Halloween 2024: 13 Scarily Entertaining Movies I Watched for the First Time
Recommending movies I watched to celebrate my favorite holiday this year
This newsletter now has a paid subscription available. If you enjoy my writing and want to support this newsletter, please consider becoming a paid subscriber for $5/month.
If you subscribe to this newsletter (I hope you do or will), you should know that Halloween is my favorite holiday. Like many others, I watch a few go-to movies yearly: Hocus Pocus, Halloweentown, Practical Magic, Casper, and the live-action Scooby Duo duology. I aimed to watch as many Halloween-related movies as possible in the lead-up to and during October, especially those I hadn’t seen before. I wound up watching 13 new (to me) movies.
Since I spend most of my time writing about TV (I wrote a list of Disney Channel’s best live-action Halloween episodes and another one of supernatural teen TV shows), I want to share a list of movies. I know it’s November. People are focused on the upcoming holidays, creating Pinterest boards for gift ideas and cozying up with Hallmark movies. I’m almost to that point, but first, I want to give you some recommendations. After all, Halloween is forever, if you ask me.
1. Descendants: The Rise of Red (2024)
Descendants: The Rise of Red introduces the franchise to a new generation with an entirely new ensemble. It features a few familiar faces, like China Ann McClain’s Uma and Melanie Paxson’s Fairy Godmother. It makes Brandy and Paolo Montalban’s Cinderella and Prince Charming from 1997’s Roger and Hammerstein’s Cinderella a part of the Descendants universe. Mostly, The Rise of Red is about new characters — tied to legacy Disney characters (Rita Ora has so much fun as the Queen of Hearts), like always — trying to find themselves while singing and dancing to new songs with a new sound. The franchise lives on!
2. Beetlejuice (1998)
Beetlejuice is a cult classic I only watched for the first time this year. Can you believe that? With Beetlejuice Beetlejuice releasing this year (I still haven’t seen it, so no spoilers!), this October is the best time to dive into Tim Burton’s wacky and wonderful Halloween romp. If you’ve seen this movie, you know how stylized and specific it is. Michael Keaton gives one of his best and most hilarious performances ever; Winona Ryder and Catherine O’Hara are international treasures. I can’t imagine another Halloween without the Day-O! dance.
3. Hotel Transylvania (2012)
Don’t underestimate the appeal of Hotel Transylvania. Adam Sandler plays a grieving Dracula who raises his vampire daughter, Mavis (Selena Gomez), in a supernatural resort. The perceived safe distance from the human world makes the arrival of Andy Samberg’s lovable Jonathan a catalyst for change among humans and supernatural beings and love between Jonathan and Mavis. This movie is such an endearing watch about acceptance and growing up. Plus, the cast has a lot of recognizable voices — Fran Drescher, Steve Buscemi, and Molly Shannon.
4. Wynonna Earp: Vengeance (2024)
If you had told me in 2016 that Wynonna Earp would come back in a TV movie on Tubi in 2024, I would believe you. There’s magic in Wynonna Earp, a show that follows Wyatt Earp’s heir as she returns to her hometown, Purgatory, to begrudgingly take up the mantle of demon hunting, which can’t be killed even after the show ends. That special spark is palpable in the ensemble members who return for Wynonna Earp: Vengeance and the script penned by the show’s showrunner, Emily Andras. This movie leaves me with more questions than answers, so I need Tubi to make another movie or more seasons of the show.
5. I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997)
I had fun with this. Sue me! There isn’t much that Kevin Williamson pens or produces that I don’t like. And with Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar, and Ryan Phillippe as the core four? I am obsessed. I couldn’t help but wonder how 21st-century technology would impact everything from how the characters interact to the execution of the horror elements. So I’m glad I watched this before the 2025 sequel that Jennifer Kaytin Robinson (!!!) is helming. Maybe I need to check out the Prime Video sequel series next.
6. Freaky (2020)
I loved this movie. This Halloween season made me a fanatic of Christopher Landon’s work. Sometimes, horror comedies fall flat because they don’t fully embrace both genres, or one becomes more stilted. Freaky avoids that pitfall with an absolutely hilarious and surprisingly endearing performance from Vince Vaughn as a near-death experience causes his character, who is a serial killer, to swap bodies with a teenage girl named Millie, played by Kathryn Newton. Now, Freaky is a movie that I will recommend to everyone, regardless of Halloween.
7. Happy Death Day (2017)
See what I mean about Christopher Landon? If Freaky pleasantly surprised me, Happy Death Day made the horror comedy my new favorite thing. I didn’t know it would be the first of many time-loop, time-traveling slashers I would watch in 2024. But I’m not mad about it. This movie is so creative and funny. It doesn’t have as many moving parts as the sequel, but it handles the ones it uses with such efficacy that it earns the sequel. I’d watch a third movie right now!
8. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016)
If I’m so honest, this movie has been on my watchlist for years — probably since 2016. But, like the internet is wont to do, people’s opinions discouraged me from watching it. Luckily, I’ve matured a lot since 2016, and I watch movies that interest me even if the internet thinks they’re bad. News flash: This movie isn’t bad (to me!). It’s not a faithful adaptation of Jane Austen’s book, but it never pretends to be or hold itself to the same standards. It stands on its own as a fun take on a familiar classic. Also, I’m always here for women with swords!
9. The Final Girls (2015)
This movie may be one of the most unexpected watches of my Halloween marathon. It’s honestly strange for it to be considered so because this cast is so catered to my interests. The ensemble is also very 2015, which makes me nostalgic. I laughed through the first third of the movie, but the rest was heartbreaking. Taissa Farmiga and Malin Akerman broke my heart in the third act. I never expected to cry at “Bette Davis Eyes,” but The Final Girls made me.
10. Happy Death Day 2U (2019)
It's another Christopher Landon movie! Shocking, right? Happy Death Day 2U almost juggles too much, but it pulls it all off. I like that this movie pairs Tree with a bit of a time-traveling Scooby Gang. I also like that every time I thought I figured the twist out (at one point, I was disappointed with the reveal), the movie pulled the rug out from under me to reveal something better. Most of all, I love Jessica Rothe in this role. I need her to be recognized as the Scream Queen she is.
11. I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998)
Honestly, this sequel doesn’t make much of a case for the story to go anywhere else, let alone the Bahamas. Still, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I had fun watching this. You can’t put Brandy in a movie and expect me to be anything less than invested. Also, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (and all the other ‘90s/early 2000s movies on this list) makes me miss 100-minute movies so fiercely that I will leap for joy when they become the standard again.
12. Totally Killer (2023)
In Kiernan Shipka, we trust! But also, Olivia Holt and Liana Liberato? A trio very familiar with coming-of-age horror projects. From Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (Shipka) to Girl vs. Monster (Holt) and Scream VI (Liberato), those women never disappoint. Totally Killer is another win on the list. The plot ebbs and flows a bit for me, but never so much that I stop caring. I also enjoy that this movie goes back to the ‘80s but doesn’t look at it with an untouchable sheen. Instead, Totally Killer points out its flaws, to say the very least, which makes it a better movie.
13. Z-O-M-B-I-E-S (2018)
It feels perfect for me to begin and end this list with Disney Channel Original Movie — or Disney Original Movies, as they’re now called. Z-O-M-B-I-E-S has been on my radar for a while because I’m a fan of the cast in other projects. Also, for nostalgia’s sake, this franchise feels like the first big one since I stopped religiously watching Disney Channel. As a child, I fell in love with The Cheetah Girls, High School Musical, and Camp Rock. I carry those movies with me today. So, I’m so glad that the Z-O-M-B-I-E-S franchise has charmed a new generation.
I hope this list gives you at least one new spooky, scary movie to check out before or during next Halloween. It’s never too late or too early to celebrate the best holiday. Like Marnie Piper says in Halloweentown, “Halloween is cool.”
Until next time,
💌 Shelby