Horror franchises are becoming the norm in cinema, and as much as I’m here for it, studios need to back off and let the creators bring long-running franchises back to form.

I recently watched/rewatched the Saw movies for a Film Club at Dawn of the Tapes, and if you happen to take a peek at the list of Film Club movies series, you will see that the majority are of the horror genre. It seems that movie studios are screaming (pun intended) for follow-ups to popular horror movies, not that it’s anything new, but some of them show no signs of ending. It seems like they’re playing a bit of a game with us that will end in either our enjoyment or our disappointment. Is the game getting tiresome?

Take Night of the Living Dead as an example. The first classic George A. Romero film was released in 1968, not to great aplomb initially, but over time appreciation for the zombie-popularising film grew until it reached cult status and full renown in the history of horror filmmaking. It has since spawned into its own franchise: there have been five more Dead films, the last in 2009 and another two on the way, as well as remakes, spin-offs, spoofs (Shaun of the Dead perhaps being the most well-known), books, comics, and even Romero’s own daughter Tina made a zombie comedy called Queens of the Dead. However, the franchise has been on a mostly downward slope since ’68, with the most recent, Survival of the Dead, being particularly disasterous in box office returns and critical reception. Very much a shame, considering it was Romero’s last full Dead film before his death in 2017.

Many classic horrors have received similar treatment in the decades since they were made, including (but not limited to) The Exorcist, The Omen, Child’s Play, Alien and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Sometimes it’s fun to see where some characters and their stories go, but other times studios take things so far that it becomes thoroughly uninteresting. In a more modern example of this, the Paranormal Activity series started off strong with one of my favourite and most unnerving of horror films, smashing the box office on the most modest of indie film budgets and receiving rave reviews, but by the seventh film, things had gotten so out of whack and wild that the initial mystery that enforced the fear-factor became so flat and unscary that it’s a wonder anyone was still watching the films. Not to mention that, though they were still technically making money, the budget-to-profit margin reduced with each subsequent film, as did the reviews. In spite of this, there is an eighth film coming, and surprisingly, there is perhaps some hope for a decent revival. The film is being produced by horror film master extraordinaire James Wan alongside fellow horror film master extraordinaire Jason Blum and original Paranormal Activity creator Oren Peli. Blum and Peli have been involved in most of the Paranormal films, but adding Wan could be the breath of fresh air the series needs. Could the franchise return from the dead and back to its terrifying roots?

Well, if Saw X is anything to go by, there is always a chance that a series could find its way back to what made it a smash in the first place. The Saw franchise is very up and down through its ten installments, with none reaching the level of its inaugural film, but the last film (so far) in the series made a stunning comeback by revolving the film around John Kramer and giving the story more substance while still providing horrendous gory traps. Likewise, the Final Destination series followed a similar trend, with no film in the franchise scoring as high as the first until the most recent, Final Destination: Bloodlines, which brought things back up to form by acknowledging its own incredulity coupled with more vicious Death-given kills. We’ve also seen the same thing happen with sci-fi horrors Alien: Romulus, the ninth film in the Alien series (including the Alien vs. Predator films) and Predator: Badlands, also the ninth film in its own Predator franchise (again including AvP). Both performed very well with fresh stories, making decent money and receiving great reviews.

With James Wan (co-creator of Saw), Jason Blum and Oren Peli behind Paranormal Activity 8, maybe there’s hope for that franchise, and thus maybe for others that have stretched longer and farther across time, if they can find a way back to what made them terrifying in the first place. It would be nice to have more proof that it’s not all just about chasing the dollar and capitalising on once-popular horror films only to run them into the ground.

Also, did you know that horror films can be good for your mental health? Just sayin’…