The Best Horror Series of the ’90s Is Officially Coming to Streaming for the First Time Ever

Hello, kiddies. The best anthology horror series of the 1990s has sadly been unavailable to stream for decades, but now it’s finally found an appropriate final resting place on a screaming…er, streaming service. Tales From the Crypt will be available to stream for the first time ever this spring.

The long-running HBO horror anthology series, which has never been available to stream thanks to some thorny rights issues, is coming to horror-centric streaming service Shudder this spring. The series, which featured more profanity, gore, and sexuality than other contemporary TV horror fare, will be presented uncensored and unaltered. To promote the show’s long-awaited release, Shudder released a promo clip with the original Cryptkeeper himself, voice actor John Kassir, returning to voice the pun-slinging cadaverous host of scare-emonies. The first season will stream on the service on May 1; another season will premiere each successive Friday until the seventh and final season debuts on June 12.

What Is ‘Tales From the Crypt’?

From 1989 to 1996, late-night HBO viewers were welcomed to Tales From the Crypt via the show’s iconic intro, featuring a Steadicam journey through a haunted house and Danny Elfman‘s eerie theme tune. Each episode of the series was loosely adapted from the EC horror comics of the 1950s, and like them, was hosted by the Cryptkeeper, a cackling, wisecracking living corpse. The series, which was produced by Joel Silver, Walter Hill, Richard Donner, and Robert Zemeckis (all of whom also directed episodes), featured a host of A-list talents both in front of and behind the camera. Directors on the series included Mary Lambert, John Frankenheimer, William Friedkin, and Tobe Hooper, while it boasted guest appearances from Arnold Schwarzenegger, Benicio del Toro, Brad Pitt, Ewan McGregor, Catherine O’Hara, Steve Buscemi, and Tom Hanks.

One of the first original hits from HBO, Tales From the Crypt was sufficiently popular to spawn two theatrical films: Bordello of Blood (with Dennis Miller and Erika Eleniak), and Demon Knight (with Billy Zane and Jada Pinkett Smith). Despite its decidedly R-rated nature, the franchise also had a spin-off Saturday morning cartoon (Tales From the Cryptkeeper) and a Double-Dare style obstacle course game show (Secrets of the Cryptkeeper’s Haunted House), both of which featured Kassir as the voice of the Cryptkeeper.

Season 1 of Tales From the Crypt will stream on Shudder starting on May 1; one season a week will be added to the service every subsequent Friday. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

Release Date

1989 – 1996-00-00

Network

HBO

Showrunner

Gilbert Adler

Directors

Russell Mulcahy, Elliot Silverstein, Tom Holland, Gilbert Adler, Stephen Hopkins, Robert Zemeckis, Walter Hill, William Malone, Gary Fleder, Kevin Yagher, Howard Deutch, Rodman Flender, John Harrison, Randa Haines, Richard Greenberg, Robert Longo, Peter S. Seaman, Peter Medak, Roland Mesa, Rowdy Herrington, Roy Ward Baker, Andrew Morahan, Tobe Hooper, Steve Perry

Writers

Scott Nimerfro, Terry Black, Colman deKay, Mae Woods, Randall Jahnson, Scott Rosenberg, Rob Cohen, Robert Reneau, Ross Thomas, Scott Alexander, Teller, Stanley Ralph Ross, Richard Christian Matheson, Yale Udoff, Kim Steven Ketelsen, Shel Willens, Joe Minion, Richard Tuggle, A. Whitney Brown, Andrew Kevin Walker, Harry Anderson, Connie Johnson, Dick Beebe, Don Mancini

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  John Kassir

  Crypt Keeper (voice)

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  Michelle Johnson

  Liz Kelly-Dixon