ScreamWire Daily

$100M worldwide opening and the biggest original-horror debut on record push Backrooms into breakout territory; Kane Parsons’ A24 title is already resetting the ceiling for genre box office.

Netflix has locked Devil May Cry for a third and final season, closing out Adi Shankar’s planned trilogy structure; the Capcom adaptation has already logged 21.7 million views for season one and remains one of the streamer’s stronger genre titles.

$100 million domestic in week one makes Backrooms A24’s biggest release; Kane Parsons says he wants to stick with originals even as sequel chatter builds around the web-series-turned-hit.

Fortunate Jack boards FilmNation’s development of the spec; deal drew competitive interest; writer Gabe Delahaye previously sold 'Uncle Wick' to Amazon after a bidding war and has placed originals at Amazon and Apple; repped by UTA, Kaplan/Perrone and Gregg Gellman.

Anonymous Content signs Markian Tarasiuk after his breakout found-footage horror Hunting Matthew Nichols, a $275K indie that played more than 900 domestic screens, turned a profit before release and generated 30M impressions through an immersive ARG; Tarasiuk is already developing a sequel.

Peacock has ordered The Break-In, a home-invasion mystery adapted from Katherine Faulkner’s novel; Megan Gallagher and Carnival Films reunite after All Her Fault, with Lisa Katz positioning it as another premium character-driven play for the streamer.

Peacock’s All Her Fault logged 46 million hours in its first three weeks, and Megan Gallagher says the Andrea Mara adaptation succeeded by preserving the opening shock and eight-hour twist engine; Gallagher is now adapting Katherine Faulkner’s The Break-In.

Hollywood is rushing creator-led horror after Backrooms and Obsession, with Blumhouse now chasing more creator partnerships and Fox Creator Studios launching a Tom Segura slate that includes a horror-comedy animated series. The bigger lesson: creators want leverage, not a studio lifeline.

Frontières heads into its 15th Montreal edition with a record 194 submissions and a first-ever Thai project in selection. The market stays weighted toward horror and adjacent genre projects, with strong female participation and a TIFF: The Market crossover planned for September.

Fantasia adds a world premiere for the Cape Fear series finale plus first looks and competition titles as it builds out its 30th edition; Nick Antosca’s Apple TV psychological thriller will screen in Montreal ahead of the June 5 finale drop.

Low-budget YouTube creator breakouts Backrooms and Obsession are being framed as a theatrical proof point after outpacing Disney’s The Mandalorian and Grogu; the conversation also spotlights AI anxiety and Atomic Monster’s next-gen horror pipeline.

Arclight Films has boarded Serena as worldwide sales agent after Cinequest and Miami premieres; the AI-centered screenlife thriller rolls into Raindance's Best Horror Feature race with Andi Matichak, Steven Strait, and Ashleigh Murray.

Fantasia locks in a second wave of 30th-anniversary titles in Montreal, including Nick Antosca’s Cape Fear, Jane Schoenbrun’s Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, Corrin Evans’ Corpus, and John/Toby Poser’s The Glorious Dead.

Production is underway in Syracuse on The Guide, a psychedelic psychological thriller from Inon Shampanier; James Badge Dale, Abigail Cowen, and Edouard Philipponnat board the psilocybin-retreat nightmare with Natalie Shampanier co-writing and starring.

Universal sets Dec. 22, 2027 for the Murder, She Wrote revival; Jamie Lee Curtis boards as Jessica Fletcher with Jason Moore directing and Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo scripting for Amy Pascal, Phil Lord and Chris Miller.

Peacock and A24's Crystal Lake is centered on Pamela Voorhees' untold backstory; Linda Cardellini says the Friday the 13th prequel premieres Oct. 15, 2026.

HBO orders The Chain as a limited series, adapting the bestselling kidnapping thriller into a coercion-driven survival saga.

20 new hour-long episodes on deck as The FBI Files reopens at Bright North Studios; production is already underway on the true-crime reboot.

Toronto-based Serial Maven picked up international distribution rights to The Dunblane Tapes, a 1x90-minute feature documentary.

Lionsgate’s The Strangers: Chapter One lands on Peacock, extending the franchise reboot’s post-theatrical life into streaming.

Donné Ngabo inks with Gersh after his Subversion breakout, adding another emerging performer to the agency roster out of the Australian theater pipeline.

Turn It Up! debuts at Tribeca as a Canadian horror-comedy seeking sales and distribution; Sam Scott turns his tinnitus experience into a practical-effects, multigeneration genre play with Bruce McCulloch and Julian Richings.

Spain’s Jarabo centers on one of the country’s most notorious serial killers; Eduardo Noriega leads Emilio Martínez-Lázaro’s production for Enrique Cerezo.

Frontières has unveiled its full 2026 Montreal slate, with 20 official selection projects plus Shorts to Feature, Genre Film Lab and Music Pitch sections. The lineup leans hard into horror, body horror, sci-fi, supernatural and hybrid genre titles from across Canada, Europe and Asia.

Netflix has removed Spanish-language original thriller Stolen Away from its library after six years, another sign the streamer is thinning out legacy originals. The series is effectively off-platform unless Netflix reverses course and re-adds it.

Season 3 opener stages a massive Gullet battle with three ships and dual tanks; Steve Toussaint says the episode airs June 21 on HBO Max in the U.S. and June 22 elsewhere, and adds that he wrote his first screenplay for C.J. Obasi’s The Blue Butterfly.

Netflix has paused pre-production on Antoine Fuqua’s Hannibal package starring Denzel Washington while producers and the studio reset the budget. The Italy shoot had been slated for later this year; both sides are trying to get the historical epic back on track.

Abigail Cowen boards The Guide to lead a psychedelic horror feature set at a psilocybin retreat; James Badge Dale and Edouard Philipponnat also star, with Inon Shampanier directing from a co-write with Natalie Shampanier.

Linda Cardellini boards Crystal Lake as Pam Voorhees, adding a high-profile name to the Friday the 13th prequel series as casting firms up.

Netflix-fueled sequel Fall 2: Deadpoint lands its first trailer after the original's streaming surge turned the 2022 survival thriller into a franchise. Scott Mann and Jonathan Frank wrote; Peter and Michael Spierig direct; UK bows Aug. 7 and U.S. Sept. 2.