8 Scary TV Treats Coming This Halloween

When & Where: Channel 4 on October 31st

Flying a little under the radar on first airing in the spring, Channel 4's horror docudrama anthology is nevertheless back for a one-off special on Halloween night itself, based around one of the supposed most haunted places in Britain.

True Horror comes from the producers of Sky Living's well-regarded 2015 miniseries The Enfield Haunting, which starred Timothy Spall and Matthew MacFadyen in a sort of British Amityville or The Conjuring, a supposedly true life tale of a 1970s poltergeist.

The Conjuring movies are definitely a major inspiration for True Horror too, which mixes dubiously "based on a real story" content (including interviews with the real people involved in its haunting stories) with old-school scares. The documentary aspects are implausible, but the horror is handled with skill and provides the requisite shocks and creepy moments.

The Halloween special sees former EastEnder and Bionic Woman Michelle Ryan as Vanessa Mitchell, a pregnant saleswoman who moved into a cottage in the Essex village of St Osyth in the 2000s. The building had previously been "The Cage", a 16th century prison for witches that had developed a reputation for hauntings ever since, something that would take its toll on her life there.

If the real Vanessa's accounts are anything to go by, then expect such classic Paranormal Activity tropes as objects flying from shelves, malfunctioning TVs and a shadowy figure looming over her newborn son.