The Exorcist Movies in Order

Why this order?

On paper The Exorcist is a short franchise, six films from 1973 to 2023 plus a TV series, but release order actively lies about how they fit together. The 1973 original, William Friedkin's adaptation of William Peter Blatty's novel, is the one film every later entry agrees actually happened. Everything after it is a branch, and several of the branches flatly contradict each other, so the real work of this guide is naming the lines.

The author's spine is The Exorcist (1973) followed by The Exorcist III (1990), which Blatty wrote and directed himself from his novel Legion. It picks up roughly 15 years after the original with Lieutenant Kinderman and deliberately skips Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), John Boorman's sequel that brought Linda Blair back as Regan. Blatty had no involvement in II and hated it, and every later entry disowns it, so it is widely skipped: canon-adjacent, but never required.

Then comes the strangest fork in franchise history: two versions of the same prequel. Paul Schrader shot a film about young Father Merrin in late 1940s East Africa, Morgan Creek shelved it as not scary enough, and Renny Harlin reshot it almost entirely with Stellan Skarsgård playing Merrin both times. Harlin's Exorcist: The Beginning opened in August 2004, and Schrader's Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist followed nine months later and reviewed better. They occupy a single story slot and even disagree on the year, 1949 in Beginning, 1947 in Dominion. Watch one, not both.

Two modern sequels then branch off the original in incompatible directions. The 2016 Fox TV series, canceled in May 2018 after two seasons and 20 episodes, was marketed as a standalone story until a season 1 reveal quietly made it a direct canon sequel to the 1973 film, and it remains the richest continuation. The Exorcist: Believer (2023) is a Blumhouse legacy sequel that treats only the original as its predecessor, brings back Ellen Burstyn as Chris MacNeil, and cannot coexist with the show's continuity. It flopped, and its planned trilogy died with it.

Next comes The Exorcist: Martyrs, Mike Flanagan's standalone reboot led by Scarlett Johansson, opening March 12, 2027. Fittingly for this franchise, filming began on March 13, 2026, the exact day the film was originally supposed to open. Our recommended path: the 1973 original (theatrical cut first, the 2000 extended cut for the spider-walk), then The Exorcist III (the Legion director's cut for the purist ending), then any branches you like. Story chronology (a prequel, then 1973, then III, then a modern branch) works for rewatchers, but it front-loads the weakest film and still forces the prequel choice. Streaming rotates constantly and the rights are split three ways, so expect the canonical spine to be the hardest part to stream and the disowned branches to be free.