It’s October, which means it’s time for an onslaught of horror movies and terrifying TV shows, old and new. A killer doll makes it to the Oval Office, a girl gets sent back in time to survive a serial-killing slasher in the ’80s, a scary demon possesses a young girl (as evil demons are wont to do) — these are just a few of the horror releases this week has to offer. But if you’re a weenie not a fan of horror, we’ve got some other stuff too, including the end of one big Disney+ show and the return of another. —James Grebey
All timeline hell broke loose last season, and a multiverse was created, which means Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Mobius (Owen Wilson) will probably spend the bulk of this season trying to make things “normal” again. Academy Award winner Ke Huy Quan joins the chaos. —Jen Chaney
➽ We can all just pretend Secret Invasion never happened.
David Jenkins’s series gained traction when fans produced plenty of fan art dedicated to the central romance between Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) and Captain Blackbeard (Taika Waititi). Now in its second season, Our Flag Means Death has to pick up the pieces of that relationship post-breakup on the high seas. —Savannah Salazar
Touted as A24’s first musical, you can bet your ass Dicks: The Musical won’t be like Wicked — though it does have Bowen Yang, so maybe we can take that back. Starring Josh Sharp and Aaron Jackson, who wrote the stage show F*cking Identical Twins that Dicks is based on, the musical follows two businessmen who find out that they’re identical twins. What ensues next is just gay chaos. Megan Thee Stallion, Megan Mullally, Nathan Lane, and the Sewer Boys round out the cast. —S.S.
Alden Ehrenreich nation, we’re thriving. Cocaine Bear, Oppenheimer, and Fair Play all in one year, wow. But onto Fair Play — the thriller that debuted at this year’s Sundance is finally hitting Netflix. Ehrenreich and Phoebe Dynevor star as co-workers in a secret romance who hit a relationship bump when one (Dynevor) gets promoted over the other (Ehrenreich). —S.S.
➽ Will Fair Play be steamier than Bridgerton, though?
The late William Friedkin’s final film, a remake of a 1950s story about a group of sailors facing a court-martial for mutiny against a naval captain who may or may not have been mentally unstable, will air on Showtime. Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Clarke, Jake Lacy, and Lewis Pullman star, and Lance Reddick makes a posthumous appearance. —J.G.
Fresh off its premiere at TIFF, The Royal Hotel sees Julia Garner and director Kitty Green reuniting in this taut thriller about a pair of backpackers (Garner and Jessica Henwick) who are stranded in an Australian town. Strapped for cash, the two work at a local bar, and akin to Green’s first feature, The Assistant, men in power continue to be incredibly threatening. —S.S.
The joint SYFY and USA Network series returns, and this time the iconic killer doll has managed to find himself in the White House. This is the worst thing to happen to Washington, D.C., since [checks notes] oh, actually this is pretty par for the course. Devon Sawa returns, playing a fourth totally new character in three seasons. —J.G.
➽ I would vote for M3GAN for president, though.
If Freaky was “a slasher movie meets Groundhog Day,” Prime Video’s new horror romp is “a slasher meets Back to the Future,” as Kiernan Shipka finds herself thrown back in time to the 1980s, where she has a chance to prevent a serial killer’s infamous rampage — and meet her teenage mom. It’s a fun romp. —J.G.
Whatever spirit possessed Pineapple Express director David Gordon Green to revive the Halloween franchise has possessed him to revive another horror franchise … and this one is about possession. Ellen Burstyn, who played the mother in the original 1973 masterpiece, returns, only now there’s not one but two possessed little girls. —J.G.
Paramount+ dug up the 2019 adaptation of Stephen King’s chilling novel for this prequel, which is set 50 years before the events of Pet Sematary. —J.G.
➽ Sometimes, dead is better. Not when it comes to horror franchises, I guess.
The horror anthology series V/H/S sets its sights on perhaps the most iconic horror era: the 1980s. This installment features five new stories from the likes of David Bruckner, Scott Derrickson, Gigi Saul Guerrero, Natasha Kermani, and Mike P. Nelson, and many of them add cosmic horror to the ’80s aesthetic. —J.G.
➽ Plus, two more movies hit streaming this week: Boogeyman, another Stephen King adaptation, and 2023’s Haunted Mansion.
The popular murder-mystery-comedy has been leading to this moment when we finally find out who pushed the pompous actor played by Paul Rudd down an elevator shaft to his death. I still say we shouldn’t rule out President McKinley, Steve Martin’s goldfish —J.C.
➽ The Ahsoka finale came and went, but spoiler alert: no alien foreheads.
Want more? Read our recommendations from the weekend of September 29.
