlock Grove.

To be fair, I have to admit that I started watching Hemlock Grove when it came out last month and I’d be lying if I didn’t tell you that I had to go back and rewatch it to write this double recap to see if I like this or not. I don’t know if it was a combination of being tired or not being completely captivated at the time, but I figured the best way for me to give HG a fair chance was to go back and rewatch it.

So this is what we're going to do: I'm going to do a Hemlock Grove recap dump so you can watch the show over the course of one weekend, and then check out my take on all the episodes at once. Let's get started with the first two episodes...

'Hemlock Grove' at WonderCon with gruesome wolf-out footage

We are only a couple weeks away from the debut of horror director Eli Roth's new series Hemlock Grove, which drops an entire season all-at-once on Netflix April 19.

As Netflix describes it, the werewolf show based on Brian McGreevy's book is set in a rusted Pennsylvania steel town where the mangled body of a teenage girl is discovered.

"As they hunt for a monster among them, rumors mount and many of the eccentric residents become suspects, from the newly arrived gypsy family to the wealthy Godfrey clan," says the synopsis, and more supernatural goodies beyond wolfs will be involved.

At WonderCon last week, the cast (which includes Famke Janssen, Dougray Scott, Bill Skarsgård, Landon Liboiron, Penelope Mitchell, Freya Tingley, Aaron Douglas and Kandyse McClure) took to the stage at WonderCon with Roth, McGreevy and executive producer Lee Shipman to chat about the show... and to horrify and delight audiences with the werewolf transformation scene.

The clip, embedded after the jump (via IGN), made my jaw drop.