The Exorcist franchise will release a new entry next year, though it will not continue the storyline of 2023's The Exorcist: Believer.
The Exorcist: Martyrs is scheduled to hit North American theaters on March 12 next year. The film is written and directed by Mike Flanagan, creator and director of The Haunting of Hill House series. The ensemble cast is led by Scarlett Johansson (Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Black Widow), Chiwetel Ejiofor (The Backrooms), Diane Lane (DC’s Man of Steel series), child actor Jacobi Jupe (Hamnet), Sasha Calle (Supergirl in DC’s The Flash), Scoot McNairy (Speak No Evil), Gil Bellows, Laurence Fishburne (The Matrix franchise), and John Leguizamo (The Odyssey).
Thirteen years ago, New York City detective Julie Miller (Johansson) ended the terror reign of satanic serial killer Father Sunday. The case made her a hero, and she has thrown herself into her work ever since. Now a new killer scrawls her name in an altar boy’s blood on the walls of a church crypt, dragging her back into the darkness she believed she had buried with him. Aided by former prison chaplain Father William (Academy Award® nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor), who heard Father Sunday’s final confession, and sharp rookie detective Gina Restrepo (Sasha Calle, The Rip), Detective Miller will discover a filament linking a lineage of serial killers, from H.H. Holmes to the Zodiac, that could corrupt everything, and everyone, she loves with an evil that goes well beyond the mortal.
In addition to the trailer, Universal Pictures also released the below poster:
Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions acquired the distribution rights for a new Exorcist trilogy for $400 million in 2021 and released The Exorcist: Believer in 2023. That film, directed by David Gordon Green, was a direct sequel to the 1973 original, starring Leslie Odom Jr., Lidya Jewett, Olivia O’Neill, Jennifer Nettles, Norbert Leo Butz, Ann Dowd, and the original film's lead actress, Ellen Burstyn. However, The Exorcist: Believer's poor box office performance and critical reception led the studio to abandon the original trilogy plan and hire Mike Flanagan to reboot the series.
The majority of Mike Flanagan’s previous works were horror films and series. His early works include Oculus and Ouija: Origin of Evil. His three most recent films are all adaptations of Stephen King's works: Gerald’s Game, Doctor Sleep (the sequel to The Shining), and last year's The Life of Chuck. Since 2018, he has created and directed five horror series for Netflix: The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, The Midnight Club, and The Fall of the House of Usher. In 2022, he signed a deal with Prime Video to produce series for them, including adaptations of Stephen King's novels Carrie (released earlier this month) and The Dark Tower. In film, he also wrote the screenplay for the DC film Clayface.
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Photo and Source: Universal Pictures