The 1980s Horror TV Anthology Boom

Every decade can lay claim to cultural movements, but one of the undeniable features of the 1980s was a horror boom across every level of media. Books, film, comics, video games . . . you name it; horror was at an all-time high. On television, that boom was largely expressed in a very particular form: the anthology TV series. Some were brand new, some were built on familiar names, but they all had the same agenda, and that was to scare the pants off the viewing audience.

The roots of the ‘80s boom dug in during the late 1960s and early 1970s and center largely around three people. Ira Levin released his novel Rosemary’s Baby in 1967; the success of the novel and its 1968 film adaptation set a tone for new modern horror in an urban setting. 1971’s The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty advanced the baton and the subsequent 1973 film adaptation was a cultural phenomenon. In 1974, Stephen King made his debut with Carrie, and would drop ‘Salem’s Lot, The Shining, The Stand, Night Shift, and The Dead Zone (as well as Rage and The Long Walk as Richard Bachman) before the decade was out. King’s massive success and an explosion in mass-market paperback sales across the board primed the pump for a deluge of horror stars in print, most of whom also started in the 1970s, including Anne Rice, Dean Koontz, Peter Straub, and Clive Barker.

Hollywood intersected with the publishing boom by adapting many of these horror bestsellers for the cinema. They also began cultivating a bumper crop of slasher films. That horror subgenre arguably kicked off in 1960 with Peeping Tom and Psycho, codified its major tropes with 1974’s Black Christmas and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and achieved something of a cultural breakthrough with the incredible independent success of 1978’s Halloween. From 1980, every studio had to have a slasher or new horror franchise, leading to the biggest wave of staple horror characters since the Universal Studios run of the 1930s and 1940s. Jason, Freddy, Chucky, and Pinhead joined Michael on a run of seemingly endless sequels (those five characters featured in a total of 19 movies between 1980 and 1990).

With all of the screaming going on in the cinema and the bookstore, TV was bound to take notice. Of course, horror had always been a little bit hard to do on television with the various censor guidelines for broadcast TV. Quality horror did have a solid television history with the likes of the original runs of The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, Night Gallery, Dark Shadows, and Alfred Hitchcock Presents, as well as top-notch TV movies like the Kolchak films (The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler) and Tobe Hooper’s incredibly effective mini-series adaptation of King’s ‘Salem’s Lot.

But the 1980s saw TV become a particularly effective outlet for the horror anthology, and in large numbers, and that was especially driven by two factors: the proliferation of new cable channels in search of programming, and the progressively larger well of source material thanks to the literary horror boom. Let’s take a look at the list.

Hammer Hour of Horror (1980): This 13-episode anthology is notable for a few reasons. It kicked off the 1980s in style, produced as it was by the studio that had defined British horror for decades. The episodes made their way to U.S. viewers in a number of ways, including BETA releases in 1982 (packaged as being hosted by Elvira) and various syndicated outlets. Hammer legend Peter Cushing shows up in the episode “The Silent Scream,” marking his final work for the studio. “The House That Bled to Death” has a scene that’s been regularly listed as one of the scariest in U.K. horror. Possibly the most famous episode, due in part to its U.S. release on tape formats (including the Elvira package), was the werewolf entry “Children of the Full Moon.”

Darkroom (1981): Short-lived but fondly remembered, Darkroom was ABC’s effort to mount a regular primetime horror space. The series was hosted by the great James Coburn, who provided appropriate menace. Guest-stars included a host of recognizable faces, like Helen Hunt, Ronny Cox, David Carradine, Rue McClanahan, and Billy Crystal. The show drew on a well of popular writers, visualizing stories and concepts from the likes of Cornell Woolrich, Robert Bloch, Robert R. McCammon, and William F. Nolan. Perhaps the best remembered episode is “Siege of 31 August,” which pits Cox’s veteran against miniature toy soldiers. That scenario, written by Night of the Hunter author Davis Grubb,  was very similar to “Battleground,” a short story from Stephen King’s 1978 collection Night Shift.

The Hitchhiker (1983-1991): HBO’s foray into an adult horror anthology was actually quite the long-term success. The series got its title from the otherwise unnamed host who introed and outroed each episode; the Hitchhiker was played for the first three episode by Nicholas Campbell and then by Page Fletcher for the remainder of the run. The tones of various episodes ran from mystery and film noir to full-on horror, and content freedom of HBO allowed for a more feature film-like presentation of violence, gore, and nudity. The show ran from 1983 until 1987 on HBO, and then picked up again on USA from 1989 to 1991; after the jump to USA, much of the content was toned down to meet basic cable standards.  During its run, the show was nominated for four Cable ACE Awards for acting; Gary Busey won for the episode “WGOD” in 1987. Among the many other notable stars who guested were Kirstie Alley (in two different episodes, one of which earned her an ACE nom), horror icon Karen Black, Willem Dafoe, Louise Fletcher, Elliott Gould, Helen Hunt, Margot Kidder, Klaus Kinski (!), Bill Paxton,  and Gene Simmons.

Tales from the Darkside intro (Uploaded to YouTube by Derek S)

Tales from the Darkside  (1983 pilot; 1984-1988 regular series): In 1982, the dream (scream?) team of horror director George A. Romero (Night of the Living Dead) and Stephen King released Creepshow, a five-story anthology film based on the duo’s mutual love of EC Comics.  The film was a medium-sized hit and encouraged the producers, Laurel Entertainment, to see if Romero could translate it to TV. Given that Warner owned some of the intellectual property, Romero reinvented the concept as its own thing, Tales from the Darkside, for first-run syndication. Romero’s stature helped lure a murderer’s row of writers to the show, either contributing scripts or allowing shorts to be adapted. King did both; he licensed “Word Processor the Gods” and scripted his short, “Sorry, Right Number.” Other writers who were adapted included Clive Barker, Harlan Ellison, Robert Bloch, and John Cheever. The series was popular enough that it yielded a theatrical release, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie, in 1990 (the “Cat from Hell” segment was based on another King story).

The Twilight Zone (1985-1989): The original The Twilight Zone ran from 1959 to 1964 and was a peerless classic of anthology television under the steady hand of creator/host/writer-of-many-episodes Rod Serling. When the original show ended, Serling sold the rights to CBS. When the revival came, it tried the unusual approach of running more than one story in the hour-long slot. Sometimes that allowed for a short that was only a few minutes in length paired with a longer, perhaps 35 to 40 minute story. The second season cut the run time to 30 minutes for one story. Familiar writers like Harlan Ellison (also a consultant), Stephen King, George R.R. Martin, Arthur C. Clarke, Greg Bear, and J. Michael Straczynski would all write episodes or see their work adapted. Famous faces making appearances included Bruce Willis (who appeared in the first episode, based on Ellison’s “Shatterday),  Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman, Frances McDormand, and Janet Leigh. The show ran two seasons in CBS before shuffling over to syndication for the third. The Twilight Zone has been relaunched twice since, once from 2002-2003 on UPN, and on CBS All Access from 2019-2020.

The first episode of The Ray Bradbury Theater (Uploaded to YouTube by Moenvision)

The Ray Bradbury Theater (1985-1992): Ray Bradbury was, and forever will be, one of the great American writers. His vast body of science fiction, fantasy, and horror works and the acclaim that came with them are unassailable. In fact, he had so much material that all 65 episodes of the series were adapted from his own work by the man himself. Bradbury also provided intros and comments across various episodes, and occasionally threw in Easter eggs or drew connections between stories in the writing. The show debuted on HBO; after the first season, it moved over to USA. The laundry list of stars involved ran from Drew Barrymore to Peter O’Toole.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1985-1989): The original AHP ran from 1955 to 1965 (although it changed its name to The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in 1962). The acclaimed director served as host of the original series (and also directed 18 episodes); the original series has been widely praised as one of the great series of its time. For the revamp, the Hitchcock intros were colorized and paired to appropriate episodes, some of which were remakes of earlier episodes. NBC carried the show for one season, after which it leaped over to (any guesses?) USA for three more.

Amazing Stories (1985-1987): One of the biggest swings taken on 1980s television, Amazing Stories was executive produced by the golden box office team of Steven Spielberg, Kathleen Kennedy, and Frank Marshall. The series pulled its name from the pulp magazine launched in 1926 by Hugh Gernsback (yes, they properly licensed its use). The show’s theme was by Spielberg’s frequent collaborator, John Williams. Though the series didn’t traffic exclusively in horror, it had several horror-based episodes and those that played with the tropes of the genre (like the genuinely funny “Mummy Daddy”). The bona fides of the production team allowed them to pull in guest stars of some magnitude up and down the history of Hollywood, including Sid Caesar, Christopher Lloyd, Kevin Costner, Kiefer Sutherland, Gregory Hines, Harvey Keitel, Mark Hamill, and Patrick Swayze. Despite never being a major ratings force, the show was nominated for 12 Emmys, winning five. A reboot ran for five episodes on AppleTV+ in 2020.

Friday the 13th: The Series (1987-1990): Frank Mancuso, Jr. produced the Friday the 13th film series beginning with 1981’s Part 2 thru 1989’s Part VIII. As such, he was able to apply the name to this hybridized anthology series that actually had nothing to do with Camp Crystal Lake or Jason Vorhees. The premise was that two cousins and their occultist ally have to track down the cursed antiques sold from their dead uncle’s shop, Curious Goods; lead actress Louise Robey was quickly anointed a scream queen favorite. While the show had a steady trio of leads, the anthology aspect came from each week’s item having a different story and different guest cast surrounding it. For original syndication, the show was popular enough to finish second in the 18-49 male demo behind only Star Trek: The Next Generation. The show was cancelled during production of the third season, leaving it without a final resolution.

The intro to Freddy’s Nightmares (Uploaded to YouTube by Israb Ali)

Freddy’s Nightmares – A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Series (1988-1990): As Freddy was HUGE in the ‘80s and the above slasher franchise had a TV foothold, it didn’t take much to convince New Line to put their movie hit on the tube. Freddy Krueger himself (Robert Englund) was the host and actually appeared in a few episodes as a major character. Many of the episodes did something different than most anthology series; there would be two stories, and a minor character from the first would be the main character of the second. The series gained additional notoriety for the heavy edits that each episode apparently had to go through to make it safe for syndicated TV. It ran for two seasons and featured a lot of young stars on the rise like Mariska Hargitay, Brad Pitt, Kyle Chandler, and Morris Chestnut.

Monsters (1988-1991): Richard P. Rubinstein was an executive producer of Tales from the Darkside and ran Laurel Entertainment; wishing to put more of the make-up and creature effects from Darkside front and center, he worked with Tribune Entertainment to launch a new venture, Monsters. While not every episode was always horror, every episode did feature a different monster, with Academy Award-winner Dick Smith at the make-up helm. The show ran for three seasons, and much like Darkside, based several scripts on stories by big names, like Stephen King and Robert Bloch.

Tales from the Crypt (1989-1996): EC Comics were famous for their horror books (before overzealous hysteria and Congressional hearings got in the way). Co-Creator William Gaines would pivot from horror to create MAD Magazine, but revisited the old stories by joining Steven Dodd to create this series for HBO. With scripts based on stories that ran in a number of different EC magazines, Tales from the Crypt was a direct hit. Hosted by The Cryptkeeper (a team-operated puppet voiced by John Kassir), the episodes featured a truly stunning roster of talent. It wasn’t unusual to see the likes of Tom Hanks, Demi Moore, Kirk Douglas, Brooke Shields, Whoopi Goldberg, or Arnold Schwarzenegger turn up in episodes. Running seven seasons, it had the longest tenure of any of the 1980s horror anthologies, and also spun out two theatrical films during its run (Demon Knight and Bordello of Blood), as well as an animated series, a kids game show, and the related science fiction anthology, Perversions of Science.

By the time that Tales from the Crypt hit the ground running, most of the other anthologies were gone. Many of the syndicated timeslots that had been occupied by horror shows in the 1980s would be taken over by a new wave of science fiction and fantasy shows in the 1990s (notably Star Trek spin-offs, Babylon 5, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Xena: Warrior Princess, and more). It’s interesting that there was enough of a hunger for horror in the Reagan Era that it could sustain a cross-media boom that involved theatrical films, publishing, and television. But if you look closely, it never really goes away. For every HBO mini-series about rich people being awful, you can find a Stranger Things or a What We Do in the Shadows keeping the old campfire alive.