This story was initially printed on Oct. 3, 2019. We’re republishing it forward of Halloween.
Halloween, for all its spooky charms, will be an amazing vacation. There’s the anxiousness of discovering a great costume, the stress to courageous fearsome issues like haunted homes and scary films and, in fact, the battle to nab the very best sweet.
These searching for a extra low-key solution to have a good time fall’s most thrilling vacation can (and will) take pleasure in a binge of TV’s greatest Halloween episodes. In spite of everything, the vacation has impressed among the most memorable vacation specials. Who may neglect the traditional Pals episode wherein Monica and Chandler host a drama-filled costume social gathering with ruthless arm-wrestling competitions? Or the heartwarming proposals that happen in Halloween episodes of Parks and Recreation and Brooklyn 9-9?
Right here’s a run-down of the very best Halloween TV episodes of all time, introduced in alphabetical order.
“Fort Night time” doesn’t depend on costumes, sweet or any typical Halloween gags to carry the thrills for viewers. Quite the opposite: the Belcher children, joined by their friends — the Pesto twins and Darryl — are foiled from getting the very best sweet within the neighborhood after they’re first trapped of their fort by a truck, then by Louise’s nemesis Millie. Ultimately, the youngsters discover their means out of the fort. Though they’ve missed out on trick-or-treating for the yr, they nonetheless discover a solution to get their sugar repair with a well-deserved prank on Millie.
It’s no secret that the officers and detectives at Brooklyn 9-9 love Halloween — a lot so, in actual fact, that they’ve an annual Halloween Heist wherein the stakes are stacked for the precinct as they cut up into groups to both pull off or cease a scheme. For the fifth annual Halloween Heist, nonetheless, Jake (one of many custom’s originators), makes use of the frilly competitors as a solution to suggest to his fellow detective, his accomplice and girlfriend Amy.
Whereas a typical episode of Buffy is normally as scary as a Halloween episode of every other present, “Worry, Itself” actually upped the ante for the gang as every of them faces his or her deepest private fears whereas attending a frat party-turned-night of the dwelling lifeless.
Considered one of Cheers‘ long-running jokes got here on the expense of postman Cliff’s love life, which is why “Fairy Tales Can Come True” is such a heartwarming shock. Within the episode, the regulars collect at Cheers, the place Cliff, dressed as Ponce de Leon, amazingly hits it off with a girl dressed as Tinker Bell. Whereas the 2 get pleasure from one another’s firm a lot that they shut the bar down, they make plans to fulfill one another as their common selves the following night time. Each rooster out a number of instances earlier than they lastly meet once more — however after they do, it’s a romantic second price ready for.
Larry David’s quirky neuroticism is on full show in “Trick or Deal with,” when he refuses, as a matter of principal, to offer Halloween sweet to 2 teenage women sans costumes. As may be anticipated, it ends in catastrophe, with the next TP-ing and vandalism of his house being the least of his worries.
Frasier and Niles’ literary-themed Halloween social gathering turns into the setting for a showdown between the brothers after a comic book misunderstanding with Roz leads Niles to imagine that the connection between his brother and his one real love, Daphne, may be greater than what he assumed.
Rising pains are hardly ever extra visceral in Freaks and Geeks than in its Halloween episode, “Trick and Treats,” wherein Sam and his pals try to return to the straightforward joys of their childhood by dressing up and doing one final spherical of trick-or-treating. Unluckily for them, nonetheless, they’ve a couple of challenges to take care of: a bully, and an unlucky shock encounter with Sam’s massive sister Lindsay, out for an evening of pranks.
In “The One With the Halloween Social gathering,” the gang gathers for a fancy dress social gathering hosted by Monica and Chandler, however the night time takes a flip for the dramatic as most of the pals confront their very own challenges. For Chandler, a pink bunny go well with costume prompts his delicate nature, whereas Phoebe offers with the wiles of her evil twin Ursula. For Rachel, newly pregnant, trick-or-treaters appear to be the right solution to faucet into her maternal facet — however issues don’t go fairly as deliberate.
Whereas this episode of Gilmore Ladies might be seen as largely a automobile for Rory’s twenty first birthday and the stress of her rift together with her mother and greatest good friend, Lorelai, it’s additionally an in-depth take a look at the intense quirkiness of their city, Stars Hole, and the best way wherein Halloween brings it totally to bear.
Glee‘s Halloween particular had its characters re-enacting the campy 1975 cult traditional The Rocky Horror Image Present, with the scholars taking up the enduring roles of Dr. Frank-N-Furter, Janet, Brad and the remainder of the forged, whereas Mr. Schue, Emma Pillsbury and her boyfriend Carl (performed by visitor star John Stamos) reckon with their love triangle. Followers of the unique movie have been fast to note that the unique Brad and Eddie (Barry Bostwick and Meatloaf, respectively) made cameos within the particular.
Meredith’s previous comes again to hang-out her as she feels her late mom’s presence in each state of affairs, which she tries to treatment by bringing her mom’s ashes to the hospital. Whereas Meredith finally makes peace together with her mom, a revered surgeon herself, by washing her stays down the surgical procedure room sink, there’s much more occurring at Seattle Grace this Halloween, together with a person with a “haunted” foot, chainsaws galore and just a little boy searching for a brand new pair of ears.
On this Halloween episode from the present’s seventh season, we see everyman Ted Mosby lastly reunite together with his dream lady (visitor star Katie Holmes), who was dressed as a “Slutty Pumpkin” after they met at a rooftop Halloween social gathering a decade in the past. Within the years since their preliminary assembly (and after Ted misplaced the sweet on which she had written her quantity), he’s by no means stopped looking for her — however as soon as he finds her, issues aren’t fairly what he expects.
The All the time Sunny gang made good use of actress Kaitlin Olson’s real-life being pregnant to make a Halloween episode of epic proportions. And in typical trend, nothing seems as anticipated. Whereas the episode aired throughout Halloween week, the precise episode doesn’t happen throughout Halloween, however in a sequence of flashbacks to a Halloween previous. When the boys harass Dee for gaining weight, she casually informs them that she acquired pregnant on the final yr’s Halloween social gathering by considered one of them. The remainder of the episode is a rollicking trip of every of their hazy views and recollections, with a race to search out witnesses who will give them accounts of what actually occurred that night time.
If you’ve been on the air for so long as Trendy Household has, there’s no scarcity of Halloween episodes — particularly when Claire Dunphy, Halloween fanatic extraordinaire, is concerned. Nevertheless, it’s the present’s first Halloween episode that’s essentially the most endearing because it establishes the Dunphy-Pritchard crew and all their eccentricities as they cope with Claire’s really scary Haunted Home.
If there’s anybody who loves a theme, it’s Leslie Knope, however even the perky do-gooder of Pawnee couldn’t preserve her spirits up throughout a fancy dress social gathering when she discovered that her foremost squeeze Ben acquired a job provide that may threaten their relationship. To not fear, nonetheless — the title’s “shock” comes with a twist that’s candy, not spooky, when Ben proposes to Leslie, solidifying their standing as presumably the cutest energy couple in all of Indiana.
Stranger Issues offers within the enterprise of otherworldly thrills, so it ought to come as no shock that the present’s Halloween episode was additional spooky, crammed with flashbacks to the Upside Down, obscure rumblings of the Demogorgon and a mysterious creature present in a trash can. However one of many highlights of the episode is pleasant somewhat than scary: in line with the sequence’ common spirit of Nineteen Eighties nostalgia, the boys adorably gown because the Ghostbusters for Halloween.
The Workplace has greater than sufficient hilarious Halloween episodes, however “Costume Contest” may simply take the cake for its wild ranges of drama and aesthetic acrobatics. When a fancy dress contest is introduced, the Scranton staffers duke it out for greatest costume (can anybody ever neglect Gabe dressed as a really tall, very glittery Girl Gaga?). However the competitors for the costume contest isn’t anyplace near the rivalry constructing between Michael and Darryl, making this episode one for the books.
Nobody does a Halloween particular fairly like The Simpsons, whose writers got here up with their very own campy style identify for the annual episodes: the “Treehouse of Horror.” The present’s sharp humor and sense of satire are honed most exquisitely in “Treehouse of Horror V: The Shinning,” a superb spoof of The Shining, wherein Homer goes loopy like Jack Nicholson’s Jack Torrance. Not like Jack, nonetheless, he loses his thoughts on account of not having any cable or beer, which is fairly on-brand.
Whereas The Twilight Zone didn’t have any designated Halloween specials, the sequence has grow to be a go-to for Halloween lovers, with marathons typically scheduled forward of the vacation. One of many episodes most cited for embodying the eerie high quality for which the present is remembered is “Residing Doll,” a harrowing story a few doll out for revenge in opposition to a merciless man. Annabel is shook!
