It was 2014 when Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith first let us inside No. 9. Since then, the anthology series has gone from strength to strength and is showing no sign of slowing down with the seventh series starting last week. Pemberton and Shearsmith deliver smart, challenging scripts and often unrecognizable performances. The brilliance of their writing often has us laughing one minute, then terrified the next. It’s staggering how they create well-rounded and effective stories in just half-an-hour, while superbly balancing horror and comedy. The fear they instill in the audience is habitually affecting and disturbing. Here are the nine scariest moments from Inside No.9
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The Sardine Song – “Sardines” (Season 1, Episode 1)
The first episode was a perfect introduction to what Pemberton and Shearsmith had in store for us. It’s a simple concept of a group of characters playing Sardines in a bedroom wardrobe. As more people join, devastating secrets are revealed. It’s a dialogue-heavy episode, which is mostly light-hearted with brilliant awkward humor. There’s a huge shift in the final minutes when Timothy West arrives. His scene-stealing performance elevates the episode from humorous to unsettling. Tim Key also has a crucial role as a man who calls himself “Ian.”
When West's Andrew comes into the picture, the atmosphere changes as it’s heavily implied that he was an abusive pedophile, and especially targeted a boy named Pip. As it turns out, Ian is Pip and in the final scene, he exacts revenge on everyone in the wardrobe by locking them in and setting it on fire. The moment this realization falls upon everyone, the music becomes morbid as Pip locks the wardrobe and breathes a sigh of relief. He starts singing “The Sardine Song,” a nightmarish nursery rhyme disturbing enough to send shivers down anyone's spine. There's a sense of gloating as Pip lights a match whilst singing and it’s unfathomably creepy to see such a shift in his character.
“That’s just Migg…” – “Tom & Gerri” (Season 1, Episode 3)
Pemberton – scuffed up and sprouting overlong hair all over his face – plays Migg, a down-on-his-luck homeless man who forces himself into Tom’s (Shearsmith) life. Tom’s girlfriend, Gerri (Gemma Arterton), makes sporadic appearances, disapproving of Tom and Migg’s relationship. It’s a mind-bending depiction of Tom’s spiral into depression.
The scariest moment is the ending. After a series of misdirections, it's revealed that Gerri died and has just been in Tom’s head the whole episode. That's not all though; Migg is discovered dead in the bathtub having been murdered by Tom when he mistakenly thought he wasn’t real. Shearsmith’s chillingly casual delivery of the line “That’s just Migg… he’s not real” upon seeing his body heightens the cruel blow. Migg is a perfect demonstration of their seamless ability to play with the audience’s feelings about characters. When Migg becomes someone to fear and shows himself to be manipulative and deceptive, it forces audiences to rethink everything he did before. His sweet, innocent voice no longer sounds genuine and his death is left for us to speculate about, adding to the overall creepiness of the episode.
Mischief – “The Harrowing” (Season 1, Episode 6)
Presented with echoes of 70s horrors like When a Stranger Calls, this conclusion to the first series remains one of the show’s most macabre episodes. Guest star Aimee-Ffion Edwards plays Katy who housesits a mansion which Count Dracula himself would be jealous of, as the owners, Hector and Tabitha (Shearsmith and Helen McCrory), head out. They leave her a list of strict rules to follow – but the most important one concerns the disabled brother of Tabitha known as “Andras” who lives upstairs and is not to be disturbed. As we have come to expect with Inside No. 9, everything is not as it seems.
It's revealed that Andras is possessed by Castiel, the demon of mischief, who's now in need of another human host. In the terrifying climax, Katy is stripped naked and tied to a chair opposite Andras. We finally see his frail, corpse-like body in full as he staggers towards her screeching “mischief!” with a menacing smile splattered across his face. The rapid music combined with Ffion-Edwards' muffled screams makes the scene incredibly disturbing. The ghostly groaning of Andras truly stays with audiences and forces them to imagine what exactly he has planned for her.
Scaredy Cam – “Séance Time” (Season 2, Episode 6)
The Season 2 finale is reminiscent of a cheesy 90s horror movie until its terrifying final scene. Shearsmith plays a disgraced TV presenter named Terry who is trying to make a comeback by rebooting his hidden-camera show “Scaredy Cam.” The show's premise involves Shearsmith disguising himself amongst a group of actors who try to scare an unsuspecting member of the public before making them yell “I’m on Scaredy Cam!”. The lighting remains dark for the episode’s entirety and the theatrical haunted house location begins as a place of fun, before turning into a place of horror.
The episode’s tone descends into darkness when the story of a young “Scaredy Cam” victim who committed suicide is brought up. The victim was a young boy who wet himself out of fear and was ridiculed when the show aired. The episode’s final sequence sees a confused Terry follow an eerie voice referencing the incident. As the disorientated, fretful voice continues, Terry sees the white-eyed spirit of the boy crawling out of a crib. The boy notices that Terry is more afraid of him, and he goes from a scared, vulnerable child to a malevolent demon in seconds. Director Dan Zeff cuts away and makes it purposefully unclear what occurs between Terry and the spirit. The next time we see Terry, he has wet himself and exclaims in a similar child-like voice “I’m on Scaredy Cam!” before the boy thrusts himself in full view of the audience, his face now fuelled with anger.
Twist Revealed – “The Devil of Christmas” (Season 3, Episode 1)
Though it may not be very festive, it does deliver lots of scares as Pemberton and Shearsmith explore the legend of Krampus with a unique twist. This whole episode is shot in the style of an old 1970s horror cheese-fest with occasional commentary from the supposed director of the picture. For a while, nothing is out of the ordinary as the director explains how he got involved in the production and points out continuity errors. The plot concerns a family on vacation in Austria who find themselves targeted by Krampus. The deliberate overacting, cheesy dialogue, and regular retakes provide a lot of laughs – however, the ending reveals a grotesque twist.
The whimsical director chillingly reveals that we have actually been watching a snuff film and the episode concludes with the murder of the lead actress. The true terror comes from the genuine screams of the actress and the nonchalant confession of the director as he states that this was one of his “better ones.” The scene in question sees Kathy (Jessica Raine) tied up, initially staying in character before being forcibly gagged. She is then brutally attacked by a man dressed as Krampus as the director explains the excitement he feels watching her acting turn into real fear. We get to experience this with him, and there’s a sickening sense of boastfulness in his voice. Everything the director describes – the fear in her eyes, the confusion, and eventual realization – is immensely disturbing to witness.
“What did you do?” – “Diddle Diddle Dumpling” (Season 3, Episode 5)
Shearsmith delivers his best performance in this subdued, tragic tale about a father obsessed with finding the owner of a black slip-on shoe when it appears outside his house. As his obsession becomes more dangerous, heartbreaking events from the past come to light. Though it’s less conspicuously scary than other episodes, the conclusion is chilling in its ambiguity.
The final scene contains David and Louise (Shearsmith and Keeley Hawes) in a quiet moment of confrontation. It’s revealed that David’s obsession is his way of coping with the loss of one of their twins. However, the scene turns dark when Louise discovers blood on David’s hands. Suddenly, we flip from feeling sympathetic to unnerved by David. It’s not revealed what he has done, as Louise asks “What did you do?” to which he responds “I can’t remember” as the disquieting sound of sirens wails in the distance. This cryptic answer from David is very alarming and it cleverly leaves audiences pondering what he could be capable of. The fearful expression on Louise’s face as the siren lights flash across her makes the scene a shocking way to conclude. The overwhelming sense of foreboding felt throughout the episode bursts out in the closing seconds.
The Basement – “To Have and to Hold” (Season 4, Episode 4)
Certainly one of the most downbeat episodes of the show, “To Have and to Hold” begins as an exploration of an unhappy marriage before shifting to something horrifying. Pemberton takes center stage as Adrian, a wedding photographer, with Nicola Walker guest-starring as his wife, Harriet. Around the halfway point is a scene that turns the entire episode on its head.
Adrian is pottering about the basement – his expression is angry and ominous music seems to be building. He makes up a Pot Noodle before stepping into a doorway when the music suddenly cuts out. Around the doorway, a trembling hand reaches out, and we hear chains rattle. Adrian had kidnapped a young woman years prior and has been holding her captive all this time. The scene ends with Adrian undoing his belt and closing the door as we see him go from an everyday man to a calculated monster just like that. This is most effective thanks to a brooding performance from Pemberton and the uncomfortable silence.
“Let us be!” – “Dead Line” (Halloween Special 2018)
“Dead Line” is one of the show’s biggest highlights. Broadcast live, this special fooled the nation with its technical difficulties which seemingly prevented it from being shown. Shearsmith even tweeted during the episode questioning what audiences were seeing. Not only was it believable, but it was also terrifying. It begins with an elderly man finding a phone in a graveyard, but we’ll never see that episode as the audio cuts off and we’re left to watch how Pemberton and Shearsmith cope – only they aren’t alone in the studio. Malignant spirits are terrorizing them and audiences are left helpless watching everything unfold.
Plenty of scares are packed into 30 minutes; strange ghostly figures stand in the background, an old lady commits suicide, and old footage inexplicably pops up constantly disrupting the broadcast. Scariest of all is the moment Shearsmith finds himself alone in darkness after Pemberton is accidentally killed. The found-footage style sequence sees Shearsmith’s GoPro capture everything in night vision. His screams get no response as he clambers around without noticing the demonic figures nearby. There’s carnage for a while before an abrupt cut-to-black and a voice hisses “Let us be!”. While most effective watched live, it’s still relentlessly frightening.
Galen – “Thinking out Loud” (Season 5, Episode 5)
In one of the show’s most distinctive episodes, we see a series of monologues directly addressed to the camera by a seemingly unrelated group of people. Ioanna Kimbrook shines as an over-enthusiastic vlogger, but most memorable of all is Pemberton’s American serial killer named Galen. His eyes stare deep into our souls as his gruff voice details the unspeakable acts he’s committed.
The most terrifying moment comes when he suddenly appears in Kimbrook’s bedroom unbeknowst to her. He brandishes a knife and explains how he’s come to take “a piece of her mind”. The power behind this scene solely comes from Pemberton’s performance. He’s scarily believable as an unpredictable psychopath and having him stare at us and gloat about his crimes is utterly captivating. It’s a performance that firmly holds the viewer in the palm of his hand, hanging onto every word.
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