The Correct Order To Watch The V/H/S Horror Movies

The first "V/H/S" movie was released in 2012, which was actually four full years before the last manufacturers of VCRs, Funai Electric, finally halted production on the medium. 

VHS was, for those of a certain age, a seminal and ubiquitous technology. Prior to VHS, the only way to see certain cinematic classics was either to go to a repertory theater (which used to be far more common) and see it on the big screen (requiring a well-curated arthouse in your town) or to wait for something to broadcast on network TV (which was often edited for content or time). With the advent of VHS, movies were on-demand for the first time. One could rent their movies from a local video store and watch them at their leisure. For a whole generation, this was the best way to see classic movies for the first time, and the technology, for however much it may be derided for its low quality, was vital and kept cinema alive. 

After the technology became moribund, however (replaced by DVDs, then Blu-rays, then streaming), VHS began to develop dust and cobwebs. In horror movies, VHS cassettes became weird, haunted objects, containing the magnetic memories of a previous decade. In 2012, when the first "V/H/S" movie came out, the technology was almost mythical ... and terrifying. What if you ... found footage? What if there was a snuff film, or worse, a ghost on it? VHS became spooky. 

The "V/H/S" movies are all anthology films, with the conceit that the viewers are watching homemade, found-footage shorts on old VHS cassettes left behind in suspicious rooms. To date, there have been seven "V/H/S" movies from 2012 to 2024, and two of the shorts in the series have been expanded into their own stand-alone features. There was also an anthology Snapchat series in 2018. Below, then, is a hand list of all nine of the "V/H/S" movies and shows to date.

The "V/H/S" films were released as follows.

• "V/H/S" (2012)
• "V/H/S/2" (2013)
• "V/H/S: Viral" (2014)
• "SiREN" (2016)
• "V/H/S: Video Horror Shorts" (2018) (TV Series)
• "V/H/S/94" (2021)
• "V/H/S/99" (2022)
• "Kids vs. Aliens" (January 20, 2023)
• "V/H/S/85" (October 6, 2023)
• "V/H/S/Beyond" (2024)

"SiREN" was adapted from David Bruckner's short "Amateur" from the first "V/H/S," while "Kids vs. Aliens" was adapted from "Slumber Party Alien Abduction," one of the shorts in "V/H/S/2." The "Video Horror Shorts" series was released, perhaps surprisingly, on Snapchat, easily presaging the massive success of Quibi only two years later. "V/H/S/Beyond" will be released this coming October. 

The VHS cassette gimmick is pretty thin throughout this series, and several of the films' "bookend" segments involve VHS cassettes being found at a crime scene. The first two "V/H/S" films feature a common character, Steve, played by Simon Barrett. It's worth noting that many of this generation's more notable horror filmmakers brushed up against the "V/H/S" series at some point, proving to be a testing ground for up-and-coming gorehounds. The first film featured not only Bruckner ("The Ritual," "The Night House"), but Adam Wingard ("You're Next," "The Guest," "Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire"), Radio Silence ("Ready or Not," "Abigail," "Scream 5, 6") and Ti West ("House of the Devil," "X" trilogy).

Other notable directors include Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead ("The Endless," "Loki"), Nacho Vigalondo ("Colossal"), Timo Tjahjanto ("The Night Comes For Us"), Scott Derrickson ("Sinister," "The Black Phone," "Doctor Strange"), Chloe Okuno ("Watcher"), Jennifer Reeder ("Knives and Skin"), Johannes Roberts ("47 Meters Down," "Welcome to Raccoon City"), Tyler MacIntyre ("It's a Wonderful Knife," "Tragedy Girls"), Vanessa & Joseph Winter ("Deadstream"), and the upcoming installment includes a segment from Flanaverse favorite, Kate Siegel. 

Several of the shorts were filmed in a way that VHS wouldn't have been able to accommodate. Only purists, however, may be bothered by that. 

The "V/H/S" films also don't skimp on horror. Each film contains at least five shorts, with some topping out at six. Only the Snapchat series is shorter, with the entire anthology, collectively, running about 16 minutes. Like any anthology series, the "V/H/S" movies are going to vary wildly in quality, with some of the shorts emerging as classics, and others wallowing in awfulness. Overall, though, they are cheap to make and have a high enough hit ratio to continue seemingly indefinitely. Time will tell if this series ever runs out of tape.