“The Conjuring 3: The Devil Made Me Do It” will be haunting theaters and HBO Max starting Friday, June 4. After detouring into spinoffs (“Annabelle,” “The Nun,” etc.), the franchise has returned its focus to demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga, respectively) and another of their bizarre cases.
The new film follows the notorious 1981 murder trial of 19-year-old Arne Johnson, who claimed he stabbed his landlord to death while under the influence of a demonic force. The case came amid a nearly 15-year long pop culture fascination with the occult fueled by films like “Rosemary’s Baby” and “The Exorcist,” and coincided with the rise of multiple conspiracy theories collectively known as the 1980s satanic panic.