James Wan says Conjuring spin-off The Crooked Man to be a dark fairy tale

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Despite greatly enjoying THE CONJURING, not for one minute did I suspect that it would spark a quickly expanding cinematic universe. THE CONJURING was quickly followed by its first spin-off, ANNABELLE, a sequel, THE CONJURING 2, and there are three further spin-offs, plus another sequel, on the way as well. Not bad for a franchise which isn't even five years old yet. One of the upcoming spin-off's will be THE CROOKED MAN, based upon the character of the same name who appeared in THE CONJURING 2, and James Wan chatted with Entertainment Weekly to discuss where they're at with the film and what style of story they're hoping to tell.

What we want to do, with The Conjuring universe, is we want each of our little offshoots to have a very different flavor, right? So, for example, Annabelle is the classic sort-of haunted doll subgenre. And with The Crooked Man, I would love to push it more down somewhat of that dark fairytale, and more whimsical, subgenre. I love the idea that, within the Conjuring universe, each of our little movies all have their own flavor, so that way they don’t feel like they’re the same films.

A dark fairy tale sounds like a lot of fun, perhaps something period? We're still a ways off from witnessing just how James Wan plans on realizing this dark fairy tale, as the spin-off is still in the very early stages of the development process, but Wan believes that they "have a really exciting story." As for THE CONJURING 3, James Wan says that they've been working very hard on developing something special.

The Conjuring films are still the mothership and the mothership needs to be strong. [Laughs] The mothership needs to be strong for all these other jet fighters to shoot out of. So, we’re in the midst of working on the script, and still hashing [it] out. We want to make sure that the script is in a really good place. With how much people have loved the first two Conjuring, I don’t want to rush in to the third one if possible.

However, due to his commitments on AQUAMAN, James Wan says that it's unlikely that he'll direct the third CONJURING film. Still, it's obvious that he has a great love for the franchise, even imagining an AVENGERS-style team-up with all the characters. "If I could pull off an Avengers of the Conjuring universe, I would love for that to happen," he laughs. "We’ll see. It could be fun."

ANNABELLE: CREATION, the next film in THE CONJURING franchise, is set to hit theaters on August 11th and will follow a dollmaker (Anthony LaPaglia) and his disfigured wife (Miranda Otto) who open their home to an orphanage years after the tragic death of their daughter. Soon after the girls arrive however, a demonic entity in the form of that familiar doll begins to haunt all those in its presence. Check out a review of ANNABELLE: CREATION from our own JimmyO.