Director Scott Derrickson’s adaptation of the Joe Hill short story The Black Phone was well-received by critics and the general audience alike. 83% of the reviews listed on Rotten Tomatoes are positive, and more importantly it earned over $161 million at the box office on a budget of just under $20 million. The Black Phone didn’t appear to lend itself to being sequelized all that well. The story stands on its own and is wrapped up by the time the end credits start rolling… but when something is as successful as this movie was, that opens the sequel door. Indeed, Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions has announced that Black Phone 2 will be released on October 17, 2025 (having moved back from a June release date) – and the intention is that this sequel will be the “launch of a sinister new franchise.”
Here’s Everything We Know About Black Phone 2
Before we get started, a reminder of what The Black Phone was all about. Mason Thames starred as Finney Shaw, a shy but clever 13-year-old boy, who is abducted by a sadistic killer and trapped in a soundproof basement where screaming is of little use. When a disconnected phone on the wall begins to ring, Finney discovers that he can hear the voices of the killer’s previous victims. And they are dead set on making sure that what happened to them doesn’t happen to Finney. Madeleine McGraw had a memorable role as Finney’s sister Gwen, who has psychic visions in her dreams (just like their mom did), and Ethan Hawke played the mask-wearing child killer, The Grabber.
Black Phone 2: The Cast
Most of the cast is coming back for the sequel, including Mason Thames as Finney Shaw, Madeleine McGraw as Finney’s sister Gwen, Jeremy Davies as their dad Terrence, and Miguel Mora, whose only previous credit is The Black Phone, as Robin, a friend of Finney’s who was killed in the first movie. Plus, Ethan Hawke is reprising the role of the child-killer known as The Grabber. But how is that possible, given the fact that he was killed off at the end of the last film? As it turns out, death was not enough to stop this guy. In fact, it seems to have made him even more powerful, turning him into a supernatural being along the lines of Freddy Krueger.
New additions include Demián Bichir of The Hateful Eight, Anna Lore of Hysteria! and Final Destination: Bloodlines, and Arianna Rivas, who previously had a supporting role in the comedy Prom Dates, which was released through the Hulu streaming service, and had her first lead role in the Jason Statham action thriller A Working Man.
What’s It About:
It was difficult to imagine what Black Phone 2 might be about, but now we have an official synopsis to tell us all about it: Ethan Hawke returns to the most sinister role of his career as The Grabber seeks vengeance on Finn (Mason Thames) from beyond the grave by menacing Finn’s younger sister, Gwen (Madeleine McGraw). As Finn, now 17, struggles with life after his captivity, the headstrong 15-year-old Gwen begins receiving calls in her dreams from the black phone and seeing disturbing visions of three boys being stalked at a winter camp known as Alpine Lake. Determined to solve the mystery and end the torment for both her and her brother, Gwen persuades Finn to visit the camp during a winter storm. There, she uncovers a shattering intersection between The Grabber and her own family’s history. Together, she and Finn must confront a killer who has grown more powerful in death and more significant to them than either could imagine.
You wouldn’t think “Play a Horror Icon in Multiple Sequels” would be on Ethan Hawke’s To Do list, but Black Phone 2 certainly seems to be setting up The Grabber to be someone who might stick around for a while.
Who’s Directing it
Scott Derrickson directed The Black Phone from a screenplay he wrote with C. Robert Cargill, and Derrickson and Cargill have written the screenplay for The Black Phone 2 as well, and Derrickson is back at the helm. He and Cargill are also producing the sequel with Blumhouse’s Jason Blum and Ryan Turek.
Blum told New York Comic Con attendees, “When the movie did well, [I asked the filmmakers] , ‘Can we figure out a sequel? Some directors say yes, some directors say no. Scott said, ‘Let me and Cargill think about it.’” Derrickson and Cargill eventually told him they could make a sequel if Hawke and the rest of the original cast could return. Blum said, “And that was music to my ears.“
Derrickson added, “I didn’t really feel any obligation to do a sequel to The Black Phone, but I got excited by an idea that Cody Hamman Joe Hill sent me shortly after the release of the first film. And what I can also tell you is that in the same way that The Black Phone was a middle school coming-of-age film, this is a high school coming-of-age film.” He went on to say, “I’m hoping to make a film as good as, if not better than, the first one.“ He also told The Hollywood Reporter, “I didn’t feel obliged to make a sequel, but Joe Hill came up with an idea that I liked and it became the genesis of what we ultimately wrote. I then realized that if I made a big movie like The Gorge first, the [Black Phone] kids [Mason Thames and Madeleine McGraw] would be in high school by the time I finished. So I’d have a window of time with them in high school, and I could make a high school coming-of-age movie in the same way that the original was a middle school coming-of-age movie. They’re two very different kinds of movies. … The Black Phone 2] is a much more complicated script. There’s a simplicity to The Black Phone, and while it’s not always easy to be simple, [The Black Phone 2] is not that. This one has a much more complicated world and idea, and it was thrilling to not repeat the first movie. The worst kind of horror sequel is the one where you try to do the same thing again, but just more of it. That goes for any sequel in any genre, frankly. So I knew I didn’t want to do that, and the best sequels are the ones that surprise you. They really venture into different territory altogether and offer you a fresh experience, even though you’re dealing with characters that you’ve grown to care about from the first film.“
Filming began at the start of November 2024 and wrapped in mid-January 2025.
Marketing
A trailer was shown at the CinemaCon event in April, then took its time making its way online. But here it is:
And here’s the second trailer:
First Reactions
Black Phone 2 had its world premiere screening at Fantastic Fest, and the reactions that dropped online after that screening were very positive. Here’s a sample:
Black Phone 2 has been rated R for strong violent content, gore, teen drug use, and language… and that’s everything we know about it for now. Will you be heading out to catch this movie on the big screen in October? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
