This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2011, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Television history is filled with horror shows such as "The Twilight Zone," "The X-Files," "Night Gallery," "Dark Shadows," "Tales from the Crypt" and "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," but the past has nothing on the present in terms of scaring viewers.
Maybe it's because of better makeup and special effects. Maybe it's because of an increased appetite on the part of viewers. But we're living in a golden age of TV horror.
Here are the 10 scariest shows of 2011:
10. Fringe • (Fridays, 8 p.m., Fox/Ch. 13): Now in its fourth season, this series is pretty much impenetrable to newcomers, what with bouncing back and forth between parallel dimensions. But it will make you jump now and then, and some of the scenes are pretty gross.
9. Being Human • (Syfy, returns January): A vampire, a werewolf and a ghost share a house — but this isn't a joke. The American remake of the British series is frightening, unsettling and sinister.
8. Bedlam • (Saturdays, 7 p.m., BBC America): Anyone who's ever seen a horror movie knows this is a bad idea: Bedlam Heights is an apartment complex inside a renovated mental asylum, where malevolent ghosts are out for revenge. Boo!
7. Vampire Diaries • (Thursdays, 7 p.m., CW/Ch. 30): You've got to love a show in which one of the vampires so enthusiastically sucks his victims' blood that he pops their heads off.
6. Teen Wolf • (MTV, returns in 2012): I know, I know. You're thrown by the title. But this reboot of the cheesy 1985 movie is dark, engaging and scary — a "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" for the 21st century.
5. True Blood • (HBO, returns in 2012): Vampires are bad enough, but this show has werewolves, shape-shifters, ghosts, witches and telepaths. Hey, even the fairies are frightening. There are scares aplenty from all quarters.
4. Supernatural • (Fridays, 8 p.m., CW/Ch. 30): In this seventh season of scaring the bejesus out of viewers, Sam and Dean have moved on from fighting Satan to battling Leviathans out of purgatory.
3. Dexter • (Sundays, 10 p.m., Showtime): It's still weird to be rooting for a serial killer, but Dexter does confine his killing to other serial killers. And this show is tense times two — will Dexter get the bad guys? Will the cops get Dexter?
2. American Horror Story • (Wednesdays, 11 p.m., FX): This family drama/ghost story is creepy beyond belief. If you're not startled out of your seat at least a couple of times an episode, you're not paying attention.
1. The Walking Dead • (Sundays, AMC): This might just be the scariest TV show EVER. It's cover-your-eyes, cringe-in-terror time when our heroes try to avoid getting eaten by the zombies.
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