Horror Industry News — Wednesday, July 22, 2026

Audible lines up an all-star Dracula rollout for October 1, with Jonathan Bailey leading the English-language cast as Count Dracula and Mary Lambert directing the adaptation of Bram Stoker’s public-domain classic.

Ralph Ineson, Corey Stoll and Nyasha Hatendi board Legendary and Apple TV’s Monsterverse series; JD Dillard is set to direct the pilot while Joby Harold showruns and Wyatt Russell returns as Young Lee Shaw.

Cine+ has already pre-bought France on Alexandre O. Philippe’s two-part Vertigo doc The Fall as Medianoche Productions heads into Frontières seeking sales and co-financing. The project is already in production with roughly a year to go, and Guillermo del Toro, Kim Novak, and Ari Aster are lined up among the witness lineup.

An animated Texas Chain Saw Massacre reimagining is moving ahead, extending Tobe Hooper’s horror IP into a new feature take.

Vanessa Marano boards and stars in bridal-party horror comedy ‘Ring Leader,’ with Jason Lapeyre co-producing as the package goes out at Fantasia’s Frontières market seeking a gap-financing partner. The feature is set for a British Columbia shoot, leaning on Canadian tax incentives to keep the budget commercially viable.

Peacock exits the planned Hostel series, and Eli Roth is now redeveloping the franchise as a feature with Paul Giamatti still circling. The pivot keeps the torture-horror IP alive after the TV take failed to land.

AMC Global Media has taken U.S. rights to Catherine Zeta-Jones’ revenge thriller series ‘Kill Jackie,’ with AMC+ set for a fall premiere. The series adapts Nick Harkaway’s novel ‘The Price You Pay’ and stacks a sizable cast around Zeta-Jones as AMC deepens its premium scripted slate.

Sony Pictures has boarded the adaptation of Alex Michaelides’ New York Times bestselling first novel The Silent Patient, which centers on celebrated painter Alicia Berenson, who murders her husband then never speaks again.

5 has acquired CMG Productions’ Ghostwatch and will air the feature doc later this year. The title digs into the BBC’s infamous Halloween 1992 broadcast, giving a cult horror property a fresh broadcast window.

Refn has Maniac Cop back on track as a feature after HBO bailed on the series; the remake is set to shoot soon after 16 years in development limbo.

Level 33 Entertainment has taken North American rights to Ever After, a dark fairy-tale survival horror feature from Laszlo Illes; the film opens exclusively in U.S. and Canadian theaters on Sept. 4, 2026 after the acquisition.

SEGA Europe and Creative Assembly team with Tubi FrightFest for a UK first-look at Alien: Isolation 2’s prologue plus a 1979 Alien screening; the festival runs Aug. 27-31, 2026 in London.

South Africa’s Totem Zea and Dutch outfit PRPL are bringing psychological thriller ‘Third Wheel’ to Fantasia’s Frontières market; the project is set to shoot in 2027 and already has development and production support from the Thuthuka Co-Development Fund. Zoe Ramushu writes and directs, with a Black female-led creative team fronting the package.

Carol Abney’s period vampire horror Los Vampires is set for a Fantasia premiere, putting the genre title on the festival market ahead of wider distribution.

Tubi FrightFest 2026 will premiere Bad Karaoke, a cursed-karaoke horror-comedy from Chris Lightbody and Robert J. Steinmiller Jr.; Lexi Underwood, Case Walker and Kate Miner star.

Queer Screams returns to Portland Aug. 14-16 with 30 new queer genre films; Bryan Fuller gets the career-achievement nod, Nancy Allen hosts a 50th-anniversary Carrie screening, and the fest adds a horror Market of Shadows.

W hile Higgsfield AI‘s most recent project, the fully AI-generated absurdist action sci-fi film “Hell Grind,” found some plot in a combination of ethnically vague heroes and monstrous villains, the company’s next project is set in the realm of Central Asian folklore.

Investigation Discovery greenlights a three-part Aileen Wuornos docuseries built around digital replication and VFX, using AI to reconstruct the serial killer across archival sources and performance capture.

MegaCity Media rolls out dual teasers for Space Goblins, a long-gestating indie sci-fi feature built with AI-assisted tools, practical creature effects, miniatures, animation, and CGI; no studio backing or crowdfunding.

14-day TRO stalls the Paramount-Warner Bros. closing after California-led antitrust claims; the court is now testing whether the megamerger can survive before the deadline lifts.

Mahal Empire pushes Alien Storm onto Amazon and Apple TV; Adam Werth’s 74-minute sci-fi/action-horror survival pic strands a Vegas bunker party in a deadly alien fog, with Tom Arnold and Kevin Sorbo in the cast.

Quiver Distribution has pushed horror-thriller Kill Trip onto VOD and digital; the release turns the stranger-danger road trip premise into a new genre title for the indie market. No sale terms disclosed, but the rollout adds another day-and-date style horror option to the distributor’s slate.

The Weird Kidz is launching on an exclusive nationwide theatrical roadshow in August, keeping the animated sci-fi horror-comedy in cinemas instead of a standard day-and-date rollout. Zach Passero directs and Lucky McKee produces, giving the title a notable genre pedigree for indie exhibitors.

A24 eyes Will Forte for David Mikalson’s R-rated puppet comedy Goblin; Skyler Gisondo and Kenneth Branagh are already set, with Branagh voicing the title character after Mikalson’s script sparked a bidding frenzy.

James Watkins remains aboard Clayface while Mike Flanagan stays on screenplay duties; Peter Safran is positioning the DC feature as R-rated body horror with a psychological-thriller frame. Flanagan passed on directing because Carrie and The Exorcist series already had him booked solid.

Indiegogo is funding Attack of the Killer Space Tentacles, an indie horror-comedy creature feature about biologically modified alien tentacles slamming the western U.S.

Sony is in talks to lease and reopen the Cinerama Dome with Robertson Properties Group, with Alamo Drafthouse likely to operate the site through Sony Pictures Experiences; any comeback would require a costly refurbishment after years of closure.

Elijah J. Alvarez’s Oz-horror feature is in post and targeting a fall 2026 premiere; the indie blends psychological thriller, supernatural slasher, and sci-fi worldbuilding around a Halloween-night curse.