Has any horror book/TV series done this?

[Jeivar]

I sometimes find myself wondering what the Friday the 13th series would have been like, if someone had from the start set out to tell a lengthy story about a strange evil that just haunts an area for decades. It would make for an interesting anthology, I think.

Can anyone think of examples?

[GloatingSwine]

I sometimes find myself wondering what the Friday the 13th series would have been like, if someone had from the start set out to tell a lengthy story about a strange evil that just haunts an area for decades. It would make for an interesting anthology, I think.

Can anyone think of examples?

So basically It then?

[Cheesegear]

Can anyone think of examples?

This is what Stranger Things was going to do. Unfortunately, the show's producer, writers and certainly the audience, loved the current cast so much that they kept the story fully continuous.
It was originally going to be Hawkins every 10 years, until the boys and Eleven were in their 40s eventually putting away the Upside Down in the final season.

[lt_murgen]

I sometimes find myself wondering what the Friday the 13th series would have been like, if someone had from the start set out to tell a lengthy story about a strange evil that just haunts an area for decades. It would make for an interesting anthology, I think.

Can anyone think of examples?

American Horror Story Roanoke was kind of like that. It was centered mostly on the present, but plenty of flashbacks to show how the evil worked it power throughout the past centuries.

[Jeivar]

So basically It then?

Yeah, I guess. But with less cosmic turtle.

This is what Stranger Things was going to do. Unfortunately, the show's producer, writers and certainly the audience, loved the current cast so much that they kept the story fully continuous.
It was originally going to be Hawkins every 10 years, until the boys and Eleven were in their 40s eventually putting away the Upside Down in the final season.

... damn.

[Cheesegear]

... damn.

Well, I mean...For exactly your specific scenario, sure.
But the Stranger Things we've got, is really good, and I'm sure most people (including myself) are glad that it didn't go the other way.

Otherwise, Haven (also based on a story by Stephen King) is about a town that has gone through The Troubles twice already, (in the '50s [?] and the '80s) and the show takes place during the third instance.
The past is mentioned constantly and frequently, and used as the set up to a whole bunch of episodes. But in 5 Seasons (~80 episodes), only a handful of episodes are actually set in the past.

[Sinewmire]

Stephen King uses it a lot, so Pet Sematery for example, uses an old indian burial ground (that it suggests is preyed on by a Wendigo) that has persisted, and calls to people to bury their loved ones in it.

Would Silent Hill count? As reviewers have said, the whole point of Silent Hill is that although the plot is usually about some crazy cult or horrible monster, the player/watcher should get a nagging feeling that the real evil is the town inself, and that the evil cults and suchlike are drawn to it, rather than it being evil because of the cults. Silent Hill 2 is an excellent example of this - there's no 'evil cult' storyline.

Ben Croshaw of Zero Punctuation, when talking about Silent Hill talks about how the nebulous oppression of Silent Hill is the real enemy, and how much more effective that is thatn a bunch of blokes in robes. Blokes can get shot, or get the sleeves caught on doorknobs etc.

[Cheesegear]

Would Silent Hill count? As reviewers have said, the whole point of Silent Hill is that although the plot is usually about some crazy cult or horrible monster, the player/watcher should get a nagging feeling that the real evil is the town inself, and that the evil cults and suchlike are drawn to it, rather than it being evil because of the cults. Silent Hill 2 is an excellent example of this - there's no 'evil cult' storyline.

Not really. I think that the OP isn't necessarily looking for an 'evil town that has been evil for generations'. The OP wants it shown, explicitly, how each generation deals with the same crisis. Warehouse 13 does this occasionally, because Warehouse 12 (1830-1914) simply didn't have the resources and technology that W13, did, compared to Warehouse 2 (300BC - 30BC). Same problems, different technology, and it's fun little side trips like that, that I think the OP is looking for.

Like Stephen King's It. It's the exact same story, set 27 apart. Except that the main characters from the first incident, come around for the second go, knowing what they learned as kids.

It's so much that something has a generational evil - loads of things do - it has to be shown.

I think.
a) I'm putting words in the OP's mouth, and
b) I know nothing about Silent Hill. Maybe it does do that.