On Thursday, mega-producer Jason Blum and actress Allison Williams were on hand at New York Comic Con to offer fans a brief preview of Blumhouse and Atomic Monster’s anticipated sequel M3GAN 2.0, with fans also privy to exclusive looks and new details around four of the studio’s other upcoming titles.
As part of its second consecutive presentation at the east coast convention, the hour-long panel was emceed by Nicole Byer and moderated by horror filmmaker Mike Flanagan, who helped tease new footage and details about Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man starring Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, The Woman in the Yard starring Danielle Deadwyler, Drop produced by Blum and Michael Bay, and Fear the Spotlight, Blumhouse’s first video game.
The event featured the world premiere of the trailer for Wolf Man, Whannell’s latest modern monster tale, which follows 2020’s well-received The Invisible Man. During the The Woman in the Yard portion of the presentation, the audience got a first look at the Jaume Collet-Serra film, which tells of a mysterious woman dressed in a black veil who terrorizes a family living on a rural farm.
BlumFest attendees also heard from Drop star Meghann Fahy and director Christopher Landon who broke down the movie — about a single mother who receives threatening iPhone AirDrops while on a first date — alongside a sneak peak at the film courtesy of new teaser footage. Williams and Blum rounded out the film portion of the panel presentation with a Q&A that was accompanied by a special message from M3GAN, who “apologized” for being unable to attend the convention.
A portion of the panel pivoted away from movies to video games to showcase Fear the Spotlight, Blumhouse’s first video game release. Set at an abandoned school where students died by mysterious circumstances, Fear the Spotlight follows young girls who navigate the campus at night. An independently made title, the game features a retro visual aesthetic reminiscent of classic ’90s PlayStation hits like Silent Hill and Resident Evil.
The presentation was hosted in anticipation of Blumhouse’s 15th anniversary in 2025. Read below for more details on what Blumhouse revealed about its upcoming slate, including M3GAN 2.0, Wolf Man, The Woman in the Yard, Drop and Fear the Spotlight.
M3GAN 2.0
Plot details regarding M3GAN 2.0 were non-existent, with Williams and Blum primarily reminiscing on the original movie’s viral success in early 2023. However, Byer confirmed with the filmmakers that “the original cast and filmmakers are back” for the sequel.
Williams commented that the first movie was a learning experience, which allowed the sequel to be “bigger” and “more expansive.”
“Animatronics are, you know, temperamental,” Williams joked, adding that M3GAN herself is “a diva.” “Sometimes she is rolled onto set. The vibe shifts in the room. It gets way spookier. It was fun to do it the second time. ‘Okay, so we know how this is achieved. We know how to do it.’ We can have a little bit more fun with it. And make it bigger and more expansive, without giving too much away.”
Williams confirmed that production on M3GAN 2.0 is wrapped.
Then came a short video message recorded by M3GAN. “Hi New York Comic Con! Miss me? Sorry I couldn’t be there, because I’m slaying on set for my killer new film M3GAN 2.0. I’ve been upgraded. See you nerds in June.” M3GAN also slyly confirmed the movie’s title is officially phrased as “two-point-oh” and not simply “M3GAN 2.”
The sequel is set to open on June 27, 2025, with the returning survivors played by Williams and Violet McGraw.
WOLF MAN
Just before debuting the trailer for Wolf Man (below), director Whannell joined Byer and Blum and discussed reimagining the classic monsters through a modern lens.
“These classic monsters, they’re so durable you can make them contemporary. That’s what I tried with Invisible Man: take this classic monster that’s been around a hundred years or more and put them in the modern world. The idea of the Wolf Man was attractive, the image of it is so embedded in people’s minds.”
Whannell added that the central idea of his version of Wolf Man is disease. “I felt like with Wolf Man, the thing that presented itself, or seemed to be staring at me in the face, was disease. Terminal illness. Degenerative diseases. It dovetailed nicely together.”
After the trailer played to great enthusiasm from the crowd, Whannell credited the work of his cast for grounding the movie’s monstrous premise. “I think, for any horror movie … a lot of these movies are dealing with outlandish situations, or heightened situations. You can only sell that to an audience through these proxy characters that make it believable.”
Citing the horror classic The Exorcist and star Ellen Burstyn, Whannell said: “It’s one of, if not the most, important thing in a horror film. Getting the actors right. I was really happy to have this cast [for The Wolf Man]. Because Julia Garner, Chris Abbott and Matilda Firth … they’re allergic to in-authnecity. You just believe what’s happening to them.”
THE WOMAN IN THE YARD
Following the film’s trailer premiere, which previewed a supernatural psychological horror drenched in rural sunlight, Blum hyped up The Woman in the Yard as “a good fit for Blumhouse.”
Blum said he was a fan of director Jaume Collet-Serra since House of Wax. “I met him [Collet-Serra] right after I saw the movie and said, ‘We would love to do a movie with you.’ And we stayed in touch — it’s been 20 years since that movie, and we stayed in touch a little bit.” After sending Collet-Serra many other scripts, it was finally The Woman in the Yard that made him say “Yes.”
While Collet-Serra has spent the last few years making big-budget features, including Dwayne Johnson vehicles like Jungle Cruise and Black Adam, The Woman in the Yard presented an opportunity to return to smaller-scale productions that feel “less made by committee.”
“He was really happy to be a singular — make a movie like an auteur,” Blum said, “We had a terrific time on the movie.”
DROP
In Blumhouse’s newest modern techno-thriller, a single mother (played by Fahy) receives disturbing AirDrop messages from an anonymous and malicious entity threatening the safety of her son and babysitter at home. The anonymous party threatens Fahy’s character to kill her date, or else. The movie unfolds over a single night and happens in real time.
At Comic Con, Fahy and director Christopher Landon joined the panel to discuss the movie’s origins and its intentions as a timely thriller. “Our producers were at dinner and started getting AirDrops from someone in the room and spent the whole night trying to figure out who it was,” Landon explained. “I think it’s a good cautionary tale. The movie touches on the idea that we live in an age where being harassed and being attacked by someone you can’t see, that’s a part of everyone’s lives.”
Fahy said that Drop was her first time performing stunts in the movie. The movie’s trailer teases a major fall, with the movie’s primary location being a high-rise restaurant. (The title Drop has many meanings.)
“This is my first time doing a film in this genre, so I was very scared,” Fahy said. “Chris [Landon] was an incredible leader. He was able to explain everything to me in a way that was useful. The rest, I was winging it. I trusted him and the script and thought that was the best way to go about it.”
She added, “A lot of the stunts in the movie was my first time doing that. It was so fun.”
MIKE FLANAGAN’S THE EXORCIST
After making an earlier cameo to hand Blum a new promotional T-shirt, horror auteur Flanagan joined the panel to preview his new version of The Exorcist. Believing the original to be “the scariest movie ever made,” Flanagan “couldn’t resist” the opportunity to helm a new iteration. “I get to say to my little childhood self: I got to make a sequel to The Exorcist.”
No other details were given about Flanagan’s The Exorcist as the conversation quickly veered into reminiscing about salvaging the 2016 film Ouija: Origin of Evil.
Said Blum: “I asked Mike for help on the second Ouija movie, and he basically said, ‘I need 10 days, and I need a steady supply of pizza. If you can give me 10 days and pizza, I can fix your movie.’ I basically liked Oculus so much that I said, ‘Do it.’ And you know what? He did. It’s a great movie.”
THE BLACK PHONE 2
At Comic Con, Blum said that a sequel to the 2022 hit The Black Phone — written by C. Robert Cargill and directed by Scott Derrickson — was not certain even though it was a successful release. “When did movie did well, [I asked the filmmakers], ‘Can we figure out a sequel? Some directors say yes, some directors say no. Scott said, ‘Let me and Cargill think about it.’”
When Scott and Cargill returned, they told Blum they can make a sequel if Ethan Hawke and the rest of the original cast could return. “And that was music to my ears,” Blum said.
In a pre-recorded message from Derrickson, the director apologized for being unable to attend NYCC due to Toronto pre-production for The Black Phone 2. But he did give fans a small glimpse at the movie, calling it a “high school coming-of-age film.”
“I didn’t really feel any obligation to do a sequel to The Black Phone, but I got excited by an idea that Joe Hill sent me shortly after the release of the first film. And what I can also tell you is that in the same way that The Black Phone was a middle school coming-of-age film, this is a high school coming-of-age film.”
He confirmed the return of Ethan Hawke “and some of your favorite characters” as well. “I’m hoping to make a film as good as, if not better than, the first one,” Derrickson said. He ended his message with the movie’s release date: October 17, 2025.
FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDY’S 2
One of the last movies covered at BlumFest is the upcoming Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a sequel to the 2023 hit adaptation of the popular horror video games.
Blum said the box office success of the first movie “shocked everyone” except for its creator Scott Cawthorn. (Cawthorn has screenwriting, story, and producer credits on the movie.) Blum praised Cawthorn for soaking in the filmmaking process as an outsider, and for being very involved in the project.
“People who own IP are pretty hands-off. [Cawthorn] was involved in every decision we made to make sure we did things that we would all appreciate and that wouldn’t make people ill, which sometimes studios can do. We listened to him. The way the movie worked the way it worked, the key person was Scott.”
Story details were not revealed at the panel. However, a teaser poster for the movie was revealed at the panel, which showed a pristine Freddy Fazbear peeking behind a red curtain, with a gold “2” and the movie’s release date: Dec. 5, 2025.
FEAR THE SPOTLIGHT
Halfway through BlumFest, Blum and moderator Byer pivoted from movies to video games to shine, ahem, a spotlight on Fear the Spotlight.
Created by husband-and-wife developers Bryan and Crista Castro of Cozy Game Pals, Fear the Spotlight is an adventure horror set at an abandoned high school. Players take control of a young girl named Vivian, who searches for her friend Amy after Amy vanishes at the school when a seance goes wrong.
Fear the Spotlight has a distinct retro aesthetic, bearing visual similarities to late 1990s games on PlayStation and Nintendo 64.
At Comic Con, Blum said Fear the Spotlight will be the first video game released by Blumhouse. “I wanted to approach our game business like the movie business,” he said onstage, “I didn’t want to make huge IP games. I wanted to make gritty, indie, different games. Hopefully the way you describe our games is how you describe our movies. There’s a ton of crossover. If you like M3GAN and Five Nights and Insidious, you’re gonna like our games, which I hope is made with the same DNA in our movies and TV shows.”
He revealed that James Wan is involved, being a hobbyist gamer. “He’s had a hand in the creative, which has been terrific,” Blum said.
Abbey White contributed to this story.
Source: Hollywoodreporter
