When it comes to horror, films tend to dominate the genre, likely because it’s easier and perhaps more palatable to take your dose of terror and tension in bite-sized chunks. There are certainly horror series that are wildly popular, like Mike Flanagan‘s collaborations with Netflix or the classic American Horror Story. But they all navigate that challenge of maintaining (high-strung or undercurrents of) tension for hours on end. So, if you’re looking for another horror series that is a masterclass in sustaining tension, then Apple TV needs to be your next stop.
Based on Victor LaVelle‘s horror fantasy novel, The Changeling is a series that tosses you into a hellish version of the labyrinthine New York City streets, where multiple storylines across generations collide. The narrative itself is mind-bending and elusive, but the show grips you tightly into its claws, creating such visceral fear that it is impossible to look away. Even if you can’t quite differentiate reality from fantasy here, you feel the intensity in your bones. This hidden gem masters the ability to keep viewers on tenterhooks and needs to be on every horror fan’s must-watch list.
What Is Apple TV’s Fantasy Horror Series ‘The Changeling’ About?
While the storytelling approach to The Changeling is multi-generational, the central storyline revolves around the seemingly average couple, Apollo (LaKeith Stanfield) and Emma (Clark Backo). We watch their meet-cute, their montage of falling in love, and the moment they realize they are going to start their own family. But there is something sinister hanging over them. On an overseas trip, Emma had met a mysterious woman who had tied a red string around her wrist and claimed that three wishes of hers would come true if the string was never cut. When Emma returns from the trip six months later, Apollo cuts said string.
Collider Exclusive · Horror Survival Quiz Which Horror Villain Do You Have the Best Chance of Surviving? Jason Voorhees · Michael Myers · Freddy Krueger · Pennywise · Chucky
Five killers. Five completely different ways to die — if you’re not shrewd enough, rapid enough, or self-aware enough to avoid it. Only one of them is the villain your particular set of instincts gives you a fighting chance against. Eight questions will figure out which one.
🏕️Jason
🔪Michael
💤Freddy
🎈Pennywise
🪆Chucky
01
Something feels wrong. You can’t explain it — you just know. What do you do? First instincts are the difference between the survivor and the first act casualty.
02
Where are you most likely to find yourself when things go wrong? Setting is everything in horror. Where you are determines which rules apply.
03
What is your most reliable survival asset? Every survivor has a quality the villain didn’t account for. What’s yours?
04
What kind of fear is hardest for you to fight through? Knowing your weakness is the first step to not dying because of it.
05
You’re with a group when things start going wrong. What’s your role? Horror movies are brutally clear about who survives group situations and who doesn’t.
06
What’s the horror movie mistake you’re most likely to make? Honest self-assessment is a survival skill. Denial is not.
07
What’s your best weapon against something that can’t be stopped by conventional means? Every horror villain has a weakness. The survivors are always the ones who find it.
08
It’s the final scene. You’re the last one standing. How did you make it? The final survivor always has a reason. What’s yours?
Your Survival Odds Have Been Calculated Your Best Chance Is Against…
Your instincts, your strengths, and your particular way of thinking under pressure point to one villain you actually have a fighting chance against. Everyone else — good luck.
Camp Crystal Lake · Friday the 13th
Jason Voorhees
Jason is relentless, but he is also predictable — and that is the gap you would exploit.
He moves in straight lines toward his target. He doesn’t strategise, doesn’t adapt, doesn’t outsmart. He simply pursues.
Your ability to keep moving, apply the environment, and resist the panic that freezes most victims gives you a genuine edge.
The Crystal Lake survivors were always the ones who stopped running in circles and started thinking about terrain, water, and distance.
You think like that. Which means Jason, for all his indestructibility, would face someone who simply refused to be where he expected.
Haddonfield, Illinois · Halloween
Michael Myers
Michael watches before he moves. He is patient, methodical, and almost impossible to detect — until it’s too behind schedule for anyone who isn’t paying close enough attention.
But you are paying attention. You notice the shape in the window, the car parked slightly wrong, the silence where there should be sound.
Michael’s power lies in the invisibility of ordinary suburbia — the fact that nothing ever looks wrong until it already is.
Your spatial awareness and instinct to map every room, every exit, and every shadow before you need them is precisely the quality Laurie Strode had.
You are not a victim waiting to happen. You are someone who already suspects something is wrong — and acts on it.
Elm Street · A Nightmare on Elm Street
Freddy Krueger
Freddy wins by getting inside your head — using your own fears, your own memories, your own subconscious as weapons against you. That strategy requires a target who can be destabilised.
You are harder to destabilise than most. You’ve faced uncomfortable truths about yourself and you haven’t looked away.
The survivors on Elm Street were always the ones who understood what was happening and chose to face it rather than flee from it.
Freddy’s greatest weakness is that his power evaporates in the presence of someone who refuses to give him the fear he feeds on.
Your psychological resilience — the ability to stay grounded when reality itself becomes unreliable — is exactly the quality that keeps you alive here.
Derry, Maine · It
Pennywise
Pennywise is antique, shapeshifting, and feeds on terror — but it has one critical vulnerability: it cannot function against someone who genuinely stops being afraid of it.
The Losers Club didn’t survive because they were braver than everyone else. They survived because they faced their fears together, and faced them honestly.
You ask the questions others avoid. You look directly at what frightens you rather than turning away.
That directness — the refusal to let fear fester in the gloomy — is Pennywise’s worst nightmare.
It chose the wrong target when it chose you. You are exactly the kind of person whose fear tastes like nothing at all.
Chicago · Child’s Play
Chucky
Chucky’s greatest advantage is that nobody takes him seriously until it’s already too behind schedule. He exploits the gap between how something looks and what it actually is.
You don’t have that gap. You take threats seriously regardless of how they present — and you never make the mistake of underestimating something because of its size or appearance.
Chucky relies on surprise, on the delay between recognition and response. You close that delay faster than almost anyone.
Your instinct to treat every unfamiliar thing with appropriate scepticism — rather than dismissing it because it seems absurd — is the exact quality that keeps you breathing.
Against Chucky, not laughing is already winning. You are very good at not laughing.
The woman’s words start to carry more weight when Emma psychologically spirals after the birth of their son. She starts losing sleep, receiving texts that disappear (or does she?), and eventually believes the newborn isn’t human at all. Is it postpartum depression and PTSD, or is there truth to her fears? It all comes to a head one fateful evening, where an unimaginable incident occurs, and Emma disappears into the night. As such, the series follows Apollo’s fantastical and horrifying search for Emma, which is layered with traumatic stories from their childhood (including absent fathers and house fires), and of their parents’ lives.
‘The Changeling’ Is a Masterclass of Visceral Performances From Start to Finish
The Changeling‘s ability to maintain tension and the audience’s attention is borne out of the cast’s stellar performances. In the lead is Stanfield, whose eyes are as poignantly expressive as they are in his previous roles, like in Get Out. From the wide-eyed innocence and determination to not be like his absent father to the twitching fear and rage later in the series, we are utterly trapped in the emotional depths of his eyes. Among his general acting prowess, Stanfield’s ocular talent allows the camera to indulge in plenty of close-ups, an intimate way to heighten the eerie feelings in the atmosphere. Everything Apollo feels as he caws his way through the gloomy underbelly of New York is immediately felt by us.
Next to him is the equally attention-grabbing Backo, who carries the weight of blurring the lines of reality in The Changeling. During the early episodes, Backo’s psychologically demanding performance creates the backbone of the show’s mystery, as Emma is the first to show signs of the potential curse looming over their family. We are constantly questioning if Emma is experiencing a severe form of postpartum depression and PTSD from her childhood, or if she really sees something we cannot. But Backo’s grueling performance ensures both interpretations carry equal weight — it doesn’t matter what the truth is, because the impact is so powerful.
Later in the series, it is Adina Porter playing Apollo’s mother, Lillian, who delivers a powerhouse performance that cinches what makes The Changeling‘s mastery over tension so meaningful. Porter flits in and out of the present timeline (where Alexis Louder takes over the role of teenage Lillian in the flashbacks), and usually leaves her two cents in a take-it-or-leave-it manner. But in a later episode, Porter dominates the screen with a gut-wrenching, soulful performance that weaves Lillian’s traumatic backstory with the pitfalls of everyday life in the present. She reminds us that things like low wages and mental illness are just as harmful and terrifying as the creepy forest, allowing the atmosphere to creep into the show’s discourse.
Tension Is the Source of Horror in Apple TV’s ‘The Changeling’
Clark Backo staring ahead in a restaurant in The ChangelingImage via Apple TV
The first season of The Changeling isn’t necessarily meant to be fully understood, but is supposed to be felt. It only covers half of the source material, so the season establishes multiple moving parts that will be explained in a potential second season. As such, building tension and anticipation is paramount in this season and becomes the epicenter of all the horror felt by the audience.
While the performances are the cornerstone to achieving this, they are supplemented by unsettling camera angles and non-linear storytelling. By oscillating between timelines, it creates a disorienting effect that keeps us on our toes while still allowing the power of generational trauma to be felt. Everything is designed to keep us off-kilter, sustaining a truly unsettling watch from start to finish.
The finale will leave you eagerly awaiting Season 2.
The Changeling is a completely underrated horror series that succeeds in making every scene brimming with tension, whether that be due to trembling anticipation or overflowing fear. Stanfield, Backo, and Porter lead us down a gloomy and sordid path, where the harsh realities of everyday life are reimagined into insidious visuals that cause just as much damage. Featuring scorching performances and a haunting tale, these eight episodes deserve a bigger audience and will entice you from their first eerie scenes.
