All the Horror You Need to Stream in May 2022

Welcome to Horrorscope, a monthly column keeping horror nerds and initiates up to date on all the horror content coming to and leaving from your favorite streaming services. Here’s what to watch in May 2022.

If you’re invested in the ever-changing landscape of streaming, the past month or so has been a good reminder that hedging your bets is a good idea. You never know when a service is going to change things up and alienate audiences, so it’s best to play the field a little bit if you can afford it.

After cracking down on password sharing and raising their prices, Netflix has decided that the best course of action is to create a subscription tier with ad breaks. (It’s also worth mentioning that the unexpected layoff of a good chunk of Tudum’s editorial staff is, uh, a bad look). Here in this column, we bring together a handful of streaming services under one roof. A good chunk of our readership has fingers in a number of different streaming pies. But seeing what’s going on elsewhere on the net is also a fun way to see if the grass is greener elsewhere.

A reminder, my friends: Freevee, formerly known as IMDb TV, is as its name suggests, free! I will also go to bat for Tubi, which is (1) free and (2) home to an unbelievable and ever-changing library.

So all that said, be sure to peruse the complete list below, calendar in hand, for a full picture of what horror movies are coming and going from your favorite streaming services in May 2022. Keep in mind that all dates listed below may not apply to viewers outside the US.

May 2022 Horror Streaming Cheat Sheet

• If you’ve ever wanted to get into the Puppet Master films, my god, head on over to ARROW. The streaming service is rolling out over ten entries in the franchise. So keep your ankles covered, and go forth into this killer doll-based series.
• If vampires and werewolves are more your speed, three of the Underworld films are coming to HBO Max this month. Keep the bloodsucker versus furballs train chugging and queue up the Twilight franchise, which is now available on Peacock and Tubi.
• If you are more of a zombie person, five Resident Evil films are headed to Hulu and Peacock. (And if you’re more into torture porn, five Saw films are also coming to the streaming service).
• Grab your wrinkle cream and early bird specials, M. Night Shyamalan’s latest chiller, 2021’s Old, is coming to HBO Max on May 13th!
• Try and manifest warmer summer days by watching Quentin Dupieux’s French indie horror-comedy Rubber, which is about a homicidal telekinetic tire’s reign of terror in the Californian desert. Roll on over to HBO Max where it’s leaving at the end of the month!
• If you like teens with low brain cell counts and oodles of increasingly silly deaths, Netflix has you covered. Or at least they will until May 31, when the first two I Know What You Did Last Summer films and three Final Destination films are leaving the platform.
• Brand spankin’ new horror films arriving on streaming include Fresh (May 2nd on Paramount+), Firestarter (May 13th on Peacock); The Twin (May 6th on Shudder); The Found Footage Phenomenon (May 19th on Shudder), and A Banquet (May 26th on Shudder).

Horror Streaming Highlights for May 2022

Pick of the Month: The Sadness (2021)

Synopsis: Young lovers Kat and Jim have their whole lives ahead of them … that is if they can survive the pandemic that has mutated into a virological tidal wave of homicidal maniacs. What begins as just another quiet quarantined day in Taipei erupts into a very literal bloodbath as the couple attempt to locate one another in the chaos.

The Sadness has been called “a rage-filled manifesto that aims to tick off every cinematic taboo possible” (Bloody Disgusting), a  “strangely cathartic” (Dread Central) blood bath that can be described with words like “explosive” “mean-spirited,” and “tasteless.”

If all of that sounds a-okay to you dear reader then strap on in for what promises to be one of the most savage gore-fests in recent memory. It’s wild to think that this is director Rob Jabbaz’s feature film debut. God knows what this maniac has in store for us down the line. All that said: this exclusive streaming premiere is the perfect opportunity to test the limits of your gag reflex.

Available on Shudder on May 12th.

An egg-cellent slice of Finnish body horror

Synopsis: A teenage girl named Tinja brings an abandoned crow’s egg home with the intent of hatching it. The egg swells and a horrifying person-sized bird emerges. Despite being a movie featuring a horrifying, Mr. Burns-looking-ass bird creature, this film’s real monster is Tinja’s mother, a perfection-seeking mommy blogger.

As our own Rob Hunter put it in his review out of Sundance, Hanna Bergholm‘s feature debut Hatching is an effective creature feature about how monsters beget monsters featuring incredible practical effects: “like a Jim Henson creation circa his Labyrinth days.”

If you love icky body horror monsters and cower in fear at those cursed vlogger family YouTube channels, Hatching may not have the subtlest thesis, but, hear me out: it has a giant, psychically-linked, goopy bird doppelgänger. (It’s also under 90-minutes, a huge plus around these parts!).

Available on Hulu on May 6th.

It’s time to celebrate the three Bs: Blood, Boobs, and Beelzebub

Synopsis: Leave it to the depraved dorks at ARROW to curate a collection centered around the great Norman J. Warren, a British director known for his racy exploitation films during the 1970s. Featuring an early example of Warren’s more erotic exploits and two delightful picks from his subsequent pivot into the horror genre, these three films offer a mico introduction to one of Britain’s spiciest genre directors.

“Britsploitation: The Norman J. Warren Collection” features three delightfully depraved titles that paint a ghoulishly perverse portrait of one of Britain’s greatest genre exports. In 1968’s Her Private Hell, a naive Italian model named Marisa (Lucia Modugno) arrives in London only to be manipulated into posing nude for saucy magazine spreads. Billed as “Britain’s first narrative sex film” Her Private Hell is a very low-budget time capsule that now plays as rather twee. How times have changed!

The two other films in the collection demonstrate Warren’s strengths in the horror genre: 1976’s Satan’s Slave and 1987’s Bloody New Year. The former tells of a young girl who winds up in the thrall of a cult while the latter follows a gaggle of shipwrecked teens who take shelter in a haunted hotel decorated for New Year’s Eve. There’s a little something for everyone!

Available on ARROW on May 2nd.

They just don’t make ’em like they used to (in pre-Code Hollywood)

Synopsis: While affluent zoologist Dr. Gorman bushwacks through the jungle in search of interesting animals, his hot young wife entertains herself in the embrace of other men. Unhappy with being cucked all the time, the not-so-good doctor uses his knowledge of animal behavior to dispatch his wife’s lovers. 

Disturbing and perverse, even by the standards of pre-Code Hollywood (which we’ll remind you were famously defined by having no standards at all), 1933’s Murders in the Zoo was directed by the British-born filmmaker-actor A. Edward Sutherland. While Sutherland is best remembered for his war romances, it makes sense that a man who was married five times would make a film about a killer cuckold.

Speaking of which, besides its appeal as an especially twisted slice of 1930s horror, the big reason to check this gem out is for Lionel Atwill‘s delightfully unhinged performance as the wealthy Dr. Eric Gorman. (Readers may recognize Atwill for his other performance as a demented M.D. in 1932’s Doctor X). Featured in the Criterion Channel’s “Pre-Code Paramount” collection, Murders in the Zoo exemplifies the boundary-pushing that was possible before the enforcement of the Hollywood Production Code.

Leaving the Criterion Channel on May 31.

Streamable Horror Incoming This Month

Horror Titles Expiring from Streaming Soon

Related Topics: Horror, Horrorscope

Based in the Pacific North West, Meg enjoys long scrambles on cliff faces and cozying up with a good piece of 1960s eurotrash. As a senior contributor at FSR, Meg's objective is to spread the good word about the best of sleaze, genre, and practical effects.