There are a lot of exciting horror franchises returning in the near future. One of the more interesting examples is Insidious which is coming back to haunt genre fans next summer. Its fifth entry has been making some significant ground with an official release date and casting announcements recently, but now fans have received their first behind-the-scenes look at the sequel thanks to producer Jason Blum.
The image that Blum shared on his Twitter page is rather simple. It’s just the famous horror producer with returning star and first-time director Patrick Wilson. The caption accompanying his post reads, “That’s right. Insidious is happening. And it’s going to be great. And you all are going to love it. Just get ready and give FNAF a rest for 2 seconds.” The last part of that is clearly Blum poking fun at his long-in-development Five Nights at Freddy’s movie which the producer has been teasing for a while.
In terms of Insidious 5, while this behind-the-scenes look doesn’t reveal anything new, it’s just great knowing that the film has finally started shooting. Depending on who you ask, Insidious has either been one of the most consistent modern horror franchises or it hasn’t been good since director James Wan left the franchise after Chapter 2. However, most horror fans can agree that Wilson is a big part of what makes this franchise successful — and he’s simply one of the most underrated actors working today. While he’s more well known as Ed Warren in The Conjuring franchise, his performance as Josh Lambert is a killer combination of heartfelt, emotionally subtle, tragic, and terrifying. Josh’s story and connection with his son Dalton, whose coma became the catalyst for this entire series, is one of the most thematically scary narrative threads in all of horror.
Wilson has made brief cameos throughout the franchise since Chapter 2, but we haven't seen the Lambert family together or as the focus of the story in almost a decade. So it's very exciting that Insidious 5 is catching up with the Lambert family all these years later. Along with Wilson, the film will also see the return of Ty Simpkins as Dalton and Rose Byrne as Josh’s wife Renai. Dalton is now starting college and his “repressed” demons have come back to haunt him. It remains to be seen who those demons are, but the series’ other dimension The Further has been the host of some of the most memorably creepy entities that the horror genre has ever seen. The Bride in Black, The Woman in White, and The Man With the Fire in His Face all had a major role to play in the traumatic events of the first two films. They may be returning to make Lambert's life a living hell once again.
Insidious 5 is set to scare its way to theaters on July 7, 2023, and along with the returning cast, the film stars Peter Dager, Sinclair Daniel, and Hiam Abbass. This will mark the first film in the series since 2018's Insidious: The Last Key. Even though it's been half a decade since then, Wilson being behind the camera has brought some renewed interest back to this iconic horror series with all signs pointing to the upcoming sequel being the major resurrection the franchise deserves. Now that the film is in production we should be hearing more news on Insidious 5 very soon. While we wait for Wilson’s exciting directorial debut, you can view Blum’s behind-the-scenes post down below.