Mike Flanagan Wants His THE EXORCIST Movie to “Invigorate” the Fan Base

Mike Flanagan has a tough horror assignment on his hands with The Exorcist. Rather than looking years ahead and mapping out another massive franchise plan, the filmmaker is focused on making one good Exorcist movie that earns its place alongside a horror classic.

The original The Exorcist remains one of the most influential horror films ever made, and Hollywood has spent decades trying to recapture its terrifying magic.

The most recent attempt came from David Gordon Green with 2023’s The Exorcist: Believer, which was intended to launch a new trilogy. Those plans were scrapped after the film’s release, opening the door for Flanagan to take the franchise in a completely different direction.

Flanagan recently spoke with Bloody Disgusting while promoting his upcoming Stephen King adaptation Carrie for Prime Video. While he has described his ideal plan for Carrie as a three-season story, he isn’t approaching The Exorcist with the same long-term thinking.

When asked whether his movie could be the beginning of something bigger, Flanagan explained that finishing the film currently has his full attention.

“Oh, you know, I have no idea. I was so fixated on getting to the end credits of that movie. That’s another franchise that has this huge legacy and so many expectations piled on it.

“I wouldn’t let myself imagine past, like, the last day of production, to be honest. It was, how do I deliver an Exorcist movie right now? One movie that is going to invigorate the fan base and show us something we haven’t seen before in one of the most explored subgenres that exists?”

That’s a pretty great goal for a franchise that has gone through just about every version of demonic possession imaginable. Flanagan isn’t talking about building a cinematic universe or planting seeds for sequels. He wants this movie to work on its own and bring something new to familiar horror territory.

He added: “So, yeah, if that turns into something more, that would be amazing. I’m still just trying to see my way to the end of the edit. I can’t see past that at the moment. But yeah, I guess, never say never.”

No official footage or images from Flanagan’s The Exorcist have been released yet, but his horror résumé makes this one easy to be curious about.

The Haunting of Hill House, Midnight Mass, and Doctor Sleep showed what Flanagan can do with supernatural horror, complicated characters, grief, faith, and some seriously creepy imagery. The Exorcist gives him a chance to play with all of those ingredients inside one of horror’s biggest franchises.

Of course, this series has had a wild history since the original movie changed the genre. Exorcist II: The Heretic arrived as the first sequel and was poorly received by audiences and critics. Its difficult production eventually became the subject of the documentary Boorman and the Devil.

The Exorcist III went in a different direction both narratively and tonally, and over the years it has developed a passionate following of its own.

The franchise hit another rough patch with Exorcist: The Beginning and Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist. Paul Schrader was originally hired to direct The Beginning, but the project was taken away from him and reworked under Renny Harlin.

After Harlin’s version struggled in 2004, Schrader was allowed to finish his interpretation, which was released as Dominion in 2005 and also had trouble connecting with audiences.

Television actually produced one of the better-received modern attempts at reviving the property. Jeremy Slater created The Exorcist TV series, which earned strong reviews but couldn’t attract enough viewers to survive beyond two seasons.

Now Flanagan gets his shot, and trying to make a great standalone horror movie feels like the right creative focus. There’s plenty of time to talk sequels if audiences respond to it. First, the movie has to connect with audiences and remind fans why The Exorcist deserves to scare the hell out of people again.

I hope that Flanagan really has found a way to show audiences something they haven’t seen in this heavily explored corner of horror.