Halloween is a special time for horror fans, even though many of us watch the genre we know and love year round. It is the time that our ‘normie’ friends jump in on the scares and enjoy some of our favorite films. Last year, the movie channel Freeform got in on the ‘31 Day of Halloween‘ action by hosting their program block during the month of October. This year it is going even bigger as it teams up with Walt Disney Television Upfront to bring even more scary goodness to the fans.

In preparation of writing this, I decided to look up the history of Freeform. Ironically, it was founded as a religious channel known as CBN Satellite Service, an extension of televangelist Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network back in 1977. It shifted in the 1980s to be the International Family Entertainment and to The Family Channel in the 90s. The owners of Fox acquired it in 1997 where it became Fox Family Channel and took off with Fox Kids programming block until it was sold to Disney in 2000s when it became ABC Family. 2015 saw it change to its current name of Freeform.

Last year saw the start of 31 Nights of Halloween and it marked the most watched October in three years for the channel. It shouldn’t come as any surprise, as horror fans are good at supporting our genre. It helped that they threw the Hocus Pocus 25th Anniversary Halloween Bash. This film will be shown again, this time for a record 27 broadcasts in the month. This year is marking the 25th anniversary of Ghostbusters, which will be celebrated, along with its sequel, Ghostbusters 2. Other films announced are the original Scream trilogy along with favorites The Nightmare Before Christmas and The Addams Family.

I think we can all agree that this sounds like a great event for younger fans or those with children they are trying to break into the genre. Regardless, pushing the genre into the mainstream only helps to continue to expand it. What do you think about this news? Will you catch Ghostbusters or Hocus Pocus or any of the other spooky films they are showing? Let us know on Twitter, Reddit, and in the Horror Movie Fiend Club on Facebook!