The Exorcist: Believer – Can It Convert Enough Fans to Justify Trilogy Plans

When Universal Studios teamed up with Peacock to buy the rights to The Exorcist franchise for $400 million, expectations were understandably high. Original plans called for brand new trilogy. The same creative team behind the rebooted Halloween trilogy were on board. But The Exorcist: Believer bombed with critics and performed below expectations at the box […]

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The Exorcist: Believer Fails to Compel or Shock Like Its Predecessor

Apparently, Universal Studios and Peacock went in together to acquire the rights to The Exorcist for a whooping $400 million. Less than a month ago, The Exorcist: Believer released a week earlier than planned to avoid something worse than The Devil … Taylor Swift’s concert movie. Now the horror movie intended to kick off a […]

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Pet Sematary Bloodlines a Reminder That This Franchise Should Stay Dead

To date, Pet Sematary remains one of the Stephen King’s best novels. Though some 80s horror fans love the original Pet Sematary adaptation, it’s a middling effort with just a handful of memorable moments. The 1992 sequel Pet Sematary Two has its fans, but it’s not particularly good either. Neary three decades later, the 2019 […]

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Be Kind Please Rewind: Ranking All Six V/H/S Movies

At the peak of the format’s popularity, the found-footage subgenre produced a handful of successful horror franchises. Arguably, The Paranormal Activity franchise was the most lucrative. Though much smaller in scale, the Hell House LLC trilogy produced decent, but diminishing, scares. Courtesy of Shudder, the V/H/S franchise has stepped forwarded as something of a new […]

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Live or Die. The Choice is Yours – The Saw Franchise From Worst to First

Somewhere in between ‘masked slashers’ and ‘insidious conjurings’, torture porn briefly reigned in horror. From Rob Zombie’s The Devil’s Rejects to Eli Roth’s Hostel and the ‘New French Extremity‘ movement, horror fans flocked to movies characterized by extreme graphic violence. However, it all started with James Wan’s Saw in 2004. The low-budget movie kickstarted a […]

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Saw X Defies Expectations and Delivers a Grisly, Satisfying Sequel

Think about this fact for a second. The Saw franchise’s original run ended with the 2010 sequel, Saw 3D. Since that sequel’s poor reception, Lionsgate has tried twice, with varying results, to revive its money-making series. If the belated 2017 sequel Jigsaw was a lukewarm attempt to reboot things, the mix of police procedural and […]

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The Conjuring Universe: All Nine Movies Ranked From Mildly Scary to Terrifying

With nearly $650 million dollars in box office receipts, The Conjuring Universe is an unqualified success. Outside of Marvel, James Wan and company have accomplished something pretty noteworthy. The fact that this is a horror universe just makes its success even sweeter for genre fans. Yes, critical reaction to the movies have varied widely. Nonetheless, […]

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