Happy Death Day Filmmaker Directing Big Bad Following Scream 7 Exit

Christopher Landon, the filmmaker behind Happy Death Day and Freaky, now has a new project on the horizon. The fan-favorite director had been set to helm Scream VII, which seemed to everyone like a perfect marriage of franchise and creative voice. However, Landon exited the project after a tumultuous week that saw star Melissa Barrera fired and co-star Jenna Ortega step away. Now, with Scream VII in the rearview, Landon is shifting his focus to a new werewolf movie called Big Bad.

According to Deadline, Lionsgate is “closing” a deal that will see Landon direct Big Bad from a script by Chandler Baker, who wrote the short story the film is based on. Baker’s Big Bad was part of Amazon’s anthology horror book Creature Feature. Todd Lieberman and Hidden Pictures are set to produce alongside Landon.

Big Bad tells the story of a family trying to survive an attack from wolves outside of their home, as well as dangers coming from the family’s own members. There’s no word yet on dates for production or a potential release schedule.

Freaky Death Day Future

Even though Landon has a new project in the works, he and the rest of the folks involved with Freaky and Happy Death Day have made it clear that they still want to continue that franchise. There was a lot of talk after the release of Freaky that it would cross over with Happy Death Day for that series’ third installment. Sadly, there has been no news on that front in quite a while.

Freaky writer Michael Kennedy talked with ComicBook.com last year, ahead of the release of It’s a Wonderful Knife, and shared his hopes for the continuation of Landon’s cult-favorite horror franchise.

“I haven’t talked to anybody. I mean Chris and I talk about it every once in a while. We’re working on some stuff together right now and we talk about it every once in a while. But we also know the reality of the situation is Freaky came out during the middle of a pandemic and didn’t make the money it would have had there been no pandemic. They still tracked the movie like normal and we were on track to make $35 million opening weekend had it not been a pandemic. And there’s a lot of sadness in that because there’s be a universe, quite frankly right now if that happened.”