It’s Halloween, my favorite time of the year. An excuse to eat upwards of 50 peanut butter cups at a time, pay $10 for a five-minute trip through a haunted house and best of all — a perfect excuse to spend entire nights in front of the television watching horror movies.

So in salute to the holiday that celebrates ghosts, ghouls and zombies, I have decided to abort my usual subject of music and instead put together a small list of some of the best horror movies to watch during the Halloween season.

First off, I want to let everyone know how excruciating it was to decide on these movies. I mean, when it comes to horror movies there are about eight trillion different categories: ghosts, living dead, slashers, supernatural, monsters, on and on and on. So I was faced with a tough decision here, folks. When most people think of Halloween they think of things like ghosts, vampires and monsters. So do guys like Freddy and Jason belong on this list? Or what about Leatherface? He wasn’t back from the dead or anything like that, but “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” was a horror movie.

After compiling about five different lists of different horror films that I thought fit the Halloween bill, I decided to hell with it. I’m just going to put down my favorite horror movies. The point on Halloween is to go get scared, right? So if you don’t want to read a dumb column about some guy’s favorite horror movies, do it anyway; you’ve already come this far.

“Lost Boys” — In my humble opinion, this is the best vampire movie ever made. Kiefer Sutherland is probably the coolest vampire ever — a plain and simple bad ass. This 1987 vamp classic captured that great ’80s feel that everyone loved, but still managed to be a great movie, something not easily achieved. Everything about this movie is cool, especially the fact that both Corey Haim and Corey Feldman are in it.

“Nightmare on Elm Street” – The first and the last in the series are by far the best among the pack, but when I say “Nightmare on Elm Street” I mean watch all of them. Freddy Krueger is a cultural icon. Even if you have never seen a single flick in the Nightmare franchise, you know who he is. And he is the wittiest, and not to mention the smartest, villain ever in a horror movie. Unlike his peers, Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees, Freddy wasn’t just some zoned-out psycho slashing throats. He slashed throats and cracked some of the best jokes ever in horror history. The first “Nightmare on Elm Street,” directed by horror master Wes Craven, managed to set itself apart considerably from the countless other slasher films with its more complicated and creative plot. I recommend finding someone with the DVD set and watching part six with 3D glasses.

“The Others” — Here is a movie that will genuinely frighten you. Set in the era of World War II, this movie is a straightforward old-fashioned ghost story with a great twist thrown in at the end. The beautiful thing about this movie is that it is able to give you goosebumps without resorting to all the big-budget special effects that so many filmmakers rely on today. The movie’s soundtrack does a fantastic job of building up climaxes that will sometimes let you down, but other times make you dangerously close to autographing your undies, if you know what I mean. “The Others” is a truly haunting film.

“Texas Chainsaw Massacre” — Some say this is the one that started it all — the story of a cannibalistic clan of family members led by the infamous Leatherface. The movie was made in 1974, so it doesn’t quite maintain the scare impact that it probably did back then, but I guarantee it will be one of the more disturbing films you ever watch. Director Tobe Hooper did a brilliant job with what he had to work with (the film was made on a budget that probably wouldn’t get you doughnuts for the crew on a film today). And “Chainsaw Massacre” lures you in from the beginning with its claims about the movie being true. They may be lying, but not completely — there are elements of truth to this absolutely gruesome movie.

“Friday the 13th” — C’mon, you had to know it was coming. Even though Halloween came first, “Friday the 13th” kicked in the doors for the slasher films that ruled the early-to mid-’80s. Jason Voorhees, like Freddy, is a character everyone knows; he is the hockey mask-wearing, machete-wielding, slightly brain-dead killer that likes to kill naked, pot-smoking teens at Camp Crystal Lake. If you have never seen the first “Friday the 13th,” you might be interested to know that Jason doesn’t actually taste blood until the second movie. I can’t tell you who the first killer is though, just in case you actually value my opinion and go rent the movie.

I’m running out of space, but rent these too: “Candyman” — the urban legend we all heard as a kid comes true; “Monster Squad” — great 1987 early teen monster flick; “Fright Night” — great example of a cheesy-as-hell ’80s horror movie that never gets old, “The Exorcist” — it will scare the hell right out of you, or into you.

Trevor Fisher

is a senior in journalism and mass communication from Knoxville. He is the arts and entertainment senior reporter for the Daily.