Happy Halloween, everyone! 

As fall hits its peak, we’ve now entered that time of year where every month has a holiday. That means lots of fall activities, leaves falling from trees, and gearing up for the cold. First up on that list, Halloween! Halloween is a cultural movement and holiday that dates back to the 8th century, where October 31st marked the start of Winter, and the ending of Summer. A Celtic festival called Samhain, Halloween started as bonfires and costumes that could ward off evil spirits. In today’s modern traditions, we’re actually not so far off. Today’s version of All Hallows Eve still keeps up with the costumes and the bonfires, but have the additional elements of haunted houses, carving pumpkins, and most importantly, candy. 

When it comes to visual and readable media, Halloween has become so much more. Movies, television shows, books, graphic novels, even music—a lot of the entertainment audiences consume is based on the spooky stuff that only comes out to play at Halloween. From psychopaths, to ghosts, to zombies, every category of ‘Halloween’ has either had some movie, show, parody, or book based on the things that make you go bump in the night. 

This year at The Game of Nerds, we’re celebrating Halloween by celebrating that media! What’s a better way to end the night after handing out candy, trick-or-treating, or de-costuming than finding a Halloween special to keep your spirits up, and the evil spirits away. So many popular television shows across channels, networks, and platforms have a dedicated Halloween special, or specials (depending on the show). Here are some of the best Halloween episodes to binge this season!

BROOKYLN 99

Brooklyn 99 is iconic and known for its fun take on Halloween. If you’ve watched the show before, you’ll know that every season has its own episode just dedicated to Halloween shenanigans. Each episode follows a ‘Halloween Heist” that becomes the precinct tradition. The main characters—Jake, Amy, Rosa, Captain Holt, Charles, Gina, Terry, Hitchcock, and Scully—all compete against one another (and sometimes in teams) to see who can steal a specifically chosen object before midnight on Halloween. Whoever wins is crowned the ultimate Detective/Genius (you’ve got to actually say ‘slash’, by the way). 

These episodes are fun take on a whodunnit mystery, with plots being revealed along the way and twists and turns surprising both us and the characters as we find out who pulled off the ultimate heist.

The heist tradition starts out in season one, episode 6, where the bet is between Jake and Captain Holt. As the seasons continue, more characters get involved in this Halloween fun.

Check out this article from Screen Rant which lists the Brooklyn 99 Halloween episodes in chronological order and ranks them!

Brooklyn 99 and all of it’s Halloween Heists are currently streaming on Peacock and Netflix

SUPERNATURAL

Supernatural is a classic show if you’re looking for scary ghosties and ghoulies, and two brothers to beat them up. You could almost classify every episode as a Halloween special with all of the fantastical elements that appear, but even a show like Supernatural enjoys telling stories about trick-or-treating, candy, and mysterious murder. 

Season 4, episode 7, titled “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester” is one of the official designated Halloween episodes, and not just for its reference to another iconic Great Pumpkin. As written on Netflix (where Supernatural is currently hosted), in this episode, “The brothers deduce a witch is sacrificing people to summon a dangerous demon. Robert Wisdom guest stars as Uriel, a specialist angel”. In season 4, Dean is freed from hell by Castiel, but in doing so, has broken the first seal that could lead to the rising of Lucifer. In this Halloween episode, Sam and Dean must find a witch, stop Lucifer from rising, work with angels, and save Halloween while they’re at it.

EVEN MORE SUPERNATURAL, OF COURSE

There are lots of other episodes from Supernatural that could be used to celebrate Halloween! Some of my favorites, and honorable mentions are: 

Season 13, episode 16, “Scoobynatural”. The first and only animated episode of Supernatural, Sam, Dean, and Cass are pulled into a real-life Scooby Doo mystery. Working with the Scooby gang, the trio have to find the mysterious bad guy while withholding pivotal information from these fictional characters—that monsters, ghosts, vampires, and everything else, are real. There’s not always someone hiding under those masks.

Season 4, episode 5, “Monster Movie”.  This black and white interpretation of an old school film throws Sam and Dean into a real life monster movie. “Dean and Sam investigate murders at Oktoberfest. Dean determines a shape-shifter demon is appearing as iconic monsters from old Hollywood movies” (Netflix). What more could you want? Dracula? Check. Classic monsters? Check. Dean as a damsel in distress AND wearing lederhosen? Yeah, sign us up. 

Season 14, episode 4, “Mint Condition”. Season 14 of Supernatural gets pretty intense, crazy, and as we neared the ending of the show, with this season being the second to last one, we needed a classic hunt to lighten things up. “Mint Condition” reflects some of the ideas in the earlier seasons by celebrating silly Halloween mysteries. “On Halloween, the Winchesters get back to basics by investigating an action figure at a comic store that comes to life” (Netflix). While the enemy in this episode isn’t just some plain ghost, and is actually a terrifying mishmash of melted skin and a bloody axe, we get to celebrate Halloween with the Winchesters once again.

Supernatural and it’s Halloween freakiness is streaming on Netflix

PARKS AND RECREATION

One of the best sitcoms from the 2010s, Parks and Recreation is full of a star-studded cast that brought the laughter every single week. Amy Poehler, Nick Offerman, Adam Scott, Rashida Jones, Aubrey Plaza, Chris Pratt, and Aziz Ansari never failed to bring us a fun plot that coincides with a team of people that care about each other, and of course, parks. The show has two known Halloween episodes, each fun and festive. 

Parks and Rec season 2, episode 7, “Greg Pikitis” shows Leslie Knope running around and keeping up with her arch enemy, teen troublemaker Greg Pikitis. Greg always knows how to pull one over on Leslie—not for malicious intent, but because he finds her amusing when she’s angry (honestly, who doesn’t?). Every Halloween Greg Pikitis and his friends vandalize a statue in a park, and every year Leslie fails to catch him in the act. This year, Leslie changes the game by enlisting her friends and her Cop boyfriend, Dave (played by the hilarious Louis C.K.), to stop Greg from his Halloween shenanigans.

Season 5, episode 5, “Halloween Surprise”, follows each character as they tackle their own problems. Ron and girlfriend Diane are celebrating their first Halloween together, but when duty calls for Diane, Ron has to take the girls out alone—hint: he does not handle this well. Leslie and Ben are facing troubles as Ben continues his work in D.C., with Leslie working in Pawnee. When Ben gets offered to work on another congressional campaign, the pair have to decide what comes next in their relationship. To distract Leslie from her personal problems, Anne suggests that they scare Gerry while the Town Hall is hosting its Halloween horror movie night. Only, Gerry, who scares too easily, ends up farting AND having a heart attack—dubbed the iconic ‘fart attack’ by Tom.

“Ugh! So much stuff is happening right now!” – Leslie Knope during this episode.

As you can tell, this episode is full of Halloween surprises, laughs, and scares.

Parks and Recreation and its Halloween he(f)art attacks are currently streaming on Peacock

THE OFFICE

Another classic sitcom, The Office ran from 2005 to 2013, and certainly provided the laughs on it’s Halloween episodes. Throughout the seasons of The Office, we get to see several variations of Halloweens that come and go at Dunder Mifflin.

Not only providing Halloween episodes for our entertainment, over its years The Office has given audiences several ideas for Halloween costumes. There’s the obvious ones, like a duos costume as Michael and Dwight, or a couples costume like Jim and Pam. There are some niche ones too, costumes that only real Office fans would recognize, like Secret Agent Michael Scarn from “Threat Level Midnight” or, a personal favorite, Michael and Dwight from their hit single, “Straight Outta Scranton”.

The Office season 3, episode 5, “Halloween” is the shows first go at tackling Halloween. Michael has to make a tough decision about who has to be let go from the office, and of course, puts it off until the last day of the month, and this month, that day falls on Halloween. As the rest of the crew at Dunder Mifflin worry over who is going to get fired, Jim and Pam dedicate their time to pranking Dwight. They pair send Dwight’s resume over to Cumberland Mills, a different paper company in Maryland. Their plan doesn’t quite work out, however, when Jim thinks about taking the job instead.

“Dwight is . . . special. But, I don’t believe that his talents are being used in this office. So Pam and I have put his resume on Monster.com, Google, Craig’s List. We’re really interested most in jobs that take Dwight out of state. Um, preferably Alaska . . . or India.”

Over the course of The Office, there are six episodes dedicated to Halloween. Check out this article that shares all the details and frights that occur over the years at Dunder Mifflin!

The Office is currently streaming on Peacock

ABBOTT ELEMENTARY

Abbott Elementary tells all about the ups and downs of what it’s like as teacher to plan holiday celebrations for kids. It’s a lot to handle—when kids are jazzed up about a holiday, they run around and transform into tiny energizer bunnies. Not only do kids on Halloween never understand obscure costumes and references that us oldies find funny, but they also find ways to cause just a little extra chaos. The Abbott crew are reminded of all of this in season 2, episode 6, “Candy Zombies”.

As the school celebrates Halloween with costumes, candy, and a haunted house, things get really scary when one kid, dressed as Thanos, steals the Halloween candy stash. Janine and the other teachers at Abbott had originally planned to only give the kids candy at the end of the school day, so that only their parents would have to deal with the terrifying sugar high. This all changes when the kids in the school eat their candy too early in the day, and end up wrecking havoc in the classrooms. This all leads into a candy hunt as Gregory, Melissa, Jacob, Ava, Mr, Johnson, Barbara, and Janine try to take back the candy, and control over the school.

Halloween returns again to Abbott Elementary in season 4, episode 4, “Costume Content”. “It’s Halloween at Abbott Elementary! Janine and Gregory proudly show off their couple’s costume, but it fails to translate. Meanwhile, Barbara faces pushback from parents concerned about hygiene and her beloved apple-bobbing tradition” (Hulu). While Janine and Gregory think that their first couples costume, based on Jurassic Park, is foolproof, they’re proved wrong when no one can understand the reference. At the same time, Barbara is having a hard time moving on from traditions she has be doing since she started teaching at Abbott. This Halloween comes full of surprises, reflections, and the realization that you’re a millennial doing a couple’s costume.

Abbott Elementary and it’s Halloween haunts are currently streaming on Disney+ and Hulu

PSYCH

For a show that deals in crimes, murders, and mysterious cases that require a Psychic, there are a surprising amount of episodes that involve the supernatural! Fake psychic Shawn Spencer and his partner Gus solve crimes with the Santa Barbara Police Department, using their knowledge, know-how, obscure 80s references, and the power of friendship to save the day. Most of the time, those cases involve solving a murder, plain and simple. Other times, however, Shawn and Gus have to figure out if a ghost is really at fault, or if there’s someone behind the mask—someone call the Scooby gang back.

There are so many episodes in Psych that celebrate the love Shawn and Gus have for Halloween, but let’s start with season one, episode 15, “Scary Sherry: Bianca’s Toast”. When Shawn and Gus investigate the mysterious death of a girl from a college campus that copies an urban legend from their childhood, the Halloween scares begin. As Juliet goes undercover to find out more about the sorority the girl was a part of, she enlists the help of the psychic duo to see what other weirdness is going on. Nothing will ever be as funny as watching Shawn and Gus run away, screaming in high pitched terror.

Season 3, episode 15, “Tuesday the 17th” is a direct parody of Friday the 13th come to life on Psych. When Shawn and Gus get roped into helping a childhood friend who is reopening their old summercamp, the pair quickly realize that something is off. Camp Tikihama is just as Shawn remembers, miserable looking and sad. The camp was shut down during his childhood after a tragic incident. Shawn starts putting pieces together as each counselor slowly disappears and everyone starts acting . . . disturbed. Shawn calls Jules, hoping that she could shed some light on the situation. When the trio get stuck at this camp because of a nasty storm outside, they realize that something truly sinister is afoot, and that not all is as it seems. Not only is a killer looming in the shadows, but whoever it is wants revenge.

“You must be out of your mind if you think for one second I’m going out there. I’ve seen enough slasher movies to know that when a brother goes off to the woods, he doesn’t even sort of come back” (Gus, “Tuesday the 17th, Psych).

“GUS, STOP! LET’S BE BRAVE!”—EVEN MORE PSYCH

Psych is a show that loves to reference other popular culture that was important not only to it’s characters, but to it’s creators and writers. In doing so, it continues to reference some iconic horror movies and classic monsters that come out to spook up on Halloween nights.

Season 8, episode 9, “A Nightmare on State Street” is another one of those parodies, this time imitating A Nightmare on Elm Street. In the second to last episode of the show, Gus starts seeing a sleep therapist as his nightmares have hit an all-time high. He can’t sleep without imagining that something horrible has happened—like zombies coming to life and eating Curt Smith (yes, Curt Smith from Tears for Fears) or getting caught in a spiders web. As Shawn and him try to combat his nightmare while solving a case simultaneously, the episode rears a similar distressing feeling, just like the movie—something isn’t right. And why does Shawn keep leaving Gus in his dreams?

Season 5, episode 11, “In Plain Fight” tells the haunting of Scare Fest, an amusement park that is finally reopening and recovering after a tragic accident caused it to close down years ago—sound familiar? “When on a haunted house ride, Shawn and Gus witness a murder they believe was committed by a ghost” (Amazon Prime Video). How do you catch a killer that isn’t alive anymore? In this Halloween themed episode of Psych, Shawn and Gus have to piece together a puzzle that doesn’t seem to fit. Tragic accident, plus board members dying, plus a ghost from the past leaving messages, equals what? Whatever it is, hopefully Shawn and Gus can wrap this up quick enough so they can give the tilt-a-whirl another go before this park closes again.

Psych and all of it’s scariness, which in Shawn’s opinion really stems from Lassie’s haircut, is currently streaming on Peacock and Amazon Prime Video

Happy Halloween!