Following the critical and commercial success of Terrifier 2, Leone began writing for the third film with plans for an overarching narrative. Leone wanted to feature Victoria more prominently, as he regretted leaving the character underdeveloped in the first film. Principal photography began in February 2024 on a $2 million budget, and wrapped that April.
Terrifier 3 premiered at Fantastic Fest on September 19, 2024, and was theatrically released in the United States on October 11, by Cineverse and Iconic Events Releasing. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and has grossed $64 million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing unrated film of all time.[7]
Plot
After being beheaded by Sienna Shaw,[a]Art the Clown's headless body decapitates a cop responding to the incident, and make its way to the asylum where survivor Victoria Heyes, now possessed by the Little Pale Girl, has just given birth to Art's own head. After reattaching his head to his body, Art and Victoria kill a nurse and a guard before entering an abandoned house and going into hibernation.
Five years later, Sienna is released from a mental health center to stay with her aunt Jess, her husband Greg and their daughter Gabbie, who idolizes Sienna but has no knowledge of the events she endured. Sienna is suffering from survivor guilt and frequently has hallucinations of her deceased best friend Brooke, whose death[a] she feels responsible for. She struggles to reconnect with her younger brother Jonathan, who is now in college trying to move on with his life. Art and Victoria are woken from their slumber when two demolition workers stumble upon them in the house. The duo kills the workers, and Victoria begins working on a costume, while Art ventures off on another killing spree. Art meets a Santa Claus impersonator at a bar, where Art kills him and takes his Santa costume. Art then poses as a mall Santa and uses explosives disguised as presents to kill several people at the mall, many of them children. Sienna thinks she sees Art at the mall in disguise before the explosion, but does not tell her family since she thinks they would not believe her and is unsure herself if it was simply a hallucination or not.
Sienna visits Jonathan at his university. There she meets Jonathan's roommate Cole and his girlfriend Mia, who hosts a true crime podcast. Mia pressures Sienna and Jonathan to participate in an interview about the Miles County Massacre, but Sienna lashes out. Sienna confesses to Jonathan that she thinks Art is still alive, and shows Jonathan the letters he wrote to her while she was in the psychiatric hospital, which state that demons can be reborn and possess hosts like Victoria. She also tells Jonathan she plans to return to the Terrifier haunted attraction to retrieve her father's sword. Art arrives at the university and kills Mia and Cole with a chainsaw. Sienna learns about the mall killings on the news and panics, demanding Jonathan return home from college and warning the family they are not safe. Greg leaves to collect Jonathan while Sienna falls asleep; she dreams about angels crafting the armor from her warrior costume that her father drew for her. Sienna wakes to hear Jess and her husband downstairs discussing what they should do about her worsening condition. When she walks into the dining room, Sienna instead finds Art and Victoria decorating Greg's decapitated and eviscerated body pinned to the wall. Sienna runs but is then incapacitated by Art with a mallet.
As Sienna regains consciousness, she sees Jess tied up across from her, and Greg's severed head used as the star on their Christmas tree. Victoria shows them a skinless head being consumed by rats, telling her it is Gabbie's. Art kills Jess by hammering a tube into her throat and forcing rats down it. Art suddenly enters with Gabbie as a hostage, and Victoria claims to Sienna that the head is Jonathan's. Vicky places a crown of thorns on Sienna's head and tries to possess her, but she resists because her will is not yet broken. Victoria tells Sienna to open her Christmas gift from Gabbie. Sienna however, breaks free and decapitates Victoria with her father's sword which she hid in the present. Victoria's pool of blood burns through the floor and creates a portal to Hell. As Sienna and Art fight, Gabbie falls in and holds onto the edge. Sienna finally gains an advantage by impaling Art to a wall, but leaves him in order to save Gabbie, who eventually falls into the abyss with the sword. Art flees through a window, while Sienna vows to find and rescue Gabbie. As Sienna looks at her wounded hands, the hand heals immediately implying she got her angelic powers.
In the final scene, Art is seen boarding a bus with a passenger and driver, who are disturbed by his appearance.
Lauren LaVera as Sienna Shaw, Jonathan's older sister and the one who decapitated Art in the previous film and now is released from a mental health center
Luciana Elisa Quiñonez as young Sienna
Elliott Fullam as Jonathan Shaw, Sienna's younger brother who is now in college and trying to move on with life after the events that he had experienced
Samantha Scaffidi as Victoria Heyes, the younger sister of Art's victim, Tara Heyes, and the sole survivor of the events of the first film, who becomes possessed by the Little Pale Girl and acts as Art's partner-in-crime
Margaret Anne Florence as Jess Shaw, Sienna and Jonathan's aunt who is the older sister of their mother Barbara
Bryce Johnson as Greg Shaw, Jess's husband and Gabbie's father
Antonella Rose as Gabbie Shaw, Jess and Greg's daughter and Sienna and Jonathan's cousin who idolizes Sienna
Chris Jericho as Adam Burke, an orderly in the Miles County Psychiatric Hospital
Terrifier franchise creator and director Damien Leone
This film featured the character of Vicky Heyes, the heroine turned villainess of Terrifier (2016), in a much more prominent role compared to the 2016 film and its 2022 sequel—with Damien Leone's biggest regret with the first film being leaving her underdeveloped. The original ending of Terrifier 2 set up Vicky's demise in the opening of this film, but Leone deemed it to be too similar to the concept of Malignant (2021). While conceptualizing the birthing scene, he decided he wanted to keep Vicky alive and give her significant character development, as he enjoyed working with Samantha Scaffidi.[9][10][11]
In December 2023, it was confirmed that Chris Jericho was set to appear in Terrifier 3.[12][13] In April 2024, it was confirmed that Daniel Roebuck was set to appear as Santa Claus in Terrifier 3.[14] In May 2024, it was announced that Tom Savini was set to appear in Terrifier 3.[15] In June 2024, it was announced that Jason Patric was set to appear in Terrifier 3.[16] In July 2024, it was announced that Antonella Rose, Krsy Fox, Clint Howard, and Jon Abrahams were set to appear in Terrifier 3.[17]
In May 2023, it was announced that Terrifier 3 was expected to begin filming in November or December 2023.[18]Principal photography began in February 2024 and wrapped in April 2024,[12][19][20] with additional scenes completed in New York until early/mid June.[16] Leone chose to shoot the film using Panavisionanamorphic lenses with the intention of making the film look like a, "vintage John Carpenter movie".[21] The film cost $2 million to produce, up from its predecessor's $250,000 budget; Variety described the budget as "still wildly low by Hollywood standards".[4]
Release
Terrifier 3 was theatrically released in the United States on October 11, 2024, by Cineverse, who acquired distribution rights in June 2023, setting it for a wide release in collaboration with Iconic Events Releasing, with an exclusive streaming debut on the former's Screambox service.[2][22] It was originally scheduled for October 25,[23] but was moved forward to its new date in May 2024.[24] The film premiered on opening night at the 2024Fantastic Fest on September 19.[25] In select AMC Theatres, the film played as a double feature with Terrifier 2, followed by a music video presentation of the film's official song "A Work of Art" by Ice Nine Kills, featuring System of a Down bassist Shavo Odadjian,[26] which was released as a single in tandem with the film's theatrical release on October 11.[27]
Cineverse spent under $5 million to acquire and market the film; advertising costs were $500,000 (as the film was largely marketed to Cineverse's Bloody Disgusting fanbase and 80 million streaming subscribers across 30 channels)[28] and additional acquisition costs were covered by a loan of at most $3.67 million, with the lender receiving 15% of royalties, capped at $6.4 million.[29] The film forwent submission for a Motion Picture Association rating to avoid an NC-17 rating.[30]
As of November 3, 2024[update], Terrifier 3 has grossed $50.9million in the United States and Canada, and $12.9million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $63.9million.[5][6]
In the United States and Canada, Terrifier 3 was projected to gross $10–11 million from 2,514 theaters in its opening weekend, with one estimate by Boxoffice Pro at $12–18 million.[32][33][34] The film made $8.2 million on its first day (including $2.6 million from Thursday night previews). It debuted to $18.9 million, topping the box office. As an indie film, Terrifier 3 notably placed ahead of DC Comics holdover Joker: Folie à Deux.[28] Theater chains treated the unrated film as an R-rated film, turning down attendees 17 or younger if unaccompanied by a parent or guardian; two distribution sources speculated that more people saw the film than reported, theorizing that a "noticeable bump" in the earnings for The Wild Robot that weekend was the result of teenagers buying tickets to The Wild Robot and then sneaking into screenings of Terrifier 3. The trend continued into the film's first Monday, during which it earned $2.6 million, bringing its four-day total to $21.5 million.[30][35] In its second weekend, the film made $9.3 million (a drop of 51%), finishing in third.[36] The film then made $4.8 million its third weekend, finishing in sixth.[37]
In France, the film opened number one box office on its first day with 45,000 admissions, more than other horror films like Saw X (35,000) and Smile (33,000).[38] In Poland, Terrifier 3 sold nearly 140,000 tickets during its opening weekend.[39][40]
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 79% of 112 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.5/10. The website's consensus reads: "Taking an axe to yuletide cheer and everything else in its path, Terrifier 3 is a bloody fantastic stocking stuffer for the holiday season."[41]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 61 out of 100, based on 18 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[42] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale, while those surveyed by PostTrak gave it a 76% overall positive score, with 59% saying they would definitely recommend it.[28]
Writing for Slant Magazine, Rocco T. Thompson described the storyline as being "half-formed" but praised the leading performances and the practical effects.[43] Thompson highlighted Scaffidi's performance in particular: "it's the surprisingly spooky Victoria Heyes who emerges as the film's villain MVP, what with the overwhelming Art often playing second banana in their scenes together. Through it all, Scaffidi exudes a chilling sense of evil from beneath pounds of prosthetics."[43] Thompson also noted that LaVera brought "emotional intensity to the narrative" in her portrayal.[43] In a review for The Austin Chronicle, Richard Whittaker highlighted the film's continued worldbuilding, the transgressiveness of the Art character, and Vicky's expanded importance as a villain in the series.[44] Similarly, Matthew Jackson of The A. V. Club praised the script and the performances of Thornton and LaVera.[45] Jackson stated that LaVera "cements herself as one of horror's brightest new stars with her second time out as Sienna Shaw."[45] In a positive review for IndieWire, Alison Foreman highlighted the script as "confident and comfortable".[46] She praised the development of both Sienna and Vicky, describing the latter as Leone's "secret weapon". Foreman states that the film gives the two characters "plenty of story to carry".[46]
International responses
France's Classification Committee banned viewers under the age of 18 from seeing the film, the first time such a ban had been issued since the release of Saw III in 2006.[47][48] There were reports of audiences vomiting and leaving theatres after watching the film's opening scene in the United Kingdom.[49][50][48] Two people reportedly passed out during a screening of the film in Australia.[51]
Sequel
In 2023, Damien Leone spoke about plans for a potential Terrifier 4.[52][53][54] In September 2024, Leone confirmed that Terrifier 4 was in development.[55][56]
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