Pride month: 7 best bets from Shudder's Queer Horror collection
- Carla Davis
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
June is Pride Month, and Shudder is happy to celebrate with its Queer Horror collection. There are currently 24 titles in the collection, but since I haven’t personally seen all of them, I would love to recommend the ones I have seen.
The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula – Spoiler alert: Three of the titles on this list are Boulet Brothers’ creations. The Boulets are without a doubt icons in the LGBTQ+ community, and Dragula was the project that made them famous. Not content with creating just another drag queen competition show, the Boulets gave theirs a horror-centric twist.
Watch the competitors participate in gory, gross, terrifying challenges, all while joking, arguing, and showing off their creative costumes and talents. So far, Dragula has had six seasons, and there is no end in sight.
The Boulet Brothers’ Halfway to Halloween TV Special – This fun and very retro special has become a Halloween tradition of mine, and it’s honestly a great watch any time of the year. It’s based on those 1970s-1980s television variety shows, and features special guests such as David Dastmalchian, Kevin Smith, Matthew Lillard, Barbara Crampton, Felissa Rose, Dana DeLorenzo, Jorge Garcia, and musical guests Twin Temple.
The sketches are perfectly campy and silly, and the entire special just screams Halloween.
The Boulet Brothers’ Holiday of Horrors – Rather than only recognizing Halloween, the Boulets released this Christmas-themed special in 2025. Instead of a comedy show, this one is an anthology special, consisting of four short films (VERY short – the entire show runs at less than one hour) devoted to darkly delicious holiday themes.
While all four stories are exactly what horror fans look for, the standout is Kate Siegel’s Down the Chimney, which looks like the old stop-action Christmas specials all kids love. But this is no kiddie tale; instead it’s an over-the-top gross out story that delights.
It’s a Wonderful Knife – Set in the town of Angel Falls, this one is an homage to It’s a Wonderful Life – with a twist. A killer known as “the Angel” is on the loose, and teenager Winnie manages to escape his clutches and kill him. Unfortunately, she is unable to save her best friend Cara, who dies.
One year later, Winnie is still traumatized, and wishes she had never been born. When her wish comes true, she is still in Angel Falls, but nobody recognizes her. Worse, the Angel is still terrorizing the town.
The Last Thing Mary Saw – Let’s leave the holidays and go back to 1840’s New York, where a young woman named Mary, wearing a bloody blindfold, is being interrogated about the strange death of her grandmother. We then see Mary’s story, as she becomes involved in a romantic relationship with the house maid Eleanor (played by Orphan’s Isabelle Fuhrman).
Living in a religious home during that time period meant that her family was shocked and horrified when the relationship was found out, and both young women were severely punished. Things only get worse when a menacing stranger (Rory Culkin) appears.
Not all of the films in Shudder's collection are originals
Nightbreed – Esteemed horror author Clive Barker wrote and directed this 1990 classic, which stars Craig Sheffer as Aaron, a young man suffering from recurring bad dreams. When Aaron sees a shady therapist for help, he is instead hospitalized, but manages to escape.
After some horrific events at a graveyard, Aaron and his girlfriend Lori are stalked by a serial killer, and by creatures known as the Nightbreed.
Spiral – Not to be confused with the Saw-related film of the same title, this one was released in 2020 as a Shudder Original. Malik, Aaron, and their teenage daughter Kayla have moved into a nice new neighborhood, and though the neighbors seem welcoming, Malik isn’t so sure. Due to trauma in his past, he is suspicious, and soon begins to discover that some pretty sinister things have happened in town.
Spiral is definitely a slow burn, but there is a sizeable pay off at the end. If you prefer your horror films to not delve into social commentary, you might not enjoy it, but I still urge you to give this lesser-known film a shot.
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