By Hope Madden 
The Bloody Benchmark: The Best Horror Movies of 2025 and Why 2026 is Already Twitching
You know, it’s funny. You spend a whole year bracing for the worst, and somehow horror movies end up being the best part of it. Let’s just put it out there: 2025 was a monster of a year for horror, in every glorious sense of the word. We’re talking an absolute embarrassment of riches, the kind that makes you argue with your friends at 2 a.m. because how could you possibly leave that film off your list? The competition was brutal. It had everything. Award-bait literary adaptations sitting right next to goopy, mop-wielding vigilantes. Sophisticated auteur nightmares and unapologetic, gore-soaked franchise revivals.
Seriously, what a lineup.
We had Ryan Coogler reinventing the vampire flick with the bloody, bluesy, and downright revolutionary Sinners, a historical vampire musical with gangster elements that somehow works like a charm. Guillermo del Toro finally realised his dream project with a lush, heartbreaking Frankenstein, even if the pacing stumbled a bit. Zach Cregger followed up Barbarian with Weapons, a terrifying, puzzle-box mystery that proves he’s no one-hit wonder.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Osgood Perkins was giving us The Monkey, a pitch-perfect blend of Stephen King and Final Destination chaos. A truly nasty reboot of The Toxic Avenger that didn’t hold back on the corrosive humour or the splatter. And from Norway, The Ugly Stepsister took a hammer and chisel to fairy tale tropes with masterful, grotesque glee.
Of course, with so much good stuff, some fantastic films got squeezed out. Real honourable mentions, the ones that keep you up at night for not making the cut. Companion had a brilliantly chilling concept, even if the marketing showed a bit too much leg. Final Destination: Bloodlines shocked everyone by being a superb, heartfelt injection of new life into a 20-year-old franchise. And let’s not forget the indie gems like Dead Mail and Hood Witch that simmered on the fringes. This year was so stacked, even the “almosts” would’ve been champions any other time.
But here’s the real kicker, the thing that has every horror fan buzzing. As incredible as 2025 was, there’s a lingering feeling… a sense that maybe, just maybe, the preceding year had a slight edge. It’s a friendly debate, but it’s there. And that debate sets the stage perfectly for what’s next. Because looking ahead to 2026?
If 2025 was a feast, then 2026 is shaping up to be a full-blown horror banquet with some seriously sharp cutlery. The momentum isn’t slowing; it’s mutating. Beyond the already-anticipated ‘Talk to Me’ sequel from the Philippou brothers—which, given the nerve-shredding precision of Bring Her Back, should be illegal—the pipeline is bursting with fresh nightmares.
We’re hearing whispers about ‘The Familiar,’ a psychological tech-horror film from a celebrated indie director playing with surveillance anxiety in a way that feels too real. Then there’s ‘Veil,’ a folk horror period piece set in the Appalachian mountains that’s reportedly so atmospherically dense you can feel the mist.
And let’s not forget the long-gestating ‘Video Night,’ a love letter to 80s VHS-era creature features that promises practical effects and a synth score you can bleed to. The trend is clear: after a year of masterful auteurs and big swings, the industry is doubling down on distinct, director-driven visions that gnaw at different fears. It’s less about one massive hit and more about a sustained, chilling ambush from all sides.
The Bloody Benchmark: The Best Horror Movies of 2025 and Why 2026 is Already Twitching
We’re about to unpack it all. The top ten that defined the year, the near-misses that deserved more love, and why this moment in horror feels so thrillingly, unpredictably alive. Buckle up.
What an incredible year for horror! Two unquestionable Oscar contenders, great international fare, great reboots and sequels, amazing original material, great independent horror, great studio horror, remarkably spooky stuff!
10. The Toxic Avenger
On Prime
Though the story’s changed, much remains the same in writer/director Macon Blair’s reboot in all its goopy, corrosive, violent, hilarious glory.
Peter Dinklage is one of the most talented actors working today, and as Winston he is effortlessly heartbreaking and tender. He’s also really funny, and this is not necessarily the kind of humor every serious actor can pull off.
Blair’s vision for this film couldn’t be more spot-on. Joyous, silly, juvenile, insanely violent, hateful of the bully, in love with the underdog—Blair’s Toxic Avenger retains the best of Troma, rejects the worst, and crafts something delirious and wonderful.
9. Chain Reactions
On Prime
Not everyone believes Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a masterpiece of American filmmaking. I find those people suspicious. Luckily, those are not the people filmmaker Alexandre O. Philippe (Memory: The Origins of Alien, 78/52) talks to for his latest documentary, Chain Reactions.
The film is a celebration of 50 years of TCM. The celebrants are five of the film’s biggest fans: Patton Oswalt, Takashi Miike, Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Stephen King, and Karyn Kusama. It’s a good group. Each share intimate and individual reminiscences and theories about the film, its impact on them as artists, and its relevance as a piece of American cinema. What their ruminations have in common is just as fascinating as the ways in which their thoughts differ.
Each of these artists came to the film from a different perspective—some having seen it early enough in their youth to have been left scarred, others having taken it in as adults and still being left scarred. But each one sees layers and importance—poetry, even—in Hooper’s slice of savage cinema.
8. Invader
On Shudder & Prime
Lean, mean and affecting, Mickey Keating’s take on the home invasion film wastes no time. In a wordless—though not soundless—opening, the filmmaker introduces an unhinged presence.
Immediately Keating sets our eyes and ears against us. His soundtrack frequently blares death metal, a tactic that emphasizes a chaotic, menacing mood the film never shakes. Using primarily handheld cameras from the unnerving opening throughout the entire film, the filmmaker maintains an anarchic energy, a sense of the characters’ frenzy and the endless possibility of violence.
Joe Swanberg, with limited screentime and even more limited dialog, crafts a terrifying image of havoc. His presence is perversely menacing, an explosion of rage and horror. Invader delivers a spare, nasty, memorable piece of horror in just over an hour. It will stick with you a while longer.
7. Bring Her Back
On Prime, HBO, Hulu, and Disney+
Filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippou drew attention in 2022 for their wildly popular feature debut, Talk to Me. Before releasing the sequel, due out this August, the pair changes the game up with a different, but at least equally disturbing, look at grief.
It’s a slow burn, a movie that communicates dread brilliantly with its cinematography and pacing. But when Bring Her Back hits the gas, dude! Nastiness not for the squeamish! Especially if you have a thing about teeth, be warned. But the body horror always serves the narrative, deepening your sympathies even as it has you hiding your eyes.
Australia has a great habit of sending unsettling horror our way. The latest package from Down Under doesn’t disappoint.
6. The Monkey
On Prime, HBO, Hulu, and Disney+
Why is it that so many kids’ toys are creepy? Not that you should call The Monkey a toy. You should not, ever. Because this windup organ grinder monkey, with its red eyes and horrifyingly realistic teeth, is more of a furry, murder happy nightmare.
The film itself is a match made in horror heaven. Osgood Perkins (Longlegs, Gretel & Hansel, The Blackcoat’s Daughter) adapts and directs the short story by Stephen King about sibling rivalry and the unpredictability of death.
Perkins surrounds deliberately low energy leads with bizarre, colorful characters—even more colorful when they catch fire, explode, are disemboweled, etcetera. The film is laced with wonderful bursts of Final Destination-like bloodletting, as the Monkey’s executions are carried out via Rube Goldberg chain reactions that quickly become fun to anticipate.
Yes, fun. And funny.
5. Dust Bunny
In theaters
Imagine Guillermo del Toro meets Wes Anderson. Equal parts fanciful and gruesome, the film tells the tale of a precocious youth named Aurora (Sophie Sloan), who hires the neighbor in 5B (Mads Mikkelsen) to kill the monster that lives under her bed.
Sloan delivers Roald Dahl’s Matilda by way of Wednesday Addams, braids and all. Mikkelsen’s adorably gruff, and the great Sigourney Weaver is having a blast playing gleefully against type and shoplifting every second of screentime.
Writer/director Bryan Fuller wastes not a frame of his feature film debut. The saturated colors and intricate patterns and textures of the set design, the ballet of horror that is his shadow imagery, the boldly whimsical costuming—all of it conjuring an amplified fairy tale. It’s tough to believe this remarkably confident feature is his first foray behind the camera.
4. Weapons
On Prime, HBO, Hulu, and Disney+
Weapons delivers an elaborate mystery slowly revealing itself, ratcheting tension, and leading to a bloody satisfying climax. Unspooling as an epilogue followed by character-specific chapters, the film builds around a single event, developing dread as it delivers character studies of a town of hapless, fractured, flawed individuals in over their heads.
This is smartly crafted, beautifully acted horror. Those who worry Cregger’s left nasty genre work behind for something more elevated need not fear. Weapons is here to work your nerves, make you gasp, and shed some blood. It does it pretty well.
3. The Ugly Stepsister
On Prime, HBO, Hulu, Disney+, and Shudder
Writer/director Emilie Blichfeldt infuses her feature debut with an impossible-to-ignore blast of sharp wit, subdued rage, and grotesque bodily horrors.
The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren) is the latest new angle to a classic tale, but don’t expect it follow the trend of humanizing misunderstood villains. Blichfeldt makes sure there are plenty of bad guys and girls throughout this Norwegian Cinderella story, punctuated by grisly violence surprisingly close to what’s in the 17th Century French version of the fairy tale penned by Charles Perrault.
It is fierce, funny, gross and subversively defiant. But is one feature film enough to immediately put Blichfeldt on the watch list of cinema’s feminist hell raisers?
Yes. The shoe fits.
2. Frankenstein
On Netflix
Lush and gorgeous, even when it is running with blood, the world del Toro creates for his gods and monsters is breathtaking. The choices are fresh and odd, allowing for a rich image of creator and creation, the natural versus the magnificent.
Oscar Isaac is a marvel of angry arrogance made humble. As his creature, the long and limby Jacob Elordi offers a monster who’s more sensitive son than wounded manchild.
Mia Goth delivers the same uncanny grace that sets so many of her characters apart, and del Toro’s script allows Elizabeth an arc unlike any previous adaptation. You don’t wander into a Guillermo del Toro film expecting less anything than glorious excess—another reason why Frankenstein and he were meant for one another.
1. Sinners
On Prime, HBO, Hulu, and Disney+
Ryan Coogler reteams with longtime creative partner Michael B. Jordan to sing a song of a 1932 Mississippi juke joint. The Smoke Stack twins (Jordan) are back from Chicago, a truckload of ill-gotten liquor and a satchel full of cash along with them. They intend to open a club “for us, by us” and can hardly believe their eyes when three hillbillies come calling.
Jack O’Connell (an amazing actor in everything he’s done since Eden Lake) has a brogue and a banjo. He and his two friends would love to come on in, sing, dance, and spend some money, if only Smoke would invite them.
It’s scary. It’s sexy. The action slaps. It’s funny when it needs to be, sad just as often. It looks and sounds incredible. And there’s a cameo from Buddy F. Guy, in case you needed a little authenticity. When Ryan Coogler writes and directs a vampire movie, he gives you reason to believe there is yet new life for the old monster.
Horror Movie Reviews on Ginger Nuts of Horror
Horror movie fans looking to deepen their appreciation for the genre should definitely check out the Horror Movie Review section of Ginger Nuts of Horror. This platform is a treasure trove of insights, critiques, and discussions that resonate with both casual viewers and dedicated aficionados alike.
Firstly, the reviews are penned by passionate writers who understand the intricacies of horror filmmaking. They delve deep into the elements that make each film unique, from unsettling visuals to compelling sound design, offering a comprehensive analysis that goes beyond superficial impressions. Such in-depth reviews can enhance viewers’ understanding and appreciation of the genre, revealing layers of meaning and intention that may go unnoticed during a first watch.
Lastly, with its focus on both mainstream and indie films, the Horror Movie Review section is an excellent resource to stay updated on upcoming releases and trends in the horror landscape. For any horror buff, exploring The Ginger Nuts of Horror Review Website is an essential step toward a deeper connection with the genre.
