Blumhouse has been Hollywood’s horror cash darling ever since Paranormal Activity, but James Wan and his Atomic Monster company have churned out gangbuster hits too within their Conjuring Universe. Starting with the The Conjuring, which made $315 million off a $20 million budget, Atomic Monster has gone on to make sequels and spin-offs related to the haunted artifacts paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren have come across. A sequel for the evil nun series was already announced for this year, and today we learned the third evil doll movie, titled Annabelle Comes Home, is coming out in 2019 as well.
The trailer opens in the Warren’s house who are taking extra special precautions with the Annabelle doll that’s been causing them troubles since the first Conjuring by locking her in a special anti-demon glass box or something. While the Warren’s daughter is smart and cuatious, her dumb teen babysitter/cousin messes up and goes into the still very, very stupid room housing very evil artifacts. After coming across Annabelle, it appears she activated all of them too, so they’ll really be able to mess with our unsuspecting protagonists. The bulk of the trailer are actually 2 extended jump scare sequences, but there are flashes of artifacts and baddies from previous Conjuring films, and Lorraine Warren calls Annabelle “a beacon for other spirits,” hinting that the Warren’s will be facing off against some kinda all-star demon dream team.
Wan-produced films are reliably well-shot, acted, and even scary most times even though they follow fairly similar formulas. More interesting than individual hauntings, however, has been the developing overarching plot concerning the Warrens. Because they are versed in the paranormal, they’ve seen all the normal tricks, so things have to get real crazy and spooky to affect them. Better yet, Annabelle the doll, despite having two movies already, has not been “beat” yet. If a villain loses in the previous movie, like Friday the 13th or A Nightmare on Elm Street, the stakes are automatically lowered. Instead, Annabelle has been growing as a threat from movie to movie, which makes an all out horror battle a cool possible twist to the now established Conjuring style of horror. Annabelle Comes Home releases June 28.
