As usual, Shudder has a wide array of films and series set to begin in June. There’s even a selection of vampire movies, which should be perfect for those of you who are still thirsty after watching Sinners.
This short list includes a cult fave, a Shudder Original film, a Shudder Original series and a series that I never got the chance to watch when it was originally released. I tried to put together a variety of options, and I hope our readers might feel the same.
The Loved Ones – I watched this weird, quirky Australian film for the first time a few years back, and it gave me that giddy feeling I imagine most horror fans get when they discover something new and different.
Lola is a rather odd teenage girl, who has a doting, protective father. Brent is a teenage boy who has undergone trauma in the form of a car accident that killed his father six months ago. He’s a pretty nice kid overall, and Lola asks him to the school dance. But he has a girlfriend, so he declines in a nice way.
That’s not good enough for Lola though, and she and her father abduct Brent, bringing him back to their house, where they have the place set up to look like the school dance. Things get brutal and weird, and despite its leaning into black comedy, The Loved Ones features some pretty extreme torture scenes.
The Loved Ones will be available to stream on June 1.
Best Wishes to All (Shudder Original Film) – We are always gung-ho for a new Shudder Original, so count us in for their Japanese film Best Wishes to All!
A nursing student goes back to the countryside home in Tokyo where her grandparents have always lived. When she browses through a family photo album, she is stopped short by the photo of a young girl whose face has been scratched out.
Soon after, she starts to hear odd sounds throughout the house, and her grandparents start to exhibit some pretty odd and disturbing behavior. That’s about all the info we currently have about Best Wishes to All, so check it out when it hits Shudder on June 13.
Hell Motel (Shudder Original Series) – Who doesn’t love a good horror anthology film or series? This eight episode series was created by Aaron Martin and Ian Carpenter of the Slasher series.
The Cold River Motel was once the site of an unsolved mass murder in the 80s, and has been recently renovated. Ten true crime followers have been invited to the Motel’s re-opening weekend, and I’ll bet you can guess what happens next. That’s right, a masked killer begins slaughtering the guests in very brutal ways.
Hell Motel stars Eric McCormack, Paula Brancati, Shaun Benson, Atticus Mitchell, Emmanuel Kabongo, Jim Watson and Genvieve DeGraves. The first two episodes will be available June 17, and new episodes will release each Tuesday after that.
The Strain – All four seasons of this FX series will be available to watch on Shudder as of June 22. It was created by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, who also wrote a trilogy of novels with the same title.
In The Strain, Dr. Ephraim Goodweather works for the CDC as head of the Canary Project in New York. He and his team are asked to investigate an incident in which an airplane landed, and everyone aboard was found dead. Goodweather discovers that the root cause was a viral outbreak, and the symptoms are eerily similar to those of vampirism.
As the virus spreads, members of the Canary Project must do everything possible to contain the virus before it is too late.