For those like myself who can barely survive a surveying of your relative's childhood dolls without getting spooked, the idea of Annabelle and now Annabelle: Creation is a no-brainer. Evil dolls, especially those who can become animated with life, are only a notch down from clowns in the ultimate ranking of scary things. So, with the new trailer for the It remake reinforcing the ironclad reasoning that all clowns are terrifying and should be sent away, now the first trailer for Annabelle: Creation, an origins tale of the evil doll at the center of the whole Conjuring universe, does the same for not-so-elaborate toys.

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Image via Warner Bros.

From the look of things in the trailer, the scares and general design of the film look to be about on par with the rest of the Conjuring universe - a love for bump scares, heavy use of shadows and old-timey music, casting of undervalued character actors like Anthony Lapaglia and Miranda Otto, etc. It's unfortunate that the trailer also spells out the arc of the film's narrative so clearly, as if there's no fun in discovering the big turns of the movie in the moment at all. Nevertheless, the fact that David F. Sandberg, the scrappy director behind last year's Lights Out, is behind all of this gives Annabelle: Creation a boost that few big-studio horror pictures can muster.

Here's the first trailer for Annabelle: Creation:

Here's the official synopsis for Annabelle: Creation:

Several years after the tragic death of their little girl, a dollmaker and his wife welcome a nun and several girls from a shuttered orphanage into their home, soon becoming the target of the dollmaker’s possessed creation, Annabelle.

 

David F. Sandberg (“Lights Out”) directs from a screenplay by Gary Dauberman, who also wrote “Annabelle.” Produced by Peter Safran and James Wan, the film stars Stephanie Sigman (“Spectre”), Talitha Bateman (“The 5th Wave”), Lulu Wilson (upcoming “Ouija 2,” “Deliver Us from Evil”), Philippa Anne Coulthard (“After the Dark”), Grace Fulton (“Badland”), Lou Lou Safran (“The Choice”), Samara Lee (“Foxcatcher,” “The Last Witch Hunter”), Tayler Buck in her feature film debut, with Anthony LaPaglia (TV’s “Without a Trace”) and Miranda Otto (Showtime’s “Homeland,” “The Lord of the Rings” Trilogy).

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Image via Warner Bros.
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Image via Warner Bros.