Cheryl Eddy is a senior writer for io9; she covers horror, books, sci-fi, fantasy, and weird culture, sometimes all at once. Email tips to [email protected].
The top story
At the start of 2024, we looked ahead and realized that the horror genre was disproportionately stuffed with reboots, remakes, and sequels. At the start of 2025, we’re gazing in that same direction and… the future still looks rather familiar.
But 2024 did come through with some exceptional originals, including The Substance, Heretic, I Saw the TV Glow, Longlegs, and Late Night With the Devil—all of which were on io9’s list of the best films of the year, along with, yes, several sequels and prequels and such (Smile 2, Nosferatu, The First Omen, Terrifier 3).
It’s often the case that smaller indies aren’t teased months or years ahead of time, only jumping onto our collective radars until they make a film-fest splash, much like The Substance did. So if you hunger for a calendar charting the arrival of truly fresh horror meat, that list may be incomplete this early in 2025. We do have a few off-the-beaten path titles to get excited about—as well as adaptations, reboots, remakes, franchise continuations, and sequels galore.
We’re also shouting out some much-anticipated TV series, since 2025 is looking to be especially nightmarish (in a good way) on the small screen too.
And, a note: we’re doing our best to only include titles with confirmed release dates—which are always subject to change—as well as focusing on stuff we’re actually excited to see!
Sequels, prequels, reboots, franchise continuations
If you loved the first film, you can pick back up with the same characters in M3GAN 2.0 (June 27), The Black Phone 2 (October 17), and Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 (December 5). A new cast populates 28 Years Later (June 20), which technically arrives 23 years after the original (28 Days Later, 2002) and 18 after its first sequel (28 Weeks Later, 2007). Zombies are eternal, after all.
Thread: An Insidious Tale (August 29) is the first Insidious spin-off, but it’s the sixth entry in the Insidious series spawned by James Wan’s 2010 original. The casting (Mandy Moore and Kumail Nanjiani co-star) and the writer-director (Jeremy Slater, making his feature directorial debut after credits on Moon Knight, The Exorcist TV series, The Umbrella Academy, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, and more) make us excited to see what new terrors the Further will throw at us this time.
Other long-lived franchises that have more left in them include The Conjuring: Last Rites (September 5), the fourth and purportedly final film in the Conjuring series, and the ninth entry in the Conjuring Universe spawned by serial franchise-starter James Wan in 2013. Death will keep trying to complete unfinished business in Final Destination: Bloodlines (May 16); it’s the sixth Final Destination movie, and the first new entry since 2011’s Final Destination 5. (So much for part four’s claims of being The Final Destination.)
While the biggest horror series of the 1990s, Scream, won’t have a new flick out this year (early 2026, though, brings Scream 7), its most prominent coattail-rider, I Know What You Did Last Summer, will revive its secrets-and-slashers formula with a fourth series entry (July 18) billed as a sequel to 1998’s terrible but wonderful I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. Fall will bring the 11th Saw movie, Saw XI (September 25). It seems poised to follow Saw X’s lead by taking place within the established Saw timeline (Saw X’s events fell between the first two movies) rather than extending the story into the future.
But wait, there’s more! Streaming eyeballs can look for the return of the Hell House LLC found-footage series, which started as a tale about an actually haunted haunt attraction but has since become mostly about freaky clowns (we’re OK with that), in Hell House LLC: Lineage (October on Shudder). Netflix’s much-loved Fear Street trilogy becomes a four-parter with Fear Street: Prom Night (2025 on Netflix), and the eighth V/H/S found-footage anthology, V/H/S/8, will bring yet more grainy gruesomeness to Shudder (2025).
And then, of course, 2025 is going to be a killer year for Predator fans, between Prey director Dan Trachtenberg’s return to the franchise with Predator: Badlands (November 7)—as well as the first Predator animated film (2025), which so far has kept most of its details under wraps.
Familiar monsters and monstrous adaptations
Leigh Whannell (The Invisible Man) returns to the Universal Monsters realm with his reimagining of Wolf Man (January 17). Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein, a long-gestating passion project, will debut on Netflix (2025), with Jacob Elordi as the monster and Oscar Isaac as Dr. Frankenstein. And Maggie Gyllenhaal brings a musical twist to The Bride of Frankenstein with The Bride! (September 25), featuring Christian Bale as the monster and Jessie Buckley as his betrothed.
Two big horror adaptations to look out for: David F. Sandberg’s Until Dawn, which brings the popular horror video game to the big screen (April 25), and The Monkey, an adaptation of the Stephen King short story by Longlegs’ Osgood Perkins (February 21).
And, well, we’re not sure where to put this one, but it’s definitely a familiar monster at least: the new Anaconda movie, starring Jack Black and Paul Rudd, has all the makings of a meta-horror giant-snake comedy scream (December 25).
Public domain horror
Like it or not, this schlocky sub-genre that takes gleeful liberties with children’s stories is here to stay. This year alone will bring Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare (January 13); a pair of Twisted Childhood Universe entries in Pinocchio: Unstrung, which has a horror bona fide in star Robert Englund (2025), and crossover extravaganza Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble (2025); and Steamboat Willie do-over Screamboat, starring David Howard Thornton (Terrifier’s Art the Clown) as Mickey Mouse (January 24).
Original stories?
Yes, they exist! We have our sights set on Ryan Coogler’s Sinners, a vampire tale starring twin Michaels B. Jordan (April 18); Vicious, starring Dakoka Fanning, from Strangers creator Bryan Bertino (2025); Clown in a Cornfield (May 9), an adaptation of the acclaimed YA horror novel from Eli Craig (Tucker & Dale vs. Evil); thriller Drop (April 11), from director Christopher Landon (Happy Death Day); Flesh of the Gods (2025), a 1980s-set vampire movie starring Kristen Stewart and Oscar Isaac from Mandy’s Panos Cosmatos; Steven Soderbergh’s haunted-house experiment Presence (January 24); and Him (September 19), an intriguing-sounding blend of sports and horror from Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions.
But really, we’re hoping for many, many more original stories in 2025—and we expect additional releases will be announced as the year continues. Maybe Bring Her Back, from the Philippou brothers behind Talk to Me? Or Let the Evil Go West, starring Sebastian Stan and Lily James, from the director of the original Speak No Evil?
Horror TV shows
If you thought your nightmares would start and end with movies in 2025, fear not—or perhaps fear more. A robust array of TV series are on the slab, including, as it happens, a whole lot of sequels, spin-offs, and franchise continuations. That includes Alien: Earth (2025, FX on Hulu); The Last of Us season two (early 2025, HBO); It: Welcome to Derry (2025, HBO); Stranger Things season five (2025, Netflix); Wednesday season two (2025, Netflix); new seasons for Walking Dead entries Dead City (season two) and Daryl Dixon (season three, both 2025 on AMC); and Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches season two (January 5, AMC and AMC+).
Eventually, though perhaps 2025 is too eager a prediction, we’ll be getting Mike Flanagan’s Carrie series for Prime Video, as well as Peacock’s Crystal Lake series, which had a showrunner shake-up in mid-2024.
As for original series? So far we’re most stoked for The Bondsman, starring the always delightful Kevin Bacon as a bounty hunter who returns from the dead and goes right back to work… with a spooky twist (2025, Prime Video).
A longshot bet
While we hope all of the sequels and spin-offs and IP retreads we’ve just discussed turn out to be entertaining and (more importantly) scary as hell, there’s certainly a chance audiences might grow weary of so many journeys through the familiar. Will 2025’s box-office results help nudge Hollywood toward embracing more fresh ideas in future years—or will we be right back here in January 2026, talking about Saw XII?
Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.