Spiders tend to elicit a reaction. Whether it’s full blown arachnophobia or just a mild unease, most people go out of their way to avoid the eight-legged creatures. There’s a theory that it’s an evolutionary survival instinct from long ago, but whether there’s truth in that or not doesn’t matter much when horror movies create many other reasons to be afraid of spiders.

Between the upcoming Itsy Bitsy, or even that unnerving spider hatching sequence in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, horror proves time and time again that audiences have visceral responses to arachnids. The scariest spiders horror has to offer, you ask? Let’s dig in.

Arachnophobes, beware…

Possum

Sean Harris plays Philip in last year’s surreal psychological horror movie, Possum. He’s an unstable children’s puppeteer still reeling from trauma he suffered in childhood at the hands of his uncle. His coveted puppet of choice? The extremely terrifying marionette named Possum, a spider-like thing with a human head. While this isn’t a real spider, that doesn’t make this any less disconcerting. Possum is a whole new level of creepy.

The Beyond

When you inherit a hotel that was built over one of the gates to hell, anything can happen. With Lucio Fulci at the helm, that means whatever does happen, it’s going to hurt a lot. Cue Martin Avery discovering the hotel’s blueprints at a library. Followed by an evil force that doesn’t want that knowledge to spread. Martin is knocked from a ladder and left paralyzed on the floor, where tarantulas suddenly swarm him to tear at his flesh. It’s an unpleasant way to go, especially if tarantulas make your skin crawl.

Most Beautiful Island

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; in a scene where her character has to lie still in a glass box, completely naked, as a venomous spider is let loose upon her body. A Chilean Recluse, the most dangerous of the recluse spiders. It’s tense and disturbing.

The Incredible Shrinking Man

When Robert Scott Carey is on vacation with his wife aboard his brother’s boat, it passes through a strange cloud that gets on Scott’s skin and causes him to start shrinking. And he doesn’t stop shrinking. Becoming so small he has to live in a dollhouse, he eventually finds himself stuck in his former home’s basement where he’s locked in a battle with a spider that thinks he’s prey. It’s an average sized spider for anyone else, but to Scott it’s a gigantic beast. Production used real spiders, too. Something that director Jack Arnold had experience with, having previously helmed Tarantula.

Kingdom of the Spiders

William Shatner plays Rack Hansen, the town veterinarian in rural Arizona determined to thwart the onslaught of migrating killer tarantulas that are devouring every living thing in their path. There’s plenty of camp to be found here, but that still doesn’t stop the movie from being an arachnophobe’s worst nightmare. It probably doesn’t help that many of the spiders are real. Or that resisting the spiders seems absolutely futile as they leave cocooned victims in their wake. Spoiler: it ends on a sobering note.

The Mist

In a creature filled movie of all shapes and sizes, leave it to the spiders to prove the most vicious. When a group of volunteers leave the safety of the grocery store to check out the pharmacy next door, they find deadly spider mutants lying in wait. Their webbing also happens to be acidic, as if they needed any extra assistance in the “scary” department. The lucky ones die quick, and the not so lucky ones get deaths befitting of Aliens.

Arachnophobia

The pinnacle of arachnophobia-based horror, this one revolves 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 oblvious humans doing innocuous things like putting on shoes or turning off lamps. But the showdown in the wine cellar is a spine-tingling battle for the ages.

The Believers

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, this late scene is an unexpected blindside. The protagonist’s girlfriend, Jessica (Helen Shaver) is alone, putting makeup over a monstrous boil on her cheek. Then she notices the lump is moving. The music kicks into overdrive as Jessica understandably panics, ramping up the tension until it erupts. Literally. Baby spiders crawl out of the now open wound on Jessica’s face. Ick.

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Based on Ray Bradbury’s novel of the same name, this kid-friendly horror/dark fantasy didn’t shy away from getting pretty harrowing. It certainly had zero qualms about introducing young audiences to arachnophobia, either. Poor Will and Jim learn that not even their bedroom is safe from the terror of Mr. Dark when a crack in the ceiling bulges and splits open, releasing hundreds of tarantulas into the room. They’re everywhere. The floors, crawling up pajama pant legs, and squirming beneath bed sheets- the normal respite for night time terrors. It’s an absolute nightmare.