Michael Chernus to play notorious serial killer John Wayne Gacy in Devil in Disguise limited series for Peacock.

We’ve got yet another serial killer drama on the way as Michael Chernus (Severance) is set to play John Wayne Gacy in a limited drama series for Peacock.

Devil in Disguise: John Wayne Gacy will chronicle “the harrowing crimes of one of America’s most notorious serial killers and the investigation that ultimately brought him down.” Over the course of six years, Gacy kidnapped and murdered 33 young men, burying many of them in the crawl space beneath his home. On the outside, Gacy didn’t seem to fit the mould of a twisted killer; he was active in his community, hosted annual summer parties, and even volunteered to entertain sick children dressed as a clown.

“I’m both excited and humbled by this opportunity,” Chernus said in a statement. “The direction that the writers are taking with this project is important, focusing on the victims and their families as well as those who finally brought John Wayne Gacy to justice.”

Chernus continued: “While Gacy was the perpetrator of these horrific crimes, I’m relieved that he won’t be the main focus of the series. It’s heartbreaking for me to think of what his victims (all young men and boys) could have done with their lives had the system not failed them so tragically. I believe in the power of storytelling and hope that by telling this story, in a thoughtful way, we can play some part in preventing this from ever happening again.“

Patrick Macmanus, known for Dr. Death and The Girl From Plainville, will serve as writer, executive producer, and showrunner on the series. Devil in Disguise: John Wayne Gacy “peels back the twisted layers of John Wayne Gacy’s life while weaving in the heartrending stories of his mostly gay victims; exploring the grief, guilt, and trauma of their families and friends; and exposing the systemic failures, missed opportunities and societal prejudices that fueled his reign of terror.“

Michael Chernus will next be seen in the second season of Severance on Apple TV+. The psychological thriller series finally wrapped shooting in April after being forced to halt due to the WGA and SAG strikes. The second season doesn’t have an official release date at this time.

Jessica Alba’s first movie in over five years is a weak copy of John Wick-style action.

Last Updated on June 27, 2024

Plot: Special Forces commando Parker is on active duty overseas when she gets called back to her hometown with the tragic news that her father has suddenly died. Now the owner of the family bar, Parker reconnects with her former boyfriend-turned-sheriff Jesse, his hot-tempered brother Elvis and their powerful father Senator Swann, as she looks to understand what actually happened to her dad. 

Review: It has been five years since Jessica Alba‘s last big screen role. While she led the Bad Boys spin-off L.A.’s Finest alongside Gabrielle Union the year after, Alba has spent the last half-decade working as Chief Creative Officer for The Honest Company, which she co-founded. While she recently stepped down from that role, her work on Trigger Warning goes back to 2021. The three-year road for Alba’s first leading role in a decade should indicate the quality of the finished product. Marketed as being an action flick in the vein of John Wick, Trigger Warning is a mediocre flick that feels like something Jason Statham would have passed over. Full of underdeveloped characters, repetitive action, and weak dialogue, Trigger Warning is yet another Netflix original that is not very good.

If the lack of marketing materials was not a clue as to the lack of quality in Trigger Warning, the fact that screeners were sent to critics less than twenty-four hours before it debuts on Netflix should tell you all you need to know about this action movie. From the outset, Trigger Warning opens with a bombastic chase sequence through a desert with Parker (Jessica Alba) in a truck pursued by terrorists. Parker has killed the bad guys after a crash and a brutal fight sequence. Chatting with her friend Spider (Tone Bell), Parker gets a phone call telling her that her father, Harry (Alejandro De Hoyos), was killed in a cave-in. Parker returns home to settle her father’s affairs by selling the family bar, Maria’s. Parker runs into her former boyfriend Jesse (Mark Webber), now sheriff of the quaintly named town of Creation. Parker also runs into family friend Mike (Gabriel Basso) and Jesse’s brother Elvis (Jake Weary). Elvis and Jesse are sons of Senator Swann (Anthony Michael Hall), a conservative politician with an iron grip on Creation, which should tell you what comes next.

Parker quickly realizes her father’s death was not an accident, and it involves Senator Swann and the local military base. Teaming up with Mike and reconnecting with Spider, Parker goes out for revenge for her father. Over the almost two-hour running time of Trigger Warning, Parker kicks ass as much as she gets her ass kicked and dispatches dozens of bad guys with everything from household objects to gunfire and more than a few with knives and a massive machete. Having appeared in Machete and Machete Kills, Jessica Alba is no stranger to action roles, but Trigger Warning boasts the most fight scenes the actress has participated in in her entire career. The action scenes are the highlight of this film, but even they begin to feel repetitive after Alba dispatches multiple thugs with the same blade slice to the neck. Most of the key action moments are used in the trailer, leaving over an hour for audiences to realize there is not all that much logic or depth to this revenge story.

So much of Trigger Warning is nonsensical, which makes the title fairly apt. There seems to have been an attempt to make this a story about a Latinx female character who kicks the ever-loving piss out of a cowboy hat-wearing conservative politician. Still, it gets lost in a story full of nonsense that boils down to greed and greed alone. Anthony Michael Hall barely registers as the villainous Senator Swann, who makes a jab about what “Latinx” means, but it comes across as blatant and heavy-handed. A character calls Alba’s Parker a racial slur at one point, to which she expediently kills him without a second thought. This would have been a wonderful showcase in the early to mid-1990s, but it does not take advantage of the setting or skills that Alba brings to the table. Jessica Alba fits Parker’s role well, but the meandering plot undermines her quest for vengeance, and the ending fails to put a stamp on why we just spent two hours with these characters.

Written by John Brancato (Terminator 3, Terminator Salvation) alongside Josh Olson (A History of Violence) and Halley Wegryn Gross (The Last of Us: Part II, Too Old To Die Young), Trigger Warning feels like it would have been a vehicle for a mid-level action star twenty years ago but is so uneven that it had nowhere to end up other than Netflix. It also comes from director Mouly Surya, who has no experience helming an action movie with the films What They Don’t Talk About When They Talk About Love and Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts to her credit. Alba and Surya may have been aiming for an unexpected angle to an action project. Still, even as a producer, Alba fails to find anything that amounts to a solid production here. The set design is somewhat better than that of other mediocre Netflix films from the last few years. Still, the bombastic and inappropriately epic score by Enis Rotthoff and the jerky cinematography from Zoe White are crippled by terrible editing from Chris Tonick and Robert Grigsby Wilson. No one seems to be the right fit for this project, with Alba coming close to being the only person in the right role.

Trigger Warning is not edgy enough to piss off either side of the political spectrum, nor is it engaging enough to warrant spending two full hours with. We have gotten unexpected action leads ranging from June Squibb to Bob Odenkirk and Bert Kreischer. Still, Alicia Vikander, Charlize Theron, and Anya Taylor-Joy have shown it is no longer shocking for an able-bodied young actress like Jessica Alba to kick ass. Netflix has found better projects like Trigger Warning with Jennifer Lopez in The Mother and Allison Janney in Lou. Both films are better constructed and more entertaining, even at a B-movie level. Trigger Warning is not even good enough to be called mediocre, and that is a shame for what seems to have been designed as Jessica Alba’s comeback as a lead. Avoid this one unless you want to see a bunch of rednecks getting killed and if you are not too worried about any semblance of a sensical plot.

Yellowstone season 6, a.k.a. Yellowstone season 5, part 2 (the final season of the show), has been given an official November premiere date

Update:

Kevin Costner has taken to his social media to confirm that although he recently stated that he loves doing Yellowstone and would be open to returning “under the right circumstances,” he will, in fact, NOT be returning to the Paramount+ show in the upcoming season. Deadline reports that Costner took it upon himself to post a video to his Instagram where he addressed the fans directly. His video post sported the caption, “An update for you guys. I’ll see you at the movies.” This video post came just hours after Paramount+ announced a release date for the final episodes in the series.

In the video, the Horizon star would candidly explain, “I want to reach out and let you know that after this long year and a half of working on Horizon and doing all the things that’s required, and thinking about Yellowstone, that beloved series that I love, that I know you love, I just realized that I’m not going to be able to continue Season 5B or into the future.” Costner continued, “It was something that really changed me. I loved it. And I know you loved it. And I just wanted to let you know that I won’t be returning and I love the relationship we’ve been able to develop and I’ll see you at the movies.”

Original Article: On June 20, 2018, Paramount Network aired the first episode of a neo-Western drama television series called Yellowstone – and a megahit franchise was born. The final batch of episodes are now in production, and while some are referring to those episodes as “Yellowstone season 6,” it’s officially Yellowstone season 5, part 2 – and Paramount Network has decided to celebrate the sixth anniversary of the show’s premiere to announce that Yellowstone season 5, part 2 has a premiere date of Sunday, November 10th at 8pm ET/PT.

Internationally, Yellowstone will premiere on Paramount+ in Canada on November 10th, the U.K. on November 11th, and in Latin America, Brazil and France later in November.

TV’s #1 show, produced by MTV Entertainment Studios and 101 Studios, Yellowstone chronicles the Dutton family who controls the largest contiguous cattle ranch in the United States. Amid shifting alliances, unsolved murders, open wounds, and hard-earned respect – the ranch is in constant conflict with those it borders – an expanding town, an Indian reservation, and America’s first national park.

It’s not known whether or not Kevin Costner, who caused a behind-the-scenes shake-up when he chose to work on the two-part epic Horizon: An American Saga rather than Yellowstone, will be appearing in the final episodes. He has said that he’s open to reporting to set, under the right circumstances.

The series was created by Taylor Sheridan and John Linson, and they both serve as executive producers alongside Art Linson, Kevin Costner, David C. Glasser, Bob Yari, Stephen Kay, Michael Friedman, Christina Voros and Keith Cox. The series is distributed by Paramount Global Content Distribution.

Yellowstone may be coming to an end with season 5, part 2, but the franchise will live in. Cast members Cole Hauser, Kelly Reilly, and Luke Grimes are on board to reprise the roles of Rip, Beth, and Kayce on a Yellowstone sequel series that might co-star Matthew McConaughey, Kurt Russell, and Michelle Pfeiffer. Jennifer Carpenter was recently cast in season 2 of the prequel series 1923. And spinoffs titled 1944 and 6666 are in the works.

Are you glad to hear that Paramount Network has announced the premiere date for Yellowstone season 5, part 2? Share your thoughts on this one by leaving a comment below.

Jesse Plemons showcases that he more than looks like Damon, but he’s a good sport at the jokes, as Damon himself usually is.

Last Updated on June 27, 2024

Jesse Plemons has made quite a name for himself with his career. However, the name he can’t help but be associated with is Matt Damon. Although Plemons has starred in his fair share of projects, mostly as a character actor, his striking resemblance to Damon do not stop the masses from either legitimately mistaking him for the Bourne Identity star or making jokes and memes out of his uncanny similarity. When Plemons had a heftier build, he would jokingly be referred to online as “Fat Damon,” but now that he has actually slimmed down to a smaller body type than his doppelgänger, the memes have changed to “Meth Damon.”

Damon is known to be a good sport when it comes to certain jokes, like when people shout “Matt Damon” to him in the same way that his marionette portrayal does from Team America: World Police. Plemons is showing that he’s an equally good sport as he addresses the subject. People reveals that while Plemons was on the TODAY show with co-star Emma Stone to promote Kinds of Kindness, the topic was breached and he humorously stated, “Still not Matt Damon.” TODAY show host Craig Melvin admitted his wife genuinely mistook Plemons for Damon when watching the film. Plemons responded,

Yeah, for a little while now, which there are worse things to be called, for sure. It’s definitely flattering. But yeah, throughout the course of my career, I’ve had various Matt Damon-associated nicknames and such.”

Emma Stone would then chime in, “Like what? Emily?” This is reference to Stone’s recent preference of being called by her real name as opposed to her stage name. Plemons responded, “Like Emily! Emily Damon.”

The two can be seen in the upcoming Yorgos Lanthimos film Kinds of Kindness, which our own Eric Walkuski was pretty lukewarm about when he mentioned in his review, “Kinds of Kindness ends up being more intriguing when you’re experiencing it rather than when you’re remembering it. Its unpredictability is absolutely its biggest asset, but when the smoke clears you wonder what, if anything, it was all for. Super fans of the director will surely be enamored with the film’s lurid quirks, while the casual moviegoer might wonder what the hell just happened during that almost three hour sideshow. It’s not exactly rewarding, but it’s also difficult to look away from.”

About the Author

E.J. is a News Editor at JoBlo, as well as a Video Editor, Writer, and Narrator for some of the movie retrospectives on our JoBlo Originals YouTube channel, including Reel Action, Revisited and some of the Top 10 lists. He is a graduate of the film program at Missouri Western State University with concentrations in performance, writing, editing and directing.

Back in the late 90s, a handful of powerful Hollywood producers set out on what was then a very exciting venture for genre fans: Dark Castle Entertainment, a production company dedicated to making medium-budget horror movies with A-list casts. Inspired by the legacy of beloved 50s schlockmeister William Castle, Dark Castle was going to remake some of the producer-director’s most famous works, like House on Haunted Hill and 13 Ghosts, in addition to focusing on original material. These movies weren’t going to be cheapies like Castle’s were – they’d have substantial budgets for the genre, top-tier creative teams behind the camera, and recognizable faces from film and television in front.. It was an inspired idea, and though now we look back on the venture with bittersweet memories, Dark Castle definitely left its mark on the horror genre. Calling Warner Bros. its home, Dark Castle had put out four features by 2004, all to middling reviews from critics and mixed responses from the paying public. But they weren’t about to stop their output; in fact, they were ready to embark on their most ambitious and expensive movie yet; this one a remake not of a William Castle movie, but the famous Vincent Price 3D shocker House of Wax. And this time it wouldn’t just be the wax that was hot; the film’s attractive young cast was going to be the main selling point – especially a notorious fame-obsessed heiress with a “hot” catchphrase (“that’s hot”). Would this gamble finally get Dark Castle the box office hit it craved, or would the whole thing go down in flames? Turn the lights down and fire up some candles – although not too many, now – because we’re going to find out WTF Happened to House of Wax (watch it HERE).

Dark Castle was formed by Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis and David Giler, three power players known for their billion-dollar-grossing blockbusters, like the Die Hard, Back to the Future, and Alien franchises. They were also well known for being three of the main creatives behind HBO’s Tales from the Crypt, which for years had doled out cheap scares and salacious sex with famous names in front of and behind the camera. They were taking their Tales from the Crypt sensibility to the big screen with their Dark Castle movies, which was absolute catnip to a young horror fan like yours truly.

Silver was the main force behind the company, heavily involving himself in every aspect of every stage of production. That would remain the case with House of Wax, although it was evidently Alan Horn, the chief of Warner Bros, who had the idea of remaking the Vincent Price classic – which itself was a remake of the 1933 chiller Mystery of the Wax Museum. Silver and his co-producer Susan Downey – yes, Robert Downey Jr’s main lady – were looking for writers with an interesting new take on the material for years to no avail. One day they had a meeting with twin brother screenwriters Chad and Carey Hayes, not exactly Hollywood heavyweights themselves with made-for-TV titles like Horse Sense and First Target to their credit. Silver asked the brothers if the title House of Wax meant anything to them, and they admitted to not having seen the original movie, but agreed to pitch their take on it.

Consciously not seeing the original, the brothers drew upon frightening experiences they actually had in their lives. Once during a camping trip a mysterious truck pulled up to them with its headlights ominously trained on the tents, drawing confused and frightened responses from the campers. Another instance saw the brothers accidentally fall into a roadkill pit – which is as disgusting as anything I can imagine, frankly. Both of these events made it into their pitch, helping convince Silver that he’d finally found the guys to bring House of Wax to vibrant life.

To helm the film, Silver found a 30-year-old director known for flashy ad campaigns named Jaume Collet-Serra, who’d never directed a feature film but was one of the busiest people in the commercial business, shooting for Playstation, Budweiser, Verizon among many others.

Unlike Dark Castle’s previous productions, House of Wax was intentionally skewing younger, casting actors in their early twenties to hopefully draw a crowd in a similar age range. It was, of course, Joel Silver’s idea to cast Paris Hilton in a supporting role. At the time, Hilton was one of the most famous, or infamous, people in the world, thanks to being a tabloid staple, starring in a popular reality show The Simple Life and, well, that sex tape with her ex that seemingly everyone had seen in 2003. Silver was betting that, despite her polarizing public image, Hilton would put asses in the seats. And he certainly could use the help, as House of Wax’s $40 million budget was Dark Castle’s largest yet, and quite an eye-popping sum for a B-horror movie.

The other main players in the cast would be familiar to any avid TV watcher: Chad Michael Murray of One Tree Hill fame was cast as bad boy ex-con Nick; playing his good-girl sister Carly would be 24 star Elisha Cuthbert; and playing Carly’s jock boyfriend was Gilmore Girls’ Jared Padalecki, still a year away from beginning his long run on Supernatural.

But the main stars of House of Wax would be its extravagant sets and ghoulish art direction. Overseen by Graham “Grace” Walker, who’d headed up the designs of Dark Castle’s Ghost Ship and Gothika, the sets for House of Wax would be built in Australia, the interiors at Village Roadshow Studios. The exterior of the small town was built from scratch where there once sat a lush green field. The town itself took approximately 10 weeks to build, with an estimated 2 miles of cable running underneath the streets in order to power up the various lights housed everywhere. For all intents and purposes, it was a fully functional town. Silver, being involved in every aspect, wanted to base the look of the town on Asmara, a city in Africa known for its eclectic architecture.

All the stops were going to be pulled for House of Wax, including an MTV special entitled Movie Life: House of Wax which would be a five-episode behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film, as well as the social lives of its four stars. Having MTV on set allowed for a rare glimpse at the ins-and-outs of the making of a Hollywood film, capturing the highs and lows of the enterprise. Naturally, it helped that Paris Hilton was in the cast, since everything surrounding her was already a reality show, so why not capitalize on that by airing the show weeks before the film’s May 6th premiere?

The show actually gave fairly interesting insight into the production of the film. Early on we see just how meticulous Silver is about the project, as he looks over every actor’s hairstyles and costume, almost like a judge in a contest. Paris being Paris, the character of Paige’s clothes were not to her liking because it clashed with her own signature style; most likely she needed prompting – from Silver or someone else – to remember she wasn’t playing herself in the film. She was certainly reminded of that on her first real day of acting. During the first campout sequence where Paige and Carly have some girl-talk in the middle of the night, Paris couldn’t be urged to get to set thanks to an anxiety attack. While moonlight was burning, Paris sat in her trailer for an extended period of time before being successfully coaxed out by her acting coach and the on-set nurse. It’s to her credit that Paige is ultimately so much different than Paris, so the acting coach really did pay off…

All jokes aside, it does appear as though making House of Wax was a rough ride for all involved. Jared Padalecki, much to his chagrin, only found on while on set that he’d really have to be sprayed with a hot wax-like material during Wade’s creepy mummification sequence. Elisha Cuthbert actually had her lips glued shut for the scene where villainous Bo traps Carly and seals her mouth closed. Because Cuthbert could not keep her lips closed for long durations of time while struggling, she suggested to the prop team that they use an actual glue to do the job. It worked out, and what you see in the movie is – at least for the most part – the real deal. Chad Michael Murray had plenty of bruises by the time shooting was over, especially thanks to a busted knee during one of the climactic sequences of Nick and Carly trying to escape. Not only that, he had all manner of things dropped on him from above, including a light fixture that accidentally hit his head. Thanks to the MTV special, we get to see Murray lose his cool on Collet-Serra bit, but who can really blame him after all that mess?

But all that was nothing compared to House of Wax‘s most notorious on-set disaster. About a month and a half into production, during a climactic battle between Nick and Bo, Chad Michael Murray noticed a curious thing when he hit the ground: his fingers were burning, like, literally bubbling thanks to the intense heat of the supposedly-controlled fire around him. This time, the fires were not under control, and before anyone knew what was happening the wall, and soon the entire set, was covered in flames. Thanks to the actual wax the production was using on nearly every piece of the set, the fire quickly became an inferno that could not be taken care of. What happened was that the wax had melted onto the flame retardant material that was on the walls and floors meant to stop any actual fires from breaking out, rendering it useless. Working with that much wax around so much fire was always going to be a dicey proposition, and now they knew just how dangerous it could be.

Thankfully, cast and crew rushed to safety outside, but serious damage was being done on the inside. Before it was extinguished by local firemen, the fire wrecked three entire sound-stages, plus all the equipment, props, wax figures and everything else it could get its flames on. Millions of dollars in damage, not to mention now the production was now without a good portion of its sets. House of Wax had just become a real-life horror movie for all involved, so the next time you watch this grimy little slasher movie, appreciate people almost died making it!

Naturally, production had to shut down and sets needed to be rebuilt. Two of the sets took a few weeks to be recreated, while another took several months. Many weeks went by before shooting could resume, which it eventually did. Paris’ infamous death scene was one of the last sequences to be shot, and it must be said the, um, “actress” was a trooper for toughing it out in a smelly and cold old sugar factory where the scene was shot. Worth noting: Paris wanted her character to be wearing heels while running away from the killer at night in the woods but that bright idea was nixed by Joel Silver, who thought it was – to quote him – stupid.

The big finale of the film sees the wax museum go down in a slimy heap, and this was achieved by blending footage of a detailed miniature of the building and CGI – some of the only CGI in the film, per the director’s request that things be done as practically as possible. To our knowledge, no footage of the set actually burning down weeks before was used in the final cut.

Once the movie was ready to be released, most of the marketing centered around Paris’ involvement. In an inspired move, the studio made no secret of the fact that she was going to get killed, and in fact played up that fact by having Hilton herself promote a “see Paris die!” campaign. During the spring of ’05 in L.A. it wouldn’t have been unusual to see people walking around with the “see Paris Die” logo emblazoned on their t-shirts. Again, you got to admit she was a trooper about it, and for her efforts she eventually “won” the Worst Supporting Actress Razzie the following year.

House of Wax opened the summer movie season on May 6, 2005; its main competition was Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven which opened that same day. Despite plenty of pre-release hype, the horror pic didn’t set the world on fire, opening with a rather unexceptional $12 million. According to writers Carey and Chad Hayes, Warner Bros. was expecting the movie to open big, and when it didn’t plenty of those involved were understandably dismayed. House of Wax would ultimately finish with a deathly $69 million worldwide, not nearly enough to recoup its $40 million budget. The Hayes brothers allegedly pitched the idea of a prequel to the studio that would center on the murderous brothers’ exploits prior to meeting our protagonists, but the studio wasn’t interested thanks to the film’s poor showing. And perhaps they simply didn’t want to risk another studio burning down…

But House of Wax has remained in the conversation for plenty of horror fans in the almost two decades since its release; there’s an appreciation for its mean-spirited attitude, its slow burn approach, and the excellent production design and make-up effects on display. And seeing Paris get a pole through her head? That’s hot indeed.

A couple of the previous episodes of WTF Happened to This Horror Movie? can be seen below. To see more, head over to our JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!