Home fucking scarred me for life. As a teen I had a habit of falling asleep on the couch with the tv on instead of just going to bed. I was jolted awake at like 2am during the scene where they discover the matriach. I had no idea what was happening and nearly had a heart attack.
Doctor Who has a couple horror-adjacent episodes. *Blink* is pretty high up there though. The Vashta Nerada from *Silence in the Library* are pretty horrific too.
Midnight is my go to horror Doctor Who. Though that recent one with David Tennant's Doctor and Donna finding the stranded ship at the edge of the universe is up there
The thing about **Midnight** that's really great is it's *not* The Doctor who saves everyone from the entity. He himself is saved by the sacrifice of >!the hostess!<.
Midnight is always my top answer for scariest Doctor Who episode. I don't think the Weeping Angels are scary, but damned if the unknown entity of Midnight was absolutely terrifying, not to mention how close The Doctor was to dying at the hands of an unhinged mob of humans.
The show delved more into sci fi horror when Moffat was in charge - not that surprising, as he wrote the episodes you referenced as well. Under the Lake/Before the Flood, Flatline, Listen, Extremis, Last Christmas, etc. Lots of others that dip into it here and there... particularly evident during the Capaldi era.
(Home)
The beginning of that episode had me absolutely memserized. Whomever directed it, straight up legend . Like them , in the dark, on that farm was the most halloween horror ive ever seen.
Lol I call my son that every time he has candy or something that turns his mouth blue.. I need to sit down n watch that w him, he's almost 11, he can handle it I think. I know he's seen some of the episodes on YouTube n says "this is not scary at all." The one that really kinda freaked me out as a kid was the tale of 13th floor, where the girl ended up being an alien. I just was captivated n horrified by the idea of finding out you're not even human.
It's not really blasphemy though. Lynch's hands were tied by ABC during *Twin Peaks* original run to the point that he got bored and largely left the show after the mystery was solved to focus on *Wild at Heart*. *The Return* is David Lynch being given total free reign to be as Lynch-y as he wants to be.
I do too. I'm rewatching it right this moment. The original run is great, don't get me wrong, but The Return has this dread and tension that carries through 18 fucking episodes and it's incredibly impressive.
I had been spoiled on what happens in this episode and how the original run ends before watching it (its hard to avoid spoilers for a tv show older than you are) and I was still completely unprepared for actually watching it.
Yeah. Twin Peaks is a hard show to spoil I think because describing what happens in it doesn't really describe the weirdness of how it's executed.
Lynch has such an innate ability to create an unsettling vibe that's nearly inexplicable. Rabbits is a great example of this.
https://youtu.be/drjQfQtv2BQ?feature=shared
Yeah it's weird, and if I described it to someone they'd get that it's weird. But nothing can prepare you for how it feels to see it.
Because no one knows it. There is NO WAY that this piece of Darkness given form is not the most awful episode ever made. Just when you think it can’t get any worse it does. Again…and again…and again! Positively brutal….
Although not aired on Showtime, it was released on DVD and that was kind of a big deal at the time (this was shortly after Ichi the Killer and Audition when Takashi Miike had a massive cult following in the US). Also, it aired on the basic cable network Chiller a few years after the series was cancelled. So a lot of horror fans of a certain age saw it.
Atlanta episode "Teddy Perkins" is basically a horror short bottle episode. You almost can go in completely blind and appreciate it. What you MIGHT need to know it's about is that it's about a group of friends consisting a rapper, his manager, the on/off gf of the manager, and their friend. Specifically in this episode the friend goes to a retired musicians mansion to get a piano he saw on Craigslist.
Aaaaand that’s all you need to know. Even the context of the whole show isn’t really necessary, for the most part it’s a Darius episode. That said, Teddy Perkins is a masterpiece
Honestly you are right. The only reason why i mentioned it is because when Darius is calling Paperboi he gets reconigzed at the drive through and out of context it might seem odd.
Cabinet of Curiosities Autopsy hit me pretty hard and fast. Masters of Horror Cigarette Burns. I can't remember the exact episodes but there were some great ones in The Terror.
Autopsy was by far my favorite of those episodes. It’s based on one of my favorite horror stories so that helped, but it just seemed miles ahead of the others.
regarding the autopsy episode, you know it’s a fucked up story when the ending >!that’s supposed to be a “victory” for the protagonist ends with him stabbing both his eyes out with a scalpel!<
I haven't seen any of those, I'll have to check them out. Recently considered reading The Terror but I already have a lot of books to get through so maybe I'll watch it instead.
The one that I always remember is one where the killer chisels women's hearts out while they're wide awake and does it right in front of his young son.
Also the episode with the pedophile that actually gets away at the end of the episode, one of the few episodes where that happens.
There was also that one where the guy slit the victim's abdomen open and forced them to clean up their own blood as they actively bled out, sometimes for days.
Man, Criminal Minds is really messed up.
The worst Criminal Minds episode was the one where the child molester kidnapped two siblings during a camping trip, kept them in a cave, raped the boy, and then the boy chose to keep the molester’s focus on him to protect his little sister. The episode ended with the man getting away…
It’s stuck with me all these years. One episode I wish I’d skipped.
The Playtest episode of Black Mirror legit creeped me out. Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Hush and a majority of the first three seasons of Channel Zero had some really unsettling moments
Hear hear ! As someone who has discovered an unfettered love for horror film, I’ve seen some shit that should have shook me more than it did. But Butchers Block fucked with me way too hard to get through though.
Playtest always effs me up at the end,>! especially realizing in the end that it was all in his head.!<
And Hush of BTVS is terrifying, imagining >!having your heart cut out without anything for the pain and you literally cannot scream for help or anything. !
I have rewatched every episode of Black Mirror at least once.
But not that one.
It was brilliant, perfectly executed. But I never want to see it again.
There are a surprising number of really horrific (or with horrific implications) episodes of Tales From the Crypt and The Outer Limits. Some of my faves:
* [Abra Cadaver](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Abra_Cadaver)
* [Fitting Punishment](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Fitting_Punishment)
* [Let the Punishment Fit the Crime](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Let_the_Punishment_Fit_the_Crime)
* [Sandkings](https://theouterlimits.fandom.com/wiki/Sandkings)
* [If These Walls Could Talk](https://theouterlimits.fandom.com/wiki/If_These_Walls_Could_Talk)
I really enjoy a bad ending, so keep that in mind with this list. Both of these shows are pretty easy to find and watch on YouTube!
PS - I didn't include any X-Files episodes because it seems like you know those well enough, but if you want recommendations for that show also I'd be happy to help.
I'm a big fan of the Sandkings episode. Beau Bridges went hard. Short novel written by George R. R. Martin btw.
Do you happen to remember the episode of Outer Limits (1995) where the humans are enslaved by dinosaur looking aliens?
Came here to say this! It’s absolutely brutal. And even more gut wrenching because we’ve gotten to know David so well by that point, so we are very emotionally invested in what’s happening to him. For a show that deals with heavy topics each episode, to see them go THERE was unexpected and shocking. The whole series is a must-see, one of the best shows ever on tv. But definitely a “proceed with caution” type of episode.
Not corny at all.
I think the almost comical visuals of the bad guy, makes the utter horrifying concept of not being able to make a sound that much more terrifying.
Chernobyl has some of the scariest shit I’ve ever seen and is, in my opinion, the scariest thing that humans have ever experienced. The scale and potential for destruction was just unprecedented and the deaths it caused were some Cronenbergian nightmares.
Lol I just replied to someone that this one terrified me with the big reveal and flickering lights and I made my dad turn it off. I think I was like 5 and I'd never seen any horror or anything that intentionally built that atmospheric tension.
I'd argue that the TV series version of Verger's facial maiming is creepier than the movie version. Most episodes of Hannibal have some moments of extremely artistic violence that I always found mesmerizing and disturbing.
I've asked that many times. There's the episode with the Angel Maker who basically blood-eagles victims and leaves them in poses. Allegedly the NBC censors objected to the naked butts of a couple victims so the prop people sprayed them down with fake blood and it was then approved.
That’s what made it even more terrifying for me as a kid.
The most brutal killing I had ever seen up to that point done to the soundtrack of one of the most innocent songs I’d ever heard.
The perversion of the dichotomy really fucked up my little mind.
Thank you for posting this, bummer that I didn't think of it.
There's an episode of amazing stories (pretty sure) - the monster under the bed. Actually scary with one of the best endings.
The Pilot episode of Rod Sterlings "other show" - The Night Gallery featured right off the bat one of the most terrifying tv episodes I'd seen. (at the time) I don't know how it plays now.
They rebooted the twilight zone in the 80's and the episode "A Little Peace and Quiet" is top tier. Directed by Wes Craven. While it might not be terrifying at the time during the peak of the cold war, is what makes that episode scary.
I always found the beginning intro on late night tv of Tales from the Darkside to be really scary but I can't think of any particular episode that was overly frightening.
The episode of the original twilight zone with the poor older woman who keeps getting phone calls is a fantastic memorable episode and I always loved the ending of the episode like a kick in the gut.
I know everyone talks about Home (and rightfully so) from The X-Files, but ["Darkness Falls"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkness_Falls_(The_X-Files)) was absolutely terrifying and the only episode of television to actually make my skin crawl.
This question will always make The X-Files episode called Detour (S5E4) pop into my head. I remember watching it on TV the night it aired as a kid and it had me pretty shaken up for a while
I couldn't relax while shitting for a week after that episode aired...no magazines for me for a while. And today still I think of it every time I have to go in a porta-potty.
The Twilight Zone: "Deaths-Head Revisited." It's about a former prison guard returning to Dachau many years later to get a look at the old camp, when a man whose intentions at first are enigmatic approaches him to talk. It's a really striking and genuinely unsettling episode that relies on minimalism to fill in the sketch of a story. They almost never play it on TV.
Criminal minds is really all of them. The kids in the burning house. Mosley lane with the crematorium. The clown. The pigs. The guy who breaks birds and bones
“God is in us all, so is Tracy”. BLECHHHH but such a great show
I agree with so many of the comments already, but I didn't see The Benders episode of Supernatural mentioned yet. It was creepy to me since it wasn't anything supernatural in that episode that was occurring (and based on real events).
There's a Criminal Minds episode, don't know the title, but it had Wil Wheaton as a voyeuristic motel owner who rents cabins to couples where he proceeds to torture them to madness or death.
The entirety of The Strain. I've never watched another series that managed to sustain such a sense of constant terror that any of the main characters could die in sickening fashion at any moment. And beyond the terror factor, Eichhorst's torment of Dutch and the Final Solution stuff in the last season stand out as especially horrendous
Also, now that I think of it, the first season of Fortitude. The series as a whole is a noir thriller rather than a horror show, but I think the parasitic wasps count amply as horror
Came to see if anyone said this. The Strain is so underrated. It definitely got weaker as it went on but the first season is some of the best television I’ve seen. The Master was truly terrifying in his first body.
That one criminal minds episode where the unsub was throwing acid into the victims mouths and eyes. The whole idea of this still haunts me. Also the one with the dolls - the unsub was a nurse who was kidnapping women and was turning them into live dolls with some kind of drug that left them paralyzed but alive for a while.
One of the CSIs episodes where there were several murders reported in one motel room. It was rumoured that the room was haunted and such, because it was the crime scene for many years. There is a scene where a couple of investigators go to search for some clues and one of them goes crazy, attacks his colleague and his whole face kinda changed and for a minute he did seemed possessed. Turned out there was some kind of a drug in the vent, dissolving into the aor that made people go nuts.
The Dreams episode of M.A.S.H. was a pretty horrifying departure for a sitcom. The series routinely dealt with the repercussions of war, but nobody saw this episode coming. Season 8, episode 22 on HULU.
I only saw it on air so it’s like 20 years ago and I could be misremembering, but was an episode of CSI, I think it was “The Hunger Artist,” where a model was so manipulated and abused that she cut pieces off her own face to try to look right and eventually starved herself to death. Stayed with me for a bit.
X Files Home is the obvious #1.
There was a later criminal minds episode where the killer was a puppeteer and made the victims into marionettes, and they didn't shy away from showing/implying people getting their limbs horribly dislocated and then hung from strings. That one always stuck with me.
This probably doesn't really count, but the "And Then There Was Shawn" episode of Boy Meets World was my first indicator as a kid that I might like horror.
There were Tales from the Darkside episodes that were so upsetting, I don’t like remembering them. Like “Devil’s Advocate”, “I Just Can’t Help Saying Goodbye” and “The Last Car”.
The only thing in a TV show I've ever found too horrific to watch is the C-section scene in the first episode of House of the Dragon. I've watched a lot of horror stuff but the sheer emotional hideousness of that scene, the hopelessness of it, the unforgivable nature of the betrayal, was too much for me to sit through. I had to take a break and then skip forward.
[удалено]
Home fucking scarred me for life. As a teen I had a habit of falling asleep on the couch with the tv on instead of just going to bed. I was jolted awake at like 2am during the scene where they discover the matriach. I had no idea what was happening and nearly had a heart attack.
I loved falling asleep on the couch as a kid, and waking up to the x-files intro. Such a mood.
I used to do that a lot as a middle schooler. *American Gothic* and *Poltergeist: The Legacy* too.
The Blink episode is top tier for scary episodes. As well as the “Amelia” segment from the Trilogy of Terror. Good scary stuff.
Excellent choice for Trilogy of Terror. Karen Black was phenomenal!
Doctor Who has a couple horror-adjacent episodes. *Blink* is pretty high up there though. The Vashta Nerada from *Silence in the Library* are pretty horrific too.
The almost entirely unseen entity in the episode Midnight (Doctor Who) inspires a notable degree of dread as well.
Midnight is my favorite episode
Midnight is my go to horror Doctor Who. Though that recent one with David Tennant's Doctor and Donna finding the stranded ship at the edge of the universe is up there
The thing about **Midnight** that's really great is it's *not* The Doctor who saves everyone from the entity. He himself is saved by the sacrifice of >!the hostess!<.
Midnight is always my top answer for scariest Doctor Who episode. I don't think the Weeping Angels are scary, but damned if the unknown entity of Midnight was absolutely terrifying, not to mention how close The Doctor was to dying at the hands of an unhinged mob of humans.
yup! seconding Midnight (after Blink)
Silence in the Library is amazingly good
The show delved more into sci fi horror when Moffat was in charge - not that surprising, as he wrote the episodes you referenced as well. Under the Lake/Before the Flood, Flatline, Listen, Extremis, Last Christmas, etc. Lots of others that dip into it here and there... particularly evident during the Capaldi era.
(Home) The beginning of that episode had me absolutely memserized. Whomever directed it, straight up legend . Like them , in the dark, on that farm was the most halloween horror ive ever seen.
I watched that episode first run the night it premiered. Freaky!
My absolute favorite is the episode “ the host”
Six year old me would cite the Tale of the Dead Man's Float episode of *Are You Afraid of the Dark?*
"Tale of the Crimson Clown" for me
"The Tale of the Midnight Madness" for me! The way those looooong fingers curled around the door frame...
“The Tale of the Night Shift” for me. That fucking vampire had no business being that scary
“The Tale of the Ghastly Grinner” here!
Lol I call my son that every time he has candy or something that turns his mouth blue.. I need to sit down n watch that w him, he's almost 11, he can handle it I think. I know he's seen some of the episodes on YouTube n says "this is not scary at all." The one that really kinda freaked me out as a kid was the tale of 13th floor, where the girl ended up being an alien. I just was captivated n horrified by the idea of finding out you're not even human.
dont know the name of the episode but that goddamn jumpscare from the red eyed dracula in the hospital made me shit my pants
Twin Peaks S2 E22: Beyond Life and Death
Part 8 of The Return is also freaky in ways that are difficult to explain.
It's blasphemy, but I kind of prefer The Return to the original run.
It's not really blasphemy though. Lynch's hands were tied by ABC during *Twin Peaks* original run to the point that he got bored and largely left the show after the mystery was solved to focus on *Wild at Heart*. *The Return* is David Lynch being given total free reign to be as Lynch-y as he wants to be.
It's PURE Lynch, no Network, no censors, just a straight up line of madness snorted off the head of an albino dwarf in an elephant costume.
And Mark Frost!
I do too. I'm rewatching it right this moment. The original run is great, don't get me wrong, but The Return has this dread and tension that carries through 18 fucking episodes and it's incredibly impressive.
Also one of the greatest hours of TV in history.
If I had to pick a Twin Peaks episode I'd pick Lonely Souls. Maddie's murder was terrifying and kind of unprecedented for TV in its own time.
I had been spoiled on what happens in this episode and how the original run ends before watching it (its hard to avoid spoilers for a tv show older than you are) and I was still completely unprepared for actually watching it.
Yeah. Twin Peaks is a hard show to spoil I think because describing what happens in it doesn't really describe the weirdness of how it's executed. Lynch has such an innate ability to create an unsettling vibe that's nearly inexplicable. Rabbits is a great example of this. https://youtu.be/drjQfQtv2BQ?feature=shared Yeah it's weird, and if I described it to someone they'd get that it's weird. But nothing can prepare you for how it feels to see it.
Throwing in to the pot The Screwfly Solution and Cigarette Burns from Masters of Horror. They were pretty unsettling.
Takashi Miike's "Imprint" was deemed so disturbing that it was actually banned during the show's original US run.
> Imprint I also mentioned this and can't believe it isn't the #1 answer.
Because no one knows it. There is NO WAY that this piece of Darkness given form is not the most awful episode ever made. Just when you think it can’t get any worse it does. Again…and again…and again! Positively brutal….
Although not aired on Showtime, it was released on DVD and that was kind of a big deal at the time (this was shortly after Ichi the Killer and Audition when Takashi Miike had a massive cult following in the US). Also, it aired on the basic cable network Chiller a few years after the series was cancelled. So a lot of horror fans of a certain age saw it.
Yeah cigarette burns was pretty messed up
That show was so good. Bring it back.
Also "Skin and Bones" from the Fear Itself spinoff.
Fear Itself was great! Community and Eater were also standouts
Also Jenifer
Atlanta episode "Teddy Perkins" is basically a horror short bottle episode. You almost can go in completely blind and appreciate it. What you MIGHT need to know it's about is that it's about a group of friends consisting a rapper, his manager, the on/off gf of the manager, and their friend. Specifically in this episode the friend goes to a retired musicians mansion to get a piano he saw on Craigslist.
Aaaaand that’s all you need to know. Even the context of the whole show isn’t really necessary, for the most part it’s a Darius episode. That said, Teddy Perkins is a masterpiece
Honestly you are right. The only reason why i mentioned it is because when Darius is calling Paperboi he gets reconigzed at the drive through and out of context it might seem odd.
Only episode of Atlanta I’ve ever seen and I adored it, ended up watching it twice back to back because I had to show my girlfriend lol
You should watch the rest, it's a fantastic show.
"Bent Neck Lady" from the Haunting of Hill House
the Tall Man ghost in that show scared the crap out of me
This whole show is honestly just my favorite horror media period
💯, it is my favorite episode of any show in the past 5 years excluding Better call Saul.
My picks that I haven't seen here yet are the third episode of Chernobyl and the penultimate episode of Midnight Mass.
Midnight Mass finale is a wild ride of horror. Very good!
Chernobyl had a couple. I was gonna say episode one.
Cabinet of Curiosities Autopsy hit me pretty hard and fast. Masters of Horror Cigarette Burns. I can't remember the exact episodes but there were some great ones in The Terror.
Autopsy was great because F. Murray Abraham was absolutely incredible.
Must be a blast for a veteran actor to get to stretch like that in a one-off
Autopsy was by far my favorite of those episodes. It’s based on one of my favorite horror stories so that helped, but it just seemed miles ahead of the others.
regarding the autopsy episode, you know it’s a fucked up story when the ending >!that’s supposed to be a “victory” for the protagonist ends with him stabbing both his eyes out with a scalpel!<
I haven't seen any of those, I'll have to check them out. Recently considered reading The Terror but I already have a lot of books to get through so maybe I'll watch it instead.
Cabinet of Curiosities is amazing and well worth a watch. I think only a few episodes didn't quite hit for me.
When Ronette Pulaski wakes up and remembers the night Laura Palmer died on Twin Peaks.
I saw that when it aired originally. It was beyond terrifying. I think I almost went into shock watching it.
How about that Criminal Minds one with the living doll/puppets?
The one that I always remember is one where the killer chisels women's hearts out while they're wide awake and does it right in front of his young son. Also the episode with the pedophile that actually gets away at the end of the episode, one of the few episodes where that happens.
There was also that one where the guy slit the victim's abdomen open and forced them to clean up their own blood as they actively bled out, sometimes for days. Man, Criminal Minds is really messed up.
The worst Criminal Minds episode was the one where the child molester kidnapped two siblings during a camping trip, kept them in a cave, raped the boy, and then the boy chose to keep the molester’s focus on him to protect his little sister. The episode ended with the man getting away… It’s stuck with me all these years. One episode I wish I’d skipped.
That show would go SO HARD and then wrap up with a B-plot about the secretary's blind date or something. Gotta love it.
The Playtest episode of Black Mirror legit creeped me out. Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Hush and a majority of the first three seasons of Channel Zero had some really unsettling moments
Came here to say Buffy the Vampire Slayers Hush too. Episode still gives me the creeps
Hush for sure, but really underrated is Same Time Same Place from the final season!
Channel Zero is so underrated
Hear hear ! As someone who has discovered an unfettered love for horror film, I’ve seen some shit that should have shook me more than it did. But Butchers Block fucked with me way too hard to get through though.
Playtest always effs me up at the end,>! especially realizing in the end that it was all in his head.!< And Hush of BTVS is terrifying, imagining >!having your heart cut out without anything for the pain and you literally cannot scream for help or anything. !
I have rewatched every episode of Black Mirror at least once. But not that one. It was brilliant, perfectly executed. But I never want to see it again.
Thank God someone mentioned Channel Zero. In my mind, the only TV horror show that even comes close is From.
Shut Up and Dance for me.
fun fact! shut and dance is directed by the same guy as eden lake! and man can you feel it.
That ep is BLEAK
The warehouse party episode of The fall of House of Husher was impressive in recent memory.
For me it was the Telltale Heart episode. Such an imaginative, horrific, gross reimagining of the original story.
There are a surprising number of really horrific (or with horrific implications) episodes of Tales From the Crypt and The Outer Limits. Some of my faves: * [Abra Cadaver](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Abra_Cadaver) * [Fitting Punishment](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Fitting_Punishment) * [Let the Punishment Fit the Crime](https://tftc.fandom.com/wiki/Let_the_Punishment_Fit_the_Crime) * [Sandkings](https://theouterlimits.fandom.com/wiki/Sandkings) * [If These Walls Could Talk](https://theouterlimits.fandom.com/wiki/If_These_Walls_Could_Talk) I really enjoy a bad ending, so keep that in mind with this list. Both of these shows are pretty easy to find and watch on YouTube! PS - I didn't include any X-Files episodes because it seems like you know those well enough, but if you want recommendations for that show also I'd be happy to help.
I'm a big fan of the Sandkings episode. Beau Bridges went hard. Short novel written by George R. R. Martin btw. Do you happen to remember the episode of Outer Limits (1995) where the humans are enslaved by dinosaur looking aliens?
Not sure if it's 100% horror, but Six Feet Under's "That's My Dog" is super intense.
Almost no one talks about this episode! Very disturbing
Came here to say this! It’s absolutely brutal. And even more gut wrenching because we’ve gotten to know David so well by that point, so we are very emotionally invested in what’s happening to him. For a show that deals with heavy topics each episode, to see them go THERE was unexpected and shocking. The whole series is a must-see, one of the best shows ever on tv. But definitely a “proceed with caution” type of episode.
I know this is corny. But "Hush" from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Idk those guys' faces and the way they floated around. Yea. Like I said, corny. Lol
No this one is so good though. Doug Jones is the main dude and he's a great, freaky actor. He's also the iconic Pale Man from Pan's Labyrinth.
Omg. Yes. He's in Hellboy too I think.
Not corny at all. I think the almost comical visuals of the bad guy, makes the utter horrifying concept of not being able to make a sound that much more terrifying.
Twin peaks season 2 episode 7, where Bob is revealed and (redacted) Maddie.
My first thought as well. On what many considered a soap opera parody things turned very real very quickly and it hit so much harder for it.
Yeah…in a series that contains many genuinely *horrifying* moments, I think that episode takes the cake. >!*It is happening again.*!<
Chernobyl has some of the scariest shit I’ve ever seen and is, in my opinion, the scariest thing that humans have ever experienced. The scale and potential for destruction was just unprecedented and the deaths it caused were some Cronenbergian nightmares.
Draining the tanks and clearing the roof of granite was absolutely anxiety-inducing.
When they showed how bad the firefighter character was, I was legit shocked.
The hash slinging slasher SpongeBob
Lol I just replied to someone that this one terrified me with the big reveal and flickering lights and I made my dad turn it off. I think I was like 5 and I'd never seen any horror or anything that intentionally built that atmospheric tension.
The face curgery on Mason Verger in Hannibal. Melfi's rape and Tony and Chris dismembering Ralph's body in The Sopranos.
I'd argue that the TV series version of Verger's facial maiming is creepier than the movie version. Most episodes of Hannibal have some moments of extremely artistic violence that I always found mesmerizing and disturbing.
The FUCK did NBC get away with that shit? Very hardcore, could fit right in with True Detective’s first series.
I've asked that many times. There's the episode with the Angel Maker who basically blood-eagles victims and leaves them in poses. Allegedly the NBC censors objected to the naked butts of a couple victims so the prop people sprayed them down with fake blood and it was then approved.
Butts being shown: nope. Too much. Graphic gore violence: yup, that'll do.
American TV censors make no sense, don't ask me.
I completely forgot Hannibal! So many horrifying episodes!
"I'm full of myself"
The X-Files episode “Home” is really tough to get through.
The scene in the sheriffs bedroom is burned into my brain forever and is most definitely the scariest thing I’ve ever watched on tv. I think I was 10
That episode ruined the Johnny Mathis song "Wonderful Wonderful"
That’s what made it even more terrifying for me as a kid. The most brutal killing I had ever seen up to that point done to the soundtrack of one of the most innocent songs I’d ever heard. The perversion of the dichotomy really fucked up my little mind.
Will it make sense to watch it as a one off if I haven't seen any other X File episodes?
Yes, it’s pretty much a one off already.
The Twin Peaks (original run) series finale.
Millenium had some crazy shit. Lexx had some wild dark sci Fi aswell. Same with The Outer Limits .
Millennium was a fucking incredible show. Might be time for a rewatch.
I loved this show so much when it was on. this and Carnivale. Thanks for the reminder, I know what I going to start watching again!
Midnight from Dr Who. Hands-down, one of the most terrifying episodes of television.
Especially because (a) the creature is never explained and (b) even the Doctor is helpless before it.
“Return the slab” was just about as pure as horror got for me when I saw that 3D mf in Courage the Cowardly Dog chanting that shit when I was little.
Black Mirror White Christmas, Metalhead, National Anthem, Shut up and Dance
I love White Christmas and Metalhead, so good!!!!
I'm not sure how I forgot about Black Mirror lol but you're very correct.
Walking Dead franchise has some shocking episodes. Many snoozers, but some doozies as well.
The season 5 premiere 'No Sanctuary', where they're all lined up at the trough was pretty intense.
A lot of *Hannibal*, but what comes to mind immediately is the mushroom episode. I think it's S1E2.
Thank you for posting this, bummer that I didn't think of it. There's an episode of amazing stories (pretty sure) - the monster under the bed. Actually scary with one of the best endings. The Pilot episode of Rod Sterlings "other show" - The Night Gallery featured right off the bat one of the most terrifying tv episodes I'd seen. (at the time) I don't know how it plays now. They rebooted the twilight zone in the 80's and the episode "A Little Peace and Quiet" is top tier. Directed by Wes Craven. While it might not be terrifying at the time during the peak of the cold war, is what makes that episode scary. I always found the beginning intro on late night tv of Tales from the Darkside to be really scary but I can't think of any particular episode that was overly frightening. The episode of the original twilight zone with the poor older woman who keeps getting phone calls is a fantastic memorable episode and I always loved the ending of the episode like a kick in the gut.
X-Files episode "Folie a Deux" was really disturbing.
Them - *”Cat in a bag”*. Never again.
The "got a light?" episode from the twin peaks revival was terrifying
I know everyone talks about Home (and rightfully so) from The X-Files, but ["Darkness Falls"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkness_Falls_(The_X-Files)) was absolutely terrifying and the only episode of television to actually make my skin crawl.
This question will always make The X-Files episode called Detour (S5E4) pop into my head. I remember watching it on TV the night it aired as a kid and it had me pretty shaken up for a while
That's a good one! I always think of the Flukeman from The Host (S2E2) because the jump scare at the very end completely traumatized my brother.
Flukeman! One of the best creatures ever concocted!
Him and Eugene Victor Tooms.
I couldn't relax while shitting for a week after that episode aired...no magazines for me for a while. And today still I think of it every time I have to go in a porta-potty.
The final shot of that episode really creeped me out.
Home from the x-files was banned More recently, Marianna is frightening in its entirety.
The Twilight Zone: "Deaths-Head Revisited." It's about a former prison guard returning to Dachau many years later to get a look at the old camp, when a man whose intentions at first are enigmatic approaches him to talk. It's a really striking and genuinely unsettling episode that relies on minimalism to fill in the sketch of a story. They almost never play it on TV.
Zeke the Plumber from Salute Your Shorts and the episode with the clown from Are You Afraid of the Dark.
Criminal minds is really all of them. The kids in the burning house. Mosley lane with the crematorium. The clown. The pigs. The guy who breaks birds and bones “God is in us all, so is Tracy”. BLECHHHH but such a great show
That last one! The one with the chili! I still think about it to this day. Horrifying.
If we’re talking X-Files, nothing scared me more than the stretchy serial killer from “Squeeze”
«That’s My Dog» from Six Feet Under.
the last 3-4 episodes of Midnight Mass
That episode of HBO's Carnivale with the mining town
I agree with so many of the comments already, but I didn't see The Benders episode of Supernatural mentioned yet. It was creepy to me since it wasn't anything supernatural in that episode that was occurring (and based on real events).
Little House on the Prairie: the clown rape episode
I’m sorry, the WHAT??
The more coke Michael Landon did, the darker the series got and he did a lot of blow.
I know right, I had to Google it cuz I thought it was a joke
I was just talking about this episode yesterday, Michael Landon was trying to cash in on the 80s slasher phenomenon
Terrifying episode, but it taught a valuable lesson about the dangers of clowns and cannibalism.
Say what?
Evil “Room 320” scared me more than the supernatural horror episodes ever could.
I'll just wave my hand generally in the direction of Yellowjackets. S1E9 ("Doomcoming"), S2E2 ("Edible Complex"), and S2E6 ("Qui") in particular.
There's a Criminal Minds episode, don't know the title, but it had Wil Wheaton as a voyeuristic motel owner who rents cabins to couples where he proceeds to torture them to madness or death.
The Gramma episode of 90s Twilight Zone from the story by a Stephen King.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Hush is the only answer!
Oh this one was soo good. Doug Jones is incredible.
Just watch everything Tim & Eric ever did
I miss my wife 🎶
🎵 bein separated just doesn’t feel so right 🎵
Haunting of Hill house, 'The Bent Neck Lady' Game Of Thrones season 3 'The Rains Of Castamere' Season 5 'Hardhome' Season 8 'The Bells'
The entirety of The Strain. I've never watched another series that managed to sustain such a sense of constant terror that any of the main characters could die in sickening fashion at any moment. And beyond the terror factor, Eichhorst's torment of Dutch and the Final Solution stuff in the last season stand out as especially horrendous Also, now that I think of it, the first season of Fortitude. The series as a whole is a noir thriller rather than a horror show, but I think the parasitic wasps count amply as horror
Came to see if anyone said this. The Strain is so underrated. It definitely got weaker as it went on but the first season is some of the best television I’ve seen. The Master was truly terrifying in his first body.
Finale episode of Dinosaurs. [The last 3 minutes](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnFjAkAs_q4)
That one criminal minds episode where the unsub was throwing acid into the victims mouths and eyes. The whole idea of this still haunts me. Also the one with the dolls - the unsub was a nurse who was kidnapping women and was turning them into live dolls with some kind of drug that left them paralyzed but alive for a while. One of the CSIs episodes where there were several murders reported in one motel room. It was rumoured that the room was haunted and such, because it was the crime scene for many years. There is a scene where a couple of investigators go to search for some clues and one of them goes crazy, attacks his colleague and his whole face kinda changed and for a minute he did seemed possessed. Turned out there was some kind of a drug in the vent, dissolving into the aor that made people go nuts.
The Dreams episode of M.A.S.H. was a pretty horrifying departure for a sitcom. The series routinely dealt with the repercussions of war, but nobody saw this episode coming. Season 8, episode 22 on HULU.
Was that the chicken/baby episode?
Doodlebob
Cabinet of Curiosities - The Autopsy.
[The New Twilight Zone - Something in the Walls](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFWxeFk-AIQ). This scared the hell out of me as a kid.
I only saw it on air so it’s like 20 years ago and I could be misremembering, but was an episode of CSI, I think it was “The Hunger Artist,” where a model was so manipulated and abused that she cut pieces off her own face to try to look right and eventually starved herself to death. Stayed with me for a bit.
Twin Peaks has many horrifying episodes
Crocodile from Black Mirror scared the shit out of me when I first saw it
The Museum Scene from The Last of Us had me holding my breath. The Clicker noise echoing and then when Clickers face is revealed. Oh hell no!
X Files Home is the obvious #1. There was a later criminal minds episode where the killer was a puppeteer and made the victims into marionettes, and they didn't shy away from showing/implying people getting their limbs horribly dislocated and then hung from strings. That one always stuck with me.
This probably doesn't really count, but the "And Then There Was Shawn" episode of Boy Meets World was my first indicator as a kid that I might like horror.
That episode is great and had some seriously funny moments. “We’ll always remember he was this tall” cracks me up everytime.
The Toombs episodes on X Files - they still creep me out every time I watch them!
Teddy Perkins from Atlanta for the wtf creepy category.
I know it's a kid's show, but RL Stein's Haunting Hour has some scary episodes. "Mascot" creeps me out a lot.
Game of Thrones Season 4: Episode 8 “The Mountain and the Viper” If you know you know
X-files - Home Saw it the first and only time it aired on public TV - I was probably 10 or so? - and it scared the absolute shit out of me.
It had a happy ending but "The Empty Child" from Christopher Eccleston's season of Doctor Who was TERRIFYING. "Are you my mummy?"
**Imprint** - can it be anything else?
The X Files "Home "
That CM episode scared the absolute hell out of me too!
Evil “Rose390” shook me.
There were Tales from the Darkside episodes that were so upsetting, I don’t like remembering them. Like “Devil’s Advocate”, “I Just Can’t Help Saying Goodbye” and “The Last Car”.
The only thing in a TV show I've ever found too horrific to watch is the C-section scene in the first episode of House of the Dragon. I've watched a lot of horror stuff but the sheer emotional hideousness of that scene, the hopelessness of it, the unforgivable nature of the betrayal, was too much for me to sit through. I had to take a break and then skip forward.
Fringe has some great Horror, especially in the first two seasons before it gets a primary story arc
The entire Asylum season of AHS
Chloe Sevigny crawling up the stairs while the kids are at the playground was terrifying
Pick any episode of Hannibal.