The massively popularEvil Deadfranchise will take its next step forward in 2026 withEvil Dead Burn, and the production process got a major update straight from the movie’s writer/director, Sébastien Vaniček. After a long hiatus, theEvil Deadfranchise was rebooted in 2013 withEvil Deadby Fede Álvarez (Alien: Romulus), and followed up with Lee Cronin’sEvil Dead Risein 2023.
The franchise’s current cadence is to have Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert, the originators of theEvil Deadseries, hand-pick a new director for each new movie. Each director brings their own unique style and flair to the base concept of Deadites wreaking havoc on the mortal world, and while there are some commonalities and Easter eggs, each new movie can comfortably be treated as a stand-alone.
The latest choice is 28-year-old writer and director Sébastien Vaniček, who put his stamp on the horror genre with the arachnophobic French creature featureInfested(titledVerminesin the original French) in 2023. Vaniček took to Instagram recently to provide an update on theproduction ofEvil Dead Burn, noting that filming is now underway.
The movie is set to star Souheila Yacoub (Dune: Part Two), Hunter Doohan (Daredevil: Born Again), Luciane Buchanan (The Night Agent) and Tandi Wright (Pearl). While plot details are sparse with the movie’s release date still a year away, we do know thatEvil Dead Burnis the first of twoEvil Deadmovies currently in development.
Sam Raimi’s Hand-Picked Director Will Bring His Unique Style To The Franchise
Sébastien Vaniček proved he can creep audiences out with hisfeature-length directorial debutInfested, which saw a French housing complex overrun by rapidly growing and mutating spiders. He now gets the opportunity to bring his style to the Deadites, which have a few basic guidelines he’ll need to stick to, but otherwise he has free rein to unleash a new version of the nightmarish demons.
In addition toEvil Dead Burn, another as-yet-untitledEvil Deadmovie is in development under the direction of Francis Galluppi (The Last Stop In Yuma County), another hand-picked choice of Sam Raimi’s Ghost House Pictures.
With the movie’s release date a year away, production should swiftly yield a marketing campaign.Evil Dead Risewas a runaway hit at the box officeafter a 10-year break afterEvil Dead. It raked in $147 million on a budget of just $19 million, so it stands to reason that Warner Bros. will want to capitalize on the renewed interest in the franchise.
Vaniček Can Deliver On The Perspective He Gave The Studio
Vaniček’s vision forEvil Dead Burnsounds like it will be a singularly brutal examination of the Deadites' chaos. As he told the French publicationKonbini:
I told the studio that I wanted to make a nasty film, a film that hurts, from which you come away tested.
It sounds like Vaniček will lean harder into the gory, vicious side of the Deadites and less into the campy, borderline silly chaos that they’re capable of. That should bode extremely well for the movie’s prospects with critics and at the box office, as the bloodyEvil Dead Risepulled no punches to great effect, not even sparing children from the Deadites' fervor.
Evil Dead Burnhas all the pieces in place to continue moving theEvil Deadfranchise in the right direction. Sébastien Vaniček’s update about production beginning a year before the movie’s release date should start the hype cycle off properly among horror fans.
