I went to a horror panel at New York Comic Con on Friday and came out with things I want to see. That needs some explaining, because I’m not a horror fan by any stretch of the imagination. I know. I’m about to spend all this time talking about BlumFest. But you can appreciate the people making something, and appreciate the storytelling, without wanting to spend your evening being terrified. Those are separate things for me.
And Mike Flanagan was in the room, which changes the conversation.
Flanagan, Ejiofor and The Exorcist: Martyrs
Flanagan came out with Chiwetel Ejiofor to unveil the trailer for The Exorcist: Martyrs, and I need a second here, because I was somewhat starstruck. There are actors whose work you admire, and you know they’re people. Obviously you know that. But then they’re standing in the room with you, and your brain goes, “Oh. That’s actually him.” I’m listening. I am. But also, that’s Chiwetel Ejiofor.
Mrs. Know-It-All and I reviewed The Fall of the House of Usher together, and that was a masterpiece. A masterpiece. Flanagan truly can do no wrong in my eyes. And yes, I realize I just said I’m not a horror fan, and now I’m calling something that is very much horror a masterpiece. When the storytelling is that good, you get me invested in the people and what’s happening, and I’ll go somewhere I wouldn’t normally go.
So now he’s writing and directing an Exorcist movie through his Red Room Pictures banner, and the cast is Ejiofor, Scarlett Johansson, Laurence Fishburne, Diane Lane and John Leguizamo. At a certain point, Mike, you can stop. I’m already interested. Blumhouse Atomic Monster and Morgan Creek are producing alongside him, with Jason Blum, Trevor Macy and Roy Lee among the producers.
What caught my attention in the trailer is the investigation. Johansson is playing a detective, and you have these horrific murders, but then you start getting into whether the thing behind them is something you can actually catch. You can arrest a person. What happens if the person isn’t where the evil stops? That’s an interesting problem, and it gives me something to think about beyond “that image is going to be deeply unpleasant to remember later.”
And there is deeply unpleasant imagery. The execution, the murders, the church, those figures on the stairs. It looks dark. Some people see that and think, “Yes, that’s exactly what I want.” I’m thinking, “I want to know what happens, but I may have some complaints about what you make me look at on the way there.” Flanagan gets a lot of trust from me, though. House of Usher earned that. The mystery, the cast and the filmmaker: that’s how you get someone like me into an Exorcist movie.
MatPat, and Amanda the Adventurer
MatPat hosted the whole thing, and I love that man. I love how his brain works. He’ll take something somebody else would look at and go, “It’s a video game, who cares?” and suddenly you’re thinking about the science and the story and some tiny detail you never would have noticed. Now you care. Now you have questions. I was there for the announcements, obviously, but I was very much there for MatPat too. I’m not going to pretend otherwise.
So the big one for me was Jason Blum announcing a deal with MatPat to develop Amanda the Adventurer, DreadXP’s indie video game, into a Blumhouse feature film, with Patrick Ewald of parent company Epic Pictures producing. He understands that world. He understands why people get invested in these games and spend so much time trying to work out what’s underneath the thing they’re being shown.
That friendly children’s entertainment surface with something wrong underneath it is interesting to me. You take something that’s supposed to make you feel comfortable and safe, and then you give someone a reason to question it. Whether I appreciate that at night when I’m trying to sleep is another conversation. As a storytelling idea, yes. And I’m just happy for him. I could probably spend too much of this talking about MatPat, but you already knew that was a possibility.
Blum also announced a short film development deal with Heidi Wong, the horror storyteller known to her followers as The Horror Queen, who’s on the TIME100 Creators list and Forbes 30 Under 30. That connects to something I liked about the whole afternoon. These are people who built an audience because they understand how to tell stories in their own space, and now they’re getting to make something in another form. You can have a whole relationship with an audience before you ever make a film, and that matters. I want to see what carries over and what they do differently.
LaKeith Stanfield goes underground
The cast that showed up was kind of ridiculous in general. Rob Savage was there talking about Other Mommy, which opened Friday, and offered the room a free screening in New York that night. Know your audience. A room full of horror fans, a free horror movie that night. That’s going to work.
Then Savage brought out LaKeith Stanfield to announce he’s starring in Savage’s next film, Molepeople, written by Nathan Elston and produced by Paramount Primal and Blumhouse Atomic Monster. Paramount has it dated for August 27, 2027. LaKeith is another person where I want to know what he saw in the material. His involvement makes me curious. Also, Molepeople. That title is already giving me questions. I’m going to need some explanation of what we’re dealing with down there.
Something Is Killing the Children
That title still does so much work. You hear it, and immediately you need an answer. What something? Why? What are we doing about it? Craig Zobel, who directed The Hunt and episodes of Mare of Easttown and The Penguin, is directing the feature adaptation of the James Tynion IV and Werther Dell’Edera comic for BOOM! Studios. Per Blumhouse, it’s the most successful original horror comic since The Walking Dead, past 5 million copies sold. Blumhouse is developing an adult animated series at the same time, with Tynion shepherding that one.
I like having both approaches available. A feature and an animated series can explore the same material differently, and I’m curious what each one pulls out of it. But I’m looking at this from the storytelling side. I’m not coming in with an encyclopedic knowledge of horror comics. I’m the guy whose attention you got with the premise, and now I want to know what you’re going to do with it.
River, and staying on dry land
Josh Giuliano introduced the trailer for River on video as an in-room exclusive, and then Jessica Rothe took the stage. It stars Rothe, Jane Levy, Max Mattern and Dane DiLiegro, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival last month, and opens in theaters January 15, 2027.
What interests me is the family drama, because that gives the danger somewhere to land. Give me people with history, who have reasons to be together and reasons that being together might be difficult, then put them somewhere they can’t easily leave. Now I want to know how they deal with each other as well as whatever’s coming after them.
And Rothe talking about being in the water with the masked killer swimming after her is just a horrible situation. Think about trying to get away from someone while swimming. You’re already working just to move. You can’t suddenly decide to sprint. She talked about how being physically out there added real fear to the performance, and as filmmaking, I get that. What the actual environment gives the actor is real. It also makes me perfectly happy to remain on land. I can support this movie from a dry location.
James Wan, RoboCop, and the rest of the slate
James Wan did a Q&A about his return to the Saw franchise and the RoboCop series starring Dan Stevens for Prime Video, and my brain had to switch gears, because RoboCop gets my attention in a different way. Wan also played videos for the room only: director Drew Hancock and Ron Perlman on Seasons, which stars Lily James and Jack Reynor, and director Ian Tuason on the next Paranormal Activity.
Curry Barker and his co-writer and co-star Cooper Tomlinson came out to talk about Anything But Ghosts, Barker’s follow-up to Obsession, dated May 7, 2027. And Paranormal Activity on Broadway showed exclusive footage and announced its run at the August Wilson Theatre is extending through February 28, 2027. Five people won tickets. The stage version does interest me, because now you’re dealing with a live audience and a physical space, and you have to think differently about where people are looking. I can get interested in how you pull that off while having some reservations about being the person you pull it off on.
There was a lot coming at us. I was trying to keep track of what was an announcement, what was a trailer and what was someone talking about a project, and meanwhile I still occasionally remembered that Chiwetel Ejiofor was there.
The room
Blum opened the session thanking fans for showing up to theaters this year, especially for Obsession and Backrooms, which became the biggest films ever for Focus Features and A24. I’ve somehow gotten to the opening at the end, but that’s where my brain took me, and it made sense in that room. You’re surrounded by people who want to show up for this stuff together. I can appreciate that enthusiasm even when their idea of a great night is a little different from mine.
I’m not a horror fan. I’m interested in good storytelling and people who care about what they’re making. Flanagan can get me to follow him into something I’d normally avoid. MatPat can get me interested in why a game has people taking apart every frame. And Chiwetel Ejiofor can apparently make me lose track of a thought just by walking into the room.
I’m still working through it, and I’m still not sure I ever need to be on a river again.
Which of these are you actually going to see? Tell me in the comments on the channel.
