Back From the Dead: The Conjuring Spin-Off The Curse of La Llorona Gets a Sequel Despite a 26% Rotten Tomatoes Score and Weak Box Office

Well, this is unexpected. The Conjuring-adjacent-but-not-actually-Conjuring flick The Curse of La Llorona is getting a sequel. Yes, the one critics torched (26% on Rotten Tomatoes) and audiences shrugged at. New Line is moving ahead anyway with a follow-up called Revenge of La Llorona.

So what is this, exactly?

Revenge of La Llorona is set to start filming in the next few days in Buffalo, New York. Raymond Cruz is back as Rafael Olvera, the priest-turned-curandero who helped fight off the weeping specter last time. Based on Mexican folklore, La Llorona is the wailing ghost who targets children, and that core myth is clearly still the draw here.

Who is (and is not) returning

Do not expect the first film's leads to pop up. Linda Cardellini and Patricia Velasquez are not returning.

New faces are taking over the sequel:

• Jay Hernandez (Suicide Squad)
• Monica Raymund (Chicago Fire)
• Edy Ganem (9-1-1)
• Martín Fajardo (Griselda)
• Acston Luca Porto (Dora and the Search for Sol Dorado)
• Avie Porto (Bob Hearts Abishola)

Quick refresher on the first movie

The original was set in the 1970s and followed Anna (Linda Cardellini), a social worker who accused a distressed mother, Patricia (Patricia Velasquez), of killing her kids. After Patricia was jailed, a malevolent force went after Anna and her children, which forced Anna to rethink what she believed about Patricia's case. It was a grim little story with some effective folklore flavor and a lot of confusion about where it fit in the larger horror ecosystem.

About that Conjuring confusion

At release, plenty of horror fans assumed La Llorona was officially part of the Conjuring Universe. That confusion did not come out of nowhere. Tony Amendola's Father Perez shows up, the same priest from 2014's Annabelle. He even mentions "an incident with a doll," and the movie flashes back to him carrying Annabelle as his reason for not jumping back into the fray, which is how Rafael Olvera ends up in the mix. To make it murkier, a presenter at SXSW introduced the film as "the next entry in The Conjuring Universe."

Since then, producer Peter Safran has tried to settle it:

You can't count it as a canon entry. It periodically gets lumped in because of director Michael Chaves and because of James Wan's company Atomic Monster, but it is not officially part of the universe. Chaves did a great job on the movie, which is why we stole him for the Conjuring universe.

And yes, that worked out for Chaves. He went on to direct The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, The Nun II, and The Conjuring: Last Rites. So the connective tissue is real on the creative side, even if the movies are not officially linked in the lore.

Bottom line

Revenge of La Llorona is happening, cameras roll in Buffalo any day now, Raymond Cruz is back, a new ensemble is stepping in, and the Conjuring branding tug-of-war is still a fun little curiosity with this corner of the horror world. Whether the sequel can turn a franchise out of a critical and box-office underperformer is the real test here. Honestly, I am as surprised as you are to see La Llorona getting another swing.