I’ve had a thing for Alfred Hitchcock and his films for as long as I can remember. Now, the fella himself was a bit of a creepo. If you don’t know anything about this just do some research into his obsession with Grace Kelly and Tippi Hedren. You can’t blame him, really, they’re gorgeous, and someone who is able to come up with the suspense laden tales he did is bound to be a little bit weird.

The whole thing started with a bookshelf in 1991 or ’92. I’d gotten in the habit of perusing the shelves of family members ever since my love of reading had been sparked. Rows and rows of books that I had paid no attention to were suddenly potential treasure troves.

One afternoon I was digging through my grandparents’ office when I found this:

Now, the book I found was in hardcover and the coloring was very different as I recall, but it was this book. And boy, was I thrilled. What we have here is some sort of spector, presumably Mr. Hitchcock himself, carrying his head and holding a two-faced version of his head by a string. Then in the background we have a creepy, possibly living house with the head of Alfred Hitchcock in it. Hot. Dog. (Sort of makes me think of The Haunting of Hill House. One of the scariest scary stories, ever, in my opinion. Leave the film versions alone and don’t let them influence the story. None of the ones I’ve seen hold up to the book.)

Shortly thereafter someone found me reading the book and tossed it out. Something about me being 7-years-old, I guess. Either way, it was just a few years later that my Granny introduced me to Rear Window and I was sold. I’m not one for really, really scary stuff, but Hitchcock’s work has just enough suspense to keep you wondering up until the very last moments.

Since we got our Roku player a couple of weeks ago I have been making my way through the first season of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, a program I used to catch when I was at my grandparents’ house, usually with Granny. Presents is very tame and only a few here and there deal with live burials and the like ;)

I’m about to dive into the second season and while I have been enjoying it all quite a bit, it doesn’t hold a candle to The Twilight Zone. I happen to think that these older shows are much better than what the networks serve up these days, but I would love to hear your opinion!

Do you have any favorite sci-fi/fantasy/suspense TV shows? Newer, older, off-the-air?

*I’ll blow you kisses if you mention something other than The X-Files.