Editorials
Five Arachnophobia Inducing Horror Movies to Stream This Week
Spiders rank high among the iconic symbols of Halloween thanks to endless seasonal décor and their superstitious association with witches. Still, the eight-legged arachnids are frequently considered the scariest thanks to the prevalent fear of them. Spiders tend to elicit a reaction.
Most people go out of their way to avoid the eight-legged creatures, whether due to full-blown arachnophobia or just a mild unease. This week’s streaming picks capture the primal terror that spiders evoke; if you’re not arachnophobic now, these five movies might instill a new fear.
Here’s where you can stream them this week.
For more Stay Home, Watch Horror picks, click here.
Arachnophobia – Tubi
The pinnacle of arachnophobia-based horror revolves around an arachnophobe protagonist forced to confront his fears in the worst possible way when the small town he’s just moved his family to is invaded by a new species of spider. A species that happens to be extremely aggressive and venomous. There’s no shortage of horrifying moments as the spider offspring quietly sneak into homes and attack oblivious humans doing innocuous things like putting on shoes or turning off lamps. But the showdown in the wine cellar is a spine-tingling, suspenseful battle for the ages.
The Believers – freevee, Roku Channel
After his wife dies in a freak accident in Minneapolis, Cal Jamison (Martin Sheen) moves him and his son Chris to New York City, where he attains a job as a police psychologist for the New York City Police Department. Finally, Cal feels that his family is safe, but unbeknownst to him, a series of brutal and inexplicable murders are about to begin sweeping through the town, putting his son in danger. For a movie that’s centered around a psychiatrist trying to keep his son safe from a Brujería practicing cult with a penchant for brutal child sacrifices, no one would expect the intense spider body horror that comes out of nowhere.
The Mist – Peacock
Frank Darabont’s bleak 2007 horror film traps survivors inside a supermarket when a mysterious fog rolls through town, unleashing deadly creatures with it. Faced with unknowable horrors lurking in the mist, some supermarket inhabitants turn to religious fanaticism. Some are driven insane. Many of them die in grotesque ways. Above all, The Mist offers a grim feeling of hopelessness that’ll leave you needing something uplifting to watch afterward. And yet, it’s the monstrous depiction of spiders and their harrowing method of feeding that offers the most terror here.
Most Beautiful Island – freevee, Kanopy
Most Beautiful Island isn’t a spider horror movie, but it will induce a healthy fear of spiders all the same. Ana Asensio wrote, directed, and starred in this dramatic horror-thriller about an undocumented woman struggling to survive in New York City. It’s the film’s third act that induces arachnid chills with a prolonged sequence that sees multiple characters subjected to arachnid terror as spectators watch. It’s such a simple concept, stretched out for maximum tension as you watch spiders skitter across naked flesh.
The Beyond – AMC+, Fandor, Kanopy, Peacock, Redbox, Plex, SCREAMBOX, Shudder
One of Lucio Fulci’s most beloved horror films and the second entry in his unofficial “Gates of Hell” trilogy, The Beyond is also the director’s most influential. Set in Louisiana, a young woman inherits a hotel and discovers it was built over one of the gates to Hell. Bleak, surreal, and dreamlike in its storytelling, The Beyond toes the line between beauty and horror. With Lucio Fulci at the helm, that means whatever does happen, it’s going to hurt a lot. Case in point? A vicious spider attack for one poor soul frozen in place and helpless against his arachnid threat.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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