Give The First Omen Filmmakers The Exorcist Franchise

Rather than proceed with the next two in the proposed trilogy, a better move would be to reconstruct the project with The First Omen‘s winning combination of director Arkasha Stevenson and screenwriter Tim Smith.

The original plan for the continuation of The Exorcist was for the second film, Exorcist: Deceiver, and an untitled third film to be in simultaneous production with Exorcist: Believer director David Gordon Green resuming his role in command.

But the recent announcement that Green has bowed out to pursue other projects (season four of the Max series The Righteous Gemstones among them), the release date has been delayed and is no longer on Universal’s release calendar.

And while The First Omen director Stevenson did hint at more to come for Omen fans, an absence of a concrete plan is the perfect opportunity for him to jump over and help save a flailing proposed trilogy before it’s too late.

The First Omen‘s tale of giving audiences a lead up to how the Anti-Christ was conceived is masterful storytelling and succeeded in giving fans an original story in the era of remakes and reboots.

The Exorcist: Believer failed at this on every level, giving disappointed moviegoers a contrived storyline with unrelatable characters, weak jump scares, and one of the most deflated climaxes I’ve ever seen in a horror entry.

A second installment of this trilogy could be spared from this sort of cinematic triage if a screenplay was written that saves only one element of what was delivered at theaters last fall; Katherine’s fate.

It’s not that Exorcist: Believer didn’t have potential. When the film opens in Haiti, I was hopeful that the film would somehow weave voodoo into the eventual possession of the girl, perhaps serving as a new vehicle for a demon being introduced. As that angle was not pursued, a prudent move by a screenwriter would now be focusing on Katherine’s existence in Hell.

Screenwriters could make a move with the next Exorcist film to have Katherine’s tormented soul emerge from the pits of Hell for vengeance to match the creativity and intensity of The First Omen.

As her father is the one responsible for her fate, a terrifying angle would combine his grief with madness, the latter of which is driven by his dead daughter revealing herself only to him. The church would step in, convinced that he’s losing his grip on reality and losing sight of the fact that he is slowly being possessed.

Akasha Stevenson has the ability to translate horrifying imagery onto film, as The First Omen has shown us. It might just be a personal pipedream, but as a fan of both franchises, I’m hopeful that someone throws a successful Hail Mary to make the next Exorcist film a winner.