A24, Resident Evil & Zach Cregger

Beyond Fest — the U.S.’s largest genre festival — is mounting a Chicago edition at the Music Box Theatre with 31 genre features, free programming in a secondary screen, and guest appearances including Meiko Kaji, Bob Odenkirk, RZA and Lilly Wachowski; the move expands Beyond Fest’s footprint into a major Midwestern market.

Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil reboot — due Sept. 18, 2026 from Constantin Film — will tell an original-story set in Raccoon City with new characters while remaining ‘obedient to the lore,’ signaling a franchise reset that avoids adapting core game protagonists.

Brian Cox has been cast as ‘The New York Ripper’ in Dexter: Resurrection Season 2 — a series-regular role that advances the show’s central mystery; the series is produced by Paramount Television Studios and Counterpart and Season 1 streams on Paramount+ Premium.

Untitled A24 horror from Arkasha Stevenson is expanding its ensemble: Suzanna Son, Katelyn Rose Downey, Fabien Frankel and Emory Cohen join a cast already including Emma Corrin, Hunter Schafer and Caleb Landry Jones; Ari Aster is attached as an executive producer.

Pluto TV’s April Ghouls line-up programs 100+ free horror films, full franchise runs and 13 dedicated genre channels across the month, expanding AVOD horror programming for the platform.

Disney+ / Hulu’s dystopian thriller Paradise saw a major streaming spike after its Season 2 finale — ranking top 5 on Disney+ worldwide and No.1 on Hulu in the U.S. — and has already been renewed for Season 3, signaling strong audience demand for high‑concept dystopian/genre dramas.

Fantasia unveiled its 30th‑anniversary poster by Donald Caron and reaffirmed the festival’s role as a major genre market—highlighting Frontières (the international co‑production market) and citing recent high‑profile acquisitions that launched at Fantasia, underlining its influence on genre sales and co‑pro financing.

Director Pierre Tsigaridis reteamed with actress Dina Silva on Frankie, Maniac Woman, which opens in select theaters April 24, 2026, and the outlet is debuting an exclusive poster/image spotlighting the titular killer.

The original Resident Evil trilogy of games has been re‑released on a new platform with promotional discounts, making the foundational survival‑horror titles more accessible to modern players.

Profile/reflection on Bruce Campbell’s career highlights his longstanding ties to horror and cult cinema amid news that he’s facing a treatable cancer diagnosis; the piece revisits his early work and collaborators like Sam Raimi and Josh Becker.

New Line is developing Gladys, a prequel feature to Zach Cregger’s 2025 horror hit Weapons, with Cregger and Monsterverse writer Zach Shields co‑writing and Cregger producing alongside Vertigo’s Roy Lee; Weapons grossed ~$270M globally.

Oscar nominee Wagner Moura has signed on to star opposite Kristen Stewart in Panos Cosmatos’s vampire thriller Flesh of the Gods, produced by A24, marking a high‑profile genre attachment and strengthening A24’s prestige horror slate.

Not The Funeral Home has optioned Dark Horse’s four‑issue comic Dead Mall for a feature and hired Michael Varrati to write a cosmic‑horror screenplay that will also draw on Adam Cesare’s unseen story notes; the story follows five teens trapped in a mall turned into a shifting, otherworldly labyrinth.

A24 released a full-length trailer for Backrooms, a liminal-space horror directed by 20-year-old Kane Parsons starring Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve; the film expands Parsons’ YouTube series and opens theatrically May 29 with Atomic Monster and 21 Laps among producers/co-financiers.

Thai genre director Banjong Pisanthanakun will direct Inherit, a GDH 559‑produced feature adapting Tayat Asun’s horror novel about an ancient centipede spirit; Korean sales company Barunson E&A has boarded international sales and is in talks for further co‑development with GDH.

Finland’s Kehittämö development programme selected five debut-feature projects for 2026 but faces closure after core funders pulled support; parliament provided a one-off €150,000 lifeline and each selected project receives €52,000, though organisers warn a sustainable funding solution is required.

A producer-side analysis argues that capital is available but locked up because filmmakers sell the wrong things; unlocking ‘stranded capital’ requires demand-side thinking and packaging that demonstrates audience demand to financiers.

A federal court dismissed appeals challenging the CRTC’s Canadian content (CanCon) decision, leaving the regulator’s ruling intact and preserving policy that affects funding and obligations for Canadian productions.

Marché du Film is expanding its innovation strand at Cannes (May 12–20) — growing the AI For Talent Summit to two days, launching a Creator Economy Summit and reconfiguring a large virtual production/immersive demo space to spotlight AI, VP and creator-to-film pipelines.

The Whistler, a supernatural film based on the Venezuelan El Silbón legend starring Diane Guerrero and Juan Pablo Raba (previously titled The Fields Are Watching), will premiere at Fantaspoa on April 11 before theatrical release this month.

They Wait in Shadows, a UK indie that externalizes grief into supernatural creatures, will be released digitally May 12 via Cleopatra Entertainment following its trailer debut. — Bloody Disgusting