The upcoming 2023 Stephen King movie The Boogeyman will continue a recent unexpected trend in the author’s adaptations with its surprising rating. Despite the failure of 2022’s Firestarter remake and the muted critical reception that Netflix’s Mr. Harrigan’s Phone received, Stephen King adaptations are still a major horror trend. 2023 alone will see the release of the long-delayed Children of the Corn remake, the Salem’s Lot remake, and Host director Rob Savage’s adaptation of the short story "The Boogeyman."

However, despite King praising Terrifier 2’s gross-out gore, readers of the iconic horror writer’s work might be surprised to learn that The Boogeyman will continue a surprising King adaptation trend. Like Mr. Harrigan’s Phone, The Boogeyman will be rated PG-13, meaning the movie won’t be able to depict any extreme gore or seriously dark content. However, this development could be good news, since King’s original short story “The Boogeyman” manages to be atmospheric without depicting much in the way of explicit violence. Not only that, but the history of horror movies proves that PG-13 projects in the genre can pack a punch when they are more atmospheric and less explicit.

Stephen King’s The Boogeyman Explained


Like Stephen King’s longer novel IT, “The Boogeyman” focuses on a troubled antihero who has been plagued by the same seemingly supernatural presence since he was a child. The story’s narrator recounts numerous tragic incidents where he lost children - which eventually led to the dissolution of his marriage - to a largely silent therapist. As the short story continues, readers begin to wonder whether the narrator is the Boogeyman he fears and if he might be more responsible for the deaths of his children than he can admit. However, the story (included in King’s debut collection Night Shift) takes things in a different, darker direction at its twisted conclusion.

Why The Boogeyman Is Rated PG-13


The movie adaptation of The Boogeyman needs to flesh out the source story further as, while the King tale could sustain a creepy short, there isn’t enough narrative meat on its bones for a full-blown feature film. Fortunately, according to the MPAA’s description, The Boogeyman will do just that. The censorship body granted The Boogeyman a PG-13 rating for what it describes as “terror, violent content, teen drug use, and some strong language.” This rating might come as a surprise to fans of the horror author’s earlier adaptations, as most King movies earn R-ratings. However, this has not always been the case.

The Boogeyman’s Rating Fits A Trend


While both of Pennywise’s movie outings, IT: Chapter Two and IT, were rated R, Netflix’s adaptation of Mr. Harrigan’s Phone was rated PG-13. Not only that, but the disastrous Firestarter remake released in May 2022 was rated R, which might be part of the reason for the more family-friendly rating given to the 2023 horror movie. That said, the success of movies like Barbarian and Smile all prove that adults-only ratings are not a major commercial deterrent when it comes to the performance of horror movies. As such, it seems likely that The Boogeyman received a lower age rating because this was the best fit for the movie’s tone.

Why PG-13 Horror Movies Went Out Of Vogue (And Came Back)


While R-rated horror movies are making a killing at the box office, this doesn’t mean that there isn’t a place for PG-13 horror movies in the genre. In the early 00s, PG-13 horror got a bad reputation thanks to poorly received and bloodless movies such as Stay Alive, One Missed Call, and Boogeyman (a movie with no relation to the Stephen King book), but these only came into existence because of the success of critically acclaimed hits like The Others, The Ring, and The Grudge. In much the same way, Mr. Harrigan’s Phone and The Boogeyman could be evidence of a new PG-13 horror boom.

Similarly, the early 2010s saw a string of critically successful horror movies such as Insidious and The Woman in Black excel with reviewers and viewers despite their ostensibly family-friendly ratings. In recent years, the pendulum has swung back to gorier horror, with Terrifier 2’s shocking kills playing a big part in the sequel’s historic box-office success. However, the more violent, R-rated horror movies there are on offer, the more likely viewers are to seek out subtler, less explicit fare. This is what makes the Stephen King adaptation of The Boogeyman and its PG-13 rating interesting, as this may signal the latest sea change in what viewers want from the horror genre.