Welcome to the first annual—perhaps the only—Pepper Bough Halloween Movie Tournament!

Over the next nine school days, you will have the opportunity to vote for your favorite horror movies from this century, with the champion being crowned on none other than Halloween night.

The game is simple. Like any tournament, we have set up brackets in which horror movies can square off against each other in individual matchups. On each entry, there will be a poll for you to vote for your favorite of the two. The winner will move on to the next round.

Today’s first round match-up is . . .

3. The Witch vs. 6. Sinister

Our staff has put together some defense for each film. Take a look, then make your vote!

History classes talk about Puritan days in ways that often ignore just how scary they had to be. I mean, everyone lived in the woods without real roads, or McDonald’s, or cell phones. They believed in witches. And they had to milk goats! “The Witch” is a time machine of a movie, and it is impossible not to believe how real this terrifying movie is. It’s in every stitch of clothing, every stone in the cottages, and every bleat of Black Phillip. As our ultra-extreme Puritan family loses their grip on reality after their baby goes missing, this movie becomes impossible to watch in the dark . . . by yourself.

Is “Sinister” the scariest movie ever made? Well, science says so. This movie, about a true crime novelist who moves his family into a murder house in order to work on a new book, was tested by a United Kingdom website called “Broadband Choices” in 2020 against 35 other scary movies and was found to raise viewer heart rates the most. Even if the science was a gimmick, this movie is certainly scary as you-know-what. The found footage murder movies that our main character watches as he does research are mini-horror masterpieces in and of themselves. And try not to look at a lawn mower the same way ever again.