I have never watched a scary movie.
I know, crazy right?
Maybe it is because I come from a scary enough family, or because growing up I had no older siblings to watch them with. Could be because I come from a family that legit believes in spirits and ghosts and thinks people can visit from the other side – that freaks me the hell out!
Either way, scary movies just aren’t my thing BUT Halloween is. I love Halloween. I love the costumes (yes they can be gory, bloody and scary too), I love decorating and baking up Halloween themed goodies.
So what can you watch to stay in the spirit without being kept up all night?
- Casper
How can you not love Casper? It’s Halloween themed because he’s a ghost, but not scary because he is a friendly ghost. - Hey Arnold’s Halloween Special
Hey Arnold is one of my favorite cartoons – it is a cartoon I plan to tell my kids about one day. It also had a great Halloween episode in season 2 (episode 11). Arnold and Gerald play a prank that sends the entire city into a panic - Sabrina the Teenage Witch
A show about a witch with a talking black cat, which spanned 7 seasons (the best are seasons 1-3 IMO) is bound to have great Halloween episodes. Google them, check YouTube, or if you have Hulu you can find them all. - Tower of Terror
A relatively unknown oldie but goodie. I saw it once on ABC Family, now known as Freeform. An out of work tabloid writer known for making up stories about aliens and ghosts takes on a story at the Tower of Terror. Believing it to be fake he is stunned to find out the stories are true and the ghosts are real - It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
Holy crap It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown is celebrating it’s 50th anniversary this year! My mom watched this when she was a kid and as tradition we watched it together as I was a kid. It’s grown to be a tradition. The kids go trick-or-treating and Linus waits in the pumpkin patch for the Great Pumpkin and the gifts he’ll bring (think Santa Claus but for Halloween) - Addams Family
You can watch both the show or the movies or both. I love Christina Ricci (she plays Wednesday in the movies) but I am a sucker for the series – in black and white and everything. The series lasted two seasons and revolved around a gothic family that was the exact opposite of normal
- Munsters
The Munsters was out around the same time as The Addams Family. This family was even more abnormal with a Frankenstein look-a-like with intelligence similar to Patrick from Spongebob. A vampire for a father in law and wife, a werewolf for a son and a pet dragon named Spot. Then, a normal human for a niece – the entire family thought she was the weird one - Hocus Pocus
A story of three sister witches that, in order to stay young, need to absorb children’s spirits. Sounds scarier than it is. Being hanged for their crimes, the witches are accidentally brought back to life 300 years later. Antics ensue as they try and adapt to the 20th century while looking for children to stay alive. - The Haunted Mansion
This is about a workaholic realtor that misses birthdays and wedding anniversaries. In attempts to make it up to his family, he decides to go on a family vacation………with a small detour to check out a mansion being sold. The family becomes trapped inside as the wife is mistaken for the former lady of the house – the one needed to break the curse and set the ghosts free. - The Craft
The Craft is about four high school girls that find out they are witches. Originally three of them, a new girl moves to the school and once together their power is intensified. It starts out fun and games with levitation and beauty spells but with more power comes more greed - Charmed
A long-running series about three sister witches that receive their powers after their grandmother dies. Each witch has her own unique power as they fight off bad witches, and demons all while trying to live a (unsuccessful) normal life. You can watch the whole series (witches, demons, ghosts) or just the Halloween episode in season 3 called All Halliwell’s Eve. - The Rocky Horror Picture Show
A cult classic from the 70s and it is one of the weirdest, but best movies you’ll see. It is a musical that plays like a parody or spoof type of movie with a virginal couple that end up at Frank N. Furter’s castle filled with sex and – just google it. And if you are old enough, may I suggest checking out if any of your local theaters put on shows. A lot of local theaters play the movie and act it out in front of the crowd for about $10 and it’s interactive. - The Haunting of…..
This is on the Lifetime network and it has celebrities meeting up with a psychic medium. The celebrity and psychic go back to wherever the paranormal activity took place and try and get answers. Whether you believe in this stuff or not makes a difference in how much you’ll enjoy the show.
- Munsters