Mike Flanagan worked for quite a while before gaining worldwide recognition and acclaim for the first TV series he’d created, Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House (2018). Prior to Netflix, there were multiple masterful films from Flanagan throughout the 2010s (Oculus, Absentia, Hush, Before I Wake, Ouija: Origin of Evil), with not a single dud in the bunch, but with Hill House, Flanagan has seemed to fall in love with the TV format and hasn’t released a film since.

The filmmaker now has a longtime deal with Netflix, which has proven to be pretty productive. Flanagan has already directed the Stephen King adaptation of Gerald’s Game for Netflix and has continued their creative partnership with The Haunting of Bly Manor, the horror series masterpiece Midnight Mass, and the recently released The Midnight Club.

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The horror film genre encompasses a wide range of subgenres, including psychological horror, paranormal horror, slasher films, supernatural horror, and more. Given this, it has been recognized as requiring a specific level of skill, especially the ability to seamlessly connect human emotions to the terror that dominates horror films. Flanagan, equipped with all that the genre demands of him, has been quite successful in his execution of horror works. Doctor Sleep, Midnight Mass, and The Haunting of Hill House are some of Flanagan’s works that have gone on to speak for the director’s skill and talent.

If you’re looking for the who’s, the what’s, and the when’s of these anxiety-inducing works, we’ve got them. We’re following Flanagan’s progress with just as much anticipation as you.

Updated December 2022 by Jessica Peerez: If you’re excited about movies and shows from Mike Flanagan, you’ll be happy to know that we’ve updated this article with more information about his upcoming work.

Fall of The House of Usher (TBA 2023)

     American International Pictures

The iconic Edgar Allan Poe was a horror master, so it was only a matter of time until Mike Flanagan transformed one of his works into a television masterpiece. In October 2021, it was announced that Flanagan would adapt Poe’s short story The Fall of The House of Usher for Netflix. Flanagan will be writing, directing, and producing the limited horror series, which is set to debut on Netflix.

The short story’s plot is already a dark masterpiece, following an anonymous narrator who tries to help his friend, the ill Roderick Usher – one of the two last members of the Usher family – and visits his house. Arriving there, he discovers that Roderick’s sister, Madeline – the other last member of the Usher family – is also ill and cataleptic, making her look like a dead person. But, sometime after Madeline dies, the real horrors begin. The story has been adapted for the screen a few times, most notably with the great Vincent Price film from director Roger Corman and the 1928 masterpiece directed by Jean Epstein and co-written by Luis Buñuel.

The Fall of The House of Usher will also adapt Poe’s other works, incorporating elements and characters of different Poe stories into its narrative. Many of Flanagan’s frequent collaborators will star in House of Usher’s cast — remarkably, Kate Siegel, Carla Gugino, Zach Gilford, Samantha Sloyan, Matt Biedel, Katie Parker, Robert Longstreet, Michael Trucco, Annabeth Gish, Henry Thomas, and the great Rahul Kohli have all starred in Flanagan projects in the past and will lead the cast here. The legendary Mark Hamill and Mary McDonnell will star alongside them, with everybody appearing in all eight episodes, four of which will be directed by Flanagan, while the other four will be directed by his longtime cinematographer, Michael Fimognari.

The series is expected to premiere in 2023. Despite production being scheduled to wrap up in May 2022, filming ran till July 2022. However, with the series now in the post-production stage, we will likely be able to see The Fall of The House of Usher sometime in early 2023.

Tweeting about the show, Flanagan said:

The Season of Passage (TBA)

     Tor Books

Based on the 1993 Pike novel, Season of Passage is a different sort of tale for Flanagan, who is reportedly making the film for Universal Pictures. A sci-fi story blended with horror, mystery, and psychological drama, The Season of Passage follows Dr. Laura Wagner as she leads a rescue mission to Mars on the U.S. spaceship Nova. A Russian ship, the Lenin, was stranded on Mars two years prior and has not been heard from since, so in peacetime, Wagner’s ship is sent to investigate.

Meanwhile, her sister on Earth has dark, seemingly telepathic visions of the cosmonauts on Mars. Combining the sci-fi story with vampires, alien infections, and supernatural suspense, The Season of Passage seems to be brimming with ideas that Flanagan can cinematically extrapolate.

The film was reported to be in the development stage in March 2022, and no release date for The Season of Passage has been announced at the time of writing. However, given that Flanagan described the project as being a dream of his since he was a teenager, the horror movie set in space will no doubt be another exceptional work by the director.

The Midnight Club Season 2 (Update: Canceled)

     Netflix

Season 1 of The Midnight Club was a Netflix original series created by Flanagan. The show was an adaptation of a novel authored by Christopher Pike. Season 1 of the show followed the story of a group of terminally ill teenagers who created a club by the name of Midnight Club. With the group coming together at midnight to share horror stories, the teenagers make a pact that those that die first will make an effort to contact those who are still living.

Despite the intriguing narrative, the show performed extremely poorly. As per data from Netflix, the show only pulled in 18.79M watched hours globally in the first weekend of its release. Regardless of its performance, many expected that the show would be given a second season, owing to Flanagan being one of Netflix’s best creators and many unexplored avenues being left at the conclusion of season 1. Many viewers were curious to see Doctor Stanton’s backstory, given the cliffhanger that season 1 ended on.

However, crushing fan expectations, The Wrap announced on December 1, 2022, that season 2 of The Midnight Club was canceled by Netflix, citing the first season’s weak viewership, which stacked up negatively against production costs. Flanagan took to Twitter to react to the cancelation. Expressing his disappointment but providing viewers with answers to the questions left at the end of season 1 via Tumblr, the director said:

Despite the cancelation of The Midnight Club, there are still quite a few of the director’s projects that we can look forward to. With 2023 almost upon us, there’s not too long to go before we enjoy the talented Mike Flanagan’s work yet again!

“I’m very disappointed that Netflix has decided not to pursue a second season of THE MIDNIGHT CLUB. My biggest disappointment is that we left so many story threads open, holding them back for the hypothetical second season, which is always a gamble.”