The final chapter in The Conjuring franchise should’ve been a victory lap for both fans and the filmmakers. Instead, it feels more like another flat tire on a haunted tricycle. Warner Bros. just dropped the first trailer for The Conjuring: Last Rites, and while it’s cool seeing Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga back as the loving couple Ed and Lorraine Warren, fans couldn’t help but ask one very important question: Why didn’t James Wan direct The Conjuring: Last Rites?
Seriously. Why isn’t the guy who made this franchise scary again behind the camera? Instead, we’re getting Michael Chaves—again. You remember him, right? The director of The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (aka the weakest entry of the franchise) and The Curse of La Llorona (aka let’s pretend it never happened). Chaves is back to helm the Warrens’ swan song, and fans are rightfully uneasy about it.
The tone is set from the very first second of the trailer. “Don’t touch anything,” warns a voice as the Warrens’ spooky artifact room takes center stage. Then, boom: jump scares, demonic whispers, bodies levitating, and yes, a girl with dark hair crawling creepily across the floor… again. How many times are we going to play the same VHS tape and pretend it’s a new movie? We saw all of this stuff in Lee Daniels’ The Deliverance, too.
The film teases one final case for the Warrens, possibly involving the death of Ed Warren himself. “Maybe a thousand,” Ed says, reflecting on the number of cases they’ve tackled. Lorraine ominously adds, “Something’s changed. Something’s different.” But it’s hard to believe anything has changed when the scares feel like they were pulled from a Blumhouse horror starter pack.
Gone is Wan’s slow-burn storytelling. Gone is the unnerving camera work that made even a shallow, dark hallway terrifying. Gone are the clever, subtle sound effects that made every scare feel real. Instead, we get loud noises and cheap thrills. That might work for a standalone horror flick, but this is The Conjuring—the crown jewel of a $2 billion franchise. It deserved better.
To be fair, the film does try to spice things up by introducing Judy Warren (Mia Tomlinson) and her boyfriend Tony Spera (Ben Hardy), while Steve Coulter returns as Father Gordon. But none of that matters if the soul of the series—the direction from Wan—is missing.
James Wan started this whole thing. He made us believe in haunted houses again. Letting someone else finish his story? That’s the real horror here.
The Conjuring: Last Rites hits international theaters on September 3, 2025, and North America on September 5. Just don’t expect the chills to stick this time.
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Tell us, did you want James Gunn to direct The Conjuring: Last Rites?
