Forget ‘Scream,’ This Beloved ‘90s Sitcom Has a Near-Perfect 23-Minute Slasher

The article highlights “And Then There Was Shawn”, a 1998 episode of the sitcom *Boy Meets World*, as an unusually effective slasher story and one of the series’ strongest episodes. It argues that the episode’s mix of horror and comedy makes it a good choice for Halloween viewing, despite not being made as a Halloween special.

In the episode, Cory, Topanga, Shawn and their classmates are left in detention after school, where a masked killer appears to target them. Flickering lights, a blood-written threat and a creepy janitor set up the horror, while the script plays with slasher conventions such as the “virgins never die” trope and the early death of a minor character. The article says the episode draws on the 1990s horror style associated with *Scream* without simply parodying one film.