Movies
Practical Effects for the Win: Five Creature Features to Stream This Week!
It’s Monday. Because sometimes nothing lifts your spirits quite like a good creature design or a monster on a rampage, this week’s streaming picks are dedicated to the creature feature.
Whether hailing from space, the darkest depths of the sea, or beyond, these five horror movies bring the monster mayhem we all love so much.
As usual, here’s where you can stream them this week…
For more Stay Home, Watch Horror picks, click here.
The Deadly Spawn – Shudder
The plot follows an alien that takes refuge in the basement of a suburb after crash landing via meteor, devouring anyone it meets and spawning at a rapid pace. It’s up to a handful of teens and a monster-obsessed boy to stop it. This labor of love and strife defies its meager budget to deliver one of the 80s’ most surprising, gory creature features. Come for the ravenous alien and get charmed by the practical effects and stellar use of miniatures.
Waxwork – Plex, Roku, Tubi, Vudu
Waxwork plays like an anthology in that the core group of characters falls victim to various wax exhibits in the mysterious wax museum owned by the ominous David Lincoln (David Warner). Stepping foot into exhibits means stepping into an alternate reality full of danger and mortal peril. It’s all a ruse for Lincoln to capture their souls to bring about the world’s end. One by one, the group of friends encounter different scenarios with various monsters and often die in gruesome, violent ways. It’s the ultimate monster movie mashup.
The Relic – HBO Max
This big budget action-horror movie sees an enormous chimeric monster prowl a Chicago museum. The opening shows how the monster, the mythical Kothoga from the Amazon, wound up there. It’s up to a homicide detective and an anthropologist to stop it before the body count grows even higher. Peter Hyams directs this adaptation of Douglas Preston’s novel with spectacle, much shrouded in darkness. But the creature design, when seen, is fantastic, and The Relic brings the fun all around.
Splinter – HBO Max, Tubi
In this fun creature feature, a road trip gets stalled out by the unexpected. A young couple sets off for a romantic camping getaway but gets car-jacked by an escaped convict and his girlfriend. Then they get a flat tire that prompts them to seek help from a nearby gas station. Something is gravely wrong there, and the foursome must team up against a bizarre parasite infecting everything. A parasite that spreads and turns its hosts into deadly beings. Brutal, suspenseful, and with a highly cool creature concept, Splinter deserved a sequel.
Leviathan – Pluto TV, Roku, Tubi
Deep-sea miners stumble upon a Soviet shipwreck, and the cargo they bring back to base unleashes a genetic mutation that threatens to destroy them all. With a hurricane battering the surface, these blue-collar workers are entirely trapped and abandoned by the corporation that employs them. It’s an Alien film set underwater, but oh, so much fun. Leviathan stars Peter Weller, Amanda Pays, Richard Crenna, Daniel Stern, Ernie Hudson, Meg Foster, and Hector Elizondo. Above all, the film offers fantastic creature design and gnarly body horror.
It was almost one year ago that Warner Bros. brought the entire original A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise to 4K in one massive 7-movie collection, with the limited edition SteelBook version of the set quickly selling out and becoming highly sought after. But we’re happy to report tonight that the SteelBook set is currently back in stock over on Amazon!
While supplies last, grab the Elm Street SteelBook collection for $154.99 right now!!
Orders placed for this re-release are scheduled to begin shipping out September 15, 2026.
[Related] Freddy’s Back: New ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ Movie in the Works at Paramount
From New Line Cinema, the collection includes the original seven films – A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985), A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988), A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989), Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991), and Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994) – along with the uncut versions of A Nightmare on Elm Street and The Dream Child.
Two BRAND NEW SPECIAL FEATURES for this set include:
- Boiler Room Confessional: The king of slashers, Robert Englund, takes us on a journey through the dream world, sharing what inspired Freddy Krueger, his rise as a cultural icon, and the legacy of A Nightmare on Elm Street, plus his favorite kills, scenes, and more.
- Freddy’s Footnotes: Robert Englund and original A Nightmare on Elm Street filmmakers revisit iconic scenes, revealing the movie magic and chaos behind our favorite nightmares. Pull back the curtain and relive epic moments through the eyes of those who made them.
Here’s the full breakdown of included Special Features for each movie…
A Nightmare on Elm Street
· Ready Freddy Focus Points
· Commentary with Wes Craven, Robert Englund, Heather Langenkamp, Ronee Blakley, Robert Shaye, and Sara Risher
· Commentary with Wes Craven, Heather Langenkamp, John Saxon, and Jacques Haitkin
· Alternate Endings – Scary Ending, Happy Ending, Freddy Ending
· The House that Freddy Built: The Legacy of New Line Horror
· Never Sleep Again: The Making of A Nightmare on Elm Street
· Night Terrors: The Origins of Wes Craven’s Nightmares
A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge
· Freddy on 8th Street
· Heroes and Villains
· The Male Witch
· Psychosexual Circus
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors
· Behind the Story: Burnout
· Behind the Story: Fan Mail
· Behind the Story: The House that Freddy Built
· Behind the Story: Onward Christian Soldiers
· Behind the Story: Snakes and Ladders
· Behind the Story: That’s Showbiz
· Behind the Story: Trading 8’s
· Dokken Dream Warriors Music Video
A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master
· The Finnish Line
· Krueger, Freddy Krueger
· Hopeless Chest
· Let’s Makeup
A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child
· Behind the Story: Womb Raiders
· Behind the Story: The Sticky Floor
· Behind the Story: Take the Stairs
· Behind the Story: Hopkins Directs
· Behind the Story: A Slight Miscalculation
Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare
· 86’D
· Hellraiser
· Rachel’s Dream
· 3D Demise
Wes Craven’s New Nightmare
· Commentary with Wes Craven
· NEW – Boiler Room Confessional
· NEW – Freddy’s Footnotes
· Becoming a Filmmaker
· Filmmaker
· An Insane Troupe
· The Problem with Sequels
· Two Worlds
· Welcome to Prime Time: It Really Happened
· Welcome to Prime Time: A Childhood Memory
· Welcome to Prime Time: Sometime in the Early 80s
· Welcome to Prime Time: So It Began
· Welcome to Prime Time: Beauty and the Beast
· Welcome to Prime Time: Making the Glove
· Welcome to Prime Time: Shapeshifter
· Welcome to Prime Time: The Shoot
· Welcome to Prime Time: The Revolving Room
· Welcome to Prime Time: All’s Well that Ends Well
· Welcome to Prime Time: Talalay’s Tally
· Welcome to Prime Time: It Couldn’t Have Happened
· Welcome to Prime Time: Alternate Ending Version
· Conclusion: Where Gothic Plots Come From
· Conclusion: Why We Like Gothic
· Conclusion: Sadomasochism
· Conclusion: Freddy vs. Pinhead
· Conclusion: Freddy’s Manic Energy
· Conclusion: Creating Lasting Characters in Horror
· Conclusion: No More Magic Tricks
· Conclusion: Monster with Personality
· Conclusion: Freddy as Sex Machine
· Conclusion: Campfire Stories
The Elm Street collection is available in this collectible SteelBook packaging (exclusive to Amazon) and as a standard 4K collection that’s also available now over on Amazon.
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