Goosebumps would go on to inspire generation after generation of young minds to dip their toes ever deeper into the bubbling bog of churning horror in dozens of forms and formats, but such a legacy would evaporate into a ghostly mist if not for the book that started it all. A notably different adaptation, the episode simplified the premise, keeping the action to a limited number of locations and undercutting the scope and small-town politics on the page. It took several years for the story to make the leap to the screen, arriving as a one hour primetime special midway through the show’s second season. Such an approach ensured that the book would not only be the first foray into the series but one of the best and most effective. While constructed utilizing all the hallmarks of a great Goosebumps outing, it’s a story unafraid to delve into unflinching moments of terror, loss and monstrousness that may only be hinted at in future installments. Still, despite their intended age groups, the early titles in the Goosebumps canon come with slightly sharper edges, headier stakes and not so subtle grotesqueries that would become sanded down as the years went on.īeing the first to don the dripping, bumpy title, Welcome to Dead House is perhaps the best example of the series’ darker tendencies. Stine’s oeuvre to invite the whole of adolescence into the spooky and the strange with open arms. Having already penned countless tales of terror and entries into his slightly more adult horror anthology Fear Street, the advent of Goosebumps expanded R.L. Stine’s decades spanning series.įor with Welcome to Dead House, Goosebumps was born. Inside a shadowy figure looms, an ominous welcome party for what would be the first ever entrant in R.L. Derelict and towering, the structure came bathed in moody blue, accented only by the fiery otherworldly glow emanating from its open front door and neighboring window.

The series adaptation aired on Sunday, J(runtime: 22 minutes and 22 minutes).īefore there were dummies, creatures lurking beneath the sink and everything eating blobs, there was a house. Welcome to Dead House was originally p ublished in July 1992 (Spine #1).

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