HBO's Classic 7-Season Horror Series Is Officially Streaming For The First Time

6 days ago 25

Demi Moore in Dead Right episode of Tales from the Crypt

Published May 2, 2026, 8:51 PM EDT

Fariba Rezwan is a Lead Editor for the Movie News team. She has been with ScreenRant for nearly five years, with roles ranging from list editor to junior news editor.

During that time, Fariba has led coverage for breaking movies and TV news, including Hunger Games, Marvel, and streaming. Additionally, she has actively provided commentary and reactions to the biggest movies and shows on her YouTube channel, The Movieception Show.

An HBO horror series from the 1980s is finally scaring audiences on streaming.

HBO, which is known as Home Box Office, is a premium network that has delivered many quality series like The Sopranos, The Wire, and Game of Thrones. As streaming slowly overtook network channels with the rise of Netflix, Warner Bros. soon introduced its own streaming platform in 2020, which, after several rebrandings, is named HBO Max. Since then, much of the original HBO content has become available on streaming, but not all.

One example is the horror anthology series, Tales from the Crypt, which ran on HBO from 1989 to 1996. The show is based on the 1950s EC Comics created by Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein. Three decades after the original comics series ended, Gaines and Steven Dodd worked on the HBO show, which contained mature content, such as violence, profanity, and explicit nudity.

Now, Tales from the Crypt is finally on streaming for the first time, but it won’t be on HBO Max. Instead, Shudder announced that the horror series will be available on their platform, with season 1 already streaming on May 1. Additional seasons will be added every Friday, so all 93 episodes will be accessible by June 12.

The horror series follows the host, Crypt Keeper (voiced by John Kassir), a wisecracking corpse who tells standalone dark stories, where an immoral or greedy character endures grueling, ironic consequences. Tales from the Crypt episodes featured many guest celebrities, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Brad Pitt, John Lithgow, and Tom Hanks, to name a few. Executive producers include Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis, and Walter Hill.

Despite the show's origins on HBO, it didn’t become available even with platforms like HBO Go. The reason is likely due to licensing issues, but the details are too complex and unclear. However, the series is obtainable through physical media, such as DVD copies of all seven seasons.

After the horror show ran in the 90s, the comic book series was revived twice, with volume 2 releasing between 2007 and 2010, while volume 3 ran in 2016 and 2017. On the other hand, the comic was adapted into a 1972 movie, directed by Freddie Francis. The anthology movie follows five strangers who meet the Crypt Keeper and learn details about their foreseeable deaths.

There have been two failed attempts to revive the horror show. Gilbert Adler, who produced the original, tried to develop one with Andrew Cosby in 2011, but was unsuccessful in finding a network. In 2016, acclaimed horror filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan attempted to reboot Tales from the Crypt on TNT, but the filmmaker confirmed that the development was “dead” two years later, citing legal matters with the rights.

Release Date 1989 - 1996-00-00

Network HBO

Showrunner Gilbert Adler

Directors Russell Mulcahy, Elliot Silverstein, Tom Holland, Gilbert Adler, Stephen Hopkins, Robert Zemeckis, Walter Hill, William Malone, Gary Fleder, Kevin Yagher, Howard Deutch, Rodman Flender, John Harrison, Randa Haines, Richard Greenberg, Robert Longo, Peter S. Seaman, Peter Medak, Roland Mesa, Rowdy Herrington, Roy Ward Baker, Andrew Morahan, Tobe Hooper, Steve Perry

Writers Scott Nimerfro, Terry Black, Colman deKay, Mae Woods, Randall Jahnson, Scott Rosenberg, Rob Cohen, Robert Reneau, Ross Thomas, Scott Alexander, Teller, Stanley Ralph Ross, Richard Christian Matheson, Yale Udoff, Kim Steven Ketelsen, Shel Willens, Joe Minion, Richard Tuggle, A. Whitney Brown, Andrew Kevin Walker, Harry Anderson, Connie Johnson, Dick Beebe, Don Mancini