'Exorcist: Believer' Explained: The Failed Trilogy's Original Plans
The Exorcist is one of those horror franchises that can’t quite figure out how to create a lasting franchise from one stellar movie. There was 1977’s The Exorcist II: The Heretic, which was considered a big misstep; 1990’s The Exorcist III, which pivoted to a more low-key detective thriller formula and only found cult success; plus two prequels and a spinoff TV series.
But in 2023, it looked like the story of The Exorcist was about to turn over a new leaf with The Exorcist: Believer, a new movie directed by David Gordon Green, who had successfully rebooted the Halloween franchise into a new trilogy. He was supposed to do the same with The Exorcist, but it never transpired, and now the entire franchise is starting over again from scratch with Mike Flanagan’s The Exorcist: Martyrs.
But just what was originally going to happen to this classic horror cinematic universe? Here’s everything we know about this now-abandoned plan, as well as the last time we heard any updates.
The Exorcist trilogy was announced in June 2021, and even at the time, it seemed like an ambitious plan. It wasn’t until almost two years later that we learned the first movie would have the title Exorcist: Believer, only five months before it hit theaters in October of that year. However, in July of that year, we learned the name of the already-planned sequel: Exorcist: Deceiver. So when fans left the theater that October, they thought that this story was just the first chapter in a grand saga.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be. Exorcist: Believer was lambasted by critics, and audiences didn’t like it much better. But all the same, it looked like Deceiver was still possible. It wasn’t until a few months later, in January 2024, that David Gordon Green exited the project altogether, and it was taken off of Universal’s release schedule. A few months after that, in March, Mike Flanagan was announced as the writer and director of a new Exorcist movie, officially shutting down any hopes of this trilogy seeing the light of day. What’s more, this new movie, The Exorcist: Martyrs, is completely separate from the other sequels, so it won’t even continue the story of Believer.
So now that it’s officially not happening, what do we know about The Exorcist: Deceiver? Back in 2024, David Gordon Green told IndieWire that the movie would have followed Ann Dowd’s character, the nurse and almost-nun who led the exorcism in Believer. “We had our next one written and had it mapped out for the third one,” he said. “Again, it was ambitious, complicated. We were going to Europe for some pretty extraordinary backdrops. It was one of those things where all of the creative parties got together.”
So while we may not know exactly what would have happened in Deceiver or even what the third movie would have been titled (The Exorcist: Acheiver? The Exorcist: Transceiver?) We do know who would have been the main character who tied this trilogy together. What really matters is that, even after so many attempts, the franchise is still trying to create the saga that the demonic possession tale has potential to be.