Stepping into the shoes of James Wan was never going to be an easy task, but director Michael Chaves took the reins for the third main installment in the massively popular Conjuring universe. Instead of trapping the Warrens inside another creaky haunted house, this 2021 entry blows open the formula. It grounds its supernatural horror in the real-life 1981 murder trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson. The film serves as a dramatic legal thriller mixed with dark occult detective work. By trading ghost hauntings for a human antagonist dabbling in satanic witchcraft, it explores new corners of the franchise lore. While it loses some of the pure dread that defined the first two movies, its ambition to try something different keeps the series alive.