The lurid horror tale that began in 2022 with Ti West’s 1980s Texas slasher X, then jumped back in time later that year with farm-girl nightmare Pearl, will come to an end this summer with MaXXXine—a sequel to X that sees Mia Goth’s character breaking into Hollywood. And as the first trailer reveals, to nobody’s surprise: there will be blood.
Like Pearl—who Goth also played, both in the prequel and as an elderly woman in X—Maxine, the daughter of a televangelist, is hell-bent on becoming a star. After getting a taste of being on camera as part of X’s doomed porn shoot, and then fleeing the bloodbath it ultimately devolved into, she pursues that goal with all she’s got.
Shifting the action to Los Angeles’ seedy underbelly, and then its studio back lots (hello, Bates Motel!), means that MaXXXine has the biggest canvas by far compared to West’s earlier entries in the trilogy—and it definitely looks like the film is going to have a blast immersing itself in as much 1980s neon, hairspray, and desperately catchy pop music as possible. Fewer hungry alligators this time around, but the Night Stalker could prove to be a worthy Maxine foil, as long as her sordid Texas past doesn’t catch up to her first.
And the cast supporting the always fierce Goth is outstanding here: Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan, Bobby Cannavale, Halsey, Lily Collins, Giancarlo Esposito, and Kevin Bacon. Here’s the official synopsis: “In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past.”
Written and directed by Ti West, MaXXXine opens July 5.