13 Summerween Movies To Get You In The Spirit

A Halloween classic from the mind of genre legend Mick Garris, with fellow genre royalty Tony Gardner on FX and Doug Jones bringing our favorite zombie Billy Butcherson to life, it’s no wonder this family friendly treat is still a go-to.

This horror comedy was released in the summer of 1993. Originally considered a box office flop, it’s since gone on to become a treasured tradition. Three ancient hags vs the twentieth century in Salem, MA provides a rich canvas for ultimate Halloween (and Summerween) vibes.
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FANGORIA #125 actually featured an extensive behind-the-scenes look with Tony Gardner. For more behind the scenes with Gardner, check out the Hocus Pocus episodes of the Flesh & Blood & Bone podcast with Tony and his daughter, Kyra Gardner.

Something about a suburban block full of nosy neighbors with nothing better to do than get all up in each other’s business just screams summer. Directed by Joe Dante (Gremlins), this horror comedy proves that sometimes it can pay off to be the aforementioned nosy neighbor.

Tom Hanks leads an all-star cast featuring Corey Feldman, Bruce Dern, Rick Ducommun, Carrie Fisher, Courtney Gaines, and Henry Gibson. When newcomers arrive in the neighborhood, the question arises — are they actually suspicious or are we just too quick to judge? Peacock recently launched a ‘Burbs TV series starring Keke Palmer, which is also worth a binge watch.

Sleep all day. Party all night. Never get old. Doesn’t sound like a half bad deal if you ask me! With iconic makeup FX by the legend Ve Neill and a collection of the most quotable lines of any vampire movie ever to hit the screen, The Lost Boys redefined what vampires could look like (Neill was the first to make them sparkle!).

Starring Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Patric, Alex Winter, and both Coreys (Feldman and Haim). Something about the Coreys feels inherently like summer. Add that to the coastal setting of the fictional Santa Carla boardwalk, and you’ve got a recipe for long summer nights, dodging bloodsuckers.
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The Lost Boys is our official FANGORIA Staff Pick for June. That means you can catch The Lost Boys on the big screen on June 13th in select Regal theaters. You’ll also receive a limited edition patch inspired by the movie (they’re noodles, Michael!).

Maybe it’s the carnival/circus aesthetic that makes Killer Klowns From Outer Space feel like a natural fit for summertime scares. Using rayguns to envelop your victims in cotton-candy cocoons and popcorn bazookas as a primary form of combat is something I can get behind.

Jojo, Shorty, Slim, Fatso, Rudy, Chubby, Spikey, and Bibbo land in the tiny town of Crescent Cove and wreak absolute killer havoc as they harvest humans. The Chiodo Brothers, who wrote, directed, and produced the horror comedy, were also responsible for bringing the incredible nightmare-inducing Large Marge sequence to life in Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure.

Creepshow and Creepshow 2 both feature killer aquatic segments, and with their splashy, over the top fantastical comic book colors, both entries have an inherently summery vibe. In the first installment, you’ll find “Something To Tide You Over,” featuring Leslie Nielsen as a husband who finds out his wife has been having an affair.

Naturally, he decides to bury her (Dawn of the Dead’s Gaylen Ross) and her lover (Ted Danson) at the beach, just up to their necks, while he torments them. As the tide rolls in, well…
And in true Creepshow fashion, there’s a twisty revenge prologue.
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Creepshow 2 features a segment that has burrowed deeply into the DNA of anyone who has ever seen it, “The Raft.” With all the makings of an ‘80s slasher setup, the tale follows a group of carefree youths as they swim out to a raft in the lake.

Unfortunately for them, there’s something in the water, and they’re stranded. Maybe skip this one if you have any lake trips planned in the immediate future.

Werewolves on the Fourth of July? ‘Merica indeed. This is another Corey Haim entry on the list (can you blame me?) with a story adapted from the Stephen King novella Cycle of the Werewolf.

A small town is plagued by a string of mysterious murders, and when Marty (Haim) encounters a werewolf one night, he’s on a mission to capture the beast and put an end to the gruesome homicides.

Gary Busey stars as Haim’s Uncle Red, who pretty much embodies the cool dream uncle, willing to hunt down werewolves and supply an underaged nephew with silver bullets and fireworks as needed.

It’s no secret King excels at capturing adolescence and coming of age. Take your pick of IT adaptations, and spend a summer afternoon with the Losers Club.

Andy Muschietti’s blockbuster mega-hit adaptation is split into two chapters. The first chapter delivers more of the summer vibes I’m looking for here, as it centers on the young Losers Club in 1989 when they first encounter It.

In between being stalked by a supernatural entity hungry for the flesh of children, there’s also bike riding and the overall backdrop of summer in a small town, while your parents have absolutely no idea where you are. This one's for the latchkey kids.
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Leigh Janiak’s Fear Street trilogy was a full-on event. And that’s no easy feat in a world of abundance, where dozens of new horror movies hit streaming platforms every month.

The series as a whole works as an excellent summerween watch, but if I have to choose just one movie from the trilogy as my summerween pick, I’ll obviously have to go with Fear Street Part 2: 1978.

While the trilogy centers on a nice blend of town lore, witches, and slashers, Part 2 drops us smack in the middle of a summer camp for some good old-fashioned slasher fun. Fear Street Part One won the coveted Chainsaw Award for Best Kill in 2022 for the epic bread slicer death. But don’t worry, plenty of gruesome kills await in Part Two. Round it out with witch lore circa 1666 in Part Three.

Jordan Peele followed up his Oscar-winning Get Out with a horrifying tale of dopplegangers. What starts out as a family trip to the seaside town of Santa Cruz (the real life location of The Lost Boys, Santa Carla!) seems to take a turn into The Strangers territory, only to find out it’s actually something much worse.

Starring Lupita Nyong’o, Winston Duke, and Elisabeth Moss, this one may just throw you into an existential crisis from which you’ll never recover.

Sinners is one of those rare movies, like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, where you can just feel the heat absolutely radiating off the screen in a way that makes you want to shower immediately after watching, desperate for some cool relief.

It's tangible. It’s sticky and sweaty, and it’s also one of the best damn films to come out in the last 20 years. Not one of the best horror films, mind you, but one of the greatest contemporary films, period. Michael B Jordan won an Academy Award for his portrayal of twin brothers Smoke and Stack by doing insane things like making sure one twin had dimples while the other did not. What an absolute madman and legend.

Vampires, epic music, and full creative brilliance on display.

The Wicker Man walked (and sang) so Midsommar could soar (and smash senior folks). Is this Christopher Lee at his most sinister? Maybe! Lee plays Lord Summerisle in this 1973 folk horror staple. A missing girl, a remote island, pagan rituals, and a puritan police sergeant doing his best to crack the case.

If you’ve never seen this, it’s highly likely you’ve come across stills and clips from the epic finale. Even being aware of that imagery which enticed me in the first place so many years ago, nothing could have prepared me for exactly what unfolds on Summerisle (including nude musical numbers and Ingrid Pitt!).
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Ok, this isn’t a movie, but there are few things that feel as quintessentially summer as “vintage” made-for-kids horror. I’m talking Halloween episodes of beloved TV series and wacky one-off Halloween specials. Eerie, Indiana is basically an entire television series dedicated to that vibe.

It’s The Twilight Zone for kids, co-created by Karl Schaefer (Z Nation) with episodes directed by Joe Dante. Where other ‘90s horror series like Are You Afraid of the Dark? and Goosebumps focused on anthologies, Eerie, Indiana had the throughline of a new kid in town (Hocus Pocus’ Omri Katz) and his best friend encountering all manner of weird phenomena. And they seemed to be the only ones who noticed something strange was afoot.
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In shows like this, familiar faces are bound to pop up. If you visit Eerie, Indiana, you’ll spot Danielle Harris, Dick Miller, John Astin, Tobey Maguire, Denise Richards, Vincent Schiavelli, Henry Gibson, and even Darla the dog (The Silence of the Lambs), just to name a few. As far as gateway horror entries go, this is a pretty solid one, even if it's not nostalgic for you.

Another TV series because Tales From The Crypt was unavailable for so long, but it’s now streaming on Shudder, which is a pretty big deal. John Kassir voices the quippy Crypt Keeper, which leads me to wonder… who do you think would win in a battle of the witty one-liners between The Crypt Keeper and Freddy Krueger?

This HBO series premiered in 1989 and ran for seven seasons with 93 episodes. That in itself should last you the summer! Like Eerie, Indiana there are a TON of familiar faces in Tales From The Crypt, including Tom Hanks, who starred in and directed “None But The Lonely Heart”, Brad Pitt, Lea Thompson, Daniel Craig, Tim Curry, Demi Moore, Joe Pesci and honestly it would probably be faster to list actors who never appeared in an episode of Tales From The Crypt.

There’s plenty of body horror and cautionary tales on display with the added bonus of The Crypt Keeper’s quippy intros and outros.
Bonus: There’s also a Tales From The Cryptkeeper animated series that was made for children in 1993. It plays like an EC comic come to life, and is a distinctly tamer vibe than the show.
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Technically, that's 15 summerween movies and 3 TV shows, which should be plenty to keep you busy with extended Summerween fun for the next couple of months, along with all the new horror movies coming our way. It's always the perfect season to binge horror movies, but enjoying horror movies in the summer is also a solid way to beat the heat. Stay cool out there.

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