The 20 Scariest Horror Movies Streaming on Peacock, from Invisible Man to American Psycho
September is here, and that means Halloween is right around the corner. To celebrate, it's time to watch a whole bunch of horror movies, and that's where Peacock always has you covered.
The NBCUniversal streaming service has retained a robust horror collection pretty much since it launched, and right now it's particularly packed with great options from across the genre's history, just waiting for horror junkies or the horror curious. More than 100 new horror films are hitting the streamer in September, and that means that we're supersizing our list of the scariest films on the service in honor of Halloween's approach. So, if you're looking for something to keep you up at night, here are 20 films to stream right now.
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The Scariest Horror Movies Streaming Now on Peacock
American Psycho (2000)
It's been nearly 25 years since Mary Harron released her adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' notorious novel, and American Psycho still feels just as vibrant, and just as frightening. Set in the 1980s, the film follows the exploits of Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale doing what might be his best work), a businessman by day and a demented serial killer by night. Or is he? The film's deep exploration of Patrick's particular mind, and what it does and doesn't perceive, is scary enough on its own. Throw in some wonderful gore and it's a dark horror-comedy classic for the ages.
Watch it here on Peacock!
We Are Still Here (2015)
Two grieving parents move to a secluded New England farmhouse in an attempt to start over, and find spirits unwilling to move on are lurking in the home's old foundations. That's the setup for Ted Geoghegan's We Are Still Here, a blisteringly powerful indie horror gem that remains one of the best releases in the genre over the last decade. Featuring great performances from Barbara Crampton, Larry Fessenden, and others, it's a haunting story that'll stay in your brain for hours.
Watch it here on Peacock!
The Exorcist III (1990)
Nearly 20 years after The Exorcist arrived and quickly gained a reputation as quite possibly the scariest movie ever made, novelist and screenwriter William Peter Blatty returned to the world of the film with this adaptation of his follow-up novel, Legion. Perhaps due to the lackluster reception of the previous sequel, Exorcist II: The Heretic, The Exorcist III has been met over the years with a certain level of skepticism among horror fans, but trust me when I tell you this is very much a film worth watching. It doesn't generate terror in the same way that The Exorcist does, but that leaves it free to create a dreadful atmosphere all its own as it tells the story of a possibly supernatural serial killer, a new possession, and George C. Scott as the cop caught in the middle of it all. Plus, keep an eye out for one of the best and most unexpected jump scares in horror history.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Sick (2023)
One of the first great horror films of 2023, Sick is simultaneously a great home invasion thriller, a solid high-concept slasher, and an incisive, often funny look at the dread that surrounded us all in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The setup is simple: Two friends head out to a secluded lake house to quarantine amid luxurious surroundings, then masked killers show up and try to murder them. Why are they trying to murder these specific people, and what does it have to do with other deaths back in the crowded city? That's for you to find out, but along the way you're definitely going to get plenty of tension-laden chase scenes, memorable injuries, and a truly wild third act.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Night of the Living Dead (1968). Photo: Night of the Living Dead (1/10) Movie CLIP - They're Coming to Get You (1968) HD / Movieclips Youtube
What can we say about Night of the Living Dead that hasn't already been said? George A. Romero's stone-cold classic served as the blueprint for the modern zombie genre. Without it, our collective cultural notion of reanimated corpses seeking out flesh and representing deeper ideas about society would simply not exist.
"We had $6,000 and a loose idea based on a short story I'd written which was in fact an allegorical thing," Romero remarked in a 1972 interview. "We decided to take that and turn it into a real blood and guts film, and that's how it started."
Watch it here on Peacock!
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The Beyond (1981)
The legendary Italian gore master Lucio Fulci made a lot of unforgettably gruesome horror films, but he arguably never got better than this classic entry in his thematic "Gates of Hell" trilogy. The premise of The Beyond is simple: A woman inherits an old house in Louisiana and finds it might have certain supernatural tendencies. That's pretty well-trod territory, but it's what Fulci and company do with that setup that makes The Beyond work as a dreamlike, unforgettably relentless descent into terror. Plus, it's packed with practical effects that remind you why Fulci had such a reputation for bloody films.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Black Christmas (1974)
Black Christmas (1974) Photo: Black Christmas (1974) KILL COUNT / Dead Meat YouTube
Once again, we return to the debate of which movie kicked off the slasher boom that would come to define the late ‘70s and all of the 1980s. Released a full four years before Michael Myers went on his famous killing spree in Haddonfield, Black Christmas might very well have a genuine claim to the title of being the first modern slasher flick.
Prior to his death in 2007, director Bob Clark shot down speculation that Halloween was a rip-off of his movie: "[John Carpenter] liked Black Christmas and may have been influenced by it, but in no way did John Carpenter copy the idea." Whatever the case, Black Christmas (a simple tale of sorority sisters being stalked and killed in gruesome fashion) makes for a festive watch any day of the year.
Watch it here on Peacock!
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The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
Shot over one sweltering Texas summer in 1973, Tobe Hooper's chaotic horror masterpiece still ranks among the most unsettling things you can watch on any given day. The seat-of-your-pants production, coupled with the real sweat across the actors' faces and a sense of lived-in funk that you can feel in your nostrils, adds an almost docudrama air to the whole piece. You feel like you're in the van with this group of youths driving to their doom, like you're in the house where Leatherface starts carving people up, and like you've got a seat for the most terrifying dinner party in history. Nearly 50 years after its release, Texas Chain Saw remains notorious not because it's bloody, but because it still feels transgressive and horrifying.
Watch it here on Peacock!
The Changeling (1980)
Photo: Pan-Canadian Distributors
One of the all-time great haunted house movies, Peter Medak's The Changeling begins with a very simple, yet effective, setup for a horror story. A composer (George C. Scott), still grieving the loss of his wife and child, moves across the country and settles into a historic, secluded mansion to begin work on some new music. It's not long before he starts experiencing odd phenomena around the house, all connected to what seems to be the ghost of a dead boy. Rich with atmosphere and anchored by Scott's wonderful central performance, The Changeling just keeps adding layers to its horrific narrative, right up until one of the most unforgettable climaxes in horror.
Watch it here on Peacock!
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Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)
Long before horror remakes became something of a subgenre unto themselves, legendary director Werner Herzog set out to offer a new vision of the most famous horror movie to ever come out of his home country of Germany: F.W. Murnau's silent classic Nosferatu. The result is Nosferatu the Vampyre, one of the greatest remakes to ever emerge in any genre at any time. Featuring gorgeous photography, hypnotic performances by Isabelle Adjani and Klaus Kinski in the title role, and genuinely chilling moments of terror, it's a true masterpiece of vampire cinema. Plus, I once heard Midnight Mass creator Mike Flanagan call it his favorite vampire movie of all time, so that's reason enough to check it out.
Watch it here on Peacock!
The House of the Devil (2009)
Ti West is a master of doing a lot with a little. His independent horror films are some of the best the genre's had to offer us over the last 20 years, and if you loved his recent successes like X and Pearl, you owe it to yourself to go back and take a look at this throwback chiller. Set in the 1980s and hinging on that decade's Satanic Panic vibes, it's the story of a babysitter who takes a gig to earn some quick cash and soon finds that she's trapped in a nightmare she may never escape. Jocelin Donahue is fantastic in the central role, and the way West manages to crank up the tension in close quarters, even when nothing seems to be happening, makes it a nail-biter to the very end.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Train to Busan (2016)
Train to Busan (2016). Photo: Train to Busan (2016) - The First Zombie Scene (1/9) | Movieclips YouTube
It's hard to do something new with the zombie genre, so when a film comes along and breathes new life (no pun intended) into the realm of reanimated corpses, you have to give credit where credit is due.
Director Yeon Sang-ho's thrilling, and terrifying, Train to Busan is one of those projects. Entirely set aboard a speeding locomotive infested with frenzied zombies, the film gained a great deal of attention for its socioeconomic subtext. In a New York Times review, Jeannette Catsoulis described the effort as "a public-transportation horror movie with a side helping of class warfare."
Watch it here on Peacock!
The Invisible Man (2020)
The plot of Leigh Whannell's The Invisible Man is certainly scary by itself: A woman can't shake her terrifying ex-boyfriend, so much so that he seems to come back from the dead as an invisible presence in her life. But that's not what makes The Invisible Man a modern horror classic. No, what really puts the film over the top is the simple attention to detail in every single horror sequence, from the subtle to the ultra-violent. Everything is put in place so perfectly that when Whannell finally lets the scares loose, you're already slumped down in your seat, biting your nails and waiting for the jump.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Psycho (1960)
Alfred Hitchcock's legendary film about a disturbed man who runs a roadside motel is, despite its age, still a very scary experience. Yes, the shower scene is iconic, but Psycho has so much more to offer in terms of pure terror. From watching Norman dispose of a body to the flat-out jump scare experience of the second kill and, of course, that final reveal, it's a film that can rattle even thoroughly modern audiences.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Get Out (2017)
Jordan Peele's horror breakthrough is a very funny, very smart movie that still manages to send chills down your spine even as you're laughing at the way the characters are navigating this strange situation. From a haunting opening attack to that climactic moment that will make you gasp until you realize exactly what's going on, Get Out is a masterpiece with chills to spare.
Watch it here on Peaocck!
Videodrome (1983)
David Cronenberg is known for movies that make you squirm, and Videodrome is no different. What's more frightening than the body horror, though, is the film's central idea that the media you consume can literally alter who you are, to the point that you lose touch with what qualifies as "reality" and even lose the things that make up your being. It's a captivating, terrifying ride, and it works even though we've long since left VHS behind in many way.
Watch it here on Peacock!
The Thing (1982)
John Carpenter has made a lot of great horror films, but in terms of pure terror, it never gets better than The Thing. The beautifully done, remarkably gruesome practical effects are one thing, but what really sets this film apart is the aura of paranoia that permeates the entire story. Carpenter just keeps ratcheting up the tension, and the sense of inescapable dread, right up to that iconic final scene.
Watch it here on Peacock!
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Saw (2004)
The Saw films would eventually evolve into an increasingly lavish parade of death traps designed to make us cringe, and while the original film has its share of those moments, the real horror lies in the sense of manipulation running through everything. You might be making one simple, horrible choice to save yourself, or you might be setting in motion a whole other set of consequences and horrors. Either way, the game is always rigged.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Dawn of the Dead (2004)
Zack Snyder's remake of the George A. Romero classic might not have the same cultural impact of the original, but that doesn't mean it fails to fill the big shoes of its predecessor. Full of lightning fast zombies, brutal kills, and very human horror that gets to the core of why zombie outbreaks can scare us so effectively, Dawn of the Dead is a thrill ride with moments that will stick in your head long after you close your eyes.
Watch it here on Peacock!
Candyman (1992)
Candyman is a film about an urban legend who will emerge if you say his name enough times in the mirror, then gut you with a hook forever implanted in one arm. That's creepy enough, but then you add in all the things the film does with bees, all the layers of violence unleashed, and it becomes a maelstrom of fear. To make things even eerier, there's Tony Todd's remarkable performance in the title role, work that's simultaneously terrifying and enticing, as though you almost want him to rip you apart.
Watch it here on Peacock!
