Halloween is basically the Emo kid Super Bowl. It’s the one time of year when the rest of the world catches up to our normal aesthetic: black eyeliner, tragic love stories, songs about death, and maybe some light grave-digging. So if it really was never a phase, here are ten movies that hit the perfect mix of spooky, sad, stylish, and scene.
Honorable Mentions:
Coraline (2009)
lost boys (1987)
dawn of the dead (2004)
cabin in the woods (2012)
labyrinth (1986)
10. Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)
If you ever thought Phantom of the Opera needed more eyeliner, power tools, and blood , this is your movie (Seriously, it even has Sarah Brightman). Repo! is an industrial rock opera packed with teenage rebellion and alt spectacle. It stars Anthony Head (yep, Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Alexa PenVegas (don’t act like you didn’t watch Spy Kids ), a drugged-up, gothed-out Paris Hilton, and Ogre from Skinny Puppy. Oh, and Joan Jett randomly shows up. PLUS, The songs go absurdly hard.
9. The Craft (1996)
The original “we are the weirdos, mister” movie. The Craft gave a generation of outcast girls their spellbook and aesthetic. It’s witchy, dark, and unapologetically teenage — all broken hearts, betrayal, and peak ‘90s mall goth fashion. There’s even a Smiths song (well, a cover) because of course there is. Everybody tried the “Light as a Feather, Stiff As a Board” trick at a sleepover.
8. Jennifer’s Body (2009)
The world didn’t deserve this movie when it came out. Now it’s a cult classic for every TEEN GIRL That got taken advantage of by a mediocre musician wearing guy-liner (too real?). Megan Fox delivers the performance of her career as a possessed high schooler taking bloody revenge, and the soundtrack is legitimately a Fueled By Ramen playlist: Panic! at the disco, Dashboard conFessional, All Time Low, Cobra Starship, Hayley Williams, Cute Is What We Aim For, and more. It’s campy, feminist, Bi-Curious, gory, and FUN!
7. Freddy vs. Jason (2003)
You can’t make a Halloween list without a slasher flick, and Freddy vs. Jason is pure early 2000s chaos. It’s got nu-metal soundtracks (Slipknot, Killswitch Engage, From Autumn to Ashes), a rave in a cornfield, and two horror icons fighting BEFORE THE MULTIVERSE cliche became way overdone. The whole premise where nightmares becoming real, outcasts getting PICKED ON BY A JOCK IN A HOCKEY MASK, the ending where the world is on fire. That feels LIKE OUR SCENE. It’s dumb fun, and that’s why it rules.
6. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Before there were emo kids, there were Rocky Horror kids. This cult classic And it’s midnight showings were the original safe space for the freaks and the geeks. and this was long before Hot Topic hit your local mall. Years before it we become mainstream Dr. frank-N-Furter was gender and sexuality fluid and letting his freak flag fly. The movie can be understood as an allegory for queer kids coming OF age from “square” 1950’s before discovering their true selves in the late 60’s and early 70’s. It’s ALSO got aliens and campy haunted-house vibes. Plus, Meat Loaf shows up. Watching it in a theater full of people shouting lines and throwing toast is a rite of passage, much like your first basement show, but with more fishnets…Maybe.
5. Twilight (2008)
You can hate it. You can try to deny it. you can even run from it. But the fact remains the same, Twilight defined an era. You can roll your eyes all you? want, but this moody vampire romance made it okay to be weird, pale, and still listening to your emo playlist (How hard does the song “Decode” go, btw?) The rainy Pacific Northwest, thE STORY OF A LOVE THAT WILL LITERALLY NEVER DIE, the angst. it’s all there. Team Edward vs. Team Jacob was our generation’s great divide, and Hot Topic MADE BANK ON THE MOST BASIC ASS T-SHIRTS. Anna Kendrick’s character deserves her own spinoff just for being the only one aware she’s in a melodrama.
4. The Crow (1994)
“Buildings burn, people die, but real love is forever.” That line alone could have been enough. Tell me that doesn’t sound like something you left in an AIM away message to sound deep. It’s the perfect Halloween movie for Anyone who felt their tragic love story was LITERALLY killing them. Gothic cityscapes, revenge, lost love, and an incredible soundtrack (Nine Inch Nails, The Cure) made it the defining film for an entire generation of goth and emo kids. Brandon Lee’s tragic performance still hits hard.
3. Scream (1996)
If horror movies were punk rock, Scream would be the self-titled debut that blew up the genre and made the old heads furious. if you weren’t there i cannot explain to you how '“punk rock” killing drew Barrymore in the first scene of this movie was. It’s meta, snarky, and entirely too self-aware. Scream knew horror tropes, broke them, made fun of them, then doubled down anyway. Plus, it gave us the icon ghostface mask that launched a thousand thirst traps.
2. Donnie Darko (2001)
You either watched Donnie Darko in high school and didn’t get it or you watched it and saw yourself in it (how’s therapy going?) It’s the ultimate “feeling like the world’s ending” movie. Time travel, POOR mental health, a creepy bunny named Frank, and existential dread set to the sounds of the most hauntingly beautiful tears for fears cover imaginable. If you ever wrote “28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, and 12 seconds” on your arm, you already know this movie’s power.
1. Anything Tim Burton
Trying to pick one Tim Burton movie is impossible. Everyone has an opinion and lots of people have devoted huge chunks of their personality to this man’s aesthetic. For every kid who felt “strange and unusual” there’s a Tim Burton movie that you feel like was written just for you. Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Sweeney Todd, Corpse Bride — they all defined the look, feel, and soundtrack of our collective spooky hearts. Burton built the mansion that emo kids live in rent-free. Watch Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure just for the “Large Marge” scene and tell me it’s not lowkey terrifying. Burton is Halloween.