The Exorcist: Believer Director Addresses Plans for Scrapped Sequels

David Gordon Green’s trilogy of Halloween films earned mixed reactions from fans, resulting in cautious optimism about his planned The Exorcist trilogy, but the disappointing critical and financial performance of last year’s The Exorcist: Believer resulted in his plans for two more movies getting scrapped. Green recently teased some of the elements he aimed to explore with those abandoned storylines, which he claimed were “ambitious” and “complicated,” while also noting that there was a different type of pressure on him compared to how he developed his three Halloween movies. Filmmaker Mike Flanagan is stepping in to direct the next The Exorcist, which is set to hit theaters on March 13, 2026.

When asked by IndieWire about his plans for the next two movies, Green admitted, “Oh, man. That’s a long answer. It’s complicated. It’s long and complicated. We had our next one written and had it mapped out for the third one. Again, it was ambitious, complicated. We were going to Europe for some pretty extraordinary backdrops. It was one of those things where all of the creative parties got together.”

As far as whether his plans would have included the return of the core cast, Green admitted, “It was going to follow Ann Dowd’s character.”

Believer followed a story in which a pair of girls wandered into the woods after school and, after being missing for days, emerged with no real recollection of what had happened to them, as audiences witnessed how the girls had become possessed by dark forces. Dowd played the neighbor of one of the families. 

“What I’m pitching, in terms of my professional ambition is, I need the creative freedom and give me the budgetary constraints so I can keep control of that. That’s something we learned pretty quickly, [with] expectations that are limitless and really daunting. So, for me to keep that creative freedom and be able to make the choices I wanted to make,” Green confessed, “As you see with the Halloween movies, the choices I make aren’t always the most popular ones. So it’s trying to make something that me, and my great friends at Blumhouse and Morgan Creek, want [for] that property to be fulfilled, as much as the audience is there and has the appetite for it. I don’t think they were on the journey I was excited about taking.”

There were nearly a dozen movies in the Halloween franchise when Green entered the picture, so fans and financers were excited to see any new take on the material, as the stakes and costs were a bit lower. In addition to the original The Exorcist being one of the scariest movies of all time, it’s only earned a handful of follow-ups over the years, which meant there were many more eyes overseeing what Green was pursuing with Believer.

“That stuff gets really complicated. And I don’t even know. Honestly, there are a lot of ins and outs of that stuff that I don’t even know,” the filmmaker detailed. “All I know is, give me some boundaries and let me loose. If there are a lot of people poking me about ideas and thoughts and notes? I’m not best in those environments. It’s just trying to make everybody get what they need.”

He continued, “I’ve made such great friends with so many executives at Universal and Blumhouse and Morgan Creek, I just want to make sure they’re doing what they feel confident in and makes them the most money. Or whatever it is they’re looking for in their satisfying experience. For me, it’s creative freedom. Every time. And I’ll always turn a corner and figure out where the freedom is. And also where the spontaneity is. I like to reinvent myself.”

The new The Exorcist is set to hit theaters on March 13, 2026.

What do you think of the filmmaker’s remarks? Contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!