13 chilling stories in Star Wars for Halloween

It’s that spooky time of year again, so I thought it would be fun to share some of the scariest stories in a galaxy far, far away. From horror to the creepy crawlies, here are 13 stories that are perfect for Halloween.

Zombies on Geonosis

The two episodes of Clone Wars “Legacy of Terror” and “Brain Invaders” hit on every single beat of horror a zombie movie would. Set up in the first episode, Obi-Wan, Anakin, and Cody meet the Geonosian Queen, Karina the Great. She commands her armies of undead Geonosians to attack our heroes as they lumber out of the catacombs. She wants to take control of the Jedi with brain worms that will take over their minds. Despite burying the queen alive, in the very next episode, a brain worm infects a clone that stows away on the ship Ahsoka Tano and Barriss Offee are on. In one of the earliest hints of Order 66, the clones slowly lose their minds as they’re infected one by one and attack the Jedi. Ahsoka barely defends herself when Barriss is possessed and begs Ahsoka to kill her. You know, for kids! Both episodes are eerie especially the second one as Ahsoka has nowhere to escape in space.

Anything with the Nightsisters

The Dark Side witches of Star Wars are always a great addition whenever they pop up. They have numerous episodes throughout Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels and Merrin’s one of the main characters of Jedi: Fallen Order.

With witches comes their own version of dark magic. They even have their own versions of zombies too that fight against General Grievous’ droid army. Dathomir seems to breed the sinister as this is where Darth Maul came from. His brother, Savage, was filled with Nightsister magic to essentially turn him from a gentle man to a Frankenstein-like beast. Possessions, ghosts, and necromancy are all wielded at the fingertips of these witches.

As another entry, spider Maul in “Brothers” is terrifying, easily one of the creepiest moments in all of Clone Wars. With his mind gone, Maul is essentially a beast hunting Savage. It’s really great.

Dark Legends

Dark Legends by George Mann is a collection of stories that people in the Star Wars universe would tell around a campfire. They’re sort of canon, but in the sense of someone going, “Hey, did you hear about the tale of a werewolf on this planet?”

These short stories are great for all ages that read more like dark fairy tales. To give some examples, one is about Darth Noctyss’ search for immortality which turns her into a monstrous creature. Another is about the Grand Inquisitor taking Force-sensitive children from an orphanage like Nosferatu. There’s a story of a gentle Shistavanen AKA the wolf people of Star Wars, becoming feral in the light of the moon and hunting his crew mates. The Target-exclusive version of the book even has the first appearance of the Drengir, the horrific plant monsters in The High Republic, who I will talk more about in a moment.

Dark Legends is a great read this time of year and Grant Griffin’s artwork for each story is hauntingly beautiful.

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Star Wars Resistance‘s “Into the Unknown”

Star Wars Resistance isn’t known for being a scary series. Tailored for a younger audience, it tends to stay in the realms of slapstick despite its stellar and accurate portrayal of how fascism invades during peacetime. But there is one episode that does play in the realms of horror and that’s the season two opener “Into the Unknown.”

In the spirit of a Goosebumps novel, Kaz, Torra, and Neeku have to fix gravity issues on the Colossus. The old ship, once on the sunny planet of Castilon, is now traveling through space throwing all the corridors into darkness. Little do our heroes know that there is a First Order droid on their vessel and it starts to hunt them from the shadows.

It’s a good little spooky story for a little one to get in the Halloween spirit. And fun fact, the Frist Order’s droid is named MB-13A. The “MB” is short for “Murder Ball” which was its nickname during production.

Spiders and Bugs

When writing this, I realized I had three separate entries dedicated to spiders and creepy crawlies. I can’t help it. Bugs are creepy!

These were from three different shows which are The Mandalorian “The Passenger,” Star Wars Rebels “The Mystery of Chopper Base,” and The Bad Batch “Infested.” Each of these episodes has some kind of crawly creature facing off against our heroes. They have to venture into the dark nests of the beasts to complete their various missions. It leads to some moments that absolutely make my skin crawl anytime I watch these episodes. They’re definitely not for anyone who might have arachnophobia.

The Star Wars: Adventures Vader’s Castle series

Vader’s Castle is a series from the Star Wars: Adventures line of comics. Written for kids, the premise is usually set around a group of smugglers stuck around Darth Vader’s castle on Mustafar trying to escape. They share stories with each other to try and keep their spirits up, but the tales are spooky ones. For example, one is of a monster hunting Tarkin. That’s because Tarkin had a hand in its creation like a Star Wars Victor Frankenstein, revealing he was the monstrous one all along. Count Dooku takes on a vampire-like persona in another one, which is very fun since Christopher Lee has played Dracula in his long career. Vaneé, Darth Vader’s assistant, is a reoccurring character in the series as we get to see his own downfall into madness thanks to the Dark Side.

What’s fun is that Vaneé and some of the Vader’s Castle stories have been adapted into our next entry on this list.

LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales

The LEGO Star Wars franchise is a ton of fun and oftentimes get to play within various genres. In Terrifying Tales, they tackled their own playful version of horror in a galaxy far, far away.

Like Vader’s Castle, the special is set up as a group of people, one being Vaneé, who share stories with Poe Dameron and his friends about spooky dealings in the galaxy. From Darth Maul to Kylo Ren, there’s a lot of fun to be had. My personal favorite is the what-if scenario of The Wookiee’s Paw. First of all, gross. Wookiees are sentient beings in the world. That’s like carrying around someone’s hand. But it’s a fun alternate universe of Luke Skywalker taking a different path which leads him to work with Darth Vader.

LEGO specials are always a fun outing.

As an honorable mention, I also want to bring up the “Ghost Protocol” mission in LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. The first time I saw Nobot’s blank stare as the camera turned creeped the heck out of me. His entire story is pretty eerie as Star Wars Explained discusses in this video.

Lord Momin

The Charles Soule run of Darth Vader might just be one of my personal favorite comics ever created which includes the darkly twisted Lord Momin.

Anything with this unique Sith Lord is deranged. He is an artist, creating art from animal and sentients’ body parts. The people of his planet locked him away in an asylum until he was rescued by the Sith Lady Darth Shaa. After he rose to power, he was killed by the Jedi.

Where it gets creepier is his spirit continues to haunt his mask. As it came into the possession of Palpatine and then Darth Vader, Momin would possess people around them through his mask to communicate with the Sith Lord. He would take control of their bodies, killing them in the process so they were his puppets to manipulate.

Momin is such a scary Sith Lord, but he’s one of my personal favorites (Sorry, Vader).

The High Republic: Into the Dark

Star Wars The High Republic: Into the Dark is a novel filled with horror elements. After the Great Disaster, Jedi Padawan Reath Silas along with Knight Dez Rydan and Masters Cohmac Vitus and Orla Jareni get stuck on an abandoned space station until the crisis has passed. The entire station has a lingering presence of the Dark Side that the Jedi can’t quite figure out. They find a series of statues that they assume wrong are the source. Taking the statues to purify them on Coruscant, they accidentally free something far more terrifying:

The Drengir, carnivorous plants that are not only difficult to kill but they can poison someone’s mind with the Dark Side. The Sith feared them so much that they were the ones who sealed the Drengir away with the statues.

Dear reader, I must say that this audiobook almost made me get into a car accident. Because I did not know that the Dringir could talk. The first time these plants whispered in grave voices, “MEAT!” I slammed on my breaks because it startled me so much. From the dark, abandoned space station with its own dangers and the plant monsters hunting our heroes, this book has some of the creepiest moments of The High Republic.

Galaxy of Fear

Full disclosure, I had never heard of this series before until I watched a video by The Geeky Waffles also covering spooky Star Wars stories. That was also the inspiration for this article, so go check out their video. But as the host Candace described the series, there was no way I could leave it off the list.

Galaxy of Fear was a 12-book series of young reader novels by John Whitman released in the 1990s. Taking place after A New Hope, they follow two Force-sensitive orphans Tash and Zak who are on the run from the Empire. Their uncle is a researcher which takes them on many creepy adventures across the galaxy including run-ins with Darth Vader himself.

Again described as another Goosebumps-like story in Star Wars, I’m going to have to check this series out myself. Thank you to The Geeky Waffles for bringing them to my attention to add to my reading list.

Anything with the Nameless

These creatures have many names. Whether it goes by the Nameless, the Great Leveler, or the Shrii-ka-rai, these eaters of the Force were the worst nightmare of the Jedi of The High Republic. With the ability to petrify a Jedi and turn them to dust, they show a Jedi their greatest fears before they died.

Our best looks at these beasts are in The High Republic main comic and also Trail of Shadows. One example was when Jedi Knight Keeve Trennis was near one. It warped her perception of reality so much that even her old master Sskeer turned into an unrecognizable beast before her eyes. Jedi Investigator Emerick Caphtor almost fell to one when it showed him his friend Stellan Gios begging for help. He was saved by a non-Force user, Sian Holt, who was unaffected by the beast.

These things are terrifying because of the fact the Jedi cannot be close to them. How do they battle something that can turn the Force against them? As the High Republic is still being written, we’ll have to wait and see how this story unfolds.

A New Dawn

Star Wars: A New Dawn introduced one of the most horrific villains in all of Star Wars that we don’t talk about enough.

Count Vidian is an absolute psychopath. He would fit in swimmingly with any slasher film. I lovingly call him “Business Vader” because he has all of the brutality of Darth Vader with none of the Force powers. Born a human, Denetrius Vidian remade himself after contracting a terminal illness. He replaced his entire body with cybernetics until only his mind was left. He has no emotions or mercy. At one point at a mining facility, a worker off-handedly told him off because his demands were unreasonable. In response, he pushed her into a vat of acid. As she screamed for help, he took up a pole and pushed her further into the vat until she melted.

This is just one example of the monster that is Count Vidian. I firmly believe that he had to be taken out so quickly because he was a force to be reckoned with. If he had survived, then he would have been one of the most feared people in the entire Empire.

Death Troopers

How could Death Troopers by Joe Schreiber not be on this list? It is the original zombies in Star Wars story. It is a straight horror story written for adults.

When the Imperial prison barge, Purge, breaks down, a boarding party is sent to investigate it. Little do they know there is a disease where death is just the beginning as the people who died are brought back as the undead. A group must find a way to survive as the hoards of zombies come for them in the dead of space.

While it is in Legends, if there is ever going to be a horror movie for Star Wars, Death Troopers is a classic. It should absolutely be adapted for the big screen.

Those are some of my favorite spooky tales. Let us know your favorites in the comments! Happy Halloween, dear reader!