For Robert Scott Carey, this was the most terrifying day of his life. But for me, it was just another Tuesday.

The Legend of Hell House was a lurid, trashy rehash of The Haunting aimed at the jaded audiences of the early Seventies, but its sense of dread-heavy atmosphere is a thing of hair-raising wonder. That’s the reason why it has become a spooky season staple for me, despite the foreknowledge that I will be rolling […]

I’ve heard of “dying onstage,” but this is a bit much. (Hey, I’m a dad now. I’m allowed to make these kinds of jokes.) Recommended listening:

Man, this Special Old Ones Cut of Summer School is really weird. Recommended listening:

AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! *hic* AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! AROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! ARF! Recommended listening: You were expecting that Warren Zevon track, right? Sorry.

Look, the laws of physics just work differently in pre-Code horror-revenge stories, okay? (from “Symphony in Death” in Menace #11, January 1954; art by Joe Maneely, other credits as yet unknown) Recommended listening:

I grew up in an era where trashy low-budget horror flicks had a marketing presence in newspapers and television. With cable and VCR tech still a ways from becoming ubiquitous household staples, and my peers and I being a little too young (and chicken) to sneak into R-rated movies, these ad spots were the sum […]

I’ve been filling out my October smörgåsbord of spooky fare with selected episodes of Night Gallery, thus triggering my umpteenth reassessment of that three-season and oh-so-early-1970s attempt to recapture some of that ol’ Twilight Zone magic. Was it a supernatural counterpart to Love American Style‘s mix of celebrity guest stars and cornball black-out gags? Was […]

Scary: Linda Blair in Hell Night (1981) Scarier: Linda Blair in The Exorcist (1973) Scariest: Linda Blair in Roller Boogie (1979) The sanity-shattering apex of existential terror: Linda Blair on The Love Boat (1982) Recommended listening:

Between The Horror at 37,000 Feet (1973)… …and The Devil’s Rain (1975)… …the once and future Captain of the USS Enterprise didn’t fare well in his early 1970s encounters with the occult. Come to think of it, he didn’t do much better against spiders, either. Recommended listening: