Are You Afraid of the Dark? is a cornerstone of ‘90s children’s entertainment, serving up scares to kids who left their TV on after All That reruns ended. Considering the lasting nightmares it inflicted on all of us, as well as the number of modern stars that originally popped up in an episode or two (like Ryan Gosling and Captain America: Civil War’s Emily VanCamp), the show still finds itself frequently talked about today. So, it should come as no surprise that Nickelodeon is revamping the series for a new audience, and it looks like it’s headed in a surprising new direction.
Deadline reports that a modern iteration of Are You Afraid of the Dark? is set to hit the small screen this October, just in time for Halloween. Featuring a new Midnight Society comprised of Miya Cich, Sam Ashe Arnold, Tamara Smart, Lyliana Wray, and It’s Jeremy Taylor, the three-episode limited series will find our gang of kids haunted by their own stories come-to-life. This is a drastic departure from the original version of the show, in which the children simply tell truly haunting tales from the safety of their own campsite.
Power Ranger’s Dean Israelite will direct the three-episode limited series from a script by BenDavid Grabinski. Rafael Casal, from last year’s highly praised Blindspotting, has also been cast as the show’s big bad, an evil ringmaster of the ominous Carnival Of Doom.
This won’t be the first time Are You Afraid of the Dark? has covered haunted carnivals, as “The Tale of Laughing in the Dark” and “The Tale Of The Ghastly Grinner” are both considered some of the scariest of the entire series. As far as traumatizing kids goes, an evil clown is the best possibility and I won’t hear otherwise.
The release of the Are You Afraid of the Dark? miniseries was originally planned to coincide with a theatrical movie, set to come out October 11th, but Paramount has now shelved the project from its release schedule. Here’s hoping the show does well enough to push the film back to the forefront, though.