The Rise of Modern Horror: Why the Genre Is Thriving More Than Ever
By Jack Ransom - Octoner 31, 2026
It's Halloween, the spookiest day of the year, and what better time to embrace all things horror? After a month of Shocktober, Spooktober, Horroroctober… you get the picture, the big day has finally arrived. So what better time than to reflect on just how impressive the rise of horror has been since 2020.
Before we begin, I would like to point out that it is undeniable just how impactful and influential Robert Eggers, Ari Aster and Jordan Peele were to this current wave of horror. Eggers utilised a period setting and dialogue choices (with the star power of Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) to take us to The Lighthouse, Aster opened raw, grief filled wounds to a mainstream audience with both Hereditary & Midsommar and the Peele injected comedy and racial commentary into classic horror tropes with Get Out & Us. These films, along with notable now-pop culture staples such as A Quiet Place (of which spawned a franchise) fitted nicely alongside legacy icons getting a new injection of life towards the end of the 2010’s: It (arguably the most recognisable and culture capturing horror film of the past 20 years) and Halloween (2018) being a direct lega-sequel to Carpenter’s 1978 classic.
We arrive in 2020, COVID hits and the world shuts down. Streaming rises, attention spans dip, social media becomes even more of the centre of communication and spreading the word, cinema is in a panic state. This period forced and allowed for a switch-up within the genre, with limited resources and budgets, creativity has to come first. Arguably the first to breakthrough this barrier and go viral was Shudder's hit Host, which entirely took place on a laptop during the pandemic and offered up some effective chills and allowed director Rob Savage to dip his toes in theatrical outings (The Boogeyman and the newly released Other Mommy - the less said about Dashcam, the better). Other notable pandemic set and/or themed horror releases included the exploitative, bad taste laden Songbird, Ben Wheatley’s micro-budget, tight-knit In the Earth and utterly vicious outbreak inspired The Sadness. In 2021 we also saw established, hugely successful directors release big-swing original horror outings that (in my opinion), were criminally underrated and deserved better than their final box office results: James Wan’s bonkers Malignant & Edgar Wright’s 60’s giallo homage Last Night in Soho.
Fast forward out of the nether-zone that was the COVID-era, the horror scene resumed its cavalcade of Blumhouse horror outings. From original IP’s (Afraid, Imaginary, M3GAN, Night Swim), sequels (Insidious: The Red Door & Out of the Further), remakes (Speak No Evil) and adapting existing popular pop-culture material (Five Nights at Freddy’s and its sequel). The aforementioned trio of influential directors that I pointed out at the start of the piece branched out into ambitious bigger budget projects (Eggers - Nosferatu, Peele - Nope & Aster - Beau is Afraid & Eddington). Long dormant franchises rose from the grave to be reanimated with new leases of life: Evil Dead Rise and Burn are gleefully gnarly revitalisations, though marred in controversy and mixed reception Scream’s success has been undeniable (with this year’s seventh outing raking in over $200 million - the highest so far and with arguably the weakest reviews), Saw X is one of the best series entries and whilst it was butchered by critics Netflix’s swiftly forgotten, trashy, splat-fest Texas Chainsaw Massacre revival was good fun.
We are heading towards the end of what has arguably been horror's most successful post 2020 year yet. The term that can be used to define this particular segment (bar one filmmaker which we will mention shortly) is ‘YouTuber’. The jump from content creator director defined this year and tapped into a generation of audiences that didn’t have the attachment to the mega-budget mixed reception franchises (your DC’s, Marvel’s & Star Wars’), movie-goers itching for originality and critics inspired by the talent on display that seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Directed by Curry Barker, who started out with comedy skits and horror shorts, the instant pop culture hit that Obsession has become is the biggest example of how word of mouth, coupled with an instant star-turn lead performance (Inde Navarette) and a killer concept conjures up a perfect storm and turned into the most profitable horror film of all time (raking in over a half a billion dollars on a $750,000 budget).
Next up was Backrooms which was carried once again by word of mouth, but also excelled in bringing its niche, chronically online audience into the mainstream. Inspired by a 4chan creepypasta post, director Kane Parsons (who is only 21) created a buzz online with his webseries adaptations of the post and was then approached by A24 for a feature length. Lastly, whilst it may not have reached the heights of the other two discussed outings, Mark Fischbach's self-financed, wrote, directed, edited and starred in a passion project adaptation of Iron Lung. His loyal fans and subscribers took it upon themselves to call up cinema chains and email them asking for them to show the film (I’m still stunned that it got local distribution near me), which led to a total haul of $50 million on a $3 million budget.
Lastly, and most relevantly, we have Zach Cregger, who launched onto the horror scene with the twisted Barbarian in 2022, tapped into multi-genre, anthology inspired ambition with riotous Weapons in 2025 and just last month delivered what for me is not only my favourite film this year but also the best video-game adaptation we have had so far in Resident Evil. Allowing Cregger to take elements of the source material, yet spin his own original tale with no Leon, Chris, Clare etc. felt not only fresh, but also gleefully risky and exciting. It too paid off in spades, as I mentioned it absolutely rocked, but also proved that direct console to screen adaptations aren’t always the way, as currently the film is well on its way to $300 million+ at the box office.
It is an exciting time to be a horror fan and the buzz and palpable sense of success, originality and acclaim is certainly infectious. Just this month we've had DC’s horror adaptation of Batman’s nemesis Clayface and the large scale creature feature Whalefall. In 2027, Robert Eggers is set to bring us Werwulf, M Night Shyamalan’s ghostly tale Remain, Mike Flanagan’s The Exorcist: Martyrs and Curry Barker’s next project Anything But Ghosts to name but a few. Long live the scares, thrills and chills!
For more features, reviews, and deep dives into film and TV, keep it locked to Film Focus Online.
Jack Ransom
Senior Writer
Jack loves to talk films: After a regular cinema trip, he likes to review them, rank them, react to them or even adding to his physical media collection!
Want your film or TV show reviewed by Jack? Contact us.
