Flash forward to the 33 year old horror vixen I am today. Just recently, I "acquired" season one of Freddy's Nightmares. This was the short lived series based on, what else, The Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Watching it now that I'm older I spot the people who are famous today like John Cameron Mitchell, Mariska Hargitay, Bill Moseley, Brad Pitt and Bob Goen. I also realize that my 12 year old self's taste in horror wasn't nearly as "refined" as my 33 year old self's taste. Some of these could be called crap if they aired today! If you haven't ever had the privilege of viewing this show it's basically Tales from the Crypt with Freddy serving up tales of his torment in dream land. He's terrorizing everyone in Springwood and we get to watch.Now, 1988 was banner year for horror television! Not only did you have the three shows mentioned above, we also had Friday the 13th: The Series, which had nothing to do with Jason Vorhees and everything to do with cursed antiques. Another awesome horror anthology show!
This really got me thinking. Why don't we have great horror television like this anymore? We have our The Vampire Diaries, True Blood & Supernatural but these aren't truely horror. The Vampire Diaries are nothing more than this neutered vampire fluff that is so popular. True Blood is soft core vamp porn, granted much better than the fluff but too much boinking and not enough killing. Now I have to give props to Supernatural. It's not really fluff and it has some cool story lines but it's not really what I would love to see in horror television.
The last good horror show, in my opinion was Masters of Horror. But really, how can you top something like that? All the greatest horror directors & writers given free reign to create amazing tales of terror. It was like giving this fat girl the keys to the horror candy store!
Mmmm horror candy...
If you were to ask me what my top 5 horror tv shows were I guess it would break down like this:
5. Monsters
4. Freddy's Nightmares
3. Masters of Horror
2. Tales from the Darkside
1. Night Gallery
I know most people would expect The Twilight Zone but it wasn't just horror, it was also fantasy & Sci Fi. Night Gallery in my opinion held true to the art of telling tales of horror & suspense.
Maybe one day I will get my horror anthologies returning to the tube. Till then it's my Tales from the Darkside dvds and a glimmer of hope.
