Spine Chillers (1980)
Season 1
Spine Chillers was a 1980 British children's supernatural television series produced by the Jackanory team and broadcast on BBC1. It featured readings of classic ghost and horror stories aimed at older children, and ran for 20 episodes of 10 minutes each.
20 Episodes
- The Red Room
E1The Red RoomThe story begins with the narrator, who’s standing by a fire in an unknown room, confidently announcing to a couple of rather creepy elderly people that he’s never seen a ghost and is not easily frightened. These creepy people – a man with a withered arm and an older woman – warn the narrator ominously that he’s doing whatever it is he’s doing (we don't know the details yet) by his own choosing. The sense of foreboding increases when another even more ghoulish old man suddenly appears. This "man with the shade" (7) enters the room and coughs up a storm. In the midst of a tense silence, the narrator asks to be shown to the haunted room. The man with the withered arm tells him to take the candle outside the door. If the narrator wants to go to "the red room" on "this night of all nights" (16, 23), says the old man, he has to go alone. The narrator doesn't seem to be phased by these warnings, gets directions from the man with the withered arm, goes out the door, picks up the candle, and leaves the others behind. After a walk up a spiral staircase, through a long, moonlit passageway, and up a small flight of stairs he finds himself at the door of the red room. We learn from the narrator, who now feels slightly nervous, that he is in Lorraine Castle. It’s been abandoned for eighteen months, since "her ladyship" left it behind. (We learn that the old people are the custodians, or caretakers, of the castle.) Apparently there have been many little incidents in this haunted, red room, dating back to the "tragic end" (31) of a joke played by a husband on his young wife there long ago. Most recently, a young duke died while trying to spend a night in the haunted room. This news doesn't bode well for our narrator, who is trying to do just what the duke did. There is a sense of the narrator's bravado fading The narrator enters the red room, which is large, dark, full of black and red furnishings and creepy shadows. He walks round of the room with his ca - The Mezzotint
E4The Mezzotint"The Mezzotint" is ghost story by British writer M. R. James, included in his first collection Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904). This is the story of Mr. Williams, the curator of a university art museum who receives a mezzotint from an art dealer. The very disturbing engraving changes each time Mr. Williams and the colleagues he enlists look at it. - Sredni-Vashtar
E7Sredni-VashtarThe story concerns a sickly ten-year-old boy named Conradin, who lives with his strict cousin and guardian, Mrs De Ropp. Conradin rebels against her and invents a new religion, idolizing as a vengeful, merciless god a polecat-ferret he names Sredni Vashtar. Conradin keeps the ferret hidden in a cage in the garden shed, and worships it in secret. The story comes to a climax when his cousin discovers his god. - A School Story
E8A School StoryTwo men are discussing the folklore of the private schools they attended. One tells of a Latin teacher named Mr. Sampson who kept a Byzantine coin that he would show his students. The narrator's friend gives the teacher a strange message in Latin which translates to "remember the well among the four", though he doesn't know why he wrote it. Later another paper shows up translating to "If you don't come to me, I'll come to you" and it visibly worries Sampson. Later at night the narrator's friend sees a man sitting on Sampson's window-sill, but when he returns with the narrator he's gone. Sampson is missing the next day. Years later a body is found - with Sampson's coin - in a well that sits between four trees. - In the Avu Observatory
E9In the Avu Observatory"In the Avu Observatory" by H. G. Wells, told by Freddie Jones, "In the Avu Observatory" is a short story of a man working in an observatory in Borneo who gets attacked by a strange bat-like creature. This early work by H. G. Wells was originally published in 1894. - The Penance
E11The PenanceThe Penance is an edgy and at times horrifying tale about a normally amiable man who has killed the cat belonging to his neighbour's children, on the grounds that he suspected it of attacking his chickens. His efforts to make up for this awful deed are met with hostility, and the children take the opportunity to plan a dire revenge. - The Stolen Bacillus
E13The Stolen BacillusThe story depicts the interaction between a ostensibly absent-minded bacteriologist who invited a curious stranger to his lab. After showing him stained image under the microscope, the stranger inquires about live samples of the bacterium. When the bacteriologist shows him the "pestilence imprisoned," the inner monologue of the stranger reveals he plans to poison London's drinking water; it is suggested that the visitor is a foreign anarchists. - More Spinned Against
E18More Spinned Against"More Spinned Against" by John Wyndham, told by John Woodvine. Wyndham had quite a fascination with spiders. In this early Wyndham short story a man who collects spiders meets a rather very grisly fate. If you have arachnophobia, this may not be the story for you. - The Hounds of Fate
E19The Hounds of FateIn this story a man is down and out traveling on foot when he comes upon a farm house. It turns out that he resembles a relative who left town some time ago and is hated by the entire village. Desperate he assumes the identity of the departed relative. This puts him in a precarious position with an unhappy ending.
