On January 12, 2007,
NBCUniversal announced the launch of Chiller on March 1, dedicated to films and television shows related to the
horror genre. The company also stated that, aside from their own content, Chiller would feature content from competing
film studios, including
Lionsgate,
Sony,
Warner Bros., and
20th Century Fox. In February 2007,
The 101, channel 101 on
DirecTV, aired a "preview" of Chiller, featuring the
pilot episodes of
Twin Peaks and
American Gothic, as well as various
horror movies and programs.
Sleuth, NBC Universal's mystery-themed network, later known as Cloo, aired a fourteen-hour movie marathon entitled "Chiller On Sleuth" to promote the launch of Chiller. The channel officially launched at 6:00 am Eastern/5:00 am Central on March 1. After a brief introduction to the channel, Chiller aired its first program,
Alfred Hitchcock Presents. On July 30, 2014, its carriage was merged with that of its former competitor
Fearnet, a network launched by
Comcast in 2006 as a
video on demand service six years before their purchase of NBC Universal.
Carriage decline and closure In 2017, NBCUniversal began to eliminate some of its non-prime networks in NBCU's cable portfolio by closing or rebranding these networks.
Cloo closed on February 1, 2017, along with
Esquire Network on June 28, and Universal HD was rebranded as the
Olympic Channel on July 14. On February 1, 2017 (the same day sister network Cloo shut down),
Dish removed the channel from their lineup, which cited that most of the network's rerun-centric programming was duplicative of that available on other networks and streaming services, with
Charter Communications (
Spectrum,
Time Warner Cable and
Bright House Networks subsidiaries) removing the network along with
Esquire Network on April 25 for the same reason. Five months later on October 2, 2017,
Verizon FiOS discontinued carriage of the channel, while
Mediacom quietly removed the channel from their lineup on October 23. On November 8, 2017,
Cox removed Chiller from its lineup when it refused to continue their carriage of Chiller within their new carriage agreements with NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment Group, removing the network from several Cox regional outlets. On November 16, 2017, NBCUniversal Cable Networks confirmed that the channel would close on December 31.
Google Fiber removed Chiller from its lineup on December 20, which left
DirecTV and
AT&T U-Verse as two of the last providers to carry Chiller until its closure. A year-end ratings recap showed Chiller as ranked 127 out of 136 networks, averaging 36,000 viewers a night. The network officially shut down around 11:59 p.m. ET on December 31 after an airing of
The Babadook with a simple message saying "Thank you for watching Chiller. GOOD NIGHT!". ==Programming==