If you too have long passed the age where trick or treating is acceptable behavior, I’ve got a treat for you today! Here are my suggestions for age-appropriate Halloween entertainment.
Feel free to pair these with the age-appropriate beverage of your choice. Bonus points for wearing an age-appropriate costume too.
Note: This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase any of the recommended products, I receive a teeny tiny commission, but it costs you nothing!
Podcasts
Crime Show :: A Ghost Story
You may remember I promo’ed the Crime Show podcast in a post last month. It’s become one of my favorites. In the Halloween episode, they take a detour from your run-of-the-mill murder and mayhem to tell the story of a couple who moved into a house and found themselves in a real-life ghost story with no rational explanation for the weird shit that was happening: Fire alarms going off when there was no fire. Glass breaking itself. Balloons bursting when no one was nearby. Dreams of a woman they’d never met but who died in the house. They invited a paranormal researcher to investigate. And then they met a tragic end.
The Black Tapes
This docudrama series follows journalist Alex Reagan as she begins an investigation of mysterious VHS tapes hinting at the supernatural. As she digs deeper, she begins to wonder if she’s imagining ghosts and demons, or if she really is being haunted by supernatural beings. Do you believe?
Books
The Last Days of Jack Sparks :: Jason Arnopp
Normally I’m not a scary movie/book person, but I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway a few years ago and dove in without really knowing what I was getting myself into. What followed was a supernatural mind-f*ck that left me scared to go to sleep for a few days after reading. Mostly because of the demons.
Seriously, one of the best books I’ve ever read, and it will screw. you. up.
Miss Peregrine’s School for Peculiar Children :: Ransom Riggs
After the mysterious death of his grandfather, Jacob Portman begins hallucinating a creepy monster with multiple tentacle-like tongues. In the weeks that follow, Jacob sifts through his grandpa’s stuff and becomes convinced the monster legit killed his grandpa—or at least that there’s something weird going on. Though his parents think he’s gone off in the deep end and suffered a nervous breakdown, they allow him to take a trip to a strange island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers his grandfather’s peculiarity is something more sinister than strange…
This YA series has been out for awhile, and if you haven’t read it yet, Halloween is the perfect time! By the way, don’t cheat and watch the movie. It kinda goes off the rails at the end, and not in a good way.
Looking for more book reviews? Check out my bookshelf »
TV Shows
Santa Clarita Diet
This isn’t so much thrilling and chilling as it is downright hilarious. After eating some sketchy oysters, real-a-tor Shelia (Drew Barrymore) survives a disgusting illness—or does she? Whatever, she feels better than ever. The only problem is the constant cravings for human flesh. Luckily, her loyal husband Jo-El (Timothy Oliphant) is committed… ’til death do them part. Warning: This series inexplicably got canceled after the third season, despite the fact that it’s laugh-out-loud funny.
The UnXplained :: Evil Places
I think the thing that gets me all freaked out about supernatural stuff is the fact that, sometimes, there is simply no rational explanation, and there’s no way to prove it one way or another. Don’t get me wrong… People can be just as creepy. But there’s something about the unknown that definitely ups the creepy factor. This episode of UnXplained posits a question: Can places be evil? Sounds silly, but there are some places on earth where bad things happen that just couldn’t have been caused by humans or be explained by science. Could they?
What are your favorite Halloween activities? Share your own creepy recommendations in the comments!
Cover photo by David Menidrey on Unsplash
