Horror Industry News — Tuesday, August 25, 2026

Blumhouse Atomic Monster and Universal lock Jacob Chase for Sleepover, dated Oct. 8, 2027. Insidious: Out of the Further opens to $60.3M worldwide and lifts the franchise past $800M global; Chase co-wrote with Bryce McGuire from his short story.

Blumhouse Atomic Monster tops $1B worldwide YTD, powered by Obsession’s $501.6M, Backrooms’ $396.5M, and a $60M bow for Insidious: Out of the Further. The labels’ four horror titles were made for just $50.75M combined, while Other Mommy and Curry Barker’s next two releases keep the run going.

Shudder has greenlit the ninth V/H/S installment; the anthology pushes the franchise into music-and-sound obsession and is slated for an exclusive October bow on the streamer.

EST N8 and BrandThink have launched B-EST Pictures as a co-develop/co-finance/co-produce venture for films and live experiences, with Thai horror title Tame as the first package. The film heads to the Toronto market for international sales ahead of an Oct. 29 Thailand theatrical release.

Rome shoot starts Sept. 7 on Patricio Valladares’ fantasy-horror take on Dante’s Inferno; Anxur Films and Skincrawl Studios are producing, while Valladares tees up Invoking Scream’s FrightFest premiere and an FMV horror game.

No. 1 on Paramount+ film charts; André Øvredal's Passenger paired a $31 million worldwide theatrical haul with a streaming surge, giving Paramount Pictures a stronger post-theatrical tail than the box office suggested.

Caroline Kepnes boards as writer-director on The Attentionist, a lakeside slasher series adapting her 2022 short story for YouTube. The short-form project extends the You author into genre TV with a self-penned adaptation.

Neon picked up It Ends after its SXSW launch and viral Letterboxd Video Store rollout, turning Alex Ullom’s debut into a distribution win after the film initially went unsigned. Neon also bought Ullom’s next feature, 4X4: The Event, before production; principal photography has now wrapped in Vancouver.

Shudder locks Parasomnia for an exclusive Sept. 4 streaming debut; writer-director James Ross II's feature debut follows a night-terror spiral that turns supernatural. The launch gives Shudder another fall horror title and a fresh first-feature voice.

A 5,000-person poll shows 18-29-year-olds are the most active theatrical demo, bolstering the case for youth-skewing horror and IP plays like Resident Evil while older-skewing star vehicles lag.

Insidious: Out of the Further is already at $60 million worldwide opening and pushed the franchise past $800 million; Chase says multiple post-Come Play projects were developed with Jason Blum and James Wan before the strikes, with Sleepover next.

Ash is out of future live-action Evil Dead projects; Bruce Campbell says he tapped out after Ash vs Evil Dead and will stay on only for voice work and cameo duties. Warner Bros. still has Evil Dead Wrath dated for April 7, 2028.

Well Go USA sets a theatrical release for Yeon Sang-ho's zombie feature Colony on Aug. 28, 2026; the director says AI research informed the creatures' movement. The interview also frames the film as a return to the Train to Busan lane after his breakout hit.

Amazon MGM greenlights the eight-episode RoboCop series and taps Dan Stevens as Alex Murphy. Peter Ocko showruns the MGM-franchise revival for Blumhouse Atomic Monster, with James Wan, Michael Clear and Rob Hackett EPing.

Robert Eggers is headed to Sitges to collect the festival’s Time Machine award for his contribution to horror and fantastic cinema. He’ll also show a clip from Werwulf, giving the next film an early genre-festival launch signal.

Production on Netflix's Black Mirror Season 8 is already underway; Charlie Brooker's new batch of episodes started shooting this summer, with no launch date set yet.

Cambodia sends ghost-story debut Becoming Human into the Oscars race; the micro-budget Anti-Archive title carries a Venice/Busan/BFI London festival run and opens locally Aug. 27 with Lights On steering world sales.

Tubi sets Buzzkill for Sept. 25 and drops first-look images on the YA sorority slasher; Jem Garrard directs from Suzanne Keilly's script, with Siena Agudong, Brec Bassinger and Aliyah's Interlude leading Blue Ice Pictures' production.

AMC books the original Halloween trilogy for a three-night September theatrical run tied to Halloween: The Game; Halloween (1978) kicks off the event on Sept. 4.

Dynamic Television sells You’re Killing Me season 1 into the UK, Europe, Australia and MENA while season 2 heads into production later this year; Acorn TV says the first run was its biggest subscriber-acquisition launch.

Warner Bros. has David Chase set to direct The Dealer’s Daughter as a feature, with Terrence Winter adapting the MKUltra book and production targeted for October. The package turns Chase’s first-look deal into a feature reset after the project was previously eyed as an HBO series.

Mark Heyman’s directorial debut pairs Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Phoebe Dynevor, Jacki Weaver and Norman Reedus in a New Mexico retreat horror-thriller; Vertical has set a wide Jan. 1, 2027 release. Darren Aronofsky’s Protozoa produces, and the MPA rated the film R for bloody violence, sexuality, drug use, nudity and language.

Fantastic Fest returns to Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar Sept. 17-24, 2026; The Adams Family's The Glorious Dead joins a lineup built around world premieres and major releases.

GenreBlast locks its 10th edition for Sept. 3-6 in Winchester, Virginia; the indie genre lineup spans chillers, thrillers, and chucklers.

Tribeca-premiered debut feature from Ben Sottak lands on Shudder in October; Milly Shapiro stars as a lone survivor in a plague-ravaged wasteland thriller.

Production kicked off in New South Wales on David Gordon Green's Amazon MGM/Miramax prison thriller Supermax; Erika Ringor and Martin Bats Bradford board the Will Smith-AnnaSophia Robb package headed to Prime Video in 240+ territories.

Spin Master, Universal Products & Experiences and Ghost Galaxy’s Hellbreak™ horror TCG launches internationally in early 2027; asmodee will distribute exclusively in Europe and also handle Canada and Asia, with the first set exceeding 200 unique cards.

Well Go USA pushes Joko Anwar's prison-set horror-thriller into U.S. theaters in October after festival bows in Berlin, Sydney and Karlovy Vary; the film mixes invisible-force gore, gang warfare and dark comedy.

Hulu sets the German vampire sci-fi mini-series for worldwide streaming in September; the Berlinoir adaptation turns a climate-dome Berlin into a blood-powered political battlefield.

Range Literary Publishing lands Richard Kelly’s 800-page Donnie Darko sequel novel for Q4; the book is the launch pad for a planned animated/mocap feature and later live-action sequels tied to the cult IP.