The Purge 5 Pulled From July Release

The upcoming fifth film in the Purge franchise, The Final Purge, is the latest movie to have its release strategy altered due to the coronavirus pandemic as Blumhouse Productions has pulled the film from its July 10th release date, per Variety. This move isn't entirely surprising, as we're only two months away from that release and fans have yet to see a single image from the upcoming endeavor, let alone any footage. Sadly, the studio didn't offer any alternate release date, with Blumhouse likely waiting until they have more information about the status of movie theaters reopening before determining an optimal release strategy.

This is only the latest disappointing announcement for Purge fans this week, as USA opted not to move forward with a third season of the TV series adaptation of the franchise.

The first three films in the series were written and directed by DeMonaco, while he merely wrote 2018's The First Purge with Gerard McMurray serving as director. DeMonaco wrote the upcoming sequel and, while a new chapter in the series has fans excited, some reports claim that it will be the last film in the series. In addition to the TV series coming to an end, franchise creator James DeMonaco has teased that this upcoming chapter could be the conclusion of the narrative.

"I have it in my head," DeMonaco previously shared in an interview last year about the franchise's ending. "I think I'm going to write it. I think it's a great way to end it all. We want to end it all, I think, in this one, and I'm very excited. When I came up with the idea and pitched it to everybody, they seemed psyched, and I think it will be a really cool ending, how we take this one home."

When the franchise launched in 2013, the concept was considered a distant dystopia. In the years since its debut, our cultural climate has changed drastically, with the events of the series feeling as though they mirror an eventual outcome. Given the current state of the coronavirus pandemic, we all find ourselves quarantined, while police in Louisiana have taken to using the alarm from the series to signal a curfew.

"The Purge is a cautionary tale," Blum said of the franchise in an interview with ComicBook.com in 2018. "James Demonaco and I think that The Purge would not be a great idea. So I think the closer you let in to the thinking of how it came to be and why people want it and why people don't want it, hopefully that becomes clearer and clearer. But we don't make the movies to push a message down people's throat; we make the movies because it's a fun, crazy, wild idea. But second to that, I don't think it would be super responsible to have people walking away thinking the movies are propaganda to start a Purge in the United States because I don't think it would be such good idea."

Stay tuned for details on The Final Purge.

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