Netflix recently made some big moves at boardroom level, signaling a more concerted shift into focusing increased time, energy and investment into creating the dreaded ‘four-quadrant’ blockbuster precision engineered to cater to the largest possible audience, and thus launch a major franchise that’ll drive up subscriber numbers.
Ironically, it’s the less expensive in-house titles that have tended to get sequels so far, with the likes of Extraction, Enola Holmes, The Old Guard, The Kissing Booth, The Christmas Chronicles, Spenser Confidential and more all acting as the launchpad for a multi-film series without breaking the budgetary bank. We can now add the Fear Street trilogy to that list, with director Leigh Janiak teasing she’s got some even more ambitious plans in store.
The filmmaker wants to use R.L. Stine’s string of seventeen books comprising over 150 stories as the basis for what she described as the Marvel Cinematic Universe of horror, and we’re hearing from our sources – the same ones who told us Netflix were developing a prequel spinoff to The Witcher long before Blood Origin was announced – that Janiak is set to get her wish.
According to our information, even more Fear Street adaptations are now in the earliest stages of development, with Netflix looking to act in double quick time after the trilogy scored widespread critical and audience acclaim, with the entire trio having dominated the most-watched list ever since Part One: 1994 was released. A mid-credits stinger left the door wide open to pick up where things left off, and like Janiak said, there’s no shortage of either source material or creativity from which to draw inspiration, and the premise is ripe for both exploration and repeated reinvention.
