Friday, October the 13th is quickly (and spookily!) approaching, which means that the brand new Disney+ Goosebumps show is premiering in mere days. Fittingly, the review embargo has lifted on the first five episodes, and what’s cool is that all of these initial entries in the 10-part series drop simultaneously for a good scary dose of pre-Halloween binge-watching.
It just so happens that Forbes’ Mitch Wallace (that’s me, by the way) got an early look at Rob Letterman and Nicholas Stoller’s fresh take on R.L. Stine’s beloved children’s horror universe. A universe that, based on this latest streaming interpretation, isn’t exactly for the innocent kiddos anymore, at least the old 1990s demographic, anyway. More on that in a bit.
I can only talk about the aforementioned initial five episodes, completely spoiler-free, of course:
- Say Cheese and Die!
- The Haunted Mask
- The Cuckoo Clock of Doom
- Go Eat Worms!
- Reader Beware
To start, it’s probably important to state that if you’re going into this new show expecting something akin to the campy ‘90s Fox Kids adaptation, then you’ll be surprised, and that’s at the very least. This is a noticeably grown-up, leveled-up, more mature take on Goosebumps, something we’ve never seen before, and that’s already starting things off on a somewhat controversial note. ‘Scarier than you remember’ is the enticing tag line, and as far as my experience goes, it’s definitely accurate.
The general story centers around a group of harbor-town high school teens battling a genuinely scary ghost who is, of course, hellbent on total revenge. This is opposed to the classics like Monster Blood or The Beast From the East or Why I’m Afraid of Bees, where a bunch of scrappy grade-schoolers or early middle-schoolers pushed through what amounted to slightly crooked afterschool specials with a bit of horror seasoning thrown in for good measure.
It’s a big change from the middle grade ‘safe scares’ that Stine originally aimed for in his retro literature, though I don’t think the change is necessarily a bad move in terms of modernization. Because considering the source material, this is a show based on Goosebumps, and not a one-to-one port of the books that the episodes borrow their titles from.
Let’s face it: things have changed during the last three decades. Now main characters have cellphones, texting and social media, technology that Stine never had to deal with while crafting his original stories. Oh look, you just received a haunted text: Goosebumps for the digital age! Reply to this frightening message with the word BOO to confirm that us OG fans are old now. This may cause charges on your geriatric mobile account, by the way. Forget monsters—aging is scary.
On to the watching experience itself, I’m happy to report that there are many actual creepy and unnerving moments in these episodes. Until now, Goosebumps adaptations have tended to lean more heavily into Stine’s goofy, dad joke humor than any kind of legitimate unsettlement. See the Jack Black movies for reference, though I loved those films, too. They were simply different, but I prefer the bigger scares presented here.
The directing and writing seem to have a good grasp on what makes things scary, at least for the most part. I view horror as a particularly nuanced genre, and one slight misstep can make the difference between genuine terror and disappointing corniness. There were a few specific moments in the first two episodes that struck the perfect horror notes for me and made me glad that Letterman and Stoller took Goosebumps in a darker direction.
Really, everything is darker in the new show. The filming, the tone, the subject matter. Stine always kept his Fear Street books and Goosebumps books separate on store shelves, as one series was for teens and one for younger audiences. This new streaming endeavor feels like a marrying of the two worlds, a remodeled mixture for millennials who have grown up, had kids of their own, and now want to revel in a revamped nostalgia with their soon-to-be (or already) teenagers.
Not to keep harping on the past, but R.L. Stine did make it a constant point to never address adult themes in Goosebumps books. Sex, drugs, death, affairs or family trouble were all off-limits, but the new show does broach many of these heavy subjects. And to be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about that. All these kids come from families that are broken in some fundamental way, and that’s a creative choice I’m sure many purist fans will take umbrage with.
Moving on to structure, I’m liking how Disney+ Goosebumps basically interprets a specific book for each episode rather than go the predictable route with something more on-the-nose. Fan-favorite book themes are respected but abstracted out into an overarching narrative that tells the brand new story of Harold Biddle, the haunted Biddle house and an unfortunate small-town past.
It was fun seeing how the show performed its own spin on classic Goosebumps items like the cursed camera and the haunted mask. The Go Eat Worms! episode provided some excellent body horror, while The Cuckoo Clock of Doom had some interesting time elements. Plus, in homage to R.L. Stine’s trademark end-of-chapter cliffhangers, each episode concludes on a chilling, uncertain note, beckoning the watcher into yet another episode. Stine will be proud, I’m sure.
Touching on Stine fingerprints, a lot of his playful humor is also retained in the show. Intense moments are never too far away from quippy one-liners or ridiculous sight gags, and that feels respectful to the source material, even if we’re now dealing with high schoolers with real life problems, as well as supernatural ones.
Additionally, there are some really fun music choices from 1993—the year the story starts—which I won’t spoil here, even though I want to. These serve to connect Harold Biddle’s ghost to the present.
That said, I have so much more to talk about, including plot, pacing and the actors’ excellent performances, but this is bordering on a tome at this point, so let’s wrap things up and we’ll save the rest for an upcoming article. Disney+ Goosebumps is, so far, very good, and as a longtime Goosebumps fan, I feel like it brings the series into the present in a dark and stylish way.
Is it a little too modern and too real at times? Perhaps, but we’ll see how the show evolves past the first five episodes. So far, this is a different and welcome take on a book series that truly shaped my childhood. Stay tuned for more Goosebumps coverage, including impressions of future episodes, an in-depth series review and some very cool interviews as we get closer to Halloween.
Happy (and eerie) watching!
Disclaimer: Disney+ provided early streaming access for coverage purposes.
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