Whereas other would-be horror franchises have promised big things only to fall early on (looking at you, Dark Universe), The Conjuring Universe has gone from strength to strength since it first terrified us on the big screen 10 years ago, with the release of the initial entry in the series in 2013. Since then, we’ve had two more direct Conjuring sequels, an entire Annabelle trilogy, The Curse of La Llorona, as well as 2018’s The Nun, which has now gotten a long-awaited follow-up in the form of The Nun II.
Given that The Conjuring Universe is nominally based on real events, as paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren really did bust some ghosts in the 1970s, every movie in the franchise is a period piece, set sometime during the second half of the 20th century. With so many sequels, prequels, and spinoffs existing in this universe at this point, then, a complete chronological timeline is becoming more and more difficult to conjure up.
So, as you go and check out The Nun II in cinemas, here’s what you need to understand about how it figures into the scariest cinematic universe out there.
Here’s how The Nun II fits into The Conjuring Universe timeline
As horror experts will know, The Nun is the first entry in The Conjuring Universe, chronologically speaking, as the demon Valak’s attack on a Romanian monastery takes place in 1952, nearly 20 years before the events of the original film, The Conjuring, occur. So, you might think that The Nun II would simply slot in right after that to be placed in second position. Well, think again, as it isn’t that simple.
The Nun II picks up four years after the events of the first one, with Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) having relocated to France in an attempt to escape her dark, demon-filled past, only to encounter Valak once more. This significant time-jump — which roughly reflects the real-life gap between the two releases — means that Annabelle prequel Creation actually comes in just before it in the timeline. The original Annabelle then fits in after The Nun II.
From there, things become a little bit easier to track, as the third Annabelle film, Curse, and the three Conjurings then take place over the course of a decade from 1971 to 1981. Presumably, if and when the series continues, we can expect things to move deeper into the ’80s. Will the big hairstyles and day-glo fashion sense prove to be scarier than the demons? Only time will tell.
Here’s a full ranking of The Conjuring Universe movies in chronological order, listing their release date first followed by the year they are set in:
- The Nun (2018) [1952]
- Annabelle: Creation (2017) [1955]
- Annabelle (2014) [1967]
- The Conjuring (2013) [1971]
- Annabelle Comes Home (2019) [1972]
- The Curse of La Llorona (2019) [1973]
- The Conjuring (2016) [1977]
- The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021) [1981]
The Nun II possesses cinema screens from Sep. 8.