The Strangers (film series)

The Strangers film series consists of American psychological horror films. Based on an original story by Bryan Bertino, the plot centers around three masked psycho-sociopathic home invaders that prey on the innocent owners. Though the first film was marketed as "based on a true story", this was a slight misdirect as the filmmaker stated that he wrote the concept from a series of break-in burglaries that took place in his neighborhood when he was growing up, as well as borrowing elements from the Manson Family Tate murders. Continuing this marketing technique, a "based on a true story" tag was also included at the beginning of the sequels.

The first film was initially met with mixed critical reception upon its release, The film made a world wide theatrical gross of $20,997,985 against a $9,000,000 production budget. Following the announcement of a new film, some critics had since described the original as a cult classic. Conversely, its sequel was met with mixed reception with criticism directed towards its inferiority to the original, The film earned 6.4 times its production budget worldwide. Some critics have positively reviewed the movie and stated that it too deserves a cult following, elaborating that, where the first film was a tribute to 1970s horror films, the second film was meant to replicate the scares of the 1980s.

The series continued with the release of a standalone trilogy of films set within the same continuity starting with The Strangers: Chapter 1, which was released on May 17, 2024. Two more sequels, Chapter 2 and Chapter 3, will follow.