Plot Details for Zach Cregger's ‘Weapons' ...

Zach Cregger turned a lot of heads in the fall of 2022 when “Barbarian” became a critical and commercial success. All this on a skimp $4.5 million budget. Up next for Cregger is “Weapons,” recently dated for January 16, 2026, release, and coming to us with very high expectations.

Last Spring, “Weapons” was all the buzz in Hollywood. Warner Bros and New Line won a bidding war, that involved multiple other studios, and snatched up the rights for an 8-figure sum. With this next one, Cregger could turn into a significant name in the horror genre, in the same vein as Peele, Aster and Eggers. We’ll see, there’s a lot riding on this next film.

We don’t know much about “Weapons,” just that it would be told via multi and inter-related storylines. Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Magnolia” was reportedly a major influence, I can now see why. The script itself is 118 pages and rumors of it turning out to be a 3-hour movie seem to be warranted.

The gist of the plot has to do with children disappearing in a small town, they all wake up in the middle of the night and walk out of their homes, not to be seen again. Everyone is bewildered, and the rest of the film tells the story from the perspective of multiple characters: teacher, detective, family.

Of course, there are also supernatural elements involved in the script — including witchcraft — but the plot is just as much about the inhabitants and their background stories as it is about the missing children. It’s quite the ambitious undertaking and if Cregger nails it on film then it could turn into something special for movie audiences.

The way Cregger shopped the script around last year was highly unusual. A producer tells me that the fact he had already established himself with “Barbarian” and still managed to get a bidding war going for “Weapons” is a promising indicator of just how good the script was. Cregger had already proven himself with “Barbarian” and he presented a script that every studio head who read it thought was phenomenal and wanted to get attached to getting it made.

Josh Brolin, who tends to be very picky with his projects, recently admitted that he was convinced to join “Weapons” after reading the script, “I'm serious when I say I think it's a brilliant design of a script. Brilliant."

The cast for the film includes Brolin, Julia Garner, Brian Tyree Henry, Tom Burke, Austin Abrams, Alden Ehrenreich, Benedict Wong and June Diane Raphael. Last we checked, THR was reporting that production was set to begin in the summer.