The Nun Nearly Had A Direct Reference To New Conjuring Movie The Crooked Man

The Nun connects back to the larger Conjuring universe and the previous films in the series in some interesting ways, but it almost had a much more direct connection with an upcoming Conjuring universe movie, according to its director, Corin Hardy. That upcoming movie is The Crooked Man, a spin-off that will focus on yet another avatar of the demon Valak, who first appeared in The Conjuring 2.

Hardy told GameSpot (full interview feature here) he didn't include too many hints for what's coming in The Nun, although he said "there certainly could be" clues that fans have yet to notice. "I did toy with putting the Crooked Man in one of the tombs or trying to have the little wind up box or something," he added. "But it felt a little strange in this one."

The Nun takes place decades earlier than the other Conjuring movies, and in another country--deep in Romania. So it makes sense that it would have been weird for a children's toy from England to randomly appear in the haunted monastery's basement. The Nun also suggests that Valak may choose its shapes based on criteria like blending in, so while the form of a nun makes sense in the current film, a sharp-toothed jack-in-the-box does not.

We still don't know much about the Crooked Man movie, or the upcoming Conjuring 3, for that matter. Conjuring series mastermind James Wan has said previously that The Crooked Man will be "somewhat of that dark fairytale, and more whimsical, subgenre."

"What we want to do, with The Conjuring universe, is we want each of our little offshoots to have a very different flavor...I love the idea that, within the Conjuring universe, each of our little movies all have their own flavor, so that way they don't feel like they're the same films," Wan told Entertainment Weekly last year.

The Nun's particular flavor is Gothic horror, so if that sounds like your cup of tea, get yourself to the theater and check it out. Or if you just want to know how it ends and whether there's an after-credits scene, we have those answers for you right here.