The lingering effects of the Coronavirus pandemic are still being felt across the industry, and it’s even affecting the marketing campaigns for some of the year’s biggest upcoming titles. For instance, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It is the third film in the massively popular series and the eighth overall installment in the highest-grossing horror franchise in history, but just 24 hours after we saw the first official images, the maiden trailer has arrived, a little over six weeks before the movie hits theaters and HBO Max simultaneously.

Back when times were much more certain and precedented, the promotional effort for a high profile sequel like The Devil Made Me Do It would have rolled on for months and featured multiple trailers, TV spots, teasers, character posters and everything in between, but The Conjuring brand has become so popular that it’s poised to do big business regardless of how much time Warner Bros. has to launch the marketing blitz.

New Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It Photos Tease Tomorrow’s Trailer

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Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson are back as Lorraine and Ed Warren, with the story following one of their most notorious cases that culminates in a murder suspect using demonic possession as grounds for their defense. It’s an interesting hook for The Conjuring 3, and at the very least, the two leads can be relied on to give solid performances as the esteemed paranormal investigators.

The Devil Made Me Do It looks as though it hits all of the required beats and ticks the mandatory boxes expected from the franchise, but perhaps the most pressing question is how well director of disappointing Conjuring spinoff The Curse of La Llorona Michael Chaves acquits himself, as he’s faced with the tough task of replacing James Wan behind the camera.

Capcom has continued to reveal information about Resident Evil Village today, with the emphasis this time being on showcasing several mechanics.

Up until now, fans have been led to believe that the developer has relied largely on borrowing gameplay elements from Resident Evil 4 and giving them a spit and polish for modern audiences which is definitely true, but Leon’s encounter with the Los Illuminados isn’t the only series entry from which this year’s installment draws inspiration.

Lady Dimitrescu, the blood-sucking castellan and one of many villains to star in Ethan’s upcoming nightmare, will feature prominently in the story, not only as an NPC but an enemy that the recently widowed protagonist will have to evade if he’s to survive through the night. Similar to Mr. X and Nemesis as seen in remakes of RE2 and RE3 respectively, Dimitrescu and her three daughters will hunt Ethan immediately upon his entering the castle gates and Capcom has even been kind enough to reveal exactly how that looks with some new footage that you can see over on PS Blog (though IGN has also shared some material that can be viewed above).

Judging from what we have here, it would seem Mother Miranda’s abnormally tall subordinate will function similarly to Umbrella’s aforementioned bioweapons by slowly and methodically hunting down her prey (that’s you, by the way), wherever it goes. On the occasions where that isn’t possible, her offspring will continue the chase, though given that they’re less powerful, it would appear as if the trio can be repelled with conventional weaponry. As for how Dimitrescu herself will be subdued, that’ll likely be impossible outside of a scripted boss battle, but it remains to be seen if she, too, can be delayed via certain means.

Whatever the case, players will have their work cut out for them when Resident Evil Village releases next month, May 7th, for consoles and PC.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has become so popular that the franchise has made a conscious effort to shy away from origin stories in recent years. Indeed, the mere existence of a superhero blockbuster hailing from Kevin Feige’s outfit is more than enough to sell any project to the masses, but casual viewers definitely need a crash course when it comes to something like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.

Out of the eleven Phase Four movies confirmed so far, twelve if you include Deadpool 3, only Shang-Chi and Eternals are introducing brand new faces. Jon Watts’ Fantastic Four might be rebooting the titular team for the MCU, but most fans are fully aware of who those characters are, and Chloe Zhao’s cosmic adventure takes place over thousands of years, so origins are arguably non-essential. But Destin Daniel Cretton’s martial arts comic book epic is another story, and we finally have the first trailer for the film, offering up a solid taste of what to expect.

First Teaser Poster For Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings

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The title hero may have made his Marvel Comics debut in 1973, but he’s far from a household name, although that looks as if it’s about to change in a major way. Simu Liu is poised to deliver a star-making turn as Shang-Chi, who finds himself forced to reckon with his past after being drawn into the orbit of The Mandarin, with Tony Leung cementing the retcon of Iron Man 3‘s divisive Trevor Slattery twist.

The Ten Rings organization ties it firmly to established MCU canon dating all the way back to Jon Favreau’s Iron Man, and based on the footage, it looks to be a whole lot of fun. Awkwafina, Fala Chen, Men’ger Zhan, Florian Munteanu, Ronny Chieng and Michelle Yeoh co-star, with Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings coming to theaters on September 3rd.

We don’t have too long to wait for Mortal Kombat, which will be with us on April 23rd. Although we’ve already received a lot of details about the movie, including some positive early praise, this week sees the release of a new clip showing Scorpion going up against Sub-Zero. Providing us with a taste of what to expect from the hard-R picture, the short video, available above, gives us a lot to be excited about.

Things kick off with Joe Taslim’s Sub-Zero creating an ice sword to take on 60-year-old legend Hiroyuki Sanada’s Scorpion, with the fight set in what appears to be a frozen-over warehouse. The two fighters proceed to go at each other with the blade and Scorpion’s kunai, with the latter appearing to gain the upper hand before Sub-Zero throws up a double to block his attack.

First Mortal Kombat Reboot Photos Tease A Bloody Brawler

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Although lacking gore, this look at Mortal Kombat showcases the martial arts prowess of its cast, as well as their physical abilities. Indeed, Taslim has commented on how shooting the video game adaptation was tougher than The Raid, partly due to having to carry more weight on his body during his scenes. Moreover, it does seem that making the fights as authentic as possible was key to the Simon McQuoid-directed film, including the performers doing all their own stunts.

This particular moment between Scorpion and Sub-Zero is likely the one we had brief glimpses of in a recent trailer, and confirms remarks from the producers regarding the importance of both characters to the overall story. With less than a week to go until its HBO Max and limited theatrical premiere, we’re keen to see whether Mortal Kombat lives up to the substantial hype, and just how much violence and bloody fatalities it manages to squeeze in without tipping over into NC-17 territory.

Is 2021 going to be the year the giant shark movie experiences a full-blown renaissance? From the looks of things, it appears to be a yes in terms of quantity and nothing else, but we’re not so sure about the quality.

This year has already seen the release of Sharks of the Corn, which did indeed try to position itself as a cross between Jaws and Children of the Corn, so take that information as you will. Shark Island is on its way to VOD at some point over the next couple of months, too, and another self-explanatory entry in the subgenre is China’s Huge Shark, summing up the premise of the film rather neatly.

Watch: First Look At This Summer’s Next Big Shark Movie Great White

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Tommy Wiseau is even joining the resurgence, with Big Shark set to mark the cult hero’s first directorial effort since The Room, and there’s also Sylvester Stallone voicing King Shark in James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad to look forward to. If that still wasn’t enough, Australian thriller Great White is expected to release this summer and has already been confirmed for a 2022 Shudder debut, while it’s got a new full-length trailer for good measure as well.

The plot follows a pair of seaplane operators and their passengers making their way to a remote island, but after experiencing some technical difficulties, they end up trapped with a bunch of hungry aquatic carnivores looking to add them to the menu. It might be a low budget effort, but the ‘inspired by true events’ tag gives it a hook, and there’s certainly plenty of atmosphere to be found in the footage that makes Great White look as though it could be the year’s shark attack movie to beat.

A core rule of slasher movies is that you should never assume the killer is dead; they will always find some way to come back. The same can also go for the victims, and a concept trailer for the new Scream combines the two, bringing back Stu and Randy.

Stu’s motivation in the original was never properly addressed, seeming to aid Billy purely for the joy of killing since, as is observed, “it’s a lot scarier when there’s no motive,” and was killed when Sidney pushed a TV onto his head, electrocuting him. Randy, meanwhile, was one of its survivors, but was murdered halfway through the sequel by Billy’s mother (“Randy spoke poorly of Billy and I got a little knife happy”). Despite this, he turned up in Scream 3 by way of a video recording that pre-empted his fears of both his own inevitable death and that the closing chapter of the trilogy would soon rear its head.

Scream Set Photos Reveal Key Location From The First Movie Is Back

The trailer uses footage from each of the movies and the TV show (along with some other sources) to suggest that the Ghostface slayings have become so ingrained in popular culture that they’re a source of inspiration for aspiring murderers, commenting on how entitled fandoms have become in deciding the direction in which the things they purport to love should actually go, with the two formerly dead characters playing important roles in realizing this. It also partially takes inspiration from The Following, a TV series created by Scream writer Kevin Williamson about a preposterously widespread cult of serial killers, amplifying the notion that literally everyone is a suspect.

The very existence of the first Scream was intended to lovingly poke fun at how formulaic slasher films had become, and this version of the franchise’s continuation attempts to take things in a new direction. Stu and Randy, who were each there at the beginning, would certainly be best placed to offer different perspectives on how the saturation of online obsession has affected what was in the beginning a simple story.