Every month, the io9 Nerd’s Watch rounds up the best sci-fi, fantasy, and horror titles coming to streamers like Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+, Max, Paramount+, Peacock, and Shudder. Shudder’s on the following list of streamers that specialize in more niche and cult offerings, but the rest are all services that venture beyond the mainstream. Seek ‘em out if your tastes run beyond what the big guys have on offer.
The horror-centric streamer—which scored a hit with last year’s gory breakout Terrifier 2—is available as a stand-alone subscription video on demand (SVOD) service that you can access using iOS, Android, Prime Video, YouTube TV, Comcast, and screambox.com. Various plans are available, but a year will run you $26.99. As of this week, you can also access its content through Amazon Freevee as a free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) variant dubbed “Screambox TV.”
The other big horror streamer boasts a mix of classic frights, new titles (especially international acquisitions), and much-loved series like The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs. For spooky season, Shudder is anchoring AMC Networks’ “FearFest,” which kicks off in September but really begins in earnest in October, unfurling new and classic entries as well as a fourth season of Creepshow (arriving October 13). The service is available on a wide array of platforms (including Apple TV, Roku, Samsung smart TV, and more; it’s also a Prime Video channel option). Plans start at $5.99 a month and you can find more details at shudder.com.
For $10.99 monthly or $99.99 annually, this service (criterionchannel.com) gives you access to “constantly refreshed selections of Hollywood, international, art-house, and independent movies, plus access to Criterion’s entire streaming library of more than 1,000 important classic and contemporary films.” If that sounds overwhelming, fear not—the site’s curators make it easy to dive in with regularly updated collections, including a current “High School Horror” section featuring Battle Royale, Prom Night, Ginger Snaps, the original Suspiria, and more.
This cult-focused platform offers “an unparalleled roster of quality content from westerns to giallo to Asian cinema, trailers, Midnight Movies, filmmaker picks, and much, much more,” with inventive sections including September’s “Eat the Rich” (featuring entries like Society and Audition) and guest curation from the likes of Gremlins director Joe Dante (naturally, he’s a fan of The Mighty Peking Man and Horror Express). A subscription costs $6.99 monthly or $69.99 annually; you can get Arrow in the U.S., Canada, the UK, and Ireland on Roku, Apple TV and other iOS devices, Samsung smart TVs, Android TV and mobile devices, Fire TV, and at arrow-player.com.
Available in the U.S. for Roku, Apple TV, Fire TV, Chromecast, and all web browsers for $4.99 monthly or $39.99 yearly, Night Flight Plus (nightflightplus.com) streams episodes of the legendary 1980s alternative variety series Night Flight, and also offers an appropriately weird, wonderful, and often musically oriented array of films. You can’t argue with a streamer that designates an “Essentials” section front and center, then populates it with the eclectic likes of Demons, The Decline of Western Civilization, Threads, The Love Witch, Suburbia, and Arise! The SubGenius Movie.
This streamer’s tag line is “something for everyone,” but what that really means is “something for everyone who needs hours and hours of access to British TV series, especially mysteries,” including popular current shows like Father Brown, Death in Paradise, and Inside No. 9, and classics like the David Suchet-starring Agatha Christie’s Poirot and multiple iterations of Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes. A subscription (britbox.com) costs $8.99 a month or $89.99 a year and you can stream on your “phone, tablet, computer, Chromecast, Apple TV or Roku device, as well as LG and Samsung smart TVs.”
Mubi’s pitch: “A place to discover ambitious films by visionary filmmakers. From iconic directors to emerging auteurs. All carefully chosen by our curators.” Or, more to the point: “We simply couldn’t resist the idea of everyone having their own film library… Your own little cinema, anytime, anywhere.” The selection is vast and emphasizes international selections, with a wide range of genres including, yes, stuff on the fringes; David Cronenberg’s 1975 Shivers and Jim Van Bebber’s 1988 Deadbeat at Dawn are currently listed as new arrivals. You can watch Mubi (mubi.com) on PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Apple TV app, Android, PlayStation, Roku, Samsung smart TVs; a monthly membership ranges from $12.99-$17.99, or yearly for $107.88-$143.88.
We’re perhaps stretching our definition of niche here, considering Crunchyroll (crunchyroll.com) is pretty much the de facto home of anime streaming online. But while some of the big studio platforms have a selection of anime, Crunchyroll’s vastly deeper and broader library of content provides all the anime you need on basically any platform that exists (desktop, mobile, gaming consoles, iOS, Android, Apple TV, Xbox, Roku, PS4), for $7.99-$14.99 a month. You’ll find a deep library of popular titles (One Piece, Jujutsu Kaisen) as well as event programming, like Attack on Titan Final Season The Final Chapters Special 1 (dubbed in English, Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, German, and Russian), which drops September 10. Might we suggest some Gundam, while you’re at it?
This one’s a FAST streamer, which means free (yay!) but with ads (sigh). It’s “dedicated to beloved movies that fall outside the mainstream ... campy, gonzo, transgressive, even revolutionary.” Check it out on ShoutFactoryTV.com or through the Shout Factory TV apps found on Fire TV, Android, Apple TV, and Roku. The Shout Cult website hasn’t been updated in a couple weeks, but August programming included The Devil’s Rain, The War of the Gargantuas, Dudes, and “24 hours of Point Break.” Speaking of dudes.
In its own words, “Fandor is your invitation to cinematic pleasures, hand-picked discoveries, and underseen curiosities. Artfully entertaining, never just content.” You can stream it via iOS, Android, Prime Video, YouTube TV, Comcast, and fandor.com. The service offers some free-with-ads titles (you will have to make a free Fandor account to access it), or you can get full access for $4.99 per month. Sample titles for cult junkies: on the TV side, there’s 13 Nights of Elvira; for movies, there’s Messiah of Evil, Deep Red, Pieces, Cannibal Holocaust, Edge of the Axe, and more.