10 Horror TV Shows That Had No Right To Be This Good

Horror lovers everywhere may well be screaming at their screens with this entry. After all, director Mike Flanagan has established himself as a modern horror auteur with The Haunting(s) of Hill House and Bly Manor, and by now any project coming from him is downright expected to be good. However, this wasn’t always the case.

Despite being his eventual third series for Netflix, Midnight Mass was originally conceived and pitched to various studios all the way back in 2014. Alas, the project seemed fated not to be, as it was continually turned down, possibly due to its nature as a niche, languid story from a hitherto unknown creator. Flanagan instead made the originally proposed novelisation of Midnight Mass a recurring Easter egg within films he did see greenlit, first as a story within a story as the author protagonist’s novel in 2016’s Hush, and then as a book prop in Gerald’s Game a year later.

Having gone on to prove himself with both films and the two Haunting seasons in the years since, Netflix finally allowed Flanagan to produce his vision for this personal story of addiction, Catholicism, and vampirism, with Midnight Mass finally airing in 2021. The show that no studio would take on was now ironically highly anticipated, though many still doubted it would be as good as his prior series, which have since been lauded as some of the best horror TV ever made. Subsequently, it still managed to smash all expectations out of the water, with many arguing that it is the best of the bunch. All hail the Flanaverse!