I’ll admit, it took me a while to come around on genre filmmakerMike Flanaganbut I’m firmly on the bandwagon these days. I remember being decidedly unimpressed with his haunted mirror movieOculus, and didn’t really get what all the was fuss was about early in his career. But Netflix has really forced me to do a ‘180’ on the guy. I really liked Flanagan’s low-budget thrillersHushandGerald’s Game, and I’ve heard good things about his latestStephen Kingadaptation,Doctor Sleep, which serves a sequel toThe Shining.
Flanagan is best known for his Netflix seriesThe Haunting of Hill House, which led the streamer to sign the director andTrevor Macy, his Intrepid Pictures producing partner, to a multi-year overall deal. And now we’ve learned that the first project to come out of that deal will beMidnight Mass, a seven-episode series about an isolated island community that begins to experience miraculous events – and frightening omens – when a mysterious young priest arrives in town.
Flanagan will direct and executive produceMidnight Masswith Macy, who are also prepping a second installment in theHauntingfranchise –The Haunting of Bly Manor, which will starVictoria PedrettifromHill House. The series is based on Henry James' gothic horror novella, and is expected to debut in 2020.
LikeJordan Peele,James WanandJason Blum, Flanagan is beginning to establish himself as a bona fide horror brand – one who seems to have a fan in genre maestro King. It’ll be interesting to see where Flanagan’s movie career goes afterDoctor Sleep, which is slated to hit theaters in November. I wonder if you’ll see him tackle a big franchise film, like Wan did withFurious 7and later,Aquaman. IfDoctor Sleepis a hit, Flanagan will be in even higher demand, and while he will have earned the right to do whatever he wants, I hope he stays true to his genre roots. Don’t forget that he’s also developing a reboot ofI Know What You Did Last Summer, while his horror scriptSnapshot 1988is out to A-list talent. Flanagan is represented by WME and Novo.
Deadline broke the news, and made sure to note that Flanagan’s new Netflix series is completely unrelated to the Vertigo comicMidnight, Mass., which follows married occult experts Adam and Julia Kadmon as they deal with supernatural cases around America.
