2026 might go down as one of the most successful years for horror movies in some time. While nothing has quite stacked up to the box office might of The Odyssey or Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the genre dominated the conversation heading into the summer with one hit after another. Despite being by far the lowest-rated entry in franchise history, Scream 7 continued the franchise’s run of success by scaring up a $214 million global haul. Yet this was the year lower-budget YouTube creators put Hollywood on notice with original ideas that surpassed expectations and earned rave reviews. It began with Mark “Markiplier” Fischbach‘s adaptation of Iron Lung earning a surprising $51 million during a very limited self-distributed release in January before May rolled around and brought with it A24’s highest-grossing film ever at $394.1 million, Backrooms, directed by Kane Parsons based on his own viral horror series.
For all their accomplishments and the other acclaimed macabre titles released so far, like 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple and Hokum, horror’s best year in a while also has an obvious standout — Obsession. Much has been made of YouTuber and Milk & Serial director Curry Barker‘s breakout hit, from its $512.6 million global box office haul, which makes it one of the most profitable movies ever made against its reported $750,000 budget, to its breakout performances from Michael Johnston and especially Inde Navarrette. The film has become nothing short of a cultural phenomenon, both proving how desirable an original IP from a creator outside Hollywood can be and inserting itself into awards conversations. Now that it’s officially available from home, it’s only continuing to dominate on streaming and VOD.
This week, Obsession pulled off a digital trifecta by reaching #1 on Prime Video, Apple TV, and Google VOD charts. Making the feat more impressive is the fact that it’s also available to stream on Peacock, yet it’s handily outperforming the titles directly behind it on each list, like Steven Spielberg‘s Disclosure Day and Antoine Fuqua‘s billion-dollar biopic, Michael. With spooky season just around the corner, there may only be more momentum coming for Barker’s smash hit as viewers look to catch up on the scariest films of the year. It certainly managed to frighten critics and audiences as it followed Bear (Johnston) experiencing the increasingly dark and horrific consequences of wishing his crush, Nikki (Navarrette) would love him more than anyone in the world.
Collider Exclusive · Horror Survival Quiz Which Horror Villain Do You Have the Best Chance of Surviving? Jason Voorhees · Michael Myers · Freddy Krueger · Pennywise · Chucky
Five killers. Five completely different ways to die — if you’re not smart enough, fast enough, or self-aware enough to avoid it. Only one of them is the villain your particular set of instincts gives you a fighting chance against. Eight questions will figure out which one.
🏕️Jason
🔪Michael
💤Freddy
🎈Pennywise
🪆Chucky
01
Something feels wrong. You can’t explain it — you just know. What do you do? First instincts are the difference between the survivor and the first act casualty.
02
Where are you most likely to find yourself when things go wrong? Setting is everything in horror. Where you are determines which rules apply.
03
What is your most reliable survival asset? Every survivor has a quality the villain didn’t account for. What’s yours?
04
What kind of fear is hardest for you to fight through? Knowing your weakness is the first step to not dying because of it.
05
You’re with a group when things start going wrong. What’s your role? Horror movies are brutally clear about who survives group situations and who doesn’t.
06
What’s the horror movie mistake you’re most likely to make? Honest self-assessment is a survival skill. Denial is not.
07
What’s your best weapon against something that can’t be stopped by conventional means? Every horror villain has a weakness. The survivors are always the ones who find it.
08
It’s the final scene. You’re the last one standing. How did you make it? The final survivor always has a reason. What’s yours?
Your Survival Odds Have Been Calculated Your Best Chance Is Against…
Your instincts, your strengths, and your particular way of thinking under pressure point to one villain you actually have a fighting chance against. Everyone else — good luck.
Camp Crystal Lake · Friday the 13th
Jason Voorhees
Jason is relentless, but he is also predictable — and that is the gap you would exploit.
He moves in straight lines toward his target. He doesn’t strategise, doesn’t adapt, doesn’t outsmart. He simply pursues.
Your ability to keep moving, use the environment, and resist the panic that freezes most victims gives you a genuine edge.
The Crystal Lake survivors were always the ones who stopped running in circles and started thinking about terrain, water, and distance.
You think like that. Which means Jason, for all his indestructibility, would face someone who simply refused to be where he expected.
Haddonfield, Illinois · Halloween
Michael Myers
Michael watches before he moves. He is patient, methodical, and almost impossible to detect — until it’s too late for anyone who isn’t paying close enough attention.
But you are paying attention. You notice the shape in the window, the car parked slightly wrong, the silence where there should be sound.
Michael’s power lies in the invisibility of ordinary suburbia — the fact that nothing ever looks wrong until it already is.
Your spatial awareness and instinct to map every room, every exit, and every shadow before you need them is precisely the quality Laurie Strode had.
You are not a victim waiting to happen. You are someone who already suspects something is wrong — and acts on it.
Elm Street · A Nightmare on Elm Street
Freddy Krueger
Freddy wins by getting inside your head — using your own fears, your own memories, your own subconscious as weapons against you. That strategy requires a target who can be destabilised.
You are harder to destabilise than most. You’ve faced uncomfortable truths about yourself and you haven’t looked away.
The survivors on Elm Street were always the ones who understood what was happening and chose to face it rather than flee from it.
Freddy’s greatest weakness is that his power evaporates in the presence of someone who refuses to give him the fear he feeds on.
Your psychological resilience — the ability to stay grounded when reality itself becomes unreliable — is exactly the quality that keeps you alive here.
Derry, Maine · It
Pennywise
Pennywise is ancient, shapeshifting, and feeds on terror — but it has one critical vulnerability: it cannot function against someone who genuinely stops being afraid of it.
The Losers Club didn’t survive because they were braver than everyone else. They survived because they faced their fears together, and faced them honestly.
You ask the questions others avoid. You look directly at what frightens you rather than turning away.
That directness — the refusal to let fear fester in the dark — is Pennywise’s worst nightmare.
It chose the wrong target when it chose you. You are exactly the kind of person whose fear tastes like nothing at all.
Chicago · Child’s Play
Chucky
Chucky’s greatest advantage is that nobody takes him seriously until it’s already too late. He exploits the gap between how something looks and what it actually is.
You don’t have that gap. You take threats seriously regardless of how they present — and you never make the mistake of underestimating something because of its size or appearance.
Chucky relies on surprise, on the delay between recognition and response. You close that delay faster than almost anyone.
Your instinct to treat every unfamiliar thing with appropriate scepticism — rather than dismissing it because it seems absurd — is the exact quality that keeps you breathing.
Against Chucky, not laughing is already winning. You are very good at not laughing.
What’s Next for the Main Stars Behind ‘Obsession’?
All of Obsession‘s key players have wasted no time lining up their next big roles. Before the film even appeared in front of general audiences, Barker was already tapped to write and direct the next Texas Chainsaw Massacre installment under A24, but that’s just the beginning. His next film with regular partner Cooper Tomlinson, Anything But Ghosts, is already shot and dated for 2027, and Universal and Blumhouse also paid through the nose to secure his next horror pitch.
Navarrette, meanwhile, has a date with the MCU, as she was revealed at D23 to be playing the mutant Rogue in Jake Schreier‘s X-Men movie. Her star will also continue to rise in the bonkers sci-fi package, The Waffle House Index, under Apple Original Films, casting her as a Waffle House graveyard shift employee enduring the most disastrous night imaginable. Last but not least, Johnston hasn’t formally been attached to any projects or confirmed anything yet, but reports have indicated he’s in talks to join Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz in the new The Mummy movie from Radio Silence.
Obsession is available to stream on Peacock and purchase through digital retailers. Stay tuned here at Collider for more on all the hottest films on streaming throughout the year.
