Best New Horror Movies - May 2026 in Review

May 2026 was a weird month for horror. Not weird in a bad way, but weird in that the best new horror movies weren’t coming from the places you’d expect. No major studio tentpoles. No legacy franchise sequels. Instead, May delivered a batch of original horror that ranged from genuinely unsettling to gleefully trashy, with a few that landed somewhere in between. Whether you caught these in theaters or on streaming, here’s a look back at what the month had to offer for fans of horror films.

The month’s biggest surprise might have been Affection, a tight little memory-loop nightmare starring Jessica Rothe that crept into theaters early in May and quietly built word of mouth. Then there was Obsession, which technically snuck into late April but was still filling theaters through May, sitting at 95% on Rotten Tomatoes and an 8.2 on IMDb. And later in the month, the internet-born Backrooms finally got its big-screen adaptation. Between all of that, May had more to offer horror fans than most summer months do. Here’s how it all shook out.

The Ones Worth Losing Sleep Over

Obsession is the real deal. Director Curry Barker took a premise that sounds almost campy on paper, a guy breaks a wish-granting willow tree to win over his crush, and turned it into something genuinely dark. Michael Johnston carries the film as the lovesick lead who gets exactly what he wished for and then some. The movie works because Barker doesn’t rush the horror. The first act plays almost like a teen romance, lulling you into comfort before the wish starts twisting in on itself. The slow transition from fairy tale to nightmare is handled with real patience, and by the time the consequences fully reveal themselves, you’re in too deep to look away. The supporting cast, including Inde Navarrette and Cooper Tomlinson, keeps the emotional stakes grounded even as things get increasingly sinister. With a Metacritic score of 77 backing up that Rotten Tomatoes number, this one’s earned the hype.

Affection flew under a lot of radars, which is a shame. Jessica Rothe (who proved her horror chops years ago in Happy Death Day) plays Ellie, a woman whose memory keeps resetting, trapping her in a cyclical nightmare with a man claiming to be her husband. The 80% on Rotten Tomatoes feels right. It’s a smart, lean movie that trusts its audience to piece things together alongside Ellie. At just 90 minutes, director BT Meza keeps the screws tightening without wasting a scene. Rothe is excellent at playing someone who knows something is deeply wrong but can’t quite hold onto why. Joseph Cross walks a careful line as the husband figure, never letting you settle on whether he’s a threat or a victim. My only gripe is the ending, which wraps things up a little too neatly for a film that spent most of its runtime being deliciously ambiguous.

Solid Scares, With Caveats

Saccharine has the single most disturbing premise of any horror movie this year so far. A lovelorn medical student named Hana starts eating human ashes as part of an obscure weight-loss craze and gets haunted by the ghost of the person she’s consuming. Natalie Erika James, who directed Relic back in 2020, brings that same sense of creeping domestic horror to a story about body image, grief, and literally digesting the dead. Midori Francis does strong work as Hana, selling both the desperation that leads to such a bizarre choice and the mounting terror when the consequences arrive. The practical effects during the haunting sequences are genuinely gross in the best way. The film sits at 6.5 on IMDb and 65 on Metacritic, and I think those middling scores reflect a second half that starts explaining too much. The first hour, though, is some of the best body horror I’ve seen since The Fly.

Backrooms is the adaptation of the creepypasta internet phenomenon, and your enjoyment will probably depend on how familiar you are with the source material. Kane Parsons, who created the original viral found-footage videos, directed this himself, which gives it an authenticity that a studio-hired gun wouldn’t have managed. The premise starts simply enough: a strange doorway appears in the basement of a furniture showroom. From there, Parsons builds out those endless liminal spaces with real craft. Chiwetel Ejiofor brings genuine weight to what could have been a thin role, and Renate Reinsve matches him beat for beat. The production design is the real star here. Those yellow-lit corridors with the buzzing fluorescent lights create a sense of wrongness that’s hard to shake. With a 7.1 on IMDb and a 77 on Metacritic, critics and audiences largely agreed this one works. Where it stumbles is in the third act, when it has to commit to an explanation for what the Backrooms actually are. The mystery was scarier than the answer.

Passenger comes from André Øvredal, who knows his way around creature features (Trollhunter, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark). This one’s a tight, contained horror film about a young couple who witnesses a gruesome highway accident and soon realizes they didn’t leave the crash scene alone. A demonic presence called the Passenger latches onto them and won’t stop until it claims them both. At 94 minutes, it doesn’t overstay its welcome, and Jacob Scipio and Lou Llobell have good chemistry as the couple under siege. Øvredal is great at building dread in confined spaces, and the sequences set inside the couple’s car are claustrophobic enough to make you want to crack a window. It’s not reinventing anything, but it’s a well-executed delivery system for scares. Melissa Leo shows up in a supporting role that adds some welcome gravity.

The Guilty Pleasures (and One Rough Watch)

Speed Demon is exactly the kind of movie its title suggests. A nun who’s lost her faith has to perform her first exorcism on a possessed passenger aboard a high-speed train, and the possessed passenger is hellbent on crashing it. Yes, it’s basically The Exorcist meets Speed. No, it doesn’t pull that off with the grace of either film. But Katie Cassidy commits fully to the role, and William H. Macy showing up in a horror B-movie is the kind of unexpected casting that keeps things entertaining. The TMDB score of 4.7 is harsh but not entirely undeserved. The CGI is rough, and some of the dialogue lands with a thud. But if you’re in the mood for something ridiculous that doesn’t take itself seriously, you could do worse on a weeknight.

Then there’s Chum, which combines a shark attack movie with a slasher on a yacht. The concept has potential. A newlywed couple joins friends on a Mediterranean yacht excursion, only to end up caught between a predatory shark in the water and a psychopathic killer on board. But with a 3.0 on TMDB, this one didn’t work for most people, and I have to agree. The kills are uninspired, the twists are telegraphed from the opening scene, and the sun-drenched Mediterranean setting is wasted on what feels like it was shot in a single weekend. Alice Eve does her best, but the script gives her nothing to work with. Skip this one unless you’re a completist for shark horror, and even then, maybe just rewatch Jaws instead.

How May 2026 Stacks Up

Overall, May was a solid month for horror in 2026. Obsession is the clear standout, the kind of original horror that makes you want to see what Curry Barker does next. Affection and Saccharine both brought smart, character-driven scares with distinctive premises. Backrooms successfully translated internet horror to the big screen, even if it couldn’t quite stick the landing. Passenger proved that a simple concept executed well is always worth watching. And the lower tier at least gave us some memorable B-movie moments, even if Chum should probably be tossed back.

If you missed any of these, Obsession and Affection are the two I’d prioritize. For fans who like their horror with a side of social commentary, Saccharine is worth your time too. Browse more horror films in our collection, and keep an eye out for what June brings. We’re nearly halfway through 2026, and the genre continues to deliver.