Filmmaker Sam Raimi got his start in the world of horror, and while genre fans will always think of him as a horror filmmaker first and foremost, he would go on to helm massive blockbusters, such as a trilogy of Spider-Man movies starring Tobey Maguire and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. News comes from Deadline today that Raimi has been tapped to direct the horror movie Send Help, which marks his first time directing a horror movie since Drag Me to Hell in 2009. While Raimi has produced horror movies and directed horror TV shows in the last 15 years, this marks his first return to feature-length horror directing in more than a decade.

Deadline describes of the new movie, "According to our sources, the film is described as a two-hander horror thriller set on an island. The story is said to fall somewhere between Rob Reiner's Stephen King adaptation Misery and Robert Zemeckis' classic Castaway."

Send Help was written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, who wrote 2003's Freddy vs. Jason and the 2009 Friday the 13th reboot.

The movie that helped put Raimi on the map was The Evil Dead, which earned a positive endorsement from horror writer Stephen King. Raimi earned enough support from the picture to develop Evil Dead II, which served both as a reboot of the original experience as well as an expansion on the ideas, with he and star Bruce Campbell ultimately concluding the trilogy with Army of Darkness.

Raimi offered up audiences a variety of experiences in the '90s with projects like Darkman, The Quick and the Dead, and The Gift, before entering the world of Marvel with 2002's Spider-Man. DC projects like Superman and Batman dominated the big screen for years, though 2000's X-Men marked a turning point for the Marvel universe. While that movie was a modest hit that generated excitement in other Marvel characters, Raimi's Spider-Man was a massive blockbuster, as were the next two films in the trilogy.

The success of Spider-Man also resulted in a variety of other Marvel figures jumping to the big screen, though Daredevil, Fantastic Four, and Ghost Rider all failed to live up to the critical success of Raimi's films. By the late 2000s, Marvel Studios launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which brought to life characters who weren't owned by Sony or Fox.

While Raimi returned to his horror roots with Drag Me to Hell and also developed the Evil Dead sequel series Ash vs. Evil Dead, he had the full-circle moment of returning to the world of Marvel 20 years after he helped pave the way for the Marvel renaissance when he directed the Doctor Strange sequel in 2022.

Stay tuned for updates on Send Help.

Are you looking forward to the project? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

The Conjuring 4 has finally gotten a release date. Warner Bros. Says that "The Untitled Conjuring Finale" will hit theaters on September 5, 2025. This news comes tethered to an announcement of Maggie Gyllenhaal's The Bride moving up a month to September 29, 2025 as well. That fall is going to be a busy month for Horror fans. Not only will they be able to see The Bride and another Conjuring movie. But, Universal's Saw XI hits theaters in the later part of the month. As it stands, this is looking like the swan song for James Wan's fan-favorite scary franchise. He's been hinting at this next movie being the end of the road for a while.

In an interview with Collider, the director laid out some thoughts about the final Conjuring film. They're trying to do their best to wrap things up in a satisfying manner. "Yeah, we are working on it right now. With the Conjuring films, we are very precious about [them]," Wan previously said. "And so we kind of want to just take our time to make sure we get it right and to make sure the emotion of the Warren stories that we want to tell, and moving into, and potentially wrapping up, we just want to make sure that it's the right thing, the right story that we're telling."

The Nun II Heralded The End Of The Conjuring

By all indications, this is the final trip to The Conjuring universe. (Barring a potential reboot down the line.) According to our ComicBook critic Kofi Outlaw, the franchises' last experience kind of heralded this development. The Nun II wasn't exactly reinvinteing the wheel during its run. So, our writer argued that it was probably time to close up shop.

"The Nun II is the eighth film in The Conjuring franchise, and it's also the clearest example yet that this franchise is starting to stretch itself thin. The story of the sequel picks up four years after the first film, in 1956," Outlaw says. "Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) has been trying to live a quiet life in a convent in Italy. Meanwhile, Frenchie/Maurice (Jonas Bloquet) has been slowly making his way across Europe, still unaware that the dreaded demon Valak attached itself to him when he save Irene from being possessed in the first film."

He adds, "However, as Valak gets closer and closer to a holy artifact that's been missing for years, its evil begins to manifest in stronger and stronger waves at a boarding school in Tarascon, France. Eventually, the church gets wind that the demon is still alive and active, and Irene is recruited to hunt down and battle the evil entity again."

Are you hyped for the end of the series? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!

Longlegs opens with a station wagon pulling up to a snowy farmhouse, with the aspect ratio of the footage replicating that of an 8mm camera. Despite initially seeming like it is a vintage home movie, the camera begins to pan in odd ways, immediately breaking the assumption that we're looking at handheld memories from a bygone era. A young girl exits the farmhouse to meet her guest, though that guest plays an unexpected game of hide and seek. When the young girl does confront this figure, their exchange is clearly nefarious based solely on body language, as this visitor identifies himself as "Longlegs." This opening scene is easily one of the most frightening opening scenes of any horror movie this year, which only sets the stage for the kind of terror writer/director Osgood Perkins is about to unleash on audiences for the next 101 minutes.

A majority of the film unfolds in the early '90s, exploring how FBI agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) has an almost-otherwordly ability to track down serial killers. For nearly two decades, Oregon has been the target of bizarre murders that eliminate entire families, yet each of them takes on the appearance of murder-suicides. Similar to the Zodiac Killer, the FBI has been receiving letters full of Satanic codes and taunts from a figure known as Longlegs (an unrecognizable Nicolas Cage), with Agent Carter (Blair Underwood) enlisting Harker to use her abilities to get to the bottom of the mystery.

One thing that has been evident throughout Perkins' entire career is he will entice viewers with an experience that seems familiar on the surface, only to take it in entirely different directions. With the opening scenes of Longlegs, he establishes the film's surreal tone and its approach to fear, serving as a litmus test for whether a viewer will join the ride of the dream-like and disquieting narrative or if the movie won't quite live up to its ominous and effective marketing campaign.

Perkins' ability to draw a viewer's eye with his framing and composition is nearly unmatched in the horror world. Whether it be a farmhouse, a dark hallway, a barn, or a cabin, Perkins manages to keep you both focused on the characters in the frame while your eyes constantly dart to the shadows of a scene to see if they can find clues about what's really going on. He also uses the camera to create a detachment between the audience and the characters, as nearly every shot features a character in the center of the frame, with their bodies either parallel or perpendicular to its lens. While so many other movies attempt to create framing and blocking that immerses an audience in those worlds organically, Perkins keeps you at a distance, almost as if to imply it would be too dangerous for an audience to be fully part of this world as he creates a more dream-like atmosphere.

Echoing the visual detachment of Longlegs is the script itself, which similarly offers stilted and sparse dialogue that makes every character feel uncomfortable in their own skin. Underwood's Carter is easily the most realized character in the movie, while Harker, Longlegs, and Harker's mother Ruth (Alicia Witt) all speak less like actual people and more like trying to remember conversations you had in a dream. While the narrative is assuredly a horror movie, the overall tone feels more in line with surrealist filmmakers like David Lynch, Yorgos Lanthimos, or Lars von Trier.

Thanks to starring in projects like It Follows, The Guest, and Watcher, Monroe has become a favorite in the horror crowd and for good reason. While some of those previous projects have allowed her to fight back against various threats that have targeted her, Longlegs showcases what's easily the most frightened and tortured performance of Monroe's career. Not only is she attempting to cope with the terror this killer is wreaking on the community, but Harker is also attempting to unlock parts of her past that might be the key to finding Longlegs and uncovering the real motivations for his mayhem. It's almost as if it physically pains Harker to interact with anyone around her, as if this would somehow rope her into the nightmare she feels she's been living in. Cage's recognizable face, however, is obscured by facial prosthetics, which allows his performance to speak for itself. Given the heightened tone of the entire experience, some audiences will dismiss Cage's performance as being cartoonish or silly, though in the world that Perkins has created, it feels like just the right balance of unhinged, intimidating, and childlike.

Between the premise and the setting of Longlegs, it's going to be hard for audiences to not draw direct comparisons between the movie and seminal serial-killer stories like The Silence of the Lambs or David Fincher's Seven (with a bit of Zodiac tossed in for good measure). Understandably, seeing a young, female FBI agent being tossed into a case in which she might be over her head, as well as Longlegs' '90s-set storyline, will evoke comparisons to Jodie Foster's Clarice Starling, while the serial killer with biblically motivated attacks who teases authorities with cryptic letters that need to be decoded will feel reminiscent of Fincher's entries in the space. This isn't to say that Longlegs feels derivative of either of those experiences, more that the cultural impact of those movies is still so significant, it'll be hard to shake that familiarity while watching the movie.

Where the experience starts to falter is in the final act, which is when all the puzzle pieces of the narrative start to come together. Anyone who's even seen a trailer or poster for Longlegs has a pretty good idea that the mystery isn't about who is committing these crimes, but both viewers and the characters want to know why he's doing these things and how he's gotten away with it for so many years. Much like how Perkins' dialogue and camera movements keep a viewer at a safe distance, the reveals about what's really going on doesn't feel fully realized. While there's a lot of allure to be found in keeping details vague and ambiguous, Perkins only does the bare minimum to explain the nature of the horrifying ordeal and leaves a lot to the audience to figure out. In this sense, Longlegs will be a frustrating experience for audiences who want the answers explicitly detailed to them, and even those who enjoy the ambiguity of evil might not be entirely satiated with the explanation of "Satanism...?" The broad strokes and ambiguity of the plot motivations do keep in line with the dreamlike nature of the film's aesthetic, keeping the answers to the mysteries just beyond reach.

With Longlegs, Perkins continues his trend of delivering entirely singular visions of terror, which started with The Blackcoat's Daughter and continued with I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House and Gretel & Hansel. The marketing campaign is bolstering that this movie could quite literally kill you with how scary it is, and while most of us will live to see the movie and tell the tale, what you've witnessed isn't something you're likely to shake off anytime soon. Even if the ultimate resolution of the story doesn't fully live up to the breadcrumbs the first two acts of the film set up, knowing that such an unconventional, ambitious, and uncompromising experience that could fall under the umbrella of any generic murder mystery feels like nothing short of a triumph.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Longlegs lands in theaters on July 12th.

Nicolas Cage is in rare form in Longlegs. Back in November 2022, reports emerged that Osgood Perkins (Gretel & Hansel) would be directing a sinister script that he penned himself, one which told the tale of this titular satanic serial killer. Three months later, Cage joined Longlegs as both the film's star and producer. Filming ran for a quick six weeks in Vancouver, leaving many of the specifics about Longlegs' plot to be kept under wraps. This particularly included Cage as Longlegs himself, as zero set photos of him as the nominal antagonist surfaced nor were any freeze-framable glimpses of his face visible in teaser trailers.

Longlegs Stars Reveal First Reactions to Nic Cage's Character

The pulse-pounding terror permeated throughout the Longlegs production when Nic Cage walked on set.

Speaking to ComicBook, Longlegs leading star Maika Monroe revealed that the first time she met Cage was when they shared their first scene together in the film.

"I didn't meet him. I didn't see anything at all of what Longlegs looked like," Monroe recalled. "The first time that I saw him was uh when Oz called action and I walked onto the set. It was incredibly shocking and haunting and exhilarating."

Co-star Blair Underwood had some time to prepare himself but still was left speechless when he encountered the titular terror.

"I'd heard rumblings. I had been working a couple of days before he came on set, but I had heard rumblings of his approach to the character. I wasn't shocked but terrified nonetheless," Underwood said. "So much of this film either stylistically or the content feels familiar, but then it turns into something that you don't expect. It turns into something very different. Then even when I saw what he was doing and how he brought the character to the screen was really some remarkable stuff."

Director Osgood Perkins was the most privy to Longlegs, as he had worked on the character's design from the very beginning.

"Meanwhile, I'd seen it every step of the way. Every little thing is chosen between Nic and myself or costumes and myself. There's a lot of conversations that go to building the thing," Perkins shared. "By the time I see the whole package put together, it's the summation of a bunch of efforts and a bunch of hits and misses. Things that have been shaded and sharpened and dulled and crafted.

"But then having him walk onto the set for the first time, on his first day, we were shooting the snowy exterior at Lee's childhood home, walking alongside him and just watching everybody watching him appear and manifest and roll in, roll up," Perkins continued. "It was really good especially because a lot of the people working on this movie are very young people. There's like this whoa quality. 'Huh?! What?!' Because it was that gnarly. And he's Nicholas Cage too. Geiger counters are going off just by his natural presence."

Longlegs slithers into theaters this Friday, July 12th.

Interview With the Vampire concluded its second season last week on AMC, but the story is just getting started. Ahead of the Season 2 finale, AMC renewed the series based on Anne Rice's novels from The Vampire Chronicles for a third season set to see Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid) get to tell his story. With series showrunner Rolin Jones having already said that the novel he wants to dig into next being The Vampire Lestat, fans of Rice's work already have some idea what that might entail but in an interview with The Los Angeles Times, Jones makes it even more clear: they're going for a "little pop masterpiece".

"Lestat becomes a rock star. Let's star there," Jones said when asked what Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire will look like. "We're going to do a lot with that and are excited about potentially working with Daniel Hart who's done the music for the first two seasons. We're going to try to beat Hedwig and the Angry Inch and Rocky Horror. We're about to try to make a little pop masterpiece."

He added, "The deeper I get into [Anne Rice's] books, I'm slowly catching up to the love that the people who really love the show have for these books and clutch them to their hearts. So many of the artists who worked on our show talked about how the tone of the book allowed them to think about coming out. These books are important to people. I feel very privileged and very lucky to be this person who's shepherding that to a new generation at this point."

What Will Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire Be About?

Here's how AMC describes Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire: In season three, resentful of the perfunctory portrayal in the trashy bestseller 'Interview With The Vampire,' the Vampire Lestat sets his story straight in a way only the Vampire Lestat can--by starting a band and going on tour. Gabrielle. Nicholas. Magnus. Marius. Those Who Must Be Kept. They join Louis, Armand, Molloy, Sam, Raglan, Fareed and others we can't tell you about yet on a sexy pilgrimage across space, time and trauma. No Auto-Tuning. No Trigger Warnings. All Feels Amplified.

"When you buy the rights to 18 Anne Rice novels that have sold more than 150 million copies, in your wildest dreams you hope there's a show as good as Interview on the other end," said Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks. "What Rolin has done with these stories and characters, working so closely with Mark, as the steward of this universe, has exceeded the loftiest version of our expectations. We can't wait to see where this creative team takes the series from here and know we are walking alongside an incredibly loyal and passionate base of fans who feel as strongly about this material as we do."

"Thank you to the brilliant casts and crews of the first two seasons that got us to this day. Thank you to the rabid, beautifully unwell fandom that scaled the castle walls to get us to this day," showrunner Rolin Jones said. "Thank you to Dan McDermott, Ben Davis for the funds and tools to continue the great work of dramatizing Anne Rice's extraordinary novels. And sincere apologies to the family and friends of actor Sam Reid, for the possession that continues to this day. Monsieur L extends his promise to return his body upon cancellation (may that evening never come.)"

The horror comedy Shaun of the Dead put filmmaker Edgar Wright and actors Simon Pegg and Nick Frost on the map, and while the following of the film grows with each passing year, a continuation of that world hasn't emerged over the past 20 years. Pegg recently recalled how studio Universal Pictures owns the rights to the property and could reboot it if they wanted, though if they did, he and his collaborators would be "incensed" by the notion, due to how personal the core storyline is to their own lives. Luckily, there have been no substantial talks of ever attempting to replicate the film's successes, so Pegg and company can rest easy for now.

"I mean, Universal owns it. If they choose to reboot it, then they can if they want I guess. Although Edgar and I would be incensed," Pegg revealed to The Hollywood Reporter. "Shaun of the Dead is incredibly personal. There's so much of us in that film. The whole joke of Ed and Shaun not being able to ever come out of The Winchester was real. That was about Nick and I, that was about our decision to just stay in a North London pub. Edgar was always in town. He was always in Soho, and he always wanted us to come into town and hang out at [London private members' club] The Groucho, and we never did. We always wanted to be in The Shepherds [pub]. My girlfriend, now my wife, was the same. She was like, 'Are we going to The Shepherds again?' That inspired that whole storyline."

He continued, "The whole thing with Shaun's mum, the stepdad, I had a problematic relationship with my stepfather. It was Edgar's idea to kill the mum. I couldn't believe it when he said that, but it was the best decision. There's so much of our own heart and soul in that film. If someone was to reboot it, it would be a cynical and exploitative exercise. I would hope that people are in love with our Shaun enough to resist a reboot. Gary King [Pegg's character in The World's End] as well, that was a lot about my own alcoholism. A really personal film."

Pegg's remarks imply he would be upset if a reboot either attempted to replicate the personal elements that were incorporated into the adventure or if a project merely took the title and went in an entirely different direction. The actor went on to cite another project that, while a compelling movie in its own right, cashed in on a more recognizable title.

"I always got annoyed at Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake -- it's a great movie. It's really exciting. But I hated the fact they called it Dawn of the Dead, because that was George [Romero]'s film," Pegg pointed out. "They could have called it 'Deadish,' which was a great line in the film that one of the actors used, and it still would have been a great film, but when you just take a title because people recognize it, it's so disrespectful to the original."

Luckily, while there was a brief period in which an American remake as a TV series was considered for a reboot of Shaun of the Dead, no substantial reports have emerged in the 20 years since it was released.

Stay tuned for the potential future of Shaun of the Dead.

What do you think of the actor's comments? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

When filmmaker Ti West originally conceived the story of Maxine Minx, he saw the opportunity to make a trilogy of films that explored her quest for fame, so while MaXXXine has been billed as the final chapter in a trilogy, West himself has teased that there could be the possibility of expanding the story at some point in the future. During a recent interview with Variety, West offered an update on his plans, and he did confirm how MaXXXine felt like it was a satisfying way to conclude the story that started with X and continued with Pearl, though once he's able to spend some time where he's not required to think about MaXXXine, he might be inspired to pursue a continuation. MaXXXine is in theaters now.

"Making a movie is, at best, two years of trauma, so we're just figuring out a story worth enduring that. I'm very grateful to A24. I'm very proud of these three movies," West shared with the outlet. "And it feels like a good place to stop, but I do have ideas of how to continue this 'universe,' or whatever you want to call it. But in about two weeks, I will wake up for the very first time not thinking about something related to these movies. Then, the movie is done, it's out, and I'm off to the next thing. And if that brings me back around to X, great. But if it brings me to something else, that's fine too. So, we'll see."

The film series wasn't conceived of as a trilogy at first, with West first wanting to tell the story of X and, due to quarantine protocols of shooting in New Zealand during the pandemic, resulted in not only the expansion of the story with star Mia Goth, but the team even used the same crew from X to secretly make the prequel Pearl. Not only was X a hit with fans, but so was Pearl, and with MaXXXine arriving in theaters this weekend, there's already a proven audience for this series.

If West does realize he wants to return to this world, it likely won't be to follow the trajectory of Maxine. With Pearl serving more as a standalone prequel that connects to X and having little connection to MaXXXine, we wouldn't be surprised to see either a film that explores a supporting character or a story that replicates the spirit of cinema from another decade.

"I'll say that, if there's more to be done in this X franchise, it's certainly not what people are expecting it to be," West shared with Entertainment Weekly this past May. "It's not just picking up again a few years later and whatever. It's different in the way that Pearl was an unexpected departure. It's another unexpected departure."

MaXXXine is in theaters now.

Would you like to get another film in the series? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Wednesday, Netflix's Tim Burton-created spinoff of The Addams Family, is set to become the biggest production ever filmed in Ireland. The first season had filmed in Romania, so the second season moving to Ireland is a boon to the local economy (although, as Variety noted in a recent story, it was hardly a surprise given that the move had already been unofficially known for a while). According to Screen Ireland, the amount spent locally by the production will make Wednesday the "largest production to ever film in Ireland," surpassing Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Per Variety, Irish prime minister Taoiseach Simon Harris visited the set of Wednesday, meeting with Burton, showrunners Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, and several of the series' cast and crew.

"I'm delighted to see Ireland continues to be chosen as a location to film series and movies which supports our economy, creates jobs, showcases our creative talents and promotes our country on a global stage," Harris said in a statement.

It's worth noting that Ireland and Northern Ireland are not the same place, so Wednesday sets this record without competing with the likes of Game of Thrones and Krypton, which both filmed in Belfast and had pretty elaborate productions.

The cast of Wednesday Season 2 will include Ortega, Steve Buscemi, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Luis Guzman, Joanna Lumley, Christopher Lloyd, Emma Myers, Joy Sunday, Hunter Doohan, Fred Armisen, Thandiwe Newton, Victor Dorobantu, Billie Piper, Haley Joel Osment, Heather Matarazzo, Georgie Farmer, Moosa Mostafa, Luyanda Unati Lewis-Nyawo, Isaac Ordonez, Evie Templeton, Owen Painter, Noah Taylor, Frances O'Connor, Joonas Suotamo, Jamie McShane and more. A recent report has indicated that Percy Hynes White, who drew controversy in 2023 after being accused of sexual abuse, will not be returning as Xavier Thorpe.

Per its official synopsis, Wednesday is a sleuthing, supernaturally infused mystery charting Wednesday Addams' years as a student at Nevermore Academy. Wednesday's attempts to master her emerging psychic ability, thwart a monstrous killing spree that has terrorized the local town, and solve the supernatural mystery that embroiled her parents 25 years ago -- all while navigating her new and very tangled relationships at Nevermore.

Series star Ortega -- who is stepping into a producer role this season -- had said that Wednesday season 2 would be backing away from the love story to lean more into horror and macabre elements.

"We've decided we want to lean into the horror aspect of the show a little bit more," Ortega said. "Because it is so lighthearted, and a show like this with vampires and werewolves and superpowers, you don't want to take yourself too seriously."

There are no details about the story for season 2 yet, but fans are waiting for that trailer to drop. Wednesday season 2 is expected on Netflix in 2025.

Audiences first met a mysterious character played by Djimon Hounsou in 2021's A Quiet Place Part II, with Hounsou returning to the franchise for A Quiet Place: Day One. This appearance by the character, who audiences learned was named Henri, sparked speculation among audiences about whether this meant that figures from Day One could have secretly been involved in the events of Part II, though director Michael Sarnoski doesn't think that would be the case. The director didn't, however, rule out the notion entirely, even joking that a future special edition of Part II could confirm such connections.

WARNING: Spoilers below for A Quiet Place: Day One

In addition to Joseph Quinn's Eric surviving the events of Day One, he's also joined by cat Frodo, as they managed to board a boat to get out of New York City, with Henri lending him some assistance. Part II takes place roughly 18 months after the events of Day One, but Sarnoski doesn't picture Eric and Frodo living in the same community as Henri.

When asked by CinemaBlend if he imagined Eric living in the community that aids the Abbott family in Part II, he admitted, "I mean, probably not. But the way that I imagined it was that it's not like we meet every single person on the island. We get a pretty quick glimpse into that society there. I don't think Joe Quinn is secretly in there."

He then joked, "Maybe when we do the George Lucas kind of re-release, we'll just CG a little Joe Quinn just kind of standing in the background. But no. I mean, maybe? Who knows? Maybe there is a cat. Let's say if you see a cat anywhere on that island, that was intended to be Frodo all along."

As it currently stands, the only significant connection between Day One and Part II is the character of Henri and, of course, the otherworldly monsters that hunt by sound. With A Quiet Place Part III on the way, it's unclear if that sequel will establish any further connections to Day One or if the prequel will instead establish the formula that the franchise will continue with a number of spinoff or standalone adventures.

A Quiet Place: Day One is in theaters now. A Quiet Place Part III is expected sometime in 2025.

What do you think of the filmmaker's remarks? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Last month, The Thing Remastered was revealed by Nightdive Studios. This marks the first time the horror game has been made available in more than two decades, and players can expect a number of quality of life changes when it releases. In a new interview with Nintendo Life, Nightdive director of business development Larry Kuperman was asked about the types of enhancements players can expect to see. While Kuperman did not go deep into detail, he did tell the outlet that there would be "significant improvements," but that the developer is also intent on sticking closely to the vision of the original team.

"I can't really go into specifics, both because we want fans to be surprised and also because the game is still in development. But fans should expect significant improvements to the quality of gameplay while staying very true to the original vision," Kuperman told Nintendo Life. "As always, our goal is to give fans a remaster that 'plays the way you remember it' only somewhat better."

Interestingly, Kuperman did note that the Nightdive "received an enormous amount of original assets and materials." This is definitely notable, as a lot of developers and publishers were bad at preserving this kind of material for older games. Kuperman says that some of that content will be making its way into the remaster, but Nightdive is also "trying to decide on the best course for preservation." Hopefully this means some kind of gallery will end up in the game, or that we'll see an official art book released alongside The Thing Remastered. However, that's just conjecture at this time.

The Thing was originally released in 2002 on PS2, Xbox, and PC. The game acts as a direct sequel to the original John Carpenter film, putting players in the role of a new character named Captain Blake. Blake and his team arrive at U.S. Outpost 31, as part of an investigation to find out what happened. There have been discussions about a potential sequel to the 1982 film, so it's hard to say whether the events of the game will still be considered canon if that happens. However, it's worth noting that Carpenter was involved with the original version of the game, and anyone that wants to see what happens after that movie might want to check out The Thing Remastered later this year!

Are you excited for The Thing: Remastered? Did you ever play the 2002 game? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

HBO has added Rudy Mancuso to the cast of Welcome to Derry, a prequel series to Stephen King's IT, which will bring back Bill Skarsg?rd as Pennywise. As with the literally ten people who were cast last week, details of Mancuso's character are currently unknown. The star's latest project is M?sica, for which he also served as writer, director and composer. Previously, he appeared in projects like Rim of the World and Drunk History. Last year, he played Albert Desmond in The Flash, which was directed by Welcome to Derry executive producer Andy Muschietti.

Mancuso is also a musician and comedian who got his start on the YouTube channel Awkward Puppets. Deadline first announced his trip to Derry.

Last week, reports emerged that Warner Bros. Discovery will rebrand Welcome to Derry -- as well as DC's Lanterns an a number of other upcoming projects based on popular IP -- from Max originals to HBO Originals, and plans to air them to the beloved cable network. It's the latest in a series of moves by WBD management seemingly aimed at marginalizing the importance of the streaming platform to the company's overall business plan.

HBO Max was the brainchild of the previous ownership, and since Discovery bought Warner Bros., it seems like they have been chipping away at the platform slowly. Adding Discovery content drowned out some of the more popular WB stuff, and rebranding to "Max," removing any ties to the wildly popular HBO, was widely mocked. Along the way, WBD removed or cancelled a number of digital-only projects, most notably the nearly-completed Batgirl and Scoob!: Holiday Haunt.

In addition to reprising his role from the movies, Skarsg?rd will reunite with filmmakers Andy and Barbara Muschietti and producers Jason Fuchs, Roy Lee and Dan Lin. They and Skarsg?rd will all serve as producers on the series, which was developed for television by Skarsg?rd, the Muschiettis, and Fuchs. Andy Muschietti, who directed the two IT movies, will helm four of the series' nine episodes.

Welcome to Derry is set in King's fictional town of Derry, Maine that Pennywise terrorized for generations. It will take place decades before the events of IT. In the novel and original TV adaptation, the earliest events of the story unfold in the late '50s, though in the two-part film adaptation of the story, the timeline shifted to the '80s and 2010s. With Welcome to Derry set to be an extension of those films, the new series looks to take place in the '50s to explore bizarre events in the town that pre-dated the story we already know.

There is no known release window for Welcome to Derry yet, and in fact it's possible the show's title could change before the trailer drops, as every report has referred to Welcome to Derry as a working title.

The fifth and final season of Stranger Things is currently in production, and fans are eager to see how the hit show will wrap up when the final episodes finally hit Netflix next year. Ever since the production for the upcoming season began, series creators Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer have shared some fun teases and behind-the-scenes content. Today, Ross took to social media to share an image of the entire cast and crew of Stranger Things to celebrate being halfway through production. The post also includes a video of Finn Wolfhard (Mike Wheeler) dropping a symbolic marble into a bowl to commemorate the occasion.

"Week 24. Happy halfway to the best cast and crew ever," Duffer captioned the post.

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Finn Wolfhard Guesses Stranger Things Spin-Off Premise:

The Duffer Brothers previously confirmed that they plan to start developing a spinoff of the series. In a funny turn of events, Finn Wolfhard is the only actor from the series who knows what the new show will be about. Apparently, the young star guessed the premise and he shared with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show that he's been sworn to secrecy.

"We were on set filming Stranger Things 4 and we were all talking about if there's going to be, like joking, 'Oh they're all going to have us back in 20 years and we're all going to fat and old,' that kind of thing," Wolfhard shared. "And then I was like, 'But if you guys are actually going to do a spin-off, it should be this...' And then I said it, and the Duffers looked at each other and looked at me and they were like, 'Could we talk to you for a second?' And then they pulled me off and they were like, 'That is the idea. Who told you?' and I was like, 'No one,' and they were like 'What do you mean? You just came up with it?' and I was like, 'Well, no, I just thought that that would be a cool way to expand.' It was really funny and they were like 'Okay, well... don't tell anyone.'"

How Will Stranger Things End?

The Duffer Brothers recently revealed that their pitch for the fifth season was a tear-jerker.

"Listen. It's our process but it's just like, we really just try to focus on one season at a time," Ross Duffer previously told The Wrap. "We do have an outline for season 5 and we pitched it to Netflix and they really responded well to it. I mean, it was hard. It's the end of the story. I saw executives crying who I've never seen cry before and it was wild. And it's not just to do with the story, just the fact that it's like, Oh my God, this thing that has defined so many of our lives, these Netflix people who has been with us from the beginning, seven years now, and it's hard to imagine the journey coming to an end."

Stranger Things is expected to return for its final season next year.

When it comes to reviving beloved properties, some storytellers aim to take core concepts of a franchise and reimagine them in entirely unconventional ways, but with the upcoming Alien TV series from creator Noah Hawley, star Sandra Yi Sencindiver claims fans of the debut entries in the saga will appreciate the experience. Whether this means that the new series will narratively, thematically, or tonally fall more in line with Alien and Aliens as compared to other entries in the saga is yet to be revealed, but given how wildly different some of the subsequent installments are from the source, this update will alleviate fans' fears.

"I think that especially the fans who love [Ridley Scott's Alien] and [James Cameron's Aliens] will be very pleased with the universe and the world-building in this reimagining," Sencindiver detailed to Variety. "A lot of brilliant people, a lot of very interesting character actors [who are] very dedicated and, of course, Noah Hawley is just a brilliant storyteller."

She continued, "I can't say anything more than that, other than it's been very exciting and interesting to play this character ... And I also think it's a pleasure that nobody has played that character before. That's also great for me, that I get to set the bar for what this character is. We'll be pleased -- the old fans of the original movies."

Heading to theaters later this year is Alien: Romulus, an adventure that takes place between the events of Alien and Aliens. The cast and crew of that project have teased that it serves more as a standalone spinoff that takes place at a specific point in time as opposed to being a continuation of established mythology. Hawley's Alien TV series, on the other hand, has been shrouded in much more secrecy. Given how he managed to take the core concept of the Coen brothers' Fargo to tell an entirely original story that channeled the spirit of the source material, we can likely expect an experience that picks and chooses what elements from the franchise it incorporates.

In the earliest entries into the series, audiences largely saw a variety of characters facing off against both the horrifying xenomorph creature but also being wary of the intentions of synthetic characters. As the series continued, other thematic elements started to be incorporated, so it's possible that Secindiver's comments could confirm a return to the franchise's narrative roots.

Stay tuned for updates on the Alien TV series.

What do you think of the actor's remarks? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Return of the Living Dead 3, the 1993 horror-comedy starring soap opera mainstay Melinda Clarke, is getting a new, extended release more than 30 years after it hit theaters. Filmmaker Dustin Ferguson (Big Freakin' Snake) announced on social media that he and producer Chris MacGibbon had acquired an old master tape that included a previously-lost cut of the movie. He plans for a physical and/or digital release soon, but the cut presumably will need a little restoration since it was stored on commercial-grade VHS. When it comes out, it will mark the third distinct version of the movie to get an official release, as the movie originally came to VHS in an "unrated" cut that had to be trimmed down to get a theatrical release with an R rating.

Per Bloody Disgusting, who first picked up on Ferguson's Facebook post, the new cut will contain about eight minutes of never-before-seen footage from the movie.

"We have aquired the 'lost' 1st cut of Return of The Living Dead 3!" Ferguson posted to Facebook. "It features almost 8 minutes of additional, never before seen footage not in the Unrated version! No information exists anywhere about this! More details soon!"

Return of the Living Dead 3 got a much warmer reception from critics than the second film in the franchise, but made just over $50,000 at the box office against a reported $2 million budget. Given that it was designed to be profitable on VHS, that wasn't a huge problem, but the lack of fan enthusiasm seemingly cooled the studio's interest.

After three Return of the Living Dead movies made between 1985 and 1993, there wouldn't be another one until the straight-to-DVD Return of the Living Dead: Necropolis and Return of the Living Dead: Rave to the Grave, which were released back to back in 2005. Those movies were not received well by the cult fan base that the original trilogy had built up, and no further Return of the Living Dead movies have been made since. A reboot is supposedly in the works.

Humorously, the timing of the announcement comes 40 years to the day after the first Return of the Living Dead movie was set; the movie features a title card noting that it's July 3, 1984.

In Return of the Living Dead 3, "A teen (J. Trevor Edmond) uses an Army chemical to revive his dead girlfriend (Mindy Clarke) after a motorcycle accident," per the official synopsis.

Return of the Living Dead 3 was written by John Penney and directed by Brian Yuzna. It also stars Kent McCord, Basil Wallace, James T. Callahan, and Sarah Douglas.

You can buy Return of the Living Dead 3 on disc or digital, or stream it free on Freevee,Tubi, and The Roku Channel.

Since releasing last summer, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre has seen a lot of paid content added, from new Victims and Killers, to Execution and Outfit Packs. If you've been holding off on buying any of that content, or the game itself, there's no better time than right now, as a huge sale has kicked off on the Xbox Store and on Steam. Some of the prices and deals will vary, but a lot of these bargains remain the same across both platforms. Notably, a lot of the DLC has been chopped down to 50% off, or more. Some of these discounts include:

• Nancy- $4.99 (50% off)
• Danny- $4.99 (50% off)
• Virginia- $4.99 (50% off)
• Nicotero Leatherface- $4.79 (70% off)
• Execution Pack II- $3.49 (50% off)

Those are the big highlights, but several Outfit Packs, individual Outfits, and Weapon Skins have also been discounted. There are substantial deals to be found, and a lot of this content has been added to the game fairly recently; Virginia just joined the game in late March, so it's been just over three months. The rest of these additions are a bit older, but the price drops might be enough to get players to try out a new main. For those that don't have the base game yet, it's been discounted to $9.99 on Steam and $13.99 on Xbox.

While most of the game's DLC has gotten temporary price drops, there are some notable exceptions, including the Hitchhiker Claymoore Outfit, which remains full price on all platforms. In terms of playable characters, there's also Hands and Maria; the two characters were just added to the game a few weeks ago, so it's not too surprising that Gun Media excluded them from the deal. However, players that don't want to pay full price can always grab the bundle, which offers both characters for a couple dollars less.

These discounts will be available on Xbox through July 8th and on Steam through the 11th. Unfortunately, there is a bit of a catch, as none of these deals for The Texas Chain Saw Massacre are currently available on PlayStation.

Are you planning on grabbing any of this DLC while it's discounted? Have you been enjoying The Texas Chain Saw Massacre? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

An adaptation of the cult-classic book series Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark landed in theaters back in 2019, and despite there being a wealth of source material to inspire follow-up films, writers Dan and Kevin Hageman have confirmed that the project is seemingly "stalled" and that they're just as "in the dark" as audiences are. A sequel was originally announced back in 2020, with the coronavirus pandemic understandably causing roadblocks on the project's development, while last year's writers' and actors' strikes also took a toll on the project. Given how few updates have emerged since the announcement of a sequel, it seems unclear if the project will ever move forward.

"I don't know. I think we're in the dark," Dan Hageman shared with Collider when asked for updates about the project, while Kevin added, "It's stalled right now. We actually don't know. We wrote a draft, Guillermo [del Toro] had a story direction of where to take it..."

Kevin continued, "No, we can't get into it, but we wrote something, and that's the last we know. We know a lot of people liked it, but we also know that nothing's happening right now. We're in the dark with you guys."

The original trilogy of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books were hits with young readers in the '80s and '90s, and while similarly popular series like R.L. Stine's Goosebumps books were adapted into TV series and ultimately movies, Scary Stories had a longer journey to live-action. Despite the built-in following of the franchise, the original movie didn't make a major impact on audiences or critics, which has likely impacted the delays in development.

While horror director Guillermo del Toro had been attached to the project for years, it was ultimately director Andr? ?vredal who brought the movie to life. ?vredal shared last year that he's still interested in moving forward with a sequel, despite the lengthy wait.

"We have a story. We have a script. We've been working on the script as late as last year and even slightly into this year," ?vredal detailed to IGN back in 2023. "The process obviously stopped with the strike -- but it's alive, for sure. COVID and then [The Last Voyage of the Demeter] eating up two years of my life certainly put a dent in the progress."

Stay tuned for updates on the sequel to Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark.

Are you hoping we get the sequel? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Lionsgate has released a new photo from The Crow, giving fans a different look at Bill Skarsg?rd's Eric. The character, who rises from the dead to avenge his and his girlfriend's murder, is the central protagonist of the film and was previously brought to the screen by Brandon Lee, the son of Hollywood icon Bruce Lee. Early looks at Skarsg?rd's take on the character have been divisive, with some fans ready to see what a grittier, more comics-accurate take on the story will be like and others mocking his appearance, often drawing comparisons to Jared Leto's Joker from Suicide Squad.

You can see the latest photo below.

"There's nothing to do with Hollywood in this movie at all," director Rupert Sanders told Empire, who debuted the image. "It's a very scrappy indie movie."

"Scrappy" might be a good descriptor for the movie which, despite a familiar IP and lots of famous names attached, seemed like it might never come out.

The Crow has been one of the most troubled productions in recent memory, trading off directors, stars, and even studios numerous times over the life of its development and production. The movie stars Skarsg?rd (IT), singer-songwriter FKA twigs (Honeyboy), and Danny Huston (Succession) and is reportedly a full restart of the story, meaning that it's likely adapting the same set of comics as the first The Crow movie, which was released in 1994.

That film was a huge success, with a hit soundtrack and an aesthetic that was five years ahead of its time. The movie spawned three sequels, The Crow: City of Angels (1996); The Crow: Salvation (2000); and The Crow: Wicked Prayer (2005), although it pretty quickly became a direct-to-DVD series.

The revived The Crow has gone through a number of directors, stars, and even studios in the last decade in its long and troubled road to the big screen. Even after news came out that the movie had wrapped production, it didn't seem like a real thing that people would be actually able to watch.

The animating philosophy behind the new movie has always seemingly been to make a movie that closely resembles James O'Barr's original comics -- that's something O'Barr was talking about nearly a decade ago at convention appearances, and something Sanders is boasting about in the Empire interview.

The Crow is directed by Rupert Sanders (Foundation, Ghost in the Shell, Snow White and The Huntsman) and written by Zach Baylin (King Richard, upcoming Creed III). Producers are Molly Hassell (Braven, Terminal), Victor Hadida (Resident Evil and Silent Hill franchises), John Jencks (Honest Thief, Guns Akimbo), and Edward R. Pressman (American Psycho, The Crow, Wall Street).

The Crow will be in theaters on August 23rd.

The ComicBook Nation crew reviews the A Quiet Place prequel Day One, and discuss The Acolyte's big reveal of "The Stranger," The Bear Season 3 and Suicide Squad Anime debuts, and some bloody new episodes of The Boys Season 4 and House of the Dragon Season 2.

PLUS: Geek news rundown includes the Batman: Caped Crusader trailer, Warner Bros. changing things up with HBO and Max, the Suicide Squad Isekai anime and what Marvel Studios needs to do in Hall H at SDCC to renew faith in the MCU!

A Quiet Place: Day One Review

Here's what ComicBook Nation Host Kofi Outlaw had to say in his 2.5 (out of 5) star review of A Quiet Place: Day One:

Even by the end, given the story premise and where we know the connective threads (like Djimon Hounsou's Henri) lead, there's little to feel good about or celebrate. It's a bad sign when concern for the animal protagonist is the driving force of a horror movie.

A Quiet Place: Day One would've been a compelling indie horror film about a doomed woman facing an apocalyptic situation, but after the heights the franchise has reached and all the promises that came with the prequel, the end result is a fine film that is comparatively the worst entry in an otherwise excellent horror franchise.

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As confirmed by its title, A Quiet Place: Day One takes place during the initial invasion of otherworldly creatures and, while previous movies took place in rural locales, the events of the film instead unfold in the heart of New York City. While the setting and timeline were the major factors setting this film apart from its predecessors, audiences were also given slight glimpses into the inner workings of the creatures themselves, specifically in one key scene that raised more questions than offered viewers answers. Director Michael Sarnoski recently offered more clarity on the bizarre encounter and what that means for the biology of the monsters.

WARNING: Minor spoilers below for A Quiet Place: Day One

Throughout the franchise, the monsters have been seen attacking and presumably killing humans, though it's never quite been clear if the creatures are using their victims as a resource to consume. In one scene, Eric (Joseph Quinn) aims to rescue the cat Frodo and witnesses strange pools of a pink liquid, as well as sees the creatures breaking apart a strange egg-like object that they then appear to eat.

"For me, the egg thing, and it's very not made a focus -- I didn't want to make that scene like, 'Hey, here's what's going on,' and that's important because it's not important to Eric at that time. He's just trying to save Frodo and you're just kind of getting a hint that there's an ecosystem of these creatures around him," Sarnoski revealed about the scene to /Film. "But yeah, for me, what I was getting at with that was you can see all these sort of pools of this pink, glassy liquid, and if you look closely, you can see that there's bodies in those pools. And the idea is that in the other movies, you kind of get that the creatures take people, and they never really say what they're doing with them. And I think everyone's just like, 'Oh, they're eating the people or something.'"

He continued, "But I like the idea that the creatures are kind of leafcutter ants that are sort of farming, using the organic material of people to grow what is their food source, which is these kind of weird melon-y, egg, mushroom things that they sort of feed the little ones with. So it just kind of is hinting at, at the end of the day, these are farmers and they have a little bit of a family dynamic to them. I liked that idea, especially coming off the first Quiet Place that's about a rural farming family."

A third entry in the proper A Quiet Place franchise is said to be on the way, though it's possible that the series could continue with more spinoffs. As far as how much background information we'll get on the terrifying creatures is yet to be seen.

A Quiet Place: Day One is in theaters now.

What did you think of the scene in the movie? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Ridley Scott has had to see his landmark sci-fi films Alien (1979) and Blade Runner (1982) get handled by new visionary directors, with Dune director Denis Villeneuve directing the 2017 sequel film Blade Runner 2049, and director Fede Alvarez bringing Alien: Romulus to theaters this year. Alien: Romulus is a spiritual sequel to Scott's original Alien film, which will see a group of young, would-be space-raiders board a ship that's infested with Xenomorphs. The new Alien film has a lot of fans looking back at the original film again - including Sir Ridley Scott himself.

In a new interview with Vanity Fair about his upcoming sequel to Gladiator (2000), Ridley Scott spoke candidly about his career and the film industry. The acclaimed filmmaker is now willing to admit that shepherding his groundbreaking films into larger franchises was a missed opportunity:

"I was slow out the starting gate," Scott explained. "I mean, I should have done the sequels to Alien and to Blade Runner. You change over the years. At that time, I didn't want to go through it again. So Jim Cameron came in--and then David Fincher--on Alien."

Scott revealed that producers and/or studios like Warner Bros. (Blade Runner) and 20th Century Fox (Alien) didn't give him any choice on what happened with sequels:

"I'm the author of two franchises. Most directors in Hollywood--certainly, let's say, at my level--don't let that stuff go," Scott continued. "But I did Alien as my second movie, so I didn't have much choice. And Blade Runner was my third movie. So, I had no choice because I had very tough partners. It was kind of 'Welcome to Hollywood.'"

Alien proceeded to become a franchise universe with three sequel films and two crossover films (with the Predator films) before Ridley Scott got the reigns back for the 2012 prequel film, Prometheus. It's a part of the business that Ridley Scott is still feeling raw about:

"I was never told or asked," he said, in regards to how sequels to his films were handled. "You can imagine I wasn't happy."

When it came to the subject of Blade Runner 2049, Scott admitted he was happy with the choice of director to carry the franchise, even while he was sad it wasn't him: "I was regretful, although he [Denis Villeneuve] did a good job."

Alien: Romulus has a theatrical release date of August 16th.

NEON has released the final trailer for the upcoming psychological thriller Longlegs. The film from director Oz Perkins appears to take place over a 30-year period from the 1970s until the late 1990s, following FBI Agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) who "is assigned to an unsolved serial killer case that takes an unexpected turn, revealing evidence of the occult. Harker discovers a personal connection to the killer and must stop him before he strikes again."

The new trailer doesn't give much away, but there is a first look at Nicolas Cage's character who has been shrouded in mystery for the promotion of the film thus far. The blink-and-you'll-miss-it clips showcase Cage behind the wheel of the car yelling as well as an incredibly brief albeit strange moment where he appears to be sniffing a doll. That's to be determined, but his unnerving appearance was certainly worth the wait.

Early reviews tease it being the "scariest film of the decade" with others calling it a must-see film. One review even likens it to 1991's The Silence of the Lambs, calling it the best serial killer film since the cult classic was released. Longlegs boasts an incredible cast, including Monroe, who has quietly been building her case for the modern-day scream queen. Monroe's horror career kicked off with 2014's It Follows. She has since starred in several critically acclaimed horror projects including Watcher, Significant Other, and Villains. Longlegs also stars Kiernan Shipka (Totally Killer, Twisters), Alicia Witt (Urban Legend, Dune), and Blair Underwood (Dear White People, Quantico).

Thus far, Longlegs has 11 reviews from critics on Rotten Tomatoes and it's currently sitting at 100%. Despite its rave reviews, an early screening at Beyond Fest in Los Angeles left many moviegoers feeling terrified afterward. "I'm somewhat surprised that people are so kind of terrified by it and find it to be so intense and so gnarly and so grotesque and so brutal," Perkins told IndieWire. "I never set out to make anybody feel bad. I don't know that any filmmaker necessarily does, although there's a couple of people who I wonder if their intention is to make people feel bad. I don't like those movies at all. But for me, honestly, I just tried to make something that was good and that people would want to enjoy."

Longlegs releases in theaters on July 12th.

The legal red tape that tied up the Friday the 13th franchise was finally unraveled, and it means fans can expect to see a lot more Jason Vorhees. Back in May, the "Jason Universe" was announced, with lots of new projects coming, including new video games. Horror, Inc. has not offered much information about that just yet, but according to a new rumor, two Friday the 13th games are currently in development. According to CineStealth on X/Twitter, one of these will apparently be a new multiplayer game, while "the other features more linear gameplay," possibly suggesting some kind of single-player game.

As with any rumor, readers should take this with a grain of salt. That said, at least part of this rumor lines up with things that have previously been revealed. During an interview with Rely on Horror last year, Friday the 13th composer Harry Manfredini revealed his involvement with a new video game based on the franchise. At the time, very few details were revealed, but the interview suggested that the game would not replicate the asymmetrical style seen in Friday the 13th: The Game. It's possible that this is the "linear" game mentioned by CineStealth.

Of course, given the popularity of Friday the 13th: The Game, and the number of people still disappointed that it has been delisted, it wouldn't be surprising to see a new multiplayer game announced as well. Jason translated very well to the world of asymmetrical horror, and there are a lot of people that would be happy to see that concept resurrected. In fact, a fan made "resurrected" project was cancelled last year following a copyright infringement claim.

Whatever ends up happening with Jason Vorhees, there are clearly big plans to bring the character to the world of video games. In addition to these rumored Friday the 13th video games, CineStealth also discussed the rumors that Jason will be appearing in Fortnite. The official Jason Universe account follows Fortnite on X/Twitter, and CineStealth claims that the character will be making an appearance in the game next season. Interestingly enough, there will apparently be no references to the Friday the 13th brand. Given the fact that Jason X appeared in MultiVersus, it's possible that skin could appear alongside Jason's traditional appearance, but that's just speculation at this time. For now, fans will have to wait and see how things play out!

Do you think we'll get two Friday the 13th video games? What do you want to see? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

[H/T: Gaming Leaks and Rumors]

Interview With the Vampire concluded its second season Sunday night on AMC and while in some ways the series drew to a close Louis' chapter of the story, it opened up a brand new one: that of the vampire Lestat. With AMC having already announced that Interview With the Vampire will be back for a third season, the Season 2 finale did quite a bit to set up for what's next for Anne Rice's iconic vampires -- here's how it went. Warning: spoilers for the Season 2 finale of Interview With the Vampire beyond this point. Read on only if you want to know.

The season finale of Interview With the Vampire saw several major events. First, Louis (Jacob Anderson) finished telling his story to Daniel (Eric Bogosian) by revealing what happened in the wake of Claudia's death. Specifically, Louis ended up killing pretty much everyone involved with the Paris coven -- especially Santiago (Ben Daniels) -- leaving only Sam (Christopher Geary) and Armand (Assad Zaman) as survivors. However, it's also revealed that Armand has been lying for seven decades when Daniel exposes to Louis that it was Lestat who actually mind controlled the audience jury and spared his life and that Armand had been an active participant in Claudia's death. It's revealed that Armand directed the "play" and would have let Louis die and the revelation leads to a violent confrontation between the two vampires -- and the end of their relationship. In the aftermath, Louis returns to New Orleans to seek out Lestat while Daniel not only ends up turned into a vampire by Armand but publishes his book -- titled Interview With the Vampire.

The publication of Daniel's book is a major part of the setup for Season 3. As fans of Rice's novels already know, the second book in her The Vampire Chronicles series -- The Vampire Lestat -- saw Lestat awakened from a decades long sleep by a rock band and, through them, discovers the novel Interview With the Vampire. He decides to respond the Louis' account of things with an autobiography of his own (and by also putting out a rock and roll album and going on tour.)

AMC has already somewhat confirmed that aspects of The Vampire Lestat will inspire Season 3. Here's how they describe the new season: "In season three, resentful of the perfunctory portrayal in the trashy bestseller 'Interview With The Vampire,' the Vampire Lestat sets his story straight in a way only the Vampire Lestat can--by starting a band and going on tour. Gabrielle. Nicholas. Magnus. Marius. Those Who Must Be Kept. They join Louis, Armand, Molloy, Sam, Raglan, Fareed and others we can't tell you about yet on a sexy pilgrimage across space, time and trauma. No Auto-Tuning. No Trigger Warnings. All Feels Amplified."

Showrunner Rolin Jones also told TVLine that Season 3 will have a distinct shift in perspective and feel -- it really will be Lestat in the driver's seat now.

"Lestat [will be] front and center, which means the show should feel like it was hijacked by Lestat," Jones said. "Aesthetically, you should be ready for what a Lestat version of the show feels like and looks like."

Last week on Interview With the Vampire, Louis, Claudia, and Madeleine were put on trial for the attempted murder of Lestat and it had devastating results. Claudia and Madeleine were both put to death, but at the last moment, Louis was spared, only to be essentially buried alive in the bowels of the theater. This week, the aftermath of the trial is revealed and the truth about who saved Louis comes to life. Here's everything that happened in the season finale of Interview With the Vampire. Warning: spoilers for "And That's the End of It. There is Nothing Left" beyond this point!

The episode picks up in the wet room of the Theatre where Louis is screaming and moaning inside his crypt. Daniel asks Armand what the consequences of saving Louis were. Armand says he was demoted. Louis said he played "what if" while trapped in his deathbed, trying to figure out if there was a choice he could have made in his life that would have changed his own fate but nothing changes it.

Armand says that Santiago takes over as leader of the coven, but Armand played up his own subjugation. When no one was looking, he swapped out a sacrifice for Louis to help him escape. Louis says that he was dead, but his rage and madness rose. He escapes to the cemetery where he kills the groundskeeper and takes shelter in a crypt. There he begins to plan his revenge like a madman. Telepathically, Armand tells Louis to leave Paris. Armand tells him that he saved him at the trial and helped him escape. Louis warns him to not be at the theater.

While the coven went to sleep, Louis douses the theater in gasoline -- pausing briefly to collection Claudia's things after he sets everyone on fire. Nine die at the theater and four escape, the two who escaped out the front die when their motorcycles explode. Santiago, trying to escape through the sewer, is hunted by Louis.

The two vampires taunt one another with Louis calling Santiago by his real name -- Francis -- and goading him about his mortal life and how underwhelming he was as a mortal man, how embarrassed his maker had been of him. Ultimately, Louis beheads Santiago. He later meets up with Armand when he started lying to him. Armand tells him it was the night of Madeleine's transformation and that he was presented with the play, that he was not part of it but he had chosen his coven and therefore did not tell Louis. Armand tells Louis Lestat is still in Paris.

They find Lestat in Magnus's lair. Lestat says he came there to think about his origins and why he does what he does. Louis confronts him about Claudia's death and says that he has come to kill him, but Lestat says he has not only the blood of Magnus but the blood of Akasha in him which would make burning him impossible. So, instead, Louis kisses Armand in front of him, emotionally wounding him instead. Lestat says to enjoy and tells Armand to see how long it holds. In the present, Louis and Armand give a quick recap of the last several decades of their relationship and how they ended up in Dubai.

With the story told, Daniel says he has some follow up questions and it turns out that tucked into the newspaper Rashid brought him is a document from Raglan. Daniel asks some specific questions, particularly about Lestat's mind control abilities and then points out that Lestat also could have saved Louis that night at the theater. Armand tries to shut it down but Daniel has a script with director's notes and those notes are Armand's, exposing him. He was fully involved with the trial and Claudia's murder. He helped orchestrate it. He also didn't save Louis. It was Lestat. Armand just took credit for it.

Armand and Louis fight. Rashid has already left; Daniel doesn't quite get the chance to before the fight happens. Louis tells Armand he is not to touch Daniel and then prepares to leave. He thanks Daniel and then destroys his laptop before departing. Louis goes back to New Orleans just ahead of a hurricane. He does a walking tour of his old neighborhood and listens to the story of the party that went down at his old townhome. Louis witnesses a vampire collecting vermin and follows him to a rundown home. There he finds a disheveled Lestat "playing" a plank carved to be like a piano keyboard.

Louis asks Lestat if he saved him in Paris and when Lestat confirms and says he knew he'd figure it out. Louis tells Lestat he didn't realize being a vampire was a gift and admits to having been awful but he came to thank him now. Lestat asks about Louis' suicide attempt and reveals he can't stop thinking about Claudia. Louis takes responsibility for Claudia's tragic life and fate. Lestat says she looked at him at the end like a child looking to her father and tries to say he was never a father but Louis just moves to hold him. The two embrace as the storm rages around them.

Daniel appears on a news program to promote his book, Interview With the Vampire. The host treats Daniel like he's a kook, but Daniel pushes back. There's something different about Daniel and it's soon revealed that Daniel is a vampire now, having been turned by Armand who has since vanished. He reaches out to Louis. The Talamasca published Daniel's book. The other vampires want to kill Louis. Daniel wants to write another book with Louis, but Louis still hasn't read the first one. After Daniel goes off to hunt his dinner, Louis telepathically confronts those who want to destroy. He challenges them to come at him telling them that he owns the night.

Some television shows conclude with a feature-length movie, but Netflix's Stranger Things is ending with eight mini-movies. Series creators Matt and Ross Duffer already revealed that the fifth and final season will span eight episodes, and that the Stranger Things series finale will run "at least two hours" when it finally arrives on Netflix in 2025. (While still feature-length, that's shorter than the season 4 volume 2's "mega-episode" finale, which clocked in at a super-sized two-and-a-half hours.) After the previous installment's two-part, nine-episode, 13-hour season, just how big is Stranger Things season 5?

According to Maya Hawke, who plays Robin, so big that the final season is going to take an entire year to shoot. "We're making, basically, eight movies," Hawke said on the Podcrushed podcast, adding that the final season's episodes are "very long."

"Season 4 and season 5 are very connected," she explained. "Season 4 had a part I and part II because they separated them, so the last two episodes came out at a different time, which is unusual for streaming. But this is its own season. It is a continuation, but it's the finale. And it has been a long time since last season."

In the two years since season 4 -- which paused production in March 2020 due to the pandemic -- Stranger Things 5 weathered the 2023 writers' strike and the actors' strike before filming got underway in January 2024. ("The show has been a little bit cursed," Hawke joked of the delays.)

"Our showrunners, Matt and Ross, take a lot of responsibility. They have an amazing team of writers, but they're very involved," she added. "They write a lot and they are very intense and serious about the quality of the continued writing, and so it takes a long time to write each season, and a long time to shoot them."

As for the shortened episode count -- season 5 will consist of eight episodes, down from season 4's nine episodes -- that's because the final season will hit the ground running. Stranger Things 5 picks up where season 4 volume 2 left off: with the Upside Down turning Hawkins, well, upside down.

"The only reason we don't expect it to be as long is because if you look at it, it's almost a two-hour ramp-up before our kids really get drawn into the supernatural mystery," Matt told the Happy Sad Confused podcast in 2022. "You get to know them, you get to see them in their lives, what they're struggling with, adapting to high school, and so forth. Steve's trying to find a date, all of that. None of that obviously is going to be occurring in the first two episodes of [season 5]."

He continued: "For the first time ever, we don't wrap things up at the end of [season] 4, so it's going to be moving. I don't know that it's going to be going 100 miles an hour at the start of [season] 5, but it's going to be moving pretty fast. Characters are already going to be in action. They're already going to have a goal and a drive, and I think that's going to carve out at least a couple hours and make this season feel really different."

Stranger Things season 5 -- starring Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Millie Bobby Brown, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Sadie Sink, Noah Schnapp, Joe Keery, Maya Hawke, Charlie Heaton, Natalia Dyer, Jamie Campbell Bower, and Linda Hamilton -- is expected to release on Netflix in 2025.

More than two years after the previous game's arrival, it seems that The House of the Dead 2: Remake is finally shambling its way on to Nintendo Switch. While nothing has been announced just yet in terms of a release date, the game has been rated by the ESRB. That submission would seem to suggest the game will be coming to Switch soon, and that's very good news for those passionate about the series. Unfortunately, the listing only mentions a Switch version, so those that played The House of the Dead: Remake on PS5 or Xbox Series X|S shouldn't get too excited just yet.

Leaks from ratings boards often give us a hint about games before an announcement happens, but they don't always pay off right away; a PEGI rating for Hi-Fi Rush on Nintendo Switch also leaked earlier this year, and the game has yet to be announced for the platform, let alone released. As such, House of the Dead fans should take this with a grain of salt, even though it seems like a pretty good sign!

The House of the Dead 2 initially released in arcades in 1998, before coming to Sega Dreamcast one year later. A rail shooter light gun game, House of the Dead 2 tasks players with shooting away at undead enemies as they make their way through various locations around Venice, Italy. At this time, we don't know of any changes or enhancements that can be expected from the remake, but The House of the Dead: Remake included several additions to the original version, including a photo mode, a gallery, and more.

The House of the Dead series has been highly-successful for Sega over the years, and has even resulted in two live-action films. House of the Dead has been largely dormant for a while, but this remake could suggest that Sega is interested in bringing the series back, as it's currently doing with so many of its other franchises. At the very least, it would be nice to see even more House of the Dead games brought to modern systems, including The House of the Dead: Overkill. For now, fans will just have to wait and see how things play out!

Are you excited for The House of the Dead 2: Remake? Did you play the original version back when it was in arcades? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

[H/T: Nintendo Life]

A Quiet Place: Day One is looking at a franchise-best start at the box office. This weekend, the newest A Quiet Place installment is projected to bring home about $53 million. Before this week, the prequel starring Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn was tabbed at $40 million. Clearly, audiences are not tired of this franchise just yet. Also, it has to be said that Inside Out 2 and Bad Boys: Ride or Die also really opened the floodgates for theaters this summer. Some estimations of A Quiet Place: Day One's potential have the movie possibly hitting $55 million. That would be an absolute victory for Paramount and franchise creator John Krasinski.

A lot of credit is due for Nyong'o and Quinn, but Krasinski also deserves some praise too. Who would have thought his little franchise that could would prove doubters wrong with this third entry. He called in Michael Sarnoski to helm this entry. Speaking to ComicBook, the director shared what advice the Quiet Place architect had for him when they started working on Day One.

"Yeah, I think it was just a lot of conversations. A lot of back and forth. He presented an idea of 'Hey, we want to do a New York, Day One movie.' And then, he really gave me the freedom to be like, 'What does that mean for you? How could that be a Michael movie?' He didn't want to force me to try and emulate the past movies," Sarnoski explained. "So, I just had to think about what kind of characters I wanted to explore. How I wanted to see this world. Then, we had a lot of back and forth about the little things we can do to sort of suggest things about the other movies. And, see some characters. But, it always had to feel in service to Sam's journey and her core emotional story."

A Quiet Place: Day One's Stars Really Shine

A Quiet Place: Day One leans heavily on Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn as a duo. ComicBook caught up with them to discuss making this blockbuster. One defining characteristic of this franchise is the eerie sense of quiet punctuated by loud abrasive noise. Both actors would reflect on selling moments without dialogue and how different that can be from other roles they've taken on in the past. A Quiet Place: Day One seems to have been transformative for a lot of the people involved.

"That was a very interesting spot to be in, where the dialogue was very effective, and kind of punched through a lot of subtext," Quinn said during our conversation. "It was very communicative in a way that was urgent, I guess, because the only reason you're going to talk in an environment like this, which is perilous if you make any noise, is when it's absolutely urgent. The rest was up to us to kind of fill that in."

Are you planning a trip to the theater this weekend? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!

Filmmaker Ti West returned to the horror realm after an extended break back in 2022 with X. While audiences were excited enough by that movie, he surprised fans by revealing that he and star Mia Goth had also developed and filmed the prequel Pearl with the same crew that made X. Given that both films were major hits with audiences and critics, expectations for the final chapter in the trilogy, MaXXXine, were quite high, and while those expectations from audiences might not have impacted the development of the movie's story, West detailed how there was a different type of pressure to honor what came before. MaXXXine lands in theaters on July 5th.

"I wouldn't say the development [was impacted]. Having made the other two movies with nobody knowing they existed, it was a very different experience making the third one with everybody knowing that it was coming," West confirmed to ComicBook of what made bringing MaXXXine to life different from its predecessors. "So everyone was putting out information of who was in the movie, what the movie might be about, and things like that."

He continued, "And then there was just a little bit more pressure. I think the idea that people were actually waiting for this movie, instead of surprising people was certainly a little bit more ... It wasn't a burden, but certainly a weight to carry when writing it, and making it. Whether it tops the other movies or, at the very least, stays at the same level, where people could say and argue which one's their favorite. And the scope of this movie was so much bigger, so I was really trying to deliver on something that the other movies didn't have, so it was hard-earned in that way, but worth it."

MaXXXine is described, "In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past."

While Goth returns to reprise her role, the movie also added a number of new cast members, including performer Moses Sumney making his feature-film debut.

"I've been wanting to get into it and really timid about really pursuing what my first thing would be, because it's so difficult to find rich characters to play, especially as a Black actor," Sumney shared of how he knew MaXXXine was the project he wanted to make his debut with. "And what I loved about this character is that he's a nerd and, truly at heart, I am a loser. You never really stop being the nerdy loser you are as a teenager and, in this business, we're all wearing these masks, and I appreciate it. I felt really seen by the character and I thought that I could connect something and bring something really real to it. I think that Ti's writing was just so excellent across all three films, but especially the character-building in this film is really excellent."

Throughout X, Maxine proclaimed how she deserved to be a star, while MaXXXine explored her first major foray into Hollywood. Giancarlo Esposito plays her agent Teddy, who goes to greater lengths than a normal agent might in order to protect and care for Maxine.

"For Teddy Knight, he certainly sees something special in Maxine. He sees a desire, and he sees a commitment, and he sees someone who really wants to get there," Esposito expressed of his character. "I think he also relates to the demons behind her eyes. He sees her soul, because I think he understands that he has had some demons, and look where he's got to. So I really love the part of the story that is so linked up in how human beings relate to each other and he's someone who believes in her more than anyone and gives her hope when she's in distress in those moments. He says, 'Look, I'm going to take care of it,' because she proved it, right? We're so often asked to prove it, and if you can show it and prove it to someone that you really do want it that badly. And not only do you want it, but you've done the work."

He added, "I love this scene where she's sitting there with the highlighter in bed; that's my life. I fall asleep with paper. And then you cut, and it's the morning and the paper. That's me. Right? So I mean, it really is -- I'm learning three things at one time. I'm on the plane, and that's how you do it. It's that kind of commitment. We can say we want it, but when you prove you want it, and she shows me that she really does want it, I'm all for it. I'll do anything to have that happen for you."

MaXXXine also stars Kevin Bacon, Elizabeth Debicki, Halsey, Lily Collins, and Michelle Monaghan.

MaXXXine lands in theaters on July 5th.

Are you looking forward to the new movie? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

A Quiet Place: Day One set a new franchise box office record for its preview night. The Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn thriller saw more than $5 million on Thursday. That would be the series best with some estimates going all the way up to $6 million. Michael Sarnoski's first entry into the A Quiet Place series seems to be going well in the initial stages. First reactions were positive and these box office numbers seem to be bearing it out. Over on Rotten Tomatoes, A Quiet Place: Day One sits at 86% freshness. While that number is lagging slightly behind the first two movies, those premiered in a very different media environment than the one we exist in now. This weekend will be a weird one to handicap for projections.

One massive hurdle stands in the way of A Quiet Place: Day One shattering the existing records for the franchise: Inside Out 2. Pixar and Disney's juggernaut will likely claim the top spot again and will likely cross over $1 billion this weekend. In addition, the animated feature will likely be the first film since Oppenheimer and Barbie to cross that wild number. A lot of viewers will be heaing to theaters to check out what Joy and company are doing. The good thing for A Quiet Place: Day One is that horror audiences are likely to make a trip out to see what the buzz is about. $50 million is the record for this series, $40 is looking a little bit more realistic this time around.

How Good Is A Quiet Place: Day One?

As people are headed out to see A Quiet Place: Day One this weekend, some might be wondering how this entry stacks up to the first two movies. ComicBook's Kofi Outlaw thinks A Quiet Place and A Quiet Place Part II are both better. In his review he explains how some of the reveals about this larger world didn't land for him. However, there's nothing lacking in Nyong'o's performance and that cat is an absolute star. The personal drama at the heart of A Quiet Place: Day One is what movie fans will be most invested in from the moment the film starts. So, if you came for all out carnage for almost two hours, you might be a little bit disappointed. Here's a quick read of the movie from our resident critic.

Outlaw explained, "A Quiet Place: Day One now attempts to move the franchise focus beyond the Abbott Family while advertising big reveals about the larger franchise storyline and the beginnings of the alien invasion of the "Death Angel" monsters. Unfortunately, the prequel's biggest revelation is that this franchise is being approached as more of an anthology than as a shared universe of interconnected stories - and as a standalone chapter, it's hard to see Day One as a compelling horror movie, rather than a well-acted character drama."

Will you be watching A Quiet Place: Day One this weekend? Let us know down in the comments!

Manifest Media's Table Read podcast recently released their Fright Night episode, which featured most of the original cast from the 1985 horror camp classic. One big change from the film was Star Wars legend Mark Hamill taking over the role of Peter Vincent, the character originated by the late, great Roddy McDowall. Fright Night director Tom Holland was also in attendance during the reading, but this event wasn't the only thing the director has in common with Hamill. Holland also helmed the original Child's Play in 1988 and Hamill voiced Chucky in the 2019 remake. ComicBook was in attendance during the Fright Night reading, and we got the chance to chat with Holland and Hamill together. Turns out, they had never talked about their Chucky connection.

"When they came to me, I said, 'No, you get Brad Dourif. He is Chucky.' And they said, 'Well, this is a reboot that alters the storyline. It's a very different Chucky. I said, 'Okay, I'll read it,'" Hamill explained to ComicBook alongside Holland. "And here's the intriguing part. Instead of the soul of a serial killer being transferred into his body ... This one was an artificial intelligence doll, where a disgruntled employee, angry at the way he was treated, switches off the safety mechanism that controls him for not injuring people or murdering them or anything. And so he's an innocent at the start."

"And then he starts learning, but he learns the wrong things," Hamill continued. "For instance, he sees a group of teenagers all sitting around and laughing their heads off at a slasher movie. So, in his head, slashing people, that's good. It makes people happy. He grows from a complete innocent to a monster by the end of the thing. That's the only reason I did it. I thought I wouldn't be interested in just doing a remake, especially since nobody can be better than Brad. And I loved the original movie."

"They messed with the remake," Holland chimed in. "They made it for Christmas. They set it in Christmas, and then they took Christmas out, but they couldn't take the Christmas lights out in the third act."

"Did you do any of the sequels?" Hamill asked Holland. "Hell no. Just Child's Play," Holland replied.

"Cause there was Child's Play 2, 3, 4," Hamill added. "I'll tell you, once I agreed to do it, I ordered all of them off of Amazon. And of course, the first one is great. By the time they get to Bride and Chucky and stuff. It's pretty silly."

Tom Holland Talks Difficulties of Making Child's Play:

ComicBook also chatted with Holland on his own during the Fright Night table read, and he spoke more about Child's Play, and explained why it was a much more difficult movie to make than Fright Night. In fact, he called Fright Night, "The best experience I've ever had directing a film."

"Yeah, Child's Play was a difficult film, but Child's Play was difficult because nobody had done the killer doll movie, and it asked a puppet to do what I needed that puppet to do. So I mean, there were a lot of shots. I'd say half to three-quarters of the shots were a terrible fight just to get them. That was nobody's fault. That was just that my expectations outpaced the technology at the time. So quite often, I had to figure out how to get the shots in different waves, and I was lucky I got them more often than I didn't, and if I couldn't get them, I figured out another way to stage the scene. So Child's Play turned out terrific, but it was much more difficult and intense."

"Every kid has woken up and looked around his room and at his action toys and his dolls and things and said, 'Oh, wouldn't it be wonderful if one of them came alive?' Well, one does. And his name is Chucky. And you're in deep sh*t trouble."

You can listen to the Fright Night episode of the Table Read podcast here.

A Quiet Place: Day One director Michael Sarnoski talked about his working relationship with John Krasinski. ComicBook had the good fortune of catching the filmmaker before A Quiet Place: Day One hits theaters today. During our chat, the director revealed that Krasinski really pushed for Sarnoski to try and make this entry in the franchise his own. Yes, there are still some rules that need to be adhered to. But, as a series progresses, there becomes a need to keep things fresh.

"Yeah, I think it was just a lot of conversations. A lot of back and forth. He presented an idea of 'Hey, we want to do a New York, Day One movie.' And then, he really gave me the freedom to be like, 'What does that mean for you? How could that be a Michael movie?' He didn't want to force me to try and emulate the past movies," Sarnoski told us. "So, I just had to think about what kind of characters I wanted to explore. How I wanted to see this world. Then, we had a lot of back and forth about the little things we can do to sort of suggest things about the other movies. And, see some characters. But, it always had to feel in service to Sam's journey and her core emotional story."

The director credited Krasinski for being down to hand him the keys at such an important juncture. He continued, "So, I was just brainstorming and talking. Thankfully, he was very generaous and open with the idea of 'make this yours and do what speaks to you.'

A Quiet Place: Day One Expands The Franchise

All this talk about Krasinski might make you wonder, is A Quiet Place: Day One as good as its predecessors? For ComicBook's Kofi Outlaw, not really. Our critic was less than enamored with the personal drama at the heart of the prequel. Despite owning massive set pieces that dwarf stuff from the first two movies, he argues that A Quiet Place: Day One is worse for not leaning into the madness of the New York City setting a little more. The review even goes so far as to suggest that you'll probably end up being more invested in the cat than anything else.

"A Quiet Place: Day One now attempts to move the franchise focus beyond the Abbott Family while advertising big reveals about the larger franchise storyline and the beginnings of the alien invasion of the "Death Angel" monsters," Outlaw argues. "Unfortunately, the prequel's biggest revelation is that this franchise is being approached as more of an anthology than as a shared universe of interconnected stories - and as a standalone chapter, it's hard to see Day One as a compelling horror movie, rather than a well-acted character drama."

Are you down with more Quiet Place spinoffs? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!

The fourth season of Stranger Things was released back in 2022, and one of the highlights of the season was the addition of Joseph Quinn as Eddie Munson. Quinn's role in the show quickly shot him to stardom and now he has some huge projects on the horizon such as A Quiet Place: Day One, Gladiator 2, and Fantastic Four. Many fans have wondered if Quinn will be popping up in the fifth season of Stranger Things despite Eddie's tragic death. Quinn previously teased a potential return, and recently shared an update with ET while doing press for the A Quiet Place prequel.

Quinn teased that the "chances are high" that he will be seeing the Stranger Things cast and creators in the future. "I love those guys! I'd love to say hello," Quinn said. "I might have that feeling too," Quinn teased when asked about fans feeling hopeful of Eddie's return. "Or maybe I don't," he added with a laugh. "I don't know! Who knows?"

"I'm sure they're working very hard to land the plane," Quinn added of the show's upcoming final season. "It's been a long time that they've been working on that, so I'm really delighted that they're kind of getting towards the end, and they're having a nice time.

How Will Stranger Things End?

Stranger Things creators, Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer, revealed that their pitch for the fifth season was a tear-jerker.

"Listen. It's our process but it's just like, we really just try to focus on one season at a time," Ross Duffer previously told The Wrap. "We do have an outline for season 5 and we pitched it to Netflix and they really responded well to it. I mean, it was hard. It's the end of the story. I saw executives crying who I've never seen cry before and it was wild. And it's not just to do with the story, just the fact that it's like, Oh my God, this thing that has defined so many of our lives, these Netflix p

"I'm gonna just make a bold statement," David Harbour (Jim Hopper) told ComicBook last year. "Each year, it feels like the show's getting bigger and bigger and more exciting. And we have a real responsibility to knock it out of the park in the final season. So if we don't, give me all of your fan rage. Write the petitions. Go ahead, do it. Because I'm going down there next week to start and I'm going to pour my whole heart into this thing. I've read some of the scripts and in my mind, they're stunningly beautiful. It's time. We're going to knock it out of the park. We're going to deliver you the finale that you need, that you want, that I want."eople who has been with us from the beginning, seven years now, and it's hard to imagine the journey coming to an end."

Stranger Things is expected to return for its final season next year. A Quiet Place: Day One hit theaters tonight.

When John Krasinski wrote and directed A Quiet Place in 2018, there was a certain amount of success that came from viewers' curiosity at seeing The Office star try his hand at a high-concept horror film about sound-sensitive monsters. The first film surprised many with its breakout success at the box office ($341 million on a budget of $17 million) - but also with its critical acclaim, which praised the way that Krasinski and his real-life wife actress Emily Blunt used the film's premise (life-or-death need for silence) to illustrate the unspoken bonds between family, in everything from intuiting feelings to how we can still interact and communicate with those close to us, even without speech. More importantly, selecting a family unit as the franchise protagonists made every main character in A Quiet Place feel indispensable - and every loss felt deeply impactful. Even as the world of the film got bigger in the sequel and the characters split up, the focus on family bonds felt just as present, as audiences hoped to see the Abbott family reunited.

A Quiet Place: Day One now attempts to move the franchise focus beyond the Abbott Family while advertising big reveals about the larger franchise storyline and the beginnings of the alien invasion of the "Death Angel" monsters. Unfortunately, the prequel's biggest revelation is that this franchise is being approached as more of an anthology than as a shared universe of interconnected stories - and as a standalone chapter, it's hard to see Day One as a compelling horror movie, rather than a well-acted character drama.

WARNING: Mild spoilers for A Quiet Place: Day One below

The plot of the prequel centers on Sam (Lupita Nyong'o), a terminally ill cancer patient living out her final days in hospice care outside NYC with only her pet cat, Frodo, as a companion. Sam and some other patients are given a field trip into the city to see a stage performance, with supervising nurse Reuben (Alex Wolff) promising Sam she can get pizza in the city. Of course, the pleasant day becomes the worst of their doomed lives, when the Death Angel invasion begins, with the streets of the city being overrun in minutes by the beasts, causing a horrific event that echoes the 9/11 attacks.

Sam and Frodo survive the initial slaughter, ending up in a shelter with other survivors. However, even if the group manages to hold together and follow the rules of silence, it quickly becomes clear that so many humans crammed together in a small hunting ground like Manhattan is nothing but a charnel house. With limited time left, and her condition worsening by the hour without proper medical care, Sam resigns herself to making a trek up to her old home in Harlem, to have a last meal at her favorite childhood pizza place. Along the way, Sam and Frodo pick up a straggler named Eric (Joseph Quinn), a law student from England who is just as alone in the crisis as Sam is. Together, the trio begin their journey - soon finding it coincides with the government's attempt to stage a mass evacuation of Manhattan.

A Quiet Place: Day One feels less like an expansion of the franchise storyline and more like a character study about Sam, Eric, and the dire situation and context that bonds them. It's a mixed-bag result from writer/director Michael Sarnoski, who is best known for the acclaimed Nicolas Cage character drama Pig. Day One obviously offers the biggest spectacle and set pieces when it comes to the Death Angels and their attack on humanity - but as is so often the case, seeing more of the creatures (in broad daylight and in mass numbers) takes away a lot of the mystique and dread caused by sound and/or the viewer's imagination.

The previous Quiet Place films always made you wonder if a monster was within earshot; in Day One, there's no guesswork needed, as the monsters are ever-present and anyone making any sound equals instant death. That new caveat often stretches credibility to the limit as NYC is, on a good day, nearly impossible to move through without generating noise - let alone when broken glass, debris, and bodies are lying all over the place. Any real walk through the destroyed city would probably last seconds, making Sam's journey look foolish more so than brave. The only novelty scare the prequel offers (besides a few tense chase sequences) is seeing herds of the monsters moving together, shaking buildings and streets like an earthquake. It conveys just how big the scope of this problem is, how fearsome the Death Angels are, and therefore how important the Abbott Family's discovery of a weakness in the monsters really is, if humanity is to survive. Day One also has (but somewhat squanders) the benefit of turning big groups of humans into an inherent threat - which is wonderfully depicted in a second-act sequence where an evacuation exodus goes horribly wrong. But since Sam opts to go it alone, the one major distinction Day One has for itself is eventually lost.

Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn are both fantastic leads and ground the monster movie carnage in performances that echo real New Yorkers who lived through 9/11 and experienced those initial 24 hours of panic, grief, and loss - but also uplifting acts of human kindness and connection with strangers they might have never bonded with, otherwise. It's a noble metaphor for a horror film that has high artistic aspirations; it is not all that effective for a B-movie horror-thriller experience. Much of Day One is watching the stars acting out small stage play-style vignettes in silence. Unlike Krasinski, Sarnoski has little levity (beyond gallows humor) to change up the dour pace and tone. Even by the end, given the story premise and where we know the connective threads (like Djimon Hounsou's Henri) lead, there's little to feel good about or celebrate. It's a bad sign when concern for the animal protagonist is the driving force of a horror movie.

A Quiet Place: Day One would've been a compelling indie horror film about a doomed woman facing an apocalyptic situation, but after the heights the franchise has reached and all the promises that came with the prequel, the end result is a fine film that is comparatively the worst entry in an otherwise excellent horror franchise.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

A Quiet Place: Day One hits theaters on June 28th.

A Quiet Place: Day One has a full rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The prequel sits at an 87% on the review aggregator with 70 published reviews at the time of writing. It's been a weird year for horror at the theater, so hopefully this is a good sign for A Quiet Place: Day One. One of the major strengths in a lot of the reviews stems from Lupita Nyong'o's performance with Joseph Quinn. She's become a very beloved actor in the horror space and that's unlikely to change with this entry. Another bright spot is the feline companion that will navigate an eerily quiet New York City with our protagonists. Michael Sarnoski is aboard to direct A Quiet Place: Day One and although the scares might not be a mile a minute like other franchises, they have an impact.

First reactions to the prequel were positive as well. People wandering into the theater expecting buckets of blood might not get exatly what they expect. (Some would wonder why that would be the case considering the strength of the first two films is building tension from being trapped in situations with these monsters instead of like a massive battle.) Despite those critiques, the scares are there and that probably matters a bit more. ComicBook's Brandon Davis gave his take after seeing it recently.

The first reviews are in for #AQuietPlace: Day One - currently it's Fresh at 89% on the Tomatometer, with 33 reviews: https://t.co/z2175JtL9L pic.twitter.com/43ejpd8CbV

-- Rotten Tomatoes (@RottenTomatoes) June 27, 2024

"A Quiet Place: Day One is excellent. It didn't have as much apocalypse-falling carnage as I'd hoped for but the human story told here is both terrifying and beautiful," Davis argued. "Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn are great. Nice new bits of lore, too. Plus, the cat is a star."

Lupita Nyong'o Shines In A Quiet Place: Day One

A big draw for A Quiet Place: Day One are the performances of Nyong'o and Quinn. Our two leads are trapped in an impossible situation as the trailers have made clear. However, even being able to navigate this space has been challenging for the actress. She told Newsweek that she's basically terrified of Horror movies and needed to work up the courage to watch A Quiet Place: Day One on her own. (This is even more amazing considering some of her fan-favorite work in the space with Jordan Peele.) Only daytime viewing of scary movies for Nyong'o and that's not changing anytime soon.

"To be honest, I'm quite the scaredy cat. So I have to admit, I didn't watch the film at the theater because I was scared to do so, I needed to watch in the daylight where I could stop and leave whenever I needed to," Nyong'o admitted. "But what I do love about this genre is that there's two emotions that really bring people together in entertainment--obviously laughter, and fear. I think those two emotions are such great cinematic experiences."

"And horror, of course, lends itself to fear. It's cathartic for us. I think we don't allow ourselves in our real lives, we're not looking for fear, we're trying to get as far away from it as possible," she contended. "So in the realm of entertainment, we get to exercise that part of ourselves that lies dormant, if we're lucky, in our real lives, and so it's cathartic and brings us together, it also makes us appreciate our reality, because our realities are always a lot better off than a horror film."

Will you be seeing the new A Quiet Place movie this week? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!

Ghostbusters fans were given an entirely fresh adventure earlier this year with Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, an experience that not only honored all the things that fans of the franchise love, but also introduced thrilling new elements into the series, which is exactly why that sequel will be honored at this year's Halloween Horror Nights. Coming to both Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Orlando Resort, fans will be able to immerse themselves in the world of the franchise in intense new ways, as the haunted houses will honor both the spooky and the silly elements of the sequel that fans loved. Halloween Horror Nights kicks off at Universal Orlando Resort starting August 30th and at Universal Studios Hollywood on September 5th.

Per press release, "The all-new Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire haunted houses at Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Orlando Resort bring the latest installment of the global Ghostbusters franchise to life as well as iconic ghosts, creatures, and characters from the beloved classic series in authentic haunted houses that capture the horror and humor for which the films are known. Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire will transport fans of the film franchise to New York City where the Spengler family teams up with the original Ghostbusters who are now at the helm of a top-secret research lab for their ghost-busting enterprise. With the daunting discovery of an old relic that has set free the vengeful spirit of Garraka, who threatens to freeze everyone to death, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their city and save the world from a second Ice Age."

"As guests venture through the haunted houses, they will find themselves in the sinister world of the supernatural, from Ray's Occult Books shop to the Ghostbusters' new high-tech lab and containment facility to the dank New York City sewer system. Fans will embark on this petrifying journey alongside the Ghostbusters, encountering iconic ghosts who slime and nefarious villains who are out for revenge -- all while trying to escape an army of ghastly creatures bent on cracking bones and turning their veins into rivers of ice. As they navigate their way through freezing and frightening conditions, the Ghostbusters will need their wit and humor to defend the city they love from a terror too chilling to believe.

"Select tickets and special vacation packages for Universal Orlando's Halloween Horror Nights are on sale now, including single-night tickets, Express Passes, the R.I.P Tour, which provides Priority V.I.P. entry to the haunted houses, and the Behind the Screams: Unmasking the Horror Tour that offers a glimpse into how the scares are brought to life via a daytime, lights-on journey through select haunted house. Tickets for Universal Orlando's first-ever Premium Scream Night on Thursday, August 29th -- an unprecedented, limited-capacity event that gives fans access to everything they love about Halloween Horror Nights before the event officially opens -- are also now available. More information about all Universal Orlando's current Halloween Horror Nights offers and entitlements can be found at www.universalorlando.com/halloween.

"A variety of Halloween Horror Nights ticket options for Universal Studios Hollywood are now available, including General Admission, Universal Express, After 2 p.m. Day/Night, the Early Access Ticket, which provides access to select haunted houses beginning at 5:30 p.m. (subject to change), in advance of the scheduled 7 p.m. event opening time, the premium R.I.P. Tour and popular passes, Frequent Fear Pass and Ultimate Fear Pass, which enable guests to experience the scares again and again.

"For fans interested in digging deeper into the terror at Halloween Horror Nights, check out the Discover Universal Blog, which unearths more details about the two original haunted houses -- 'Monstruos 2: The Nightmare of Latin America' and 'Dead Exposure: Death Valley' -- at Universal Studios Hollywood. New updates will be posted regularly for the events at both Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood.

"Fans can get their Halloween Horror Nights gear now with an all-new merchandise collection available for purchase at Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood, as well as online at http://shop.universalorlando.com. New items include a t-shirt and hat for the Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire haunted house.

"Additional details, including new haunted houses coming to both Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Orlando Resort, will be revealed soon. For more information and to purchase tickets for Universal Studios Hollywood's event, visit www.UniversalStudiosHollywood.com/Halloween. For more information and to purchase tickets for Universal Orlando's event, visit www.UniversalOrlando.com/Halloween."

Halloween Horror Nights kicks off at Universal Orlando Resort on August 30th and at Universal Studios Hollywood on September 5th.

Are you excited for the new haunted house? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Dexter: Original Sin is adding Sarah Michelle Gellar. Just when you thought the push back toward the past couldn't get anymore literal, the Showtime series adds the star of Buffy The Vampire Slayer to the cast of the Dexter prequel. On social media, the show teased her involvement with the Showtime series as Chief Tanya Martin. So, she'll be keeping a close eye on Patrick Gibson's Dexter Morgan this time around. After all, Dexter: Original Sin is set in the far-flung past of 1991. So, the TV-favorite serial killer is a long way from the man we met in the prestige TV era years ago. Gellar isn't the only late Millenial/Gen X favorite along for the prequel either. Christian Slater is playing Dexter's dad, Harry Morgan in the series as well.

Showtime and Paramount Media Networks President Chris McCarthy sounds excited to explore a new chapter with a fan-favorite series. "The DEXTER saga has been an undeniable creative and popular success for SHOWTIME, both in its original, groundbreaking form and the record-setting DEXTER: NEW BLOOD," McCarthy wrote teasing other spinoffs. "The series is a rich foundation for other shows in the lane of complex, subversive antiheroes that SHOWTIME has always done so brilliantly. Clyde is deep into compelling stories and characters that will satisfy the cravings of our multifaceted audience."

Sarah Michelle Gellar is joining #DexterOriginalSin as CSI Chief Tanya Martin? Big slay ? pic.twitter.com/Jm8mJpBdb7

-- Dexter (@SHO_Dexter) June 27, 2024

How Does Dexter: Original Sin Connect To The Original Series?

In essence, it's a prequel to the beloved Showtime series: "Set in 1991 Miami, Dexter: Original Sin follows Dexter (Gibson) as he transitions from student to avenging serial killer. When his bloodthirsty urges can't be ignored any longer, Dexter must learn to channel his inner darkness. With the guidance of his father, Harry (Slater), he adopts a Code designed to help him find and kill people who deserve to be eliminated from society without getting on law enforcements' radar. This is a particular challenge for young Dexter as he begins a forensics internship at the Miami Metro Police Department."

"Dexter: Original Sin is executive produced by Clyde Phillips and produced by Showtime Studios and Counterpart Studios. Executive producers also include Scott Reynolds (Jessica Jones), Michael C. Hall (Dexter), Mary Leah Sutton (Resident Evil), Tony Hernandez (Emily In Paris), Lilly Burns (Russian Doll), with the series being produced by Robert Lloyd Lewis (The Lincoln Lawyer). Reuniting with Slater is Michael Lehmann (Heathers), who serves as directing executive producer."

Are you excited about all these TV favorites joining the cast? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!

Terminator Zero will be taking The Terminator franchise in a whole new direction when the anime makes its debut with Netflix later this Summer, and the voice cast has been revealed ahead of its premiere! Terminator Zero will mark a lot of firsts for the science-fiction horror film and TV franchise as it not only will be the first entry in the franchise set in Japan, but it will also serve as the first ever animated take on it all. Given all of these major firsts for The Terminator, Netflix has locked in some major names to bring the characters behind it all to life.

Following the previous announcement that Timothy Olyphant will be leading the cast as the voice of the Terminator, Netflix has revealed more additions to Terminator Zero's voice cast. They include Rosario Dawson (Ahsoka, Common Ground) as Kokoro, an advanced AI and Japan's answer to Skynet, Andr? Holland (Moonlight, The Knick) as Malcolm Lee, Kokoro's creator, Sonoya Mizuno (House of the Dragon, Crazy Rich Asians) as Eiko, who comes from a post-Judgement Day 2022 to stop Malcolm from launching Kokoro, and Ann Dowd (The Handmaid's Tale, MASS) as The Prophet. You can check out the new look at Terminator Zero below.

Rosario Dawson, Andr? Holland, Sonoya Mizuno, and Ann Dowd will join Timothy Olyphant in TERMINATOR ZERO. The all-new anime premieres August 29! pic.twitter.com/wYWUNFL2m5

-- Netflix (@netflix) June 27, 2024

What Is Terminator Zero?

Created and executive produced by Mattson Tomlin (Project Power, The Batman II) for Skydance Animation and Production I.G, Terminator Zero is directed by Masashi Kudo and will be running for eight episodes with its debut season when it releases on August 29th (Judgment Day in The Terminator franchise) with Netflix. As for what to expect from the series, Netflix begins to tease Terminator Zero as such, "2022: A future war has raged for decades between the few human survivors and an endless army of machines. 1997: The AI known as Skynet gained self-awareness and began its war against humanity."

The synopsis for the anime's story continues with, "Caught between the future and this past is a soldier sent back in time to change the fate of humanity. She arrives in 1997 to protect a scientist named Malcolm Lee who works to launch a new AI system designed to compete with Skynet's impending attack on humanity. As Malcolm navigates the moral complexities of his creation, he is hunted by an unrelenting assassin from the future which forever alters the fate of his three children."

Yesterday, HBO revealed that they had cast ten new actors in recurring roles in Welcome to Derry, a prequel series to Stephen King's IT, which will bring back Bill Skarsg?rd as Pennywise. No characters names are given, and with ten people all in recurring roles, it seems likely these will be either members of the Derry community who aren't main characters, or main characters only in one half of a time-shifted narrative. The new actors will join a cast that already includes Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar and Stephen Rider.

Per Deadline, who first broke the news, here's the rundown of new actors: Alixandra Fuchs (Hatfields & McCoys), Kimberly Guerrero (The English), Dorian Grey (Star Trek: Discovery), Thomas Mitchell (Spiral), BJ Harrison (Family Law), Peter Outerbridge (Batwoman), Shane Marriott (Fargo), Chad Rook (Billy the Kid), Joshua Odjick (Little Bird) and Morningstar Angeline (Echo). There's no details on any of the roles just yet.

The news comes less than a day after news that Warner Bros. Discovery will rebrand Welcome to Derry -- as well as DC's Lanterns an a number of other upcoming projects based on popular IP -- from Max originals to HBO Originals and move them to the beloved cable network. It's the latest in a series of moves by WBD management to minimize the importance of the streaming platform to the company's overall business plan.

In addition to reprising his role from the movies, Skarsg?rd will reunite with filmmakers Andy and Barbara Muschietti and producers Jason Fuchs, Roy Lee and Dan Lin. They and Skarsg?rd will all serve as producers on the series, which was developed for television by Skarsg?rd, the Muschiettis, and Fuchs. Andy Muschietti, who directed the two IT movies, will helm four of the series' nine episodes.

Welcome to Derry is set in King's fictional town of Derry, Maine that Pennywise terrorized for generations. It will take place decades before the events of IT. In the novel and original TV adaptation, the earliest events of the story unfold in the late '50s, though in the two-part cinematic adaptation of the story, this timeline shifted forward for the earliest events taking place in the '80s. With Welcome to Derry set to be an extension of those films, the new series looks to take place in the '50s to explore bizarre events in the town that pre-dated the fatal run-ins with the entity living in the sewers of the town.

A24 has recruited romantic comedy icon Hugh Grant to play a sweater-vest wearing "nice guy" in their next movie -- but it isn't quite what it sounds like. In the new trailer for The Heretic, audiences can get a first look at Grant playing a man who traps a pair of young missionaries in his house of horrors. The women, who are going door to door trying to convert people, figure out too late that Grant's character is lying to them, and when they try to leave, they realize that he has the whole house rigged. Eventually, he offers the pair two doors, and lets them choose which way they want to try and escape the house.

Grant, best known for his work in the 1990s, has recently taken a turn toward franchise entertainment. He starred in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves and Wonka last year, drawing praise for both films, in which he played against type.

"I got a bit better," Grant said last year, explaining why he got out of romantic comedies. "I got a little less bad after I had children, got married, got happier....I got too old and fat and ugly to do romantic comedies, obviously, so I got off with more interesting things."

You can see the trailer below.

Of course, he is returning to one of his most famous roles next year with Peacock and Universal's Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, which brings back Renee Zelweger in the title role and reunites her with Grant for the first time since 2004's Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason.

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, who wrote and directed the movie, wrote John Krasinski's 2018 A Quiet Place. After that movie blew up, they wrote and directed 2019's Haunt, the Adam Driver movie 65, and the Stephen King adaptation The Boogeyman, which starred Thatcher.

Per the official synopsis for The Heretic, "Two young missionaries are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse."

Written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, the film stars Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, and Chloe East. Heretic will be in theaters on

While AMC announced that Interview With the Vampire will be back for a third season on Wednesday, Season 2 of the critically acclaimed series based on the works of Anne Rice still has one final episode to go. This Sunday's season finale is set to show what happened next after the devastating penultimate episode which saw the trial of Louis, Claudia, and Madeline -- and the stunning return of Lestat. But according to series stars Eric Bogosian and Assad Zaman, Season 2 is not only going to be intense but it will leave fans satisfied.

"You have no idea. From a perspective of being a real person, living in a real world, doing a dramatic show, and I'm acting in it, the inventiveness of Anne Rice and Rolin Jones together, you just can't wait to see where this is all gonna lead," Bogosian said (via Collider). "I've had such a good experience with this show that I'm ready to be putty in their hands for whatever Rolin cooks up. I was quite happy with the way it all ends up, mostly, but I'm not going to get into that right now."

"I think you're going to be satisfied," Zaman added.

Interview With the Vampire Season 3 Will See Lestat Tell His Tale

While Season 2 is set to end in a satisfying place, the series isn't done. On Wednesday, AMC announced that they had renewed Interview With the Vampire for a third season and in Season 3, Lestat will have his say. The third season is set to find Lestat "resentful of the perfunctory portrayal in the trashy bestseller 'Interview With the Vampire'" and will see him "set his story straight in a way only the Vampire Lestat can -- by starting a band and going on tour. Gabrielle. Nicholas. Magnus. Marius. Those Who Must Be Kept. They join Louis, Armand, Molloy, Sam, Raglan, Fareed, and others we can't tell you about yet on a sexy pilgrimage across space, time, and trauma. No Auto-Tuning. No Trigger Warnings. All Feels Amplified."

"When you buy the rights to 18 Anne Rice novels that have sold more than 150 million copies, in your wildest dreams you hope there's a show as good as Interview on the other end," said Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks. "What Rolin has done with these stories and characters, working so closely with Mark, as the steward of this universe, has exceeded the loftiest version of our expectations. We can't wait to see where this creative team takes the series from here and know we are walking alongside an incredibly loyal and passionate base of fans who feel as strongly about this material as we do."

The Season 2 finale of Interview With the Vampire airs Sunday on AMC.

Actor Maika Monroe's breakout role came in the indie horror movie It Follows, with the compelling and open-ended nature of the story's mythology igniting countless questions from fans about a follow-up. Director David Robert Mitchell is confirmed to be bringing the sequel They Follow to life, which will feature Monroe's return, and while we don't know much about what the adventure will focus on, the actor confirmed that shooting is set to start in early 2025. If the project sticks to that timeline, it's entirely possible that They Follow could be released in the Halloween season, yet no official release date has been confirmed.

Monroe confirmed the shoot date to IndieWire, and while she didn't divulge any details about the movie's actual plot, she teased, "I just know that David wouldn't do a sequel if it wasn't going to be incredible, and the script is so f-cking good. I'm obsessed. I'm just so excited to step into playing Jay again and just where you find her, it's going to be great."

Also released in 2014 was another breakout indie hit for Monroe with The Guest, and while she took a brief hiatus from the horror genre, she's returned in full force with projects like Watcher, Significant Other, and this year's Longlegs. They Follow, however, marks the first time she'll be reprising a role from earlier in her career.

When asked how she's preparing to revive a character she created, the actor admitted, "I have no idea. This is going to be my first time. It's going to be such a new kind of adventure for me. Probably a lot of conversations with David and kind of piecing together everything that happened in the 10 years between these films. I think it's going to be very, very fun."

In the original movie, teens were targeted by a supernatural being that could take on countless shapes and appearances, slowly shambling towards its target. The only thing that could slow the being was for these teens to pass on this target to someone by having sex with them, leaving the teens to try to create more obstacles in the creature's path, while also causing them to wonder if the people approaching them in any setting were real people or the being in disguise.

Monroe reflected on how, while she was intrigued by the experience, she couldn't have anticipated the movie resonating so strongly with audiences.

"Of course I had no idea what it was going to be," the actor admitted. "I had seen David's previous film, The Myth of the American Sleepover, that was so beautiful and so dreamy, and I was like, 'Okay, maybe this style mixed with a horror film could be very interesting,' but I had no idea the effect of it and that it [would be] such an important film to so many people, so many years later."

Stay tuned for updates on They Follow.

Are you looking forward to the new movie? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Writer Jed Mackay should also be applauded for how he weaves his Moon Knight run into the event. The Midnight Mission may have been here from the start, but seeing Moon Knight arrive as the force to put an end to Blade's terror is executed to perfection. I know a few Moon Knight fans who will be losing their minds over his big splash page.

And yet I can't shake the feeling of being slightly underwhelmed. The reveal of what's really going on with Blade isn't too much of a surprise if you've kept up with his recent stories. But after the heel turn in Blood Hunt #1, it feels like a letdown for it to be revealed that something else is walking around in Blade's body calling the shots. For as goofy as his portrayal can sometimes be, Eric Brooks is an interesting and deep enough character that you can write a story where he takes over all vampires and is driven to side with them over humanity.

That could make for one hell of a character study, and it's what Bryan Hill's recent run was seemingly leading toward. But, nope. He's just possessed, meaning however the comic ends the character will likely be free of any consequences, setting the stage for an easy return to the status quo. This is obviously neither a new nor unique problem for comics, but it still feels like a missed opportunity.

Also, for as many tie-ins as this event has had over the past couple of months, it seems not much has happened in Blood Hunt itself. Blade's forces got the advantage in the opening issue, they were forced to retreat last issue and now we'll get the big battle in Blood Hunt #5 likely involving Moon Knight, Bloodline and Dracula alongside the Avengers. This wasn't helped by the current Avengers lineup being one of its most overpowered, but MacKay never found a way to maintain the story's momentum after that fantastic opening issue.

Gripes aside, Blood Hunt #4 isn't bad. And I like that they're already teasing at least two major after-effects spilling out of this series. But as this event has continued it has gone from being a potential all-time great to just "another one." Simply put, that bites.

Published by Marvel Comics

On June 26, 2024

Written by Jed MacKay

Art by Pepe Larraz

Colors by Marte Garcia

Letters by Cory Petit

Cover by Pepe Larraz and Marte Garcia

A new Van Helsing TV series has landed at CBS, following a reportedly intense bidding war to acquire it. It is being executive produced by Rob Doherty, who re-imagined Sherlock Holmes for modern times with his hit TV series Elementary, which also aired on CBS (2012-2019). Carl Beverly and Sarah Timberman will be executive producing for Lionsgate TV, which is backing the project. Author Jonathan Lee (Lockerbie) will be writing the series.

The initial synopsis for this Van Helsing TV series describes " a contemporary take on the monster hunter Dr. Abraham Van Helsing, who uses his uniquely inquisitive mind working alongside his ex, relentless FBI special agent Mina Harker, to solve New York City's most harrowing cases".

That sounds a lot like Elementary, with its re-imagined Sherlock Holmes/Dr. Watson relationship and mythos, while keeping it bedded in a police/detective TV procedural framework.

There have been several attempts to turn the Abraham Van Helsing character from Bram Stoker's Dracula into a compelling franchise solo character. In 2004, Universal tried to turn the character into a horror-action movie hero, with Hugh Jackman (Deadpool & Wolverine) playing Van Helsing; that film had modest success ($300 million on a budget of $170 million) and had a tie-in video game that was largely panned by both fans and critics. In the 2010s, Syfy launched the Van Helsing TV series, which moved the mythos into a dystopian future and followed Abraham's female descendant, Vanessa, who awakens from a coma (like Walking Dead's Rick Grimes) to find a world overrun by vampires. Syfy's Van Helsing ran for five seasons (2016-2021) and earned a passionate cult following, proving that the character was viable to hold down a franchise or series.

Other than those two big media attempts, Van Helsing has been the subject of more niche content lanes like anime (the Hellsing miniseries of 2001-2002) or is included in other works about vampires or the Dracula mythology. Sir Anthony Hopkins famously played Van Helsing in Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, while Christopher Plummer played him in Dracula (2000). While the character won't be named "Van Helsing," horror director Robert Eggers (The Lighthouse, The Witch) will be remaking the classic film Nosferatu, with Willem Dafoe as "Prof. Albin Eberhart Von Franz," who seems to be the Van Helsing character in the film.

The new Van Helsing TV series is in development at Lionsgate TV, to air on CBS.

Source: Deadline

One of the most anticipated horror movies of the summer has just earned an extra week's worth of anticipation, as NEON has announced that the Hunter Schafer-starring Cuckoo has been pushed back a week from its most recent release date. Funnily enough, this release date reflects a date that the movie previously held, so while some movies earn delays due to unexpected behind-the-scenes snags, this is likely an attempt by NEON to maximize the film's potential. The movie was originally set to hit theaters this past May, though it was ultimately pushed to August 9th, then up to August 2nd, and now it is once again slated to be released on August 9th.

Cuckoo is described by NEON, "Reluctantly, 17-year-old Gretchen (Hunter Schafer) leaves her American home to live with her father, who has just moved into a resort in the German Alps with his new family. Arriving at their future residence, they are greeted by Mr. K?nig, her father's boss, who takes an inexplicable interest in Gretchen's mute half-sister Alma. Something doesn't seem right in this tranquil vacation paradise. Gretchen is plagued by strange noises and bloody visions until she discovers a shocking secret that also concerns her own family."

Also starring in the film are Dan Stevens (The Guest), Jessica Henwick (Underwater), Marton Cs?k?s (Freelance), Greta Fern?ndez (Santo), and Jan Bluthardt (Luz).

Neon added of the upcoming project, "Following his festival sensation Luz, German director Tilman Singer has once again succeeded in creating an atmospheric and visually outstanding horror trip with an original plot and perfidious twists."

As far as release delays are concerned, this is a relatively minimal one, but given the buzz that the movie has been earning at festival screenings all year, fans will still be a bit disappointed that they'll have to wait a bit longer to see what the excitement is all about. Ahead of the release of Cuckoo, NEON will also be releasing the horror film Longlegs in July, starring Nicolas Cage as a freaky serial killer, while the studio unleashed the nun-themed horror movie Immaculate in theaters back in March.

By the end of the year, it's possible that NEON could take up three spots on best-of-the-year lists this December.

Cuckoo lands in theaters on August 9th.

Are you looking forward to the movie? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

Even as someone who is, at best, a casual appreciator of Godzilla (I saw the 1954 original years ago and 2023's Godzilla Minus One more recently and rank both highly), it's hard not to tell that the "King of the Monsters" is having a moment in pop culture. Toho released two back-to-back critically acclaimed Godzilla reinventions within the past decade while, at the same time, Legendary Pictures has built a shared cinematic universe in Hollywood around Godzilla and Kong. That influx of interest has also come to comics, the most high-profile of which see Godzilla crossing paths with heroes from other properties, including the Power Rangers and the Justice League. Simultaneously, IDW Publishing has released a string of mostly well-received Godzilla comics focused on Godzilla and his pantheon of fellow kaiju. Godzilla: Here There Be Dragons even received awards attention in the form of two nominations from the 2024 Eisner Awards. Now IDW Publishing has brought back most of that series' creative team--writer Frank Tieri, artist Inaki Miranda, and colorist Eva de la Cruz--for a sequel.

The follow-up series is dubbed Godzilla: Here There Be Dragons II - Sons of Giants, a mouthful of a title that gets its secondary subtitle from the secret cabal of kaiju worshippers introduced in the first series' framing story. The groups' prominent place in the title ("Sons of Giants" dwarfs "Here There Be Dragons II" in the logo on the issue's cover) is indicative of the series' shift in focus, bearing no apparent direct tie to the tale of Francis Drake's trip to Monster Island that was the main thrust of the first Here There Be Dragons, and instead focusing on the shadowy cult.

As such, Here There Be Dragons II jumps a few centuries into the future. The main story takes place in 1804, when a journalist approaches Vice President Aaron Burr, hinting that he knows the real reason for Burr's ill-fated duel with Alexander Hamilton and that it had less to do with Hamilton besmirching Burr's good name and more to do with a coin stamped with Godzilla's likeness found on Hamilton's body. This plot barely gets underway as the issue splits time between that conversation and two flashbacks, one to a story of Godzilla in feudal Japan and another to the monster's activities in Ancient Rome.

One might think that these flashbacks distract from the main story. On the contrary, they're the issue's highlights. Miranda and de la Cruz get the most room to show their versatility in these scenes, mimicking the style of traditional Japanese artwork in the first story and going as big as possible in the latter to convey Godzilla's scale relative to the Roman army. Readers may even find themselves wishing these vignettes had been expanded to full-issue tales, with the story of the vengeful samurai being particularly poignant.

But the reporter's investigation is squeezed because of the flashbacks' inclusions. The issue barely gets past his first meeting with Burr, and what follows after is of questionable logic. How is it that this reporter is canny enough to discover the existence of a secret monster-worshipping society but not careful enough to think twice about blindly following a man he already believes killed a peer to protect the group's secrets to a second location? Or foolish enough to think it safe to let his guard down around this person, even for a minute? In a story like this, there's always the chance that a twist is waiting to explain it all, but taken at face value (as we have little choice but to do with this issue alone), it's confounding.

It's hard to get invested in the conspiracy angle at this point because, thus far, readers don't know much about what the Sons of Giants are up to. Yes, they are uncomfortably comfortable with killing people to keep their existence shrouded in mystery but beyond that, we only know that they like to dress up in silly kaiju-themed hats and robes and tell monster stories, making them hardly the worst bunch of nerds ever encountered (aside from all the murder). While Godzilla: Here There Be Dragons II - Sons of Giants #1 may not hook readers on its central mystery by the time the issue ends, the gorgeous historical vignettes are enough for even casual kaiju lovers to consider returning for a second look.

Published by IDW Publishing

On June 26, 2024

Written by Frank Tieri

Art by Inaki Miranda

Colors by Eva de la Cruz

Letters by Steve Wands

Cover by Inaki Miranda

The Department of Truth has always been a frustrating comic for me, largely because of its incomplete examination of conspiracy theories and their impact on human society. The Department of Truth treats conspiracy theories both reverently but also fails to examine their real world impact and the victims they often leave behind. We've seen time and time again, especially in recent years, how easily propaganda and distorted facts can corrode and destroy, but the comic book has never really committed to exploring the destruction conspiracy theories bring, nor does it examine the tainted seeds they grow from, usually driven by bigotry or malcontent.

The usage of Lee Harvey Oswald is a fantastic case of the comic's paradoxical treatment of conspiracy theories. The real-life Oswald was a troubled man, a dissatisfied Marxist repeatedly court-martialed from the US Army who then attempted to defect to the Soviet Union. Oswald had already tried to kill a retired major general before he murdered Kennedy and he planned Kennedy's assassination for months. There is a preponderance of evidence showing Oswald killed Kennedy, but the question of why he did it remains unclear. That void in Oswald's story is the soil in which countless conspiracy theories have grown from.

While the inclusion of Oswald in The Department of Truth wasn't surprising given that he was at the heart of one of the biggest questions in American history, it was curious how he was portrayed. Because of Oswald's history, his personality, motivations, and life have been scrutinized and examined by a thousand historians and psychologists. But instead of using those profiles to recreate Oswald, The Department of Truth has portrayed him as a gruff establishment-type, a preserver of the secret truth and one of the reasons why America enjoys its supposed exceptionalism. To be blunt, the comic has bastardized Oswald and turned him into the opposite of what he was. And at least during the first 22 issues of the series, there was never a clear hint as to whether the comic did so deliberately or simply to fill a need in the story, regardless as to whether the series was in essence peddling the same sort of embellishment it was supposedly rallying against.

I'm glad The Department of Truth is finally getting around to telling Oswald's story, although I feel frustrated by how the arc opens. There's only the vaguest hint that creative understood who Oswald really was in this issue, instead choosing to rather joyously drag Frank Capra into its vague re-telling of history. Yes, Capra was a propogandist (he was probably one of the most successful in history), but the comic again seems to rest its laurels on knowing that fact rather than examining anything else about the director's life. At one point, the comic's version of Capra tells Oswald that he didn't found the Department of Truth "to fight a war," when the actual Capra tried to... twice. The actual Frank Capra was a fascinating person, one who effectively retired when the US government rejected him twice during the onset of the Korean War and went on to make science documentaries. But the comic's version of Capra instead hones in on one point and in essence erases the real Capra in place of a falsity sharing his name.

But, here is what I find so frustrating about The Department of Truth. Is its treatment of Oswald or Capra or any other historical figure simply a demonstration of the core message of the comic? By utilizing these brazenly two-dimensional versions of complex human beings, is the comic simply showing that it can create its own truth by honing in on one point and simply rewriting the rest of that person's history and personality? If that's the true aim here, it's brilliant, really - a fascinating meta-narrative of sorts by depicting historical persons and placing them in roles that they would never willingly enter. And honestly, I'm still unsure of whether that's what the comic is doing, which is pretty impressive 23 issues in.

The Department of Truth is one of two things: it's either guilty of the very same thinning of the truth to craft a fictional narrative that it finds more pleasing, or it is in fact showing how easy it is to warp the truth by using the occasional fact as a guidepost for falsehood. While I suspect it's the former, the latter is why I'm glad that this comic book is back. It's time to see whether The Department of Truth is brilliant or exceedingly obtuse, with issue #23 being the first to begin peeling back the curtain.

Published by Image Comics

On June 26, 2024

Written by James Tynion IV

Art by Martin Simmonds

Colors by Martin Simmonds

Letters by Aditya Bidikar

Cover by Martin Simmonds

The Vampire Lestat will have his say. On Wednesday, AMC announced that they are renewing Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire for a third season. The renewal news comes just a days ahead of the Season 2 finale, set to air on Sunday, July 30th. The renewal also comes soon after AMC announced a third series in the Immortal Universe, The Talamasca. According to the network, the third season of the critically acclaimed series will see Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid) get to tell his story after Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson) had his chance in the first two seasons.

Here's how AMC describes Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire: In season three, resentful of the perfunctory portrayal in the trashy bestseller 'Interview With The Vampire,' the Vampire Lestat sets his story straight in a way only the Vampire Lestat can--by starting a band and going on tour. Gabrielle. Nicholas. Magnus. Marius. Those Who Must Be Kept. They join Louis, Armand, Molloy, Sam, Raglan, Fareed and others we can't tell you about yet on a sexy pilgrimage across space, time and trauma. No Auto-Tuning. No Trigger Warnings. All Feels Amplified.

"When you buy the rights to 18 Anne Rice novels that have sold more than 150 million copies, in your wildest dreams you hope there's a show as good as Interview on the other end," said Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks. "What Rolin has done with these stories and characters, working so closely with Mark, as the steward of this universe, has exceeded the loftiest version of our expectations. We can't wait to see where this creative team takes the series from here and know we are walking alongside an incredibly loyal and passionate base of fans who feel as strongly about this material as we do."

"Thank you to the brilliant casts and crews of the first two seasons that got us to this day. Thank you to the rabid, beautifully unwell fandom that scaled the castle walls to get us to this day," showrunner Rolin Jones said. "Thank you to Dan McDermott, Ben Davis for the funds and tools to continue the great work of dramatizing Anne Rice's extraordinary novels. And sincere apologies to the family and friends of actor Sam Reid, for the possession that continues to this day. Monsieur L extends his promise to return his body upon cancellation (may that evening never come.)"

For fans of Rice's novels, the premise of Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire will be somewhat familiar as it appears that the series will be taking on The Vampire Lestat, the second book in Rice's The Vampire Chronicles series. It's something that Jones has previously said would be his focus for a third season of the series before the show was official renewed.

"There's no green light. I can't talk about it," Jones said, noting AMC has not yet renewed Interview With the Vampire (via Collider). "I can only talk about this: The next book I would do would be The Vampire Lestat. I have no idea who makes the decisions about why things are titled what they are. I think it's called The Vampire Lestat. That's what I think it's called, so that's what I would like to make. We're already pulling from other books. We've pulled from The Vampire Lestat. We've pulled from The Queen of the Damned. We've pulled from The Vampire Armand. We've pulled a little bit or at least some seeds from The Body Thief. There's some stuff from Prince Lestat. We've read them. We're building this things as if they're all one giant thing."

What is The Vampire Lestat About?

The book, first published in 1985, is the sequel to Interview With the Vampire. While Interview was narrated by Louis de Pointe du Lac, The Vampire Lestat is told from Lestat's point of view with the conceit of the novel being that it is Lestat's response to Louis' memories in Interview With the Vampire. The novel tells Lestat's history and origin story, including the founding of the Theatre des Vampires and his own version of the events of Interview With the Vampire. In particular, the novel expands the vampire culture and mythology of Rice's characters and further fleshes out the world setting up for novels to follow, such as The Queen of the Damned, the third book in the series.

Season 3 of Interview With the Vampire does not yet have an anticipated release date. The Season 2 finale will air Sunday, June 30th on AMC.

When Ti West's A24 slasher, X, was released in 2022, horror fans had no idea that an iconic trilogy was about to be born. The post-credit scene for the film revealed that West and star Mia Goth had secretly filmed a prequel titled Pearl, which was released later that year and ended up being just as well-received as its predecessor. At that time, it was also announced that West was working on a third installment, MaXXXine, which would follow Goth's character after the events of X. Not only did West provide something unique by gifting horror fans with three films in only two years, but he's managed to make each installment entirely distinctive and captivating. After one viewing, it feels safe to call MaXXXine the weakest of the trilogy, but that doesn't mean it's not a worthy follow-up with with some extremely satisfying nods to '80s schlock.

In 1985, six years after Maxine Minx (Mia Goth) escaped the horror on Pearl's farm that left her friends dead, the wannabe star has made a name for herself in the adult film industry in Los Angeles. After booking a role in a horror movie, Maxine's dreams finally seem to be coming true, but when more people in her life begin to die, it becomes clear someone doesn't want her to forget what happened in Texas.

There are a few factors that help set MaXXXine apart from X and Pearl. First is the flashy 1980s vibe that West seems to understand perfectly. These days, 1980s nostalgia isn't exactly in short supply, but West has managed to create a love letter to the era that comes across as genuine rather than a cosplay of the time. For example, the inclusion of the real-life serial killer Richard "Night Stalker" Ramirez was an interesting choice that felt much more sincere than a similar attempt made by American Horror Story: 1984 a few years back. Rather than try to shoehorn Ramirez into the story, West uses his looming presence to help audiences understand the fear that was permeating through Hollywood at the time.

Another amusing addition to MaXXXine was the movie with the movie, Puritan 2, which added a fun meta layer to the experience. Those behind-the-scenes moments were elevated by the presence of Elizabeth Debicki, who plays the film's director. Debicki commands every scene she's in, and despite the many threats lurking around Maxine at all times, Debicki manages to be the only person who can make the titular character seem fragile. Unlike the films that came before, MaXXXine also has a mystery element that will keep you guessing the whole way, which makes room for an amusing cop duo played by Bobby Cannavale and Michelle Monaghan.

While there's a lot to love in MaXXXine, it doesn't quite measure up to X's gory mayhem or Pearl's acting showcase. Some moments will undoubtedly make you squirm, but they're further and farther between this time around. And while Goth is utterly fantastic in the threequel, she doesn't get the same space to show off her chops. Pearl was, above all, a character study that allowed Goth to chew up every moment whereas MaXXXine takes more time to highlight its setting and the people around her. However, that does leave room for some extremely delightful performances by Kevin Bacon and Giancarlo Esposito. It was clear that Bacon was having a blast playing a sleazy private investigator, and he easily earns the brunt of the film's laughs.

MaXXXine is a horror film made by horror fans for horror fans, and it's meant to be seen on the big screen. West's X trilogy will likely go down in history as one of the most prolific horror endeavors of the decade. Everyone will undoubtedly have different favorites and, while MaXXXine may rank last here, it is guaranteed to have some hardcore fans.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

MaXXXine lands in theaters on July 5th.

IT prequel series Welcome to Derry will be airing on HBO, as well as streaming on Max. The decision to air the show on HBO comes as part of Warner Bros. Discovery's overall shift in content strategy. The company is following the blueprint of its hit Game of Thrones spinoff House of the Dragon, by airing premium IP on HBO, instead of relegating its high-budget premiums to being "Max exclusives" as originally planned. The Harry Potter TV series and DC's Green Lantern series Lanterns have both also shifted from being Max exclusives to being HBO originals that will also stream on Max.

It's noted in the report that this shift in content strategy will begin in 2025. Two of Warner Bros. most highly-anticipated upcoming 2024 releases - DC's Batman spinoff The Penguin and Dune prequel series Dune: Prophecy - will still be Max streaming exclusives. There are more questions hanging over Max's second-tier original content properties like the breakout dramedy Hacks or The Sex Lives of College Girls. Even more uncertain are the Max series that have modest budgets but are based on major IPs: namely DC's Peacemaker series (a tie-in to James Gunn's DC Universe franchise), as well as And Just Like That..., the Sex and the City sequel series. Both series are on the bubble since they are strong draws as Max exclusives, but also successful enough (respectively) to be contenders on HBO.

HBO and Max content chairman and CEO Casey Bloys is spearheading this shift in content distribution strategy; it's a much-needed course correction from the quagmire Warner Bros. Discovery ended up in, with "HBO Max" and then "Max" failing to grab as big of a streaming market share as hoped, while the split approach to content distribution through TV and streaming arguably destabilized HBO's once-perennial position as king of weekend appointment television (Saturday night movie premieres and Sunday night original content premieres).

Bloys has indicated in interviews that he and "Sarah Aubrey [head of original programming at Max] and her team are trying to focus more on using the Warner Bros. IP to do big tentpole shows."

What Is Welcome to Derry About?

Welcome to Derry is set in the infamous town of Derry, Maine that Pennywise terrorized for generations. It will take place decades before the events of IT. In the novel and original TV adaptation, the earliest events of the story unfold in the late '50s, though in the two-part cinematic adaptation of the story, this timeline shifted forward for the earliest events taking place in the '80s. With Welcome to Derry set to be an extension of those films, the new series looks to take place in the '50s to explore bizarre events in the town that pre-dated the fatal run-ins with the entity living in the sewers of the town.

Welcome to Derry will star the previously announced Madeleine Stowe, Stephen Rider Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, and James Remar. IT movie star Bill Skarsg?rd will reprise his role as the iconic clown Pennywise; Skarsg?rd will reunite with Andy and Barbara Muschietti, the minds behind both IT films. Additionally, Jason Fuchs and Brad Caleb Kane serve as co-showrunners of Welcome to Derry.

Source: THR

Witter Entertainment, a company that offers officially-licensed, limited-run VHS tapes, has done what no other studio has done in over 15 years: they got a VHS on sale in Walmart stores across the U.S. A two-tape edition of Terrifier 2 is selling in stores across the country as part of a promotional endcap put together by Bloody Disgusting, in which they hawk the coolest wares int he horror biz by offering Walmart a chance to sell exclusive merch from Witter, Neca, Fright Rags, and more. The tapes, if you can find them, are currently selling for $29.99.

The last mainstream, commercial VHS release in the U.S. was David Cronenberg's A History of Violence. Based on the graphic novel of the same name, the movie starred Viggo Mortensen, Ed Harris, William Hurt, and Maria Bello.

It's hard to get exact numbers on sales and dates for VHS, but according to CNN Money, Walmart left the VHS business in late 2005 or early 2006, with the 2005 holiday season serving as a kind of last hurrah for the format. It's likely (but difficult to know for sure) that this is the first new, pre-recorded VHS tape sold in Walmart stores since.

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Walmart is one of the last bastions of hope for DVD and Blu-ray fans, with exclusive steelbooks coming in every week and a disc-media section that still offers more than 200 movies and TV shows in most locations. According to Bloody Disgusting, the curated horror section that includes Terrifier 2 will be in more than 3,000 stores nationwide. Even if there are only a handful of tapes in each location, 3,000 locations likely means that Terrifier 2 holds the distinction of being the best-selling VHS tape in years.

Fairly recently, they made a play to attempt an acquisition of Studio Distribution Services, which serves as the primary distribution company for most DVDs and Blu-rays in the U.S. Until and unless that deal closes, SDS is a joint venture between Warner Bros. and Universal Pictures.

The Bloody Disgusting merch is only available in brick and mortar stores. Not only can you not buy it on the Walmart website, but you can't even search it up to find out whether your local store is participating. For that, you'll have to either call or visit your local store. Per their website, Walmart has a little over 4,000 locations in the United States, so if you live in the U.S., it's more likely than not that one of the locations near you will be participating in the Bloody Disgusting program -- although Witter, in response to disappointed fans on Instagram, admitted that it is a "long roll-out."

While there are some VHS-themed collectibles in the Bloody Distgusting collection, including decorative Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street toys, Witter confirmed that the tape will be fully playable, and features an introduction from Damien Leone, harkening back to the direct-to-VHS heyday of things like Full Moon Features, where founder Charles Band would have a presentation on each tape.