Jenna Ortega hosted Saturday Night Live last weekend and took part in a sketch that puts a comedic twist on the classic The Exorcist

Jenna Ortega was the guest host on Saturday Night Live this past weekend, and it was only fitting that the show would use the young scream queen – whose credits include Scream 2022, X, Studio 666, You, Insidious: Chapter 2, The Babysitter: Killer Queen, American Carnage, and the Addams Family series Wednesday – in a sketch that puts a comedic twist on a horror classic. For a sketch that spoofs the 1973 film The Exorcist (watch it HERE), Ortega stands in for Linda Blair as a possessed young girl who undergoes an unusual exorcism, courtesy of her neighbor. The sketch clip can be seen at the bottom of this article… but it’s geo-blocked, so you’ll have to be in the US or in a country that allows the use of a VPN to watch it.

The Exorcist aside, I’m not a fan of many exorcism movies. If they played out like this Saturday Night Live sketch, I’d find them to be more enjoyable.

Speaking of The Exorcist, director David Gordon Green recently wrapped production on a sequel to that classic. Green has already directed a trilogy of sequels in the Halloween franchise, and intends for this Exorcist movie to be the first in another trilogy of sequels that he will direct. He crafted the story for The Exorcist 2023 with Peter Sattler (Broken Diamonds), then wrote the screenplay with Danny McBride (who wrote all three of the new Halloweens with him) and their Halloween Kills co-writer Scott Teems. Story details are being kept under wraps.

Universal and Peacock paid an amount somewhere in the range of $400 million to acquire the rights to distribute this Exorcist trilogy. The first of the new sequels stars Leslie Odom Jr. (Hamilton) as a character who tracks down Chris MacNeil after his child becomes possessed, with original Exorcist star Ellen Burstyn reprising the role of Chris MacNeil. Also in the cast are Lidya Jewett (Nightbooks), Jennifer Nettles (The Righteous Gemstones), Ann Dowd (The Handmaid’s Tale), Okwui Okpokwasili (Master), and newcomer Olivia Marcum, playing unspecified roles, and Raphael Sbarge (Carnosaur) as a pastor.

Green’s The Exorcist is scheduled to reach theatres on October 13th. Ortega can currently be seen on the big screen in Scream VI (read our review HERE).

The Last of Us told the story of the first game in one season, but the story of The Last of Us Part II will take multiple seasons

The first season of the HBO TV series adaptation of the video game The Last of Us covered the entirety of the first game, and for the second season the show will be moving on to an adaptation of the sequel game, The Last of Us Part II. But season 2 is not going to cover the entirety of the second game. It’s going to take more than one season to tell this story.

During an interview with GQ, showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann (who was also the creative director on the video games) were asked if the next season would “span the entire course of the second game”. Mazin replied, “No. No way.” Druckmann added, “It’s more than one season.“

But when asked if the story of The Last of Us Part II would cover two or three seasons, Mazin and Druckmann couldn’t give a solid answer. Mazin said, “You have noted correctly that we will not say how many. But more than one is factually correct.” And Druckmann said, “Some of the stuff I’m most excited for [in Part II] are the changes we’ve discussed and seeing the story come to life again in this other version. And I think it’s exciting because it leans into those feelings you had from the game, really heavily, in a new way.“

The story of the The Last of Us video game is set years after a fungal plague wiped out much of humanity, transforming most into vicious zombie-like monsters, the story follows Joel, who’s living in a militarized quarantine zone. He has a close relationship with Tess, who operates in the black market of this community. Together, they’ve become known by the local criminal underworld for their ruthlessness. On a mission to reclaim their stolen guns, they run into the leader of the Fireflies, a resistance group, who tasks them with smuggling a young girl named Ellie out of the zone. This mission soon becomes much more than they were prepared for. 

Pedro Pascal plays Joel, who is “tormented by past trauma and failure. He must trek across a pandemic-ravaged America, all the while protecting a girl who represents the last hope of humanity”. He is joined in the cast by Bella Ramsey as Ellie, “a 14-year-old orphan who has never known anything but a ravaged planet and who struggles to balance her instinct for anger and defiance with her need for connection and belonging… as well as the newfound reality that she may be the key to saving the world”; Anna Torv as Tess, “a smuggler and hardened survivor in a post-pandemic world”; Gabriel Luna as Joel’s brother Tommy, “a former soldier who hasn’t lost his sense of idealism and hope for a better world”; Merle Dandridge as Marlene, “the head of the Fireflies, a resistance movement struggling for freedom against an oppressive military regime”; Nico Parker as Joel’s daughter Sarah; Jeffrey Pierce as Perry, “a rebel in a quarantine zone”; Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett as Bill and Frank, “two post-pandemic survivalists living alone in their own isolated town”; and Storm Reid as Ellie’s best friend Riley.

Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who did the motion-capture performances for Joel and Ellie in the video game, are also in the cast of the show. Baker plays James, “a senior member of a group of settlers who must fight to keep their community alive in the face of increasingly brutal odds.” Baker also hosts a podcast that will serve as a companion to the TV series. Johnson’s character is Anna, “a pregnant woman, alone and on the run, who must give birth under the most terrifying of circumstances.”

Mazin and Druckmann are directors on the series, as are Kantemir Balagov (Beanpole), Jasmila Zbanic (Quo vadis, Aida), Peter Hoar (Doctor Who), Jeremy Webb (The Punisher), and Liza Johnson (What We Do in the Shadows).

The Last of Us is a co-production with Sony Pictures Television, PlayStation Productions, Word Games, The Mighty Mint, and game developer Naughty Dog. Druckmann serves as executive producer alongside Carolyn Strauss, Naughty Dog’s Evan Wells, Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan of PlayStation Productions, and Mazin.

I haven’t watched The Last of Us yet (or played the video games), but I have seen fans in the comments section of our articles here on JoBlo / Arrow in the Head say they felt parts of the first season felt rushed and it could have benefited from either longer episodes or more episodes. So it seems like a good thing that The Last of Us Part II isn’t going to be condensed into one season.

What do you think of the story of The Last of Us Part II playing out over multiple seasons? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

The latest entry in the Mission: Impossible series is gearing up for promotion as it promotes one of Cruise’s daredevil stunts.

A year after Tom Cruise saved cinemas with Top Gun: Maverick, the daredevil action star returns to his most famous franchise with an epic, two-parter starting with this summer’s Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One. In this entry, Cruise is already revealed to be hanging on to the wing of a bi-plane, and most notably, he would be making a motorcycle jump off a cliff into a wing glide. Paramount has recently dropped a new teaser poster for the film which headlines the stunt.

There is yet to be an official synopsis released, and the plot is currently being kept under wraps. However, the trailer features the return of the Kittridge character, who was the former director of the IMF in the original Mission: Impossible back in 1996. The trailer also features Hayley Atwell getting caught up in a situation with Ethan Hunt, as well as a couple of trained assassins, played by Esai Morales and Guardians of the Galaxy‘s Pom Klementieff, throwing down with a number of opposers.

The movie sports a cast including Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Esai Morales, Pom Klementieff, Mariela Garriga, Henry Czerny, Shea Whigham, Greg Tarzan Davis, Frederick Schmidt, Charles Parnell, Rob Delaney, Cary Elwes, Indira Varma, and Mark Gatiss. Christopher McQuarrie returns to write and direct after helming Rogue Nation and the massively praised Fallout entries. Tom Cruise and Christopher McQuarrie also partner up as producers with executive producers David Ellison, Dana Goldberg, Don Granger, and Tommy Gormley.

Recently, Tom had been spotted filming scenes for part two of Dead Reckoning on an aircraft carrier off the coast of Italy. The massive production filmed both parts back-to-back, not unlike the Lord of the Rings and Back to the Future series. The Mission: Impossible series aims to up the ante with each installment. The marketing for the sequels once McQuarrie took over showcased the newest daredevil sequences Cruise would film for each film, starting with him hanging onto a plane at takeoff in Rogue Nation, flying a helicopter himself in a copter chase, and skydiving in Fallout, and now this with the motorcycle jump.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is due to hit theaters on July 14.

Neve Campbell passed on Scream VI, but directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett still want her to return for another sequel

Scream VI (read our review HERE) is the first entry in the slasher franchise not to feature Neve Campbell as heroine Sidney Prescott. Sidney was originally part of the story crafted by Scream 2022 writers James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick, but had to be written out when Campbell passed on the project due to a pay dispute. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett – the directors of both Scream 2022 and Scream VI – recently said they hope to see the franchise continue with a Scream 7 and beyond, whether they’re still involved or not… and judging by the opening weekend box office of Scream VI, it looks like they’ll get their wish. During an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett said that if they are involved with further Scream sequels, they’re still hoping to get Campbell to return for another one.

The filmmakers were asked, “On the subject of Neve Campbell and a potential return someday, has no one given up on her?” Bettinelli-Olpin replied, “We’d never give up on her. We love Neve, and we love Sidney. So we’d love to be able to make another movie with her, and we’re not giving up.“

Personally, I would be fine with Sidney Prescott being left alone in her happy ending and not having to deal with any more Ghostface killers in her life. She has overcome plenty of trouble already. But if the filmmakers really want to bring her back, the number crunchers better be ready to show Neve Campbell the money.

The Campbell-less Scream VI shows us what happens when the four survivors of the Ghostface killings leave Woodsboro behind and start a fresh chapter.

Those four survivors are the returning Scream 2022 characters played by Melissa Barrera (as Samantha Carpenter), Jenna Ortega (as Samantha’s sister Tara Carpenter), Mason Gooding (as Mindy’s brother Chad Meeks-Martin), and Jasmin Savoy Brown (as Mindy Meeks-Martin). They’re seeking to start a fresh chapter in New York City… but while the story is set in New York, the movie was filmed in Montreal.

Also in the cast are franchise regular Courteney Cox (as Gale Weathers), Scream 4 star Hayden Panettiere (as Kirby Reed), and new additions Dermot Mulroney as Detective Bailey, Samara Weaving as Laura, Tony Revolori as Jason, Liana Liberato as Quinn, Josh Segarra as Danny, Jack Champion as Ethan, Devyn Nekoda as Anika, and Henry Czerny as Dr. Stone.

Vanderbilt produced Scream 6 with Paul Neinstein and William Sherak for Project X Entertainment. Original Scream screenwriter Kevin Willamson serves as executive producer alongside Chad Villella, Ron Lynch, Cathy Konrad, Marianne Maddalena, and Spyglass’s Gary Barber and Peter Oillataguerre.

Would you like to see Neve Campbell / Sidney Prescott return for another Scream sequel? Let us know by leaving a comment below.