Frank Darabont’s The Mist set a punishing standard for anyone attempting another adaptation of Stephen King’s novella. Its final scene remains one of the most devastating endings in modern horror, ensuring that any new version will face immediate comparisons. Mike Flanagan is not running from that challenge, but he has no interest in recreating what Darabont already accomplished. Flanagan’s upcoming Mist movie reunites him with King after Gerald’s Game, Doctor Sleep, The Life of Chuck, and the new Prime Video adaptation of Carrie. Warner Bros. announced the project earlier this year, but has not revealed its cast, production schedule, or release date. Flanagan has now offered a concrete update on how far the movie has progressed behind the scenes.
During an interview at the Toronto International Film Festival for Flanagan’s new Prime Video adaptation of Carrie, Collider’s Perri Nemiroff asked when audiences might finally see his interpretation of the story. Flanagan could not provide a release window, but he confirmed that he is actively writing the screenplay. He even revealed when he currently expects to deliver it to the studio.
“I’m writing it right now,” Flanagan told Collider. “I was working on it on the airplane here.” He said the screenplay is due around Halloween and planned to continue working during his flights and between interviews at TIFF. Flanagan qualified the Halloween deadline with “I think,” meaning it should not be treated as a firm production announcement. Turning in a screenplay also does not mean filming will immediately begin, particularly when no cast has been announced. Still, his answer confirms that the project has moved beyond its initial announcement and into active development.
Collider Exclusive · Horror Survival Quiz Which Horror Villain Do You Have the Best Chance of Surviving? Jason Voorhees · Michael Myers · Freddy Krueger · Pennywise · Chucky
Five killers. Five completely different ways to die — if you’re not smart enough, fast enough, or self-aware enough to avoid it. Only one of them is the villain your particular set of instincts gives you a fighting chance against. Eight questions will figure out which one.
🏕️Jason
🔪Michael
💤Freddy
🎈Pennywise
🪆Chucky
01
Something feels wrong. You can’t explain it — you just know. What do you do? First instincts are the difference between the survivor and the first act casualty.
02
Where are you most likely to find yourself when things go wrong? Setting is everything in horror. Where you are determines which rules apply.
03
What is your most reliable survival asset? Every survivor has a quality the villain didn’t account for. What’s yours?
04
What kind of fear is hardest for you to fight through? Knowing your weakness is the first step to not dying because of it.
05
You’re with a group when things start going wrong. What’s your role? Horror movies are brutally clear about who survives group situations and who doesn’t.
06
What’s the horror movie mistake you’re most likely to make? Honest self-assessment is a survival skill. Denial is not.
07
What’s your best weapon against something that can’t be stopped by conventional means? Every horror villain has a weakness. The survivors are always the ones who find it.
08
It’s the final scene. You’re the last one standing. How did you make it? The final survivor always has a reason. What’s yours?
Your Survival Odds Have Been Calculated Your Best Chance Is Against…
Your instincts, your strengths, and your particular way of thinking under pressure point to one villain you actually have a fighting chance against. Everyone else — good luck.
Camp Crystal Lake · Friday the 13th
Jason Voorhees
Jason is relentless, but he is also predictable — and that is the gap you would exploit.
He moves in straight lines toward his target. He doesn’t strategise, doesn’t adapt, doesn’t outsmart. He simply pursues.
Your ability to keep moving, use the environment, and resist the panic that freezes most victims gives you a genuine edge.
The Crystal Lake survivors were always the ones who stopped running in circles and started thinking about terrain, water, and distance.
You think like that. Which means Jason, for all his indestructibility, would face someone who simply refused to be where he expected.
Haddonfield, Illinois · Halloween
Michael Myers
Michael watches before he moves. He is patient, methodical, and almost impossible to detect — until it’s too late for anyone who isn’t paying close enough attention.
But you are paying attention. You notice the shape in the window, the car parked slightly wrong, the silence where there should be sound.
Michael’s power lies in the invisibility of ordinary suburbia — the fact that nothing ever looks wrong until it already is.
Your spatial awareness and instinct to map every room, every exit, and every shadow before you need them is precisely the quality Laurie Strode had.
You are not a victim waiting to happen. You are someone who already suspects something is wrong — and acts on it.
Elm Street · A Nightmare on Elm Street
Freddy Krueger
Freddy wins by getting inside your head — using your own fears, your own memories, your own subconscious as weapons against you. That strategy requires a target who can be destabilised.
You are harder to destabilise than most. You’ve faced uncomfortable truths about yourself and you haven’t looked away.
The survivors on Elm Street were always the ones who understood what was happening and chose to face it rather than flee from it.
Freddy’s greatest weakness is that his power evaporates in the presence of someone who refuses to give him the fear he feeds on.
Your psychological resilience — the ability to stay grounded when reality itself becomes unreliable — is exactly the quality that keeps you alive here.
Derry, Maine · It
Pennywise
Pennywise is ancient, shapeshifting, and feeds on terror — but it has one critical vulnerability: it cannot function against someone who genuinely stops being afraid of it.
The Losers Club didn’t survive because they were braver than everyone else. They survived because they faced their fears together, and faced them honestly.
You ask the questions others avoid. You look directly at what frightens you rather than turning away.
That directness — the refusal to let fear fester in the dark — is Pennywise’s worst nightmare.
It chose the wrong target when it chose you. You are exactly the kind of person whose fear tastes like nothing at all.
Chicago · Child’s Play
Chucky
Chucky’s greatest advantage is that nobody takes him seriously until it’s already too late. He exploits the gap between how something looks and what it actually is.
You don’t have that gap. You take threats seriously regardless of how they present — and you never make the mistake of underestimating something because of its size or appearance.
Chucky relies on surprise, on the delay between recognition and response. You close that delay faster than almost anyone.
Your instinct to treat every unfamiliar thing with appropriate scepticism — rather than dismissing it because it seems absurd — is the exact quality that keeps you breathing.
Against Chucky, not laughing is already winning. You are very good at not laughing.
What to Expect From Mike Flanagan’s ‘The Mist’ Adaptation
Thomas Jane as David at the end of ‘The Mist.’ Image via Dimension Films
The filmmaker also addressed the unavoidable comparisons to Darabont’s 2007 adaptation. Flanagan called the earlier movie “wonderful” and “vicious,” making it clear that his new version is not intended to correct something he believes Darabont got wrong. His admiration for that movie is precisely why he believes his own adaptation needs a different identity. “There’s no point in doing it again, so I get to do something new, which is always exciting,” Flanagan explained. He did not reveal whether that new direction concerns the characters, the creatures, the ending, or another element of King’s story. For now, audiences only know that he does not plan to deliver a retread of the previous movie.
Warner Bros. has not announced when production will begin or when the movie will reach theaters. Stay tuned at Collider for the rest of Nemiroff’s interview with Flanagan and Carrie star Summer H. Howell, and don’t miss the series when it premieres on October 7 on Prime Video.
