Field notes

Seven main-series films plus the licensed Japanese spin-off almost every list drops. Release order, story order, and what the ratings say about where the series lost the thread.

Three films that share a name and almost nothing else. Why 10 Cloverfield Lane began life as an unrelated script, and where the name came from in the first place.

Six films, two of them competing versions of the same prequel shot from the same script and both released. The full order, and the two entries worth your evening.

Two prequels, one direct sequel and a 2026 entry now in cinemas. Release order, story order, and why the original scores a full point higher on Douban than on IMDb.

The film Murnau made four years after Nosferatu turns a hundred, and it is on real screens for it. What it is, why it counts as horror, how scary it actually is, and every screening the cinemas we track are selling — rebuilt from the feed on every build.

Alan Parker’s 1987 detective story, on Alamo Drafthouse screens across a dozen states in a three-day window. The occult noir it turns into, the ten seconds that cost it an X rating, and the full schedule with tickets.

Kubrick takes a full 5 for dread; Carpenter takes a full 5 for gore. Both on the same five Alamo screens a week apart, with the dates and tickets — and no invented anniversary run.

The two tails of the Douban−IMDb gap, from every film with 5,000+ ratings on both. Hong Kong’s canon and three James Wan films on one side; the last decade of Western horror on the other. Recomputed from the catalog on every build.

The director who invented Sleep No More, Blumhouse producing, and critics calling it the scariest show on Broadway. Where to see it, its full tour history, and how scary it actually gets.

The averages agree almost perfectly. The individual films don't — Chinese audiences rate Train to Busan a full point higher, and some HK classics have 88× more Douban votes than IMDb votes.