On Friday, October 10, Blumhouse hosted its annual BlumFest, a panel at New York Comic Con where cast and creatives–including Jason Blum–discuss the upcoming slate of projects. This year marks 15 years for the company, so fans were ready for something big.
Announcements from the panel included films like the Black Phone 2 (which releases next week), the upcoming Insidious 6, and a look at some of the game titles coming to Blumhouse Games. The announcement of Sleep Awake, a first-person psychedelic horror set in the far future, was given by none other than Nine Inch Nails’s Robin Finck, who is the game’s creative director.
The biggest draw was the upcoming Five Nights at Freddy’s 2. While it seemed that the panel was beginning to wrap up and we would be left with nothing more than a brief announcement, Blum was joined onstage by the film’s director, Emma Tammi, and Elizabeth Lail, who plays Vanessa Shelly. Moments later, the stage was crashed by none other than Matthew Lillard, who plays the film’s villain, William Afton.
While no additional trailer or footage was shown, fans were treated to a horrifying sight: Out of the darkness of the wings ambled two life-size animatronics of Toy Freddy and Toy Bonnie. While I wilted in horror, the rest of the room screamed their delight as the voice actors behind these wretched costumes were revealed.
Surprise casting announcements ahead
Toy Freddy will be voiced by Kellan Goff, who voiced Glamrock Freddy, Sun, and Moon in the game Five Nights at Freddy’s: Security Breach. Toy Bonnie will be voiced by none other than Matthew Patrick (MatPat) of the YouTube channel The Game Theorists.
One final announcement was made, and was undoubtedly the most shocking of them all: Toy Chica as played by Megan Fox. Though Fox could not be at the panel, her involvement seemingly comes down to her kids being fans of the material.
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 hits theaters December 5. The fate of a third installment is still up in the air, but not for long, according to Lillard. He promised the crowd that if enough love was shown for the sequel, the third installment would be as good as guaranteed.
BlumFest felt bare this year, but many of the company’s projects are still early in development. Sleep Awake seems like the most exciting thing on their roster by far, so it will be interesting to see the fan reactions to it once it is released.
(featured image: Craig Barritt/Getty Images for ReedPop)
Rachel (she/her) is a freelancer at The Mary Sue. She has been freelancing since 2013 in various forms, but has been an entertainment freelancer since 2016. When not writing her thoughts on film and television, she can also be found writing screenplays, fiction, and poetry. She currently lives in Brooklyn with her cats Carla and Thorin Oakenshield but is a Midwesterner at heart. She is also a tried and true emo kid and the epitome of “it was never a phase, Mom,” but with a dual affinity for dad rock. If she’s not rewatching Breaking Bad or Better Call Saul she’s probably rewatching Our Flag Means Death.
Edgar Wright has taken on no easy feat: He’s bringing a novel accurate adaptation of Stephen King’s The Running Man to us. Co-written with Michael Bacall, the film stars Glen Powell as Ben Richards and, from the trailer, does look more like the novel!
At New York Comic Con, I was lucky enough to talk with Wright on the press line about the film and the adaptation process and one of the things I asked him about was how to include important aspects of a character’s journey into the film while not being able to include every single thing about them. For me, there is a chapter that informed so much about Ben’s love for his family but it also happens a great deal into the novel. Meaning, that information has to be played out in different ways.
“It’s obviously important in the movie to understand why he would… he’s going onto a show which nobody has won and what are the circumstances that lead him to signing on the doted line? He isn’t doing it at gunpoint, but he’s sort of essentially emotionally blackmailed into it, but he’s doing it for the sake of his family,” Wright said on Ben Richard’s motivation for joining “The Running Man.”
Wright went on to talk about how he and Bacall approached Ben. “But then there’s also a point where we always thought about it, like when we were working on the script, it’s almost like a character going off to war and in sort of wartime movies. The idea is ‘I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again.’ It is a very emotional, I say “goodbye” but it’s not framed like a goodbye, but it feels like it is, and so it is really important to have those scenes and we don’t have that specific scene in the film, but I think we have scenes that hopefully have the same emotion.”
I also spoke with Powell about the chapter as well and between the two of them, I cannot wait to see what the team has done when The Running Man hits theaters on November 14.
Rachel Leishman (She/Her) is an Assistant Editor at the Mary Sue. She’s been a writer professionally since 2016 but was always obsessed with movies and television and writing about them growing up. A lover of Spider-Man and Wanda Maximoff’s biggest defender, she has interests in all things nerdy and a cat named Benjamin Wyatt the cat. If you want to talk classic rock music or all things Harrison Ford, she’s your girl but her interests span far and wide. Yes, she knows she looks like Florence Pugh. She has multiple podcasts, normally has opinions on any bit of pop culture, and can tell you can actors entire filmography off the top of her head. Her current obsession is Glen Powell’s dog, Brisket.
Her work at the Mary Sue often includes Star Wars, Marvel, DC, movie reviews, and interviews.
Game of Thrones is not without funny characters and meme-able moments, but you might be surprised with just how dang funny and delightful A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.
Without giving too much away, the show, a spin-off set 100 years before the OG series based on a series of George R. R. Martin novellas, delivers punchlines and editing choices that might remind you more of Family Guy than Game of Thrones. At round table interviews as part of New York Comic-Con 2025, A Knight Of the Seven Kingdoms‘ showrunner Ira Parker and star Peter Claffey, who plays Ser Duncan the Tall a.k.a. “Dunk,” talked about how funny the show is and how they maintained that tone in a Westerosi environment.
For Claffey, a former professional Rugby player and alum of both Bad Sisters and Vikings: Valhalla, a love of/desire to make comedy is part of what brought him to performing. “When I finished playing rugby and kind of went into this and tried to go full hog into this,” he said, “I started by writing a lot of sketch comedy stuff, and I really enjoyed it.” This show leans into comedic moments and opt for comedic takes on moments that Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon wouldn’t necessarily choose. There aren’t just comic relief characters, like Tyrion Lannister or The Hound. Everyone on this show is funny, from Claffey himself to Dexter Sol Ansell as Egg and Daniel Ings as Ser Lyonel Baratheon.
“I think because of writing the sketch comedy, filming different skits and stuff like that I was honing the craft slightly in order to play those comedic beats, and I was quite glad that I had that in the artillery to then take a scene and have a discussion with Ira or have a discussion with [directors Owen Harris and Sarah Adina Smith] and say how can we make this that sort of theme that we wanted.”
That does not mean that the show isn’t dark at times.
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is as violent, action-packed, and grotesque as you’d expect regardless. It’s still Westeros, after all. There are still ambitious characters, cruel characters, and a morbid aversion to telling morally black and white stories. However, Claffey continued, “you can find so much comedy from terrible situations.” It’s one of his favorite kinds of comedy. “I’m an enormous fan of Ari Aster and Robert Eggers,” he said, “and Ari Aster especially has developed this genre of nightmare comedy where you find yourself horrified but also laughing your head off. Movies like [Kristoffer Borgli’s] Dream Scenario, and I really loved [Aster’s] Beau is Afraid. I do think when the stakes are so high in this series that we’ve shot, there are moments to take a breath away. When we watched it back it was nice to see those things. Hopefully everybody feels like we pulled it off.”
Parker, who is also a writer on House of the Dragon, reiterated that it’s important the show still look and feel like Game of Thrones. “People like sitting in Westeros” and pretending the fantasy world is be real, he said, so any comedy has to have a subtle touch so as not to disrupt the “gritty, grimy, Earth-” world Martin created. “Certainly in our shooting of the show we wanted to be as faithful as as classic and we didn’t want to be too stylized in the camera movements and the way that it was shot,” said Parker. “We wanted people to feel like this was a world that they recognized but then also start giving subtle nods to, you know, we’re gonna try and do a little something different with our storytelling.”
The biggest difference between this show and the shows in this universe we’ve seen before is that it has a singular perspective. This is entirely Dunk’s story. If he’s not in the scene, we don’t see the scene. So, as Parker explained, the comedy was a way to sneak in backstory and not bore the audience. (Remember how Game of Thrones used to do that with sex scenes so much that people started calling it sexposition? Different times…)
“So obviously, very early on, letting people know with the slaps and the cutaways,” Parker continued, referencing a gag in the show’s pilot as Dunk thinks back to the abuse he endured as a squire. “Dunk is standing at that graveside thinking about the good and the bad. He has such a conflicted relationship with Ser Arlan, obviously in the books and in this show, and it’s important to show both sides of this so it wasn’t just somebody eulogizing and thinking about how great they were. We see the knight and squire relationship can be quite brutal and quite complicated at times.”
Taking a moment like that and playing it for laughs is “just a very handy tool to get a bit of background on Dunk […] very quickly so that you can launch into the story with us,” Claffey explained. “Obviously we don’t have the benefit of Dunk’s inner monologue as we do in the books and we can’t ever cut away from [his point-of-view] either. Everyone has to be in with this one human being from the get go. So packing information into there was the fun, was the challenge of this series.”
Leah Marilla Thomas (she/her) is a contributor at The Mary Sue. She has been working in digital entertainment journalism since 2013, covering primarily television as well as film and live theatre. She’s been on the Marvel beat professionally since Daredevil was a Netflix series. (You might recognize her voice from the Newcomers: Marvel podcast). Outside of journalism, she is 50% Southerner, 50% New Englander, and 100% fangirl over everything from Lord of the Rings to stage lighting and comics about teenagers. She lives in New York City and can often be found in a park. She used to test toys for Hasbro. True story!
Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arcassistant director Masato Nakazono, president of MAPPA and the film’s supervising producer Manabu Otsuka, and CGI producer Yusuke Tannawa appeared at New York Comic Con on Sunday, where they discussed delivering one of Chainsaw Man’s more popular arcs.
According to Nakazono, for the team — which was led by director Tatsuya Yoshihara — it was important that the film “inherited the strengths of the TV series, so we worked together to highlight the essence of the original manga” as well as the show in the best way for a theatrical film.
“For example, in terms of the visual look, Makima’s hair color has been changed. [We] would make it more vibrant, more color that will stand out in a film,” Nakazono said via a translator. “We wanted to inherit the anime series, but size-wise, [it] is different. We had to make sure that all the background would fit in the theatrical frame as well, so we worked hard on that.”
Speaking to challenges around bringing the manga-turned-TV series to the big screen, Nakazono explained how the film’s team expanded the dialogue from the manga as they adapted it. “There are no speaking words between panels, so we have to create that and make sure the dialogue is going to stand up,” he explained. “The characters Reze and Denji have very personal, intimate relations. Denji thinks Reze is so cute, so we wanted to do things that made the audience feel the same way as Denji would.”
In terms of the film’s animation, which blends 2D and 3D styling, Tannawa explained how the “wanted to make sure the 2D and 3D coexisted naturally as one visual.” Additionally, with the scale and sizing of a TV series and film being different, “we had to make sure the background would fit into the theatrical frame as well.”
Addressing why the Chainsaw Man movie’s creative team partnered with Sony to distribute the film internationally — a nontypical distribution approach for anime — Otsuka explained it was driven by them wanting to tell the next story arc after the first season of the anime series on the big screen.
“The season one TV series of Chainsaw Man has been praised, so there was talk of making a sequel to that. We wanted to make a sequel as a film, not on TV. There were so many fans who have enjoyed it, so we felt like Chainsaw Man would be [released] as one independent film, and we felt like Sony distribution would help us, and that’s how we decided to collaborate with them,” he said.
Later in the panel, after screening clips and animatics with live commentary and holding giveaways for fans, the panel shared messages from the director and character designer.
“With this film, all of us on the staff wanted to convey the fun and the appeal of Chainsaw Man to as many people as possible, so we gave it our all this time,” wrote Kazutaka. “We work to fully capture the charm of Tatsuki Fujimoto’s characters. The action scenes are like an amusement park ride. You can just empty your head and enjoy them.”
“In Reze Arc, a completely new genre is born — love, violence, action, romance, shark. I believe it’s a film whose impact will differ depending on which character’s perspective you follow. You can feel the thrill and the tension throughout the action, and you can also sense the preciousness of each character through the romance elements,” the message from Yoshihara read. “In Chainsaw Man, devils regain their strength by consuming blood. For Reze Arc, every member of the production team offered up a huge amount of blood, and as a result, the movie is bursting with energy. Every time you go to the theater to watch Reze Arc, it gives strength to all of us on the staff as well.”
Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc will release in theaters on Oct. 24.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Indie horror production company Blumhouse is back in theaters with some of our favorite films and it was also back at New York Comic Con to tease 10 upcoming titles. The Mary Sue was able to attend this year’s BlumFest panel and trust me when I say you’re goingto be excited about what’s coming up.
Moderated by Nicole Byer (Nailed it!), the BlumFest panel featured not only studio exec Jason Blum, but talent such as Leigh Whannell (The Invisible Man), Christopher Landon (Happy Death Day), and Meghann Fahy (White Lotus). Attendees were also surprised at the beginning with a video of Kevin Bacon asking you to “get in the van.” Afterward, a scannable QR code took you to a mailing list to sign up for The Van, Blumhouse’s fan program. Listen, if Kevin Bacon asks, I’ll do it.
What are Blumhouse’s upcoming projects?
One thing I’ve always loved about Blumhouse is its extensive and diverse range of films and projects. There’s truly something for everybody. The slate of upcoming projects continues that tradition. Director Leigh Whannell joined Blum on stage first to discuss his upcoming Wolf-Man project and give fans a full trailer. As a modern reimagining of the classic wolf-man tale, it seems terrifying already. If there is anybody I trust to lead this project, it’s Whannell.
Attendees also saw the first-ever trailer for Christopher Landon’s upcoming film The Drop. It follows a woman on a date who receives a mysterious AirDrop that turns her night upside down. The first look at the film’s poster was also shown via a QR code for fans to share.
They also showed a trailer for another upcoming film, Jaume Collet-Serra’s (Black Adam) The Woman in the Yard, and a final trailer for Blumhouse’s first-ever game Fear the Spotlight, released on October 22. The Woman in the Yard promises to unsettle everybody even in the middle of the afternoon and Fear the Spotlight seems like an interesting dive into the video game world—with a horror twist.
Allison Williams (Get Out) dropped by to discuss M3GAN and the sequel M3GAN 2.0, and M3GAN herself appeared onscreen to remind us that she’s still here, watching us. Director Mike Flanagan (Ouija) also popped in to discuss his upcoming remake of The Exorcist. He told the crowd he “saw an opportunity to make the scariest movie I’ve ever made, and I just couldn’t resist it.” I still think about Midnight Mass so I know he’ll be able to deliver.
Blum also teased TheBlack Phone 2 to thunderous applause. The official poster for Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 was also revealed to the audience for the first time. It releases on December 5, 2025. At the end of the panel, fans snagged exclusive T-shirts with all the upcoming Blumhouse titles on the back. (Yes, I did grab one.)
What film are you looking forward to the most? I can’t wait to devour all of them!
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When you get permission to rule over the DC Universe, what’s the first franchise to take up, up, and away? If you ask DC’s new boss James Gunn, the answer is, of course, Creature Commandos. Wait, creature what-now? Slated to premiere on Max on December 5, Creature Commandos is a new adult-oriented animated series based on a mighty obscure superhero team from DC Comics. On day two at New York Comic Con 2024, series creator James Gunn appeared on the main stage — along with members of the show’s cast — and revealed why Creature Commandos, of all things, is launching the “new” DCU – and what it might foreshadow about the DCU’s future.
Gunn began work on the show entirely of his own volition after the success of his other DC series Peacemaker. “The truth is, I had talked to Max after Peacemaker did so well. I talked to Peter Girardi at WB Animation about creating an animated series,” Gunn explained. “I like the Creature Commandos. I love monsters. I love Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. It just seemed like the perfect thing to do. I wrote the scripts without even having a deal, and I happened to get hired as the head of DC Studios. And I very graciously, thank you self, greenlit the show.”
During the panel, a new two-minute trailer for Creature Commandos premiered to rapturous enthusiasm from the audience. With a vivid art and animation style with deep, bold colors, the trailer introduces each member of the Creature Commandos, voiced by David Harbour (as Eric Frankenstein), Indira Varma (as the Bride), Frank Grillo (as Rick Flagg Sr.), Alan Tudyk (as Dr. Phosphorus), Zoë Chao (as Nina Mazursky), and Sean Gunn (as both G.I. Brobot and reprising his Weasel from The Suicide Squad), as well as all their unique monstrous abilities. The trailer goes hard and heavy on the bloodletting, along with some cameos from other DC characters like Viola Davis’ Amanda Waller.
“We want this to be very different from what Superman is going to be when that comes out,” Gunn said. “We want Peacemaker to be different from that.”
Gunn also confirmed DC actors will portray their characters across live-action and animation productions. For example: Frank Grillo, who stars as Rick Flagg Sr., will reprise his Creature Commandos role in both Superman and Peacemaker season 2. (Grillo commented that his white hair as Rick Flagg conflicted with his shooting schedule for Paramount’s Tulsa King.)
Name-dropping in-development projects like Supergirl and Lanterns and insisting they will be different too, Gunn clarified “it’s a connected universe, but we’re not imposing any sort of overall aesthetic. And Creature Commandos is definitely its own thing.”
Returning for season 2 on November 3, Amazon Prime’s Invincible is full of wildcard moves like shocking superhero twists that disrupt a charming coming-of-age narrative. And its myriad cast of voice actors is no exception. At New York Comic-Con, series/comic creator Robert Kirkman and showrunner Simon Racioppa spoke to reporters in a roundtable setting and told The Mary Sue all about it.
It seems like Invincible‘s voice cast falls into three categories: superhero alumni, comedians, and The Walking Dead alumni. Undeniably, if you’re a TWD fan and not watching this show, you’re missing out. All the besties have reunited! The main cast includes Steven Yeun, Gillian Jacobs, Andrew Rannells, Zazie Beetz, J.K. Simmons, and Mark Hamill. I could keep going!
But forming cliques was not the intent. “I think that we always try to think of the best actor for the role,” said Kirkman during the discussion. “I love that we have a wide range […] not only do we have big movie stars like Seth Rogen, but we have great actors like Grey DeLisle. She’s an excellent voice actor that’s done, you know, a ton of different things.” Also known as Grey Griffin, the performer Kirkman shouted out plays Shrinking Rae, Monster Girl, and Olga in Invincible.
If nothing else, the cast keeps voice sessions fun and different, according to Kirkman. “It’s great having Kevin Michael Richardson and Sterling K. Brown in scenes together, you know,” Kirkman continued. “And you’ve got absolute lunatics like Jason Mantzoukas and Ben Schwartz, [who] just will not do our dialogue, no matter how hard we try to get them to do our dialogue exactly the way that we’ve written it. It’s just a great mix.”
“I think it’s that diversity that actually brings something really great to the show,” continued Racioppa. “Linda Lamontagne is our casting director, and she just brings us a great variety of names. And we also ask for, like, a wild card pick. We’re like, ‘Who’s the craziest person you could think of for this role?’ And she gives us a couple of names of people you might not consider. You’re like ‘Wait a second, actually…’ and you talk about that.”
Besides Brown and Schwartz, some of the new Invincible cast members in Season 2 include Tatiana Maslany, Chloe Bennet, Cliff Curtis, Rob Delaney, Daveed Diggs, Calista Flockhart, Luke MacFarlane, Scoot McNairy, Ella Purnell, Tim Robinson, Rhea Seehorn, Lea Thompson, Jay Pharoah, and Paul F. Tompkins. “So I think we’re very lucky that, again, we have such a broad cast in so many different ways and they really just bring something different and something special to the show that you can’t get anywhere else,” said Racioppa.
However, that doesn’t mean the producers don’t have a wish list for potential future seasons of Invincible. Earlier this year at San Diego Comic-Con, Kirkman said that Bryan Cranston had to turn down a role on Invincible for scheduling reasons. Comedian Connor O’Malley (I Think You Should Leave, Joe Pera Talks To You) simply declined. (And as our Rachel Leishman observed at PaleyFest this year, Kirkman brought up O’Malley as a dream ‘get’ again! Come through, sir!)
This piece was written during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike, the work being covered here wouldn’t exist.
