The Freddy the 13th movie, director Dan Trachtenberg’s (Predator: Badlands) upcoming project, has landed an appropriate release date, as the animated horror-comedy will be released on 13 October 2028.
As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, the film’s release date will fall on a Friday, making it an apt Friday the 13th reference to its source material, Yehudi Mercado’s 2025 indie horror comic Freddy the 13th, which was itself inspired by the iconic Friday the 13th American slasher horror franchise starring famous masked killer Jason Voorhees.
Positioned as a more family-friendly horror flick that will deliver both PG-rated scares and laughs in equal measure, the currently untitled Freddy the 13th movie will be co-directed by Mercado, with Trachtenberg also doubling up as producer alongside Ben Rosenblatt, with the pair previously working together on 2025’s Predator: Killer of Killers and 2022’s Prey.
The original Freddy the 13th comic follows Freddy Vanwinkle, the thirteenth son of a thirteenth-born son, who accidentally kills the legendary killer Nighty Night and inherits his powers, and this upcoming adaptation is set to follow the source material closely, with Freddy killing and inheriting the powers of the Boogeyman instead.
Trachtenberg and Mercado previously took to Instagram to celebrate the adaptation’s announcement, with the latter writing, “I’m incredibly excited to have found a team crazy enough to want to make an animated horror-comedy for the whole family. Most of all, I’m grateful I never gave up on my dreams. Thanks, Paramount Animation! Let’s get spooky!”
With Trachtenberg already having past experience with animated horror films like Predator: Killer of Killers, it will be interesting to see how he changes the formula this time around to suit a more PG-centric audience, especially since horror comedy films are hard to come by these days. At least the team has quite a bit of time to figure things out, as Freddy the 13th is set to launch on 13 October 2028.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
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