Bennett Glace and Jim Hickcox are podcasting for their lives this Halloween season by talking through every episode of Season 1 of Showtime’s Masters of Horror 

Split Tooth mainstays Jim Hickcox and Bennett Glace made a near-fatal mistake when they took a drive down a winding mountain pass. The pair barely survived an accident and they may soon wish they hadn’t. Jigsaw himself has a challenge for Jim and Bennett: record podcasts for each episode in Masters of Horror Season 1. The catch? They can’t talk for more than 20 minutes or the room will fill with poison gas. Will the pair make it through all 13 episodes of the series without betraying Jigsaw’s unconscionable constraints of brevity? 

Created by Mick Garris, Masters of Horror was a two-season series on Showtime that challenged genre legends to create an hour-long horror film. Follow along as Bennett and Jim are forced to spend no more than 20 minutes discussing each episode — featuring underrated work from site-favorite filmmakers like Tobe Hooper, Stuart Gordon, and Larry Cohen, and horror icons such as John Carpenter and Dario Argento — from the first season of the series or face a room full of poisonous gas.

All episodes will be added to this page, in order of release (newest at bottom), as they are released. Listen to the series below, or on Spotify, Apple, or Amazon:

Find the whole (pod)Casters of Horror: A Journey Through Masters of Horror Season 1 Playlist here, or scroll below for each episode

Ep. 1: Incident On and Off a Mountain Road (Don Coscarelli)

The first episode of Masters of Horror reflects the predicament Bennett and Jim find themselves in. Bree Turner stars as a woman who takes an ill-fated trip down the titular pass. She encounters a backwoods murderer whose whole shtick is a touch too familiar. Don Coscarelli directed the first four Phantasm films, Bubba Ho-Tep, and John Dies at the End, among others. Come along as Bennett and Jim tackle a trip through familiar genre territory.

Ep. 2: Dreams In The Witch House (Stuart Gordon)

It’s not Stuart Gordon’s best Lovecraft adaptation, but Masters of Horror’s sophomore efforts gives your favorite sophomoric podcasters plenty to discuss. In his adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s The Dreams in the Witch House, a graduate student (Ezra Godden) begins having horrible dreams of a witch and a rat-faced man after moving into a cheap room in a boarding house, while his new neighbor may not be the innocent mother she appears to be. Give it a listen to hear Bennett’s thoughts on the difference between hitting yourself in the head versus hitting your head on something and much, much more.

Ep. 3: Dance of the Dead (Tobe Hooper)

Masters of Horror doesn’t have the best reputation and perhaps no episode has attracted more derision than Tobe Hooper’s post-apocalyptic Dance of the Dead. Among the most Nu-metal pieces of media ever created, Dance of the Dead follows a post-nuclear war town with drugged-up teenagers looking for thrills. Featuring Robert Englund as a twisted night club emcee, it’s the first episode of the series to truly feel like a nightmare that you can’t see on network TV. Unsurprisingly, Bennett and Jim find plenty to love in the episode. They sing the praises of Robert Englund’s go-for-broke performance, the scuzzy mise-en-scène, and Hooper’s total disinterest in narrative. It’s another late-career triumph from one of the best to ever do it. 

Ep. 4: Jenifer (Dario Argento)

Yowza! Put the kids to bed before you check out this episode. Dario Argento keeps it spooky and sexy in his underrated installment. Steven Weber (Dracula: Dead and Loving It) gets in way over his head during Argento’s Jenifer. After saving a young girl’s life, he finds she has a unique appetite that puts everyone around her in danger. With queasy sexuality and relentless momentum, the giallo master proves that his mid-aughts are just as interesting as any period in his career. All that’s missing is an appearance from Asia Argento!

Ep. 5: Chocolate (Mick Garris)

Series maestro Mick Garris writes and directs this series lowlight. Bennett and Jim don’t break from consensus here. Gangs of New York’s Henry Thomas appears in Mick Garris’ high-concept romance as a food scientist with a psychic connection to a mysterious woman. Jim and Bennett try their best to see the best in Chocolate. If nothing else, they agree that Matt Frewer is having fun. 

Ep. 6: Homecoming (Joe Dante)

One of the most acclaimed Masters of Horror installments, Joe Dante’s political satire takes Jim and Bennett back to the 2004 election. Slain servicemen rise from the grave in Homecoming to cast their ballots against an unnamed (and poorly imitated) George W. Bush. Your hosts discuss Small Soldiers, their memories of Bush-era America, and much more.

Ep. 7: The Deer Woman (John Landis)

John Landis’ horny horror-comedy indulges many of the series’ worst impulses with its tale of a seductive cryptid. Max Landis earned his first screenwriting credit with his father’s entry in Masters of Horror’s first season. It’s an auteurist effort in the worst sense, blending plenty of misogyny into its tonal soup. In episode seven, Bennett and Jim weigh the merits of John Landis’ careers in both horror and comedy. 

Ep. 8: John Carpenter’s Cigarette Burns

If you’ve seen one episode of Masters of Horror, it’s probably this entry from the master himself, John Carpenter. It’s often regarded as the best, and the presence of Udo Kier as a mysterious film collector goes a long way in helping establish its atmosphere. Otherwise, it’s a pretty standard episode of the show. Your hosts discuss the dangers of depicting “art that kills you” and the highs and lows of its masterful director’s career.

Ep. 9: The Fair Haired Child (William Malone)

The podcast enters a stretch of top-notch episodes with William Malone’s visually distinct and genuinely creepy installment. Throughout the season, the boys have made plenty of jokes at the expense of directors like Malone. “Really, he’s a master of horror?” Like feardotcom and House on Haunted Hill, The Fair Haired Child proves that William Malone definitely deserves that distinction. With strange flashbacks and an occult mystery plot, the episode has some of the most arresting images and performances of the series. Despite some Nu-metal styling and a sometimes exposition-heavy script, this is one episode that could hopefully encourage viewers to give its director’s output a second look.

Ep. 10: Sick Girl (Lucky McKee)

An unusually sweet episode with two eccentric central performances wows your hosts. Don’t let all the goop, slime, and creepy critters fool you; Lucky McKee’s Sick Girl is remarkably tender for an episode of Masters of Horror. Angela Bettis returns from Mckee’s May (2001) in a superficially similar story of an eccentric loner searching for love. Here, she’s an entomologist whose field of study and cartton voices tends to send partners packing. Some viewers may find her performance grating, but Jim and Bennett agree it’s a series highlight while also cheering the performance of Erin “Misty Mae” Brown.

Ep. 11: Pick Me Up (Larry Cohen)

Pick Me Up isn’t just a great episode of TV — it’s an underrated gem that Bennett and Jim both recommend highly to all genre fans. Michael Moriarty delivers a performance for the ages in Larry Cohen’s final directorial effort, the high-concept thrill ride Pick Me Up. Moriarty is one of two roving killers who menace a bus full of passengers before trailing our final girl (The Waterboy’s Fairuza Balk). One killer’s a trucker who picks up passengers before dispatching them. The other’s a drifter who thumbs rides to make his kills. Come for that can’t-miss premise and stay for the inventive kills and one-of-a-kind acting choices.

Ep. 12: Haeckel’s Tale (John McNaughton)

It’s an undead orgy on this fun yet frivolous episode which sees John McNaughton fill in for George Romero in the director’s chair. The penultimate episode of Season 1 finds Masters of Horror looking more like “Goosebumps for adults” than ever. Its title character finds himself confronting horrible truths about the ways love and lust can endure after death. Bennett and Jim wonder what the Haeckel estate must think of this strange tale, ask which periods Jon Polito could realistically live in, and discuss McNaughton’s classicWild Things. 

Ep. 13: Imprint (Takashi Miike)

Imprint scared Showtime’s censors enough to pull it from the release schedule. Even our seasoned podcasters have to admit it’s pretty grim. Takashi Miike is back to his old tricks with Imprint. It’s got gore, grotesqueries, and all sorts of torture. Bennett and Jim also found it far more atmospheric than your average Season 1 episode. As with last year’s look at Miike on Split Picks, our hosts admire Miike’s craft while occasionally wincing at some of his more excessive decisions. Imprint has plenty of images that still surprise in 2024 and must’ve been utterly scandalous almost 20 years ago. Not sure you can handle Imprint? Skip watching it and listen to Bennett and Jim’s discussion instead.

Ep. 14: The Power Ranking of all Masters of Horror Season 1 Episodes

Rather than bore listeners with the details of their miraculous escape, Bennett and Jim share their end-of-season reflections and rankings. And though Masters of Horror is often regaled as an underwhelming excursion, our (podCasters) look back fondly on the majority of its chapters. As a whole, they feel the season was a successful experiment with a few obvious, protruding duds. But which episodes will they rank highest? Find out here in the series wrap-up episode.

Find the complete October Horror 2024 series here:

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