The Exorcist: Believer – Trailer, Release Date & Everything We Know

Blumhouse Productions is prepping The Exorcist: Believer, a direct sequel to the original 1973 horror classic The Exorcist, and here’s the latest The Exorcist reboot updates. There’s no real debate that The Exorcist, directed by William Friedkin, is one of the greatest horror movies ever made. It’s one of only six horror movies nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards, and it’s also one of the scariest ever made, even more so if the viewer is a Christian. Audiences of all backgrounds tend to love The Exorcist though, which holds up extremely well nearly 50 years after its release. Now, in 2023, the long-awaited official successor to The Exorcist, titled The Exorcist: Believer, is officially on the way.

The Exorcist: Believer isn’t the first movie to step up to become the second “proper” Exorcist movie though. The Exorcist’s massive popularity ensured Hollywood would try to make it a franchise, even back in the 1970s. In the eyes of many the only successful Exorcist project since 1990 is the short-lived FOX TV show — but even this failed to live up to the original. That may all be about to change, as Blumhouse Productions and director David Gordon Green are looking to give The Exorcist the same revitalizing treatment they gave Halloween in 2018. They’re prepping not a franchise reboot, but a direct sequel to Friedkin’s original. Here are the latest new Exorcist movie updates, including news, cast, storyline, release date, and more.

Related: Why The Exorcist Sequels Failed (& How The New Movie Can Succeed)

The Latest The Exorcist: Believer News

The latest

The Exorcist
reboot news sees the first trailer for

The Exorcist: Believer
arrive — and the new

Exorcist
movie has already created conversations from just how terrifying it looks. The first

Exorcist
reboot footage does an excellent job of setting up the story without explicitly revealing that it is an Exorcist movie. While it initially focuses on the two missing girls and the strange occurrences that happen once they return, the arrival of Ellen Burstyn as Chris McNeil really adds to the excitement.The buzz around this first footage from

The Exorcist: Believer
suggests that the movie could succeed in launching this new trilogy. The studio clearly has a lot of confidence in

The Exorcist: Believer
as the first trailer was then accompanied by the news that the

sequel The Exorcist: Deceiver already has a release date
. The next installment in the franchise will be released on April 18, 2025. There is a planned third film to follow, but no release date or title has been announced for it yet.

The Exorcist: Believer Release Date

The Exorcist reboot news confirms that Blumhouse and David Gordon Green’s The Exorcist: Believer will release on October 13, 2023, as well as stream on Peacock, just in time for Halloween. The Exorcist 2 was initially confirmed in August of 2020. The Exorcist 2 release date is also almost exactly a year after Halloween Ends debuted in 2022, keeping up Blumhouse and Green’s run of releasing new horror franchise entries right before the spooky holiday.

Filming for The Exorcist: Believer wrapped in March, but that doesn’t mean work on the movie is totally over or that there’s nothing to do before The Exorcist: Rebirth’s October 13 release date. While the original 1973 The Exorcist movie created its now-legendary scares using incredible practical effects, The Exorcist: Rebirth can enhance its terrifying possession scenes with CGI and other digital effects — all of which require a considerably longer time in post-production.

The Exorcist: Believer Cast

Several confirmations from the newest The Exorcist reboot updates have shed light on The Exorcist: Believer cast, including that Ellen Burstyn (The Exorcist) will be reprising her role as Regan’s mother, Chris McNeil. Leslie Odom Jr. (Hamilton) has been cast in a main role, playing a man who seeks Chris MacNeil’s help because his own child is possessed. Ann Dowd (The Handmaid’s Tale) has also been added to The Exorcist 2 cast as a nurse who cares for the two possessed children.

Other The Exorcist: Believer cast members have been revealed over time, including Raphael Sbarge (Risky Business) as a pastor and E.J. Bonilla (The Long Road Home) as Father Maddox. Child actresses Lidya Jewett (Good Girls) and Olivia Marcum (Matilda the Musical) are in undisclosed roles, but will likely have some connection to the possessed child. Rory Gross (Tulsa King) will be playing someone named Tyler. Linda Boston (The Oval) will be playing a school principal, while Nigel Barto (First Wives Club) and Amanda Beth (The Light) have been cast as nurses. Finally, Nick Benas (The Righteous Gemstones) has been cast as a neighbor, presumably, Leslie Odom Jr.’s neighbor, and Jennifer Nettles (The Righteous Gemstones) will be in an undisclosed role.

The most notable new Exorcist movie updates when it comes to the cast is the return of Linda Blair in The Exorcist: Believer. The horror sequel wouldn’t be a legacy sequel without a returning character, and Blair is that connective tissue that The Exorcist: Believer needs. In the original 1973 The Exorcist, Blair played Regan MacNeil, the young daughter who became possessed. It isn’t clear in what kind of capacity Blair will be in the movie, whether it’ll be a simple cameo or a major role, though she reportedly worked for several days on the film.

Related: The Exorcist: Believer’s Cast & Character Guide

The Exorcist: Believer Story Details

Some The Exorcist reboot updates have shed some light on the upcoming horror film’s story details. The Exorcist 2 will star Leslie Odom Jr., best known for playing Aaron Burr in the Broadway smash Hamilton, as well as its Disney+ movie version. Odom Jr. will portray the father of a child possessed by a demon, who in his desperate search for salvation, goes to Chris MacNeil (original Exorcist star Ellen Burstyn) for help. This is the first time the Oscar-winning Burstyn has ever appeared in an Exorcist sequel, and her presence instantly gives the project prestige.

Based on the behind-the-scenes image in the latest The Exorcist reboot updates, a lot has been given away about the sequel’s ambition. The circle on the floor is not only a hint at one of the Exorcist’s new methods, but the location gives just as much away too. the circle can be found on the floor of a dining room, which marks the first time an exorcism has ever taken place outside of a bedroom in the franchise. While moving from a bedroom to a dining room doesn’t sound like much of a leap, it’s at least a start.

Though he doesn’t have any direct involvement in the movie, celebrated director Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy), visited the iconic outdoor staircase from the original The Exorcist. There was no caption for the image that del Toro posted to Twitter, but it was posted just one month after filming of the movie wrapped. The photo could simply be a reference to the director’s love of horror movies, or it could be hinting at the franchise’s future too.

The Exorcist: Believer Trailer

The first The Exorcist reboot trailer has arrived, offering fans a terrifying return to the demonic possession movie. The Exorcist: Believer trailer begins by introducing the new characters of the franchise, focusing mostly on Leslie Odom Jr. as a father whose young daughter and her friend go missing only to show up three days later with no memories of what happened. But the relief soon turns to terror as the girls begin exhibiting terrifying behavior.

The trailer for the new Exorcist movie gradually builds toward the exciting reveal that this is indeed a sequel to The Exorcist audiences are familiar with, rather than a restart of the story, with subtle notes of the iconic score being played before the name Regan is finally invoked and Ellen Burstyn’s Chris MacNeil is reintroduced. She is asked to help due to her experience with exorcisms. However, it soon becomes clear that this demon is the same one that possessed her daughter decades ago. It is a chilling trailer that helps to establish The Exorcist: Believer as its own story that will also pay homage to the original.

Blumhouse’s New Exorcist Trilogy Explained

The best part of this whole thing for fans, assuming the new Exorcist 2 turns out well, is that it’s set to be only the beginning of a brand-new trilogy of films. The new Exorcist trilogy, Starting with The Exorcist: Believer, is the result of a $400 million blockbuster deal involving Blumhouse, distributor Universal Pictures, and rights holder Morgan Creek. In an interesting development, Exorcist 3 and 4 may end up skipping theaters and debuting on NBC Universal’s Peacock streaming service.