This is a slate report, not a review of any one title. We’re scoring Screamify’s Micro Horrors™ lineup, vertical horror series in short episodes made for phones, as a package: range, depth and how easy it is to get started. It comes in at 8.6.
Range: strong
Five premises with almost no overlap. A robotaxi that picks its own route (Autonomous). A masked slasher at game night (Game Night: Survive the Slasher). Two streamers who summon a demon for views (Scary Mary). A woman followed by a stalker, shot as found footage (In Sight). And, still to come, a Cherokee-legend witch in a period piece (Raven Mocker). Tech horror, slasher, horror comedy, found footage and folk horror is a wide spread for five titles.
Depth: good, with one thin spot
Episode counts run 16 (Autonomous), 20 (Scary Mary) and 32 (Game Night), so there’s real viewing time on three of the four. In Sight is a single episode. It works as a sampler but it’s the weakest part of the package. That’s most of the gap between this score and a 9.
Getting started: easy
Episode 1 of Autonomous, Game Night and Scary Mary is free in the Screamify app on iOS and Android. A short free first episode is the right way to sell a format people haven’t tried yet.
Raven Mocker: holding at 8.9
We scored the announcement an 8.7 in July and nudged it to 8.9 at wrap in September. Today’s news is a window: later this year. There’s no date, and we don’t move a number on a window. It stays at 8.9 until we see it.
The facts that matter: 20 episodes, a Screamify Original, written by John White and directed by Gabe McCauley. The listing promises a heart-eating witch out of Cherokee legend, a Civil War love story that never ended, and three teenagers in 1971 who walk straight into it.
Slate: 8.6. Raven Mocker anticipation: 8.9, unchanged.
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