10 Best Single Horror TV Seasons Ever
The greatest single seasons slices of small screen terror.
TV as a whole is in a major boom period right now, with bigger budgets being offered up, more patience shown from networks, and more superstar names gravitating from the big screen to the small screen. Like the greater medium itself, this boom has certainly been seen in the horror corner of television in recent years.
The all-time greats of the genre are literally the stuff of nightmares, with their sinister, chilling moments remaining with a viewer long after you've finished an episode, a season or when the series has completely concluded. In fact, those shows are so fantastic at what they do, it's even enough to bring some viewers back for a rewatch and the chance to be scared all over again. Here, the attention is on specific seasons of those shows, as this article is all about exploring the very best single seasons of horror.
To steer clear of too much repetition, only one season of any given show will be included. Sure, one could argue that all three seasons of a series like Stranger Things are worthy of inclusion on this list, but don't be expecting to see three entries taken up with that excellent Duffer Brothers offering.
Taking all of that into account, then, here are ten brilliant, terrifying single seasons of horror television.
10. The Exorcist - Season 1
When it was announced that the legendary Exorcist was being spun into a TV series, the collective horror community let out a frustrated groan at yet another famed idea of yesteryear being revisited and cashed in on rather than a network trying to create something entirely new and original.
To its credit, Fox's The Exorcist managed to be new and original while simultaneously revisiting something from decades past.
Billed as completely its own beast, this Jeremy Slater-created show introduces audiences to Alfonso Herrera's Father Tomas Ortega and the older, grizzled Father Marcus Keane (Ben Daniels) as they explore a supposed case of possession. The target of this haunting is young Casey Rance, with her family believing that both the girl and their house are being spooked by something dark and sinister.
While poor Casey's condition worsens, the pair of priests are refused permission from the church to perform an exorcism. Having kept audiences on their toes for its first five episodes, it's the end of that fifth offering that really shakes things up - revealing that the matriarch of the Rance family, Angela (Geena Davis), is in fact the Regan MacNeil character seen in the Exorcist movies.
In that one move, this TV series revealed itself to actually be a sequel to those films, and the handling of this reveal alone marks this debut season out as something stupendous.