20 best shows like Puppet Master (1989)

Poltergeist: The Legacy is a Canadian horror television series which ran from 1996 to 1999. The series tells the story of the members of a secret society known as the Legacy and their efforts to protect humankind from occult dangers. Despite bearing the Poltergeist name, there is no real connection between the show and the Poltergeist trilogy aside from the title.Poltergeist: The Legacy debuted on Showtime, and all first-run episodes of the first three seasons premiered on that network, though they were later syndicated. After the third season, Showtime cancelled the show, and the rights were purchased by Sci Fi Channel which continued the series for another season. This same pattern was followed by Stargate SG-1, which also debuted on Showtime, was also sold into syndication, and was rescued from cancellation by Sci Fi.The fourth season of Poltergeist: The Legacy featured an episode starring WWE wrestler The Undertaker as a being from Hell who collected souls, a deliberate crossover with RAW, which was also airing on the USA Network at the time and earning the network some of the highest ratings on cable TV. It was hoped that this cameo would help boost awareness of the new show, and thus generate a larger audience.

The supernatural phenomenon begins again with a fresh crop of inspiring heroes who take on the ultimate struggle between those with extraordinary abilities and those with nefarious motives to hunt and harness their powers. Epic adventures await these newly empowered allies as they cross paths with some of the original characters, unlocking the mysterious fate of the universe and their place within it.

This scripted anthology series mashes up wildly different genres to tell suspenseful stories with funny, imaginative twists. Each episode turns familiar tropes inside out to create a curated and eclectic collection of stories filled with equal parts nostalgia and modern satire.

When they were boys, Sam and Dean Winchester lost their mother to a mysterious and demonic supernatural force. Subsequently, their father raised them to be soldiers. He taught them about the paranormal evil that lives in the dark corners and on the back roads of America ... and he taught them how to kill it. Now, the Winchester brothers crisscross the country in their '67 Chevy Impala, battling every kind of supernatural threat they encounter along the way.

When a young boy vanishes, a small town uncovers a mystery involving secret experiments, terrifying supernatural forces, and one strange little girl.

FBI agent Audrey Parker arrives in the small town of Haven, Maine to solve a murder and soon discovers the town's many secrets—which also hold the key to unlocking the mysteries of her lost past.

A retired FBI serial-profiler joins the mysterious Millennium Group, a team of underground ex-law enforcement experts dedicated to fighting against the ever-growing forces of evil and darkness in the world.

Are You Afraid of the Dark? is a joint Canadian-American horror/fantasy-themed anthology television series. The original series was a joint production between the Canadian company Cinar and the American company Nickelodeon.The episode "The Tale of the Twisted Claw" was aired as a pilot on the evening of October 31, 1991 in the USA and in October 1990 in Canada. Are You Afraid of the Dark? was aired from August 15, 1992 to April 20, 1996 on Nickelodeon's SNICK. The series also aired on the Canadian television network YTV from October 30, 1990 until June 11, 2000.A revived series with new directors, writers, and cast was produced by Nickelodeon from 1999 to 2000 and also aired on SNICK. The sole member from the original lineup to return for the sixth and seventh seasons was Tucker, although Ross Hull returned for the concluding miniseries, which notably broke from the show's established format by blurring the line between story and "reality".

Each episode transports the audience to worlds of wonder through the lens of today’s most imaginative filmmakers, directors and writers. A reimagining of the original anthology series by Steven Spielberg.

Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King is an 8-episode anthology series on TNT based on short stories written by Stephen King. It debuted on July 12, 2006, and ended its run on August 2, 2006. Although most of them are from the collection of the same name, there are some stories from different collections by King. A trailer confirming a DVD release of the series was made available in October 2006. The series was filmed entirely in Melbourne, Australia.

When an explosion at a top-secret government lab injures an elderly janitor, no one could have expected the terrifying results. Exposure to mysterious chemicals causes him to undergo a bizarre transformation. He is slowly... incredibly... growing younger every day. Now, a ruthless CIA assassin will stop at nothing to take him prisoner and turn him into a government guinea pig. With his future on the line, the janitor goes on the run with his wife and a feisty female agent. All the while, he continues to transform... into a being with powers that are as deadly as they are unimaginable.

After a vintage Chucky doll turns up at a suburban yard sale, an idyllic American town is thrown into chaos as a series of horrifying murders begin to expose the town’s hypocrisies and secrets. Meanwhile, the arrival of enemies — and allies — from Chucky’s past threatens to expose the truth behind the killings, as well as the demon doll’s untold origins.

Ichabod Crane is resurrected and pulled two and a half centuries through time to unravel a mystery that dates all the way back to the founding fathers.

Anything can turn spooky in this horror anthology series based on the best-selling books by master of kid horror, R.L. Stine. In every episode, see what happens when regular kids find themselves in scary situations, and how they work to confront and overcome their fears.

We love to play games with our children. But what happens when someone else starts to play with them too? Someone we don't know. Can't see. Can't hear. In The Whispers, someone or something -- is manipulating the ones we love most to accomplish the unthinkable. An unseen alien force has figured this human weakness out. They have invaded earth and are using our most unlikely resource to achieve world domination – our children.

In a world mostly wiped out by the plague and embroiled in an elemental struggle between good and evil, the fate of mankind rests on the frail shoulders of the 108-year-old Mother Abagail and a handful of survivors. Their worst nightmares are embodied in a man with a lethal smile and unspeakable powers: Randall Flagg, the Dark Man.

In the year 2093, a team of scientists aboard the Nightflyer, the most advanced ship ever built, embarks on a journey to find other life forms. Their mission takes them to the edge of the solar system, and to the edge of insanity, as they realize true horror isn't waiting for them in outer space—it's already on their ship.

Night Visions is an hour-long, American television horror anthology series, with each episode comprising two half-hour stories dealing with themes of the supernatural or simply the dark side of human nature. Henry Rollins was the uncredited host of the show.The series aired on Fox from July 12 to September 6, 2001, after which it was picked up by the Sci Fi Channel, which reran the series beginning June 14, 2002. Sci Fi later aired the three remaining original episodes that produced for, but unaired, on Fox. One of these, "Cargo / Switch", ran as part of the Night Visions series, while the two other episodes' segments were edited into the Sci Fi Channel film Shadow Realm, minus the Rollins introductions and the Night Visions name.The show's directors included some best known for feature films, including Tobe Hooper and Joe Dante, and others, such as Brian Dennehy, JoBeth Williams, and Bill Pullman, known primarily as actors.

Four young friends' paper routes are disrupted on Hell Day 1988, when they unknowingly time travel to 2019. While searching for a way home, they come face-to-face with their adult selves and learn how to work together to save the world.

R. L. Stine's The Haunting Hour is a Canadian/American original anthology horror-fantasy series, with episodes each half an hour long. The series is based on The Haunting Hour: Don't Think About It Movie, and the books The Haunting Hour and Nightmare Hour anthology by R. L. Stine.

Set in a single room of an average American motel, each episode tells a different story of the assorted characters who pass through it.

Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior was a short-lived American police procedural drama that aired on CBS. The show debuted in 2011 as a spin-off from the successful Criminal Minds, which had premiered in 2005. This edition's profiling team also worked for the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Behavioral Analysis Unit in Quantico, Virginia. In an April 2010 episode of Criminal Minds, during the show's fifth season, the original team met the new team and worked with them to find a San Francisco serial killer. This episode served as the new series' backdoor pilot. Just like the parent series, CBS owned the underlying North American rights, while ABC owned the international rights. The series premiered on February 16, 2011, and filled the Wednesday 10 pm time slot, airing immediately after the original Criminal Minds. CBS cancelled the series on May 17, 2011. The series ends with a cliffhanger. On September 6, 2011 CBS DVD released the complete series as a 4 disc-set. It is packaged as "The DVD Edition". There are numerous special features and two episode commentaries with the cast and crew. The set includes the backdoor pilot from season five of the original show.

The Outer Limits is an anthology series of distinct story episodes, sometimes with a plot twist at the end. Unlike the original incarnation of the series, which was a pure anthology with each episode completely unrelated to the others, the revival series maintained an anthology format, but occasionally featured recurring story elements that were often tied together during season-finale clip shows.

Tales of science fiction, fantasy and the occult, exploring humanity's hopes, despairs, prides and prejudices in metaphoric ways. Next stop ahead The Twilight Zone.

A post-apocalyptic story about a botched U.S. government experiment that turns a group of death row inmates into highly infectious vampires, and an orphan girl who might be the only person able to stop the ensuing crisis.

After waking in a park with total amnesia — and surrounded by dead bodies, all wearing latex gloves — a young woman must fight to uncover her past, and resume her position at the head of Britain’s most secret (supernatural) service before the traitors who stole her memory can finish what they started.

Dominion is an epic supernatural drama set in the near future. Specifically, 25 years after "The Extinction War," when an army of lower angels, assembled by the archangel Gabriel, waged war against mankind. The archangel Michael, turning against his own kind, chose to side with humanity. Rising out of the ashes of this long battle are newly fortified cities which protect human survivors. At the center of the series is the city of Vega, a glistening empire that has formed from the ruins of what was once Las Vegas.

A young boy's horror comic book comes to life in this anthology series of terrifying tales.

After a fortuitous drug bender saves his life, addict Jake ventures out into the quiet streets… unaware that most of the world already died in their beds. Now, battling sleepless fatigue and encroaching delirium, Jake teams with a scrappy teenager, overnight doctor and red-eye pilot to search for answers… and just maybe find a way to sleep again.

A jet leaves on a red-eye flight from Los Angeles to Boston. But early in the flight, ten passengers awaken to a startling realization: All of the other passengers have vanished.

Torchwood is a British science fiction television programme created by Russell T Davies. The series is a spin-off from the 2005 revival of the long-running science fiction programme Doctor Who. Torchwood follows the exploits of a small team of alien hunters, who make up the Cardiff branch of the fictional Torchwood Institute, which deals mainly with incidents involving extraterrestrials.

Based on the stories of Stephen King, the series intertwines characters and themes from the fictional town of Castle Rock.

A masked figure known as "The Curious" collects tales of dark magic, otherworldly encounters and twisted technology in this kids anthology series.

A medical student who becomes a zombie joins a Coroner's Office in order to gain access to the brains she must reluctantly eat so that she can maintain her humanity. But every brain she eats, she also inherits their memories and must now solve their deaths with help from the Medical examiner and a police detective.

Consumed by the mystery surrounding the donor heart that saved her life, a young patient starts taking on sinister characteristics of the deceased.

Can you tell the difference between fact and fiction? Several stories of strange, mysterious and incredible occurrences are chronicled during each episode. It is up to the viewer to decide which stories actually happened and which were completely fabricated by the show’s writers. The answer is revealed by Jonathan Frakes at the conclusion of each episode.

Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist join forces to take on common enemies as a sinister conspiracy threatens New York City.

Storm of the Century, alternatively known as Stephen King's Storm of the Century, is a 1999 horror TV miniseries written by Stephen King and directed by Craig R. Baxley. Unlike many other King mini-series, Storm of the Century was not based upon a Stephen King novel—King wrote it as a screenplay from the beginning. The screenplay was published in February 1999.

Monsters is a syndicated horror anthology series which originally ran from 1988 to 1991 and reran on the Sci-Fi Channel during the 1990s. As of 2011, Monsters airs on NBC Universal's horror/suspense-themed cable channel Chiller in sporadic weekday marathons.In a similar vein to Tales from the Darkside, Monsters shared the same producer, and in some ways succeeded the show. It differed in some respects nonetheless. While Tales sometimes dabbled in stories of science fiction and fantasy, this series was more strictly horror. As the name implies, each episode of Monsters featured a different monster which the story concerned, from the animatronic puppet of a fictional children's television program to mutated, weapon-wielding lab rats.Similar to Tales, however, the stories in Monsters were rarely very straightforward action plots and often contained some ironic twist in which a character's conceit or greed would do him in, often with gruesome results. Adding to this was a sense of comedy often lost on horror productions which might in some instances lighten the audience's mood but in many cases added to the overall eeriness of the production.

Father Vergara—an exorcist, boxer and ex-convict—lives in a remote village in Spain. Hoping to be lost and forgotten, Vergara’s demons catch up to him.

Set in a near-dystopian future, a former cop is forced to take part in a death race where the cars run on human blood. You lose a leg and you lose your head.

A high concept thriller that tells the story of Dr. Ephraim Goodweather, the head of the Center for Disease Control Canary Team in New York City. He and his team are called upon to investigate a mysterious viral outbreak with hallmarks of an ancient and evil strain of vampirism. As the strain spreads, Eph, his team, and an assembly of everyday New Yorkers, wage war for the fate of humanity itself.

Firestarter: Rekindled is a 2002 television miniseries and the sequel to the film adaptation of the Stephen King novel Firestarter. It stars Marguerite Moreau as now-grownup Charlie McGee, Danny Nucci, Dennis Hopper, and Malcolm McDowell as Charlie's old nemesis from the original story, John Rainbird.It debuted as a Sci Fi Pictures two-night miniseries on the Sci Fi Channel.

CDC researcher Abby Arcane investigates what seems to be a deadly swamp-born virus in a small town in Louisiana but she soon discovers that the swamp holds mystical and terrifying secrets. When unexplainable and chilling horrors emerge from the murky marsh, no one is safe.

The vampire Angel, cursed with a soul, moves to Los Angeles and aids people with supernatural-related problems while questing for his own redemption. A spin-off from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

The Hunger is a British/Canadian television horror anthology series, co-produced by Scott Free Productions, Telescene Film Group Productions and the Canadian pay-TV channel The Movie Network. Though it shares a title with the feature film The Hunger the series has no direct plot or character connection to the film, and was created by Jeff Fazio. Originally shown on the Sci Fi Channel in the UK, The Movie Network in Canada and Showtime in the US, the series was broadcast from 1997 to 2000, and is internally organized into two seasons. Each episode was based around an independent story introduced by the host; Terence Stamp hosted each episode for the first season, and was replaced in the second season by David Bowie. Stories tended to focus on themes of self-destructive desire and obsession, with a strong component of soft-core erotica; popular tropes for the stories included cannibalism, vampires, sex, and poison.

On a night in London in 1946, newspaper reporter Ellen McGillivray arrives at the home of legendary literary figure, Herbert George Wells. Expecting to hear of the events and people who formed his prophetic imagination, she is informed of a world in which known scientific boundaries no longer exist. It begins a half-century earlier at London's Imperial College of Science where Wells meets Jane Robbins, a scientist equally fascinated by unnatural phenomenon, and a woman who immediately captures Wells' heart. Through midnight experiments and secret investigations into the paranormal, through the follies of chance and the miracles of fate, Wells and Robbins find themselves slipping into whirlpools of time, both past and present.

Set in the volatile world of 17th century Massachusetts, 'Salem' explores what really fueled the town's infamous witch trials and dares to uncover the dark, supernatural truth hiding behind the veil of this infamous period in American history. In Salem, witches are real, but they are not who or what they seem.