Movies
Over 20 New Horror Movies and Shows Releasing in September 2021!
Can you feel it? Halloween is in the air, and October is going to be packed with horror offerings. So, consider September the calm before the Halloween storm. That doesn’t mean it’ll be a wasteland for horror offerings; there’s still plenty of new movies and shows to sink your teeth into.
The third season of FX’s “What We Do in the Shadows” kicks off on September 2, reuniting us with our favorite vampire roommates. The new season will see the housemates panic about handling the revelation of Guillermo’s vampire killer lineage. The vampires will also deal with a power upgrade, a tempting Siren, gargoyles, werewolf kickball, Atlantic City casinos, wellness cults, ex-girlfriends, gyms, and supernatural curiosities galore. Plus, Colin Robinson is turning 100.
September 2 also brings the release of new Shudder original Superhost. Still/Born and Z‘s Brandon Christensen takes on the horror-comedy, pitting vacation vloggers against an unhinged super host. Look for horror mainstay Barbara Crampton.
If you need your regular dose of Ted Bundy, Lin Shaye stars in Ted Bundy: American Boogeyman, coming to VOD & DVD via Dark Star Pictures on September 3. Daniel Farrands’ latest tells “the true story behind the manhunt that brought America’s most fearsome boogieman to justice.”
‘We Need to Do Something’
A family of four seek shelter from a storm, only to become trapped in the bathroom. With no rescue in sight and hours slip into days, teen Melissa (Sierra McCormick) begins to suspect she might be responsible for the horrors plaguing her family and threatening the world. The horrors of We Need to Do Something arrive in limited theaters, digital and VOD on September 3.
September 3 also brings Burial Ground Massacre to digital platforms. Michael Madsen stars in the film that follows a group of college students who spend a night at an old, eerie manor, only to realize that a terrifying stalker is watching their every move.
Sixteen years after making her horror debut in Wolf Creek, actress Cassandra Macgrath is back in Witches of Blackwood, with a day-and-date DVD and Premium TVOD release on September 7. McGrath stars as Claire, “who, following the death of her mother, returns to her hometown, to discover it riddled with witchcraft and overshadowed by a mysterious darkness, steeped in rumors of a soul-stealing entity. As she seeks the truth behind her mother’s death, a confrontation with a coven of witches is the only way to survive.”
“Armed with a few good scares and lush production design, Ruth Platt’s film is a gentle ghost mystery filtered through the eyes of a child,” our own Joe Lipsett said in his review of Martyr’s Lane. Look for this ghostly mystery from a child’s perspective when it arrives on Shudder on September 9.
‘Malignant’
Perhaps the most anticipated of the month belongs to James Wan’s most welcome return to horror with Malignant, coming to theaters & HBO Max September 10. Annabelle Wallis stars as Madison, a woman paralyzed by horrific visions of grisly murders. She soon realizes that these waking nightmares are a terrifying reality. Wan previously cited Dario Argento, Mario Bava, and Brian DePalma as influences for this one.
Described as an ode to John Waters, Death Drop Gorgeous sees a dejected bartender and an aging drag queen forced to fight for their lives when a masked maniac targets gay men and drains their blood. This one slashes its way into limited theaters and VOD platforms on September 10.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead is the title character in Netflix’s upcoming action-thriller Kate, a female assassin who has just 24 hours to get vengeance on her murderer before she dies. Kate will premiere on Netflix on September 10, and you can expect this one to earn its R-rating.
‘Kate’
Based on the DC Comics series by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra, and published by Vertigo between 2002 and 2008, “Y: The Last Man” traverses a post-apocalyptic world in which a cataclysmic event decimates every mammal with a Y chromosome but for one cisgender man and his pet monkey. The series adaptation follows the survivors in this new world as they struggle to restore what was lost and the opportunity to build something better. “Y” will premiere on September 13, exclusively on FX on Hulu.
To get you in the holiday spirit, Halloween-set horror anthology Bad Candy is coming to Select Theaters on September 10, On Demand on September 14. “On Halloween night in New Salem, Radio DJs Chilly Billy (Corey Taylor) and Paul (Zach Galligan) tell a twisted anthology of terrifying local myths. Residents of the small-town experience horrifying paranormal encounters that lead them to a grim end.”
Karen kicks off BET’s “Summer of Chills” lineup of original thrillers, arriving on the network on September 14. Karen centers on “Karen Drexler (Taryn Manning), a racist white woman who makes it her personal mission to displace the new Black family that has just moved in next door to her. Community activist Malik (Cory Hardrict) and his wife Imani (Jasmine Burke) are the couple who have just moved to the Atlanta suburb, but they won’t be backing down without a fight.”
From producer Sam Raimi and director David Yarovesky (Brightburn) comes Netflix’s Nightbooks, a kid-friendly gateway horror movie headed to Netflix on September 15. Krysten Ritter stars as an evil witch who kidnaps a special boy and forces him to tell her stories every night.
‘Prisoners of the Ghostland’
The English-language debut of Suicide Club director Sion Sono, Prisoners of the Ghostland, is coming to theaters and on VOD and Digital on September 17. When star Nicolas Cage describes it as “the wildest movie I’ve ever made,” well, you pay attention. Cage stars as a bank robber sprung from prison by The Governor (Bill Moseley) and tasked with retrieving adopted granddaughter Bernice (Sofia Boutella) in this east-meets-west spaghetti western mashup (review).
One of horror’s greatest icons gets a documentary spotlight in Boris Karloff: The Man Behind the Monster. The documentary explores the life and legacy of the legend and receives a limited theatrical run on September 17.
George A. Romero’s horror classic Night of the Living Dead gets an animated adaptation with Night of the Animated Dead. It includes never-before-seen, exclusive animated scenes not found in the original live-action film. Look for it on digital on September 21.
Intrusion arrives on Netflix on September 22, which looks to explore what happens *after* a home invasion upended the lives of a happy couple. It leaves the wife traumatized and suspicious of everyone around her. Logan Marshall-Green (Upgrade) and Freida Pinto (“The Path”) lead the cast.
“Creepshow” season 3
The anthology horror series “Creepshow” returns to Shudder for its brand new third season on September 23, and new episodes will be available every Thursday on the road to Halloween. Still promising to offer the most fun you’ll have being scared, season three brings more vignettes of monsters, murder, the supernatural, and more. Greg Nicotero is back as showrunner and executive producer of “Creepshow,” with confirmed directors for Season 3 including Rusty Cundieff (Tales from the Hood) and Mattie Do (The Long Walk).
The groundbreaking novels from Isaac Asimov come to the screen in the new Apple TV+ series “Foundation,” set to premiere on September 24. “When revolutionary Dr. Hari Seldon predicts the impending fall of the Empire, he and a band of loyal followers venture to the far reaches of the galaxy to establish The Foundation in an attempt to rebuild and preserve the future of civilization. Enraged by Hari’s claims, the ruling Cleons — a long line of emperor clones — fear their unrivaled reign may be weakening as they’re forced to reckon with the potential reality of losing their powerful legacy forever.”
Netflix will unveil Mike Flanagan’s “favorite project so far” on September 24. The seven-episode limited series “Midnight Mass” tells the tale of a small, isolated island community whose existing divisions are amplified by the return of a disgraced young man (Zach Gilford) and the arrival of a charismatic priest (Hamish Linklater). When Father Paul’s appearance on Crockett Island coincides with unexplained and seemingly miraculous events, a renewed religious fervor takes hold of the community – but do these miracles come at a price?
No One Gets Out Alive, an adaptation of The Ritual author Adam Nevill’s novel, comes to Netflix on September 29 to close out the month’s genre offerings. In the film, “An immigrant (Cristina Rodlo) in search of the American dream is forced to take a room in a boarding house, where she finds herself in a nightmare she can’t escape.”
“Midnight Mass”
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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