The Hell House LLC franchise has always been a chilling exercise in atmosphere, lore, and lingering dread. With Hell House LLC: Lineage, the fifth and allegedly final installment, writer-director Stephen Cognetti takes the saga to theaters for the first time. The film arrives August 20, 2025, bringing back familiar faces, introducing new blood, and expanding the Abaddon legacy in startling ways.
At the heart of Lineage are three standout performances: Elizabeth Vermilyea returning as Vanessa Shepherd, Searra Sawka as the determined investigator Alicia Cavalini, and newcomer Mike Sutton as Father David. Together, they guide fans through a story that connects the Abaddon Hotel, the Carmichael Manor, and decades of unexplained terror.
Elizabeth Vermilyea: Returning to Vanessa Shepherd
Elizabeth Vermilyea first appeared in Hell House LLC III: Lake of Fire as Vanessa Shepherd, the host of Morning Mysteries. Unlike most who entered the Abaddon Hotel, she survived. Years later, Vanessa returns in Lineage, scarred by trauma, plagued by nightmares, and pulled once more into Abaddon’s orbit.
For Vermilyea, revisiting Vanessa after so much time was a rare gift:
“I’ve never gotten to revisit a character after time away,” she explained. “It was really interesting and cool to go back over who she was as a person then versus now and the journey she would have to go on to get to the place she’s in now, which is kind of a dark place”.
This time, Vanessa isn’t just a survivor; she’s a key to the mystery itself. Revelations about her past, including a shocking family connection, tie her directly to the decades of carnage in Abaddon. Through Vermilyea’s performance, audiences witness the raw humanity of a woman who carries both the weight of the franchise’s history and the empathy to ground its most harrowing moments.
Searra Sawka: Digging Too Deep as Alicia Cavalini
Searra Sawka returns to the franchise after her role in Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor. In Lineage, she’s back as Alicia Cavalini, a journalist determined to untangle the endless threads of Abaddon’s horrors.
Sawka described Alicia as relentless:
“My character doesn’t like no for an answer and kind of just wants to get this case solved. I dive pretty deep in this one and I get into a big mess”.
Much of that “mess” involves carrying the heavy load of exposition. In one pivotal scene, Alicia unravels generations of lore in a single breathless sequence. Sawka admitted the difficulty:
“It was just word vomit after word vomit. I literally blacked out during that scene. I wanted to know the story inside and out so that I had a path I was following, and the lines were just a guide”.
Her performance, however, never buckles under the weight. Alicia becomes the audience’s guide, moving from observer to participant as her investigation draws her into Father David’s exorcism and the clowns’ chilling domain. Sawka even delivered her first-ever horror scream during filming, a scream that critics are already praising as one of the best in the genre.
Mike Sutton: A Commanding Presence as Father David
While Vermilyea and Sawka return to familiar territory, Lineage introduces Mike Sutton as Father David, a priest with ties to Abaddon’s past. Sutton, a veteran of the horror genre, immediately made his mark with a performance rooted in reverence for classic possession cinema.
“One of my favorite movies of all time is The Exorcist,” Sutton said. “There is a lot of parallels between what happens in this film and what Father Damian experienced. I rewatched it three or four times and tried to pick up some of the nuances that I thought were powerful”.
Father David’s presence anchors some of the film’s most unnerving sequences, including a casket-bound apparition and a confrontation with the franchise’s infamous clowns. For Sutton, the practical effects on set were enough to blur fiction and reality:
“It was creepy on that day. There was smoke in the air, it was quiet, it felt heavy and it didn’t take much to get to where we needed to be for those scenes”.
His dynamic with Sawka’s Alicia also provided one of the film’s standout moments, a moral debate about good, evil, and the gray space between. Their chemistry, sharpened by shared training and rehearsals, adds surprising depth to the film’s chaos.
Closing the Doors of Abaddon—For Now
Though Lineage is being promoted as the franchise’s finale, even the cast isn’t entirely convinced it’s the end. “Steven swears it is,” Sawka admitted, “but honestly, I feel like he might want to bring it back. There’s just so much he could still do with it”.
Whatever the future holds, this chapter cements Vermilyea, Sawka, and Sutton as essential figures in Hell House LLC’s haunting legacy. Together, they embody what fans love most about the franchise: fear rooted in humanity, lore steeped in mystery, and the kind of scares that leave you checking the shadows long after the credits roll.
I’ll admit my bias here, I’m a huge fan of this series. Getting the chance to chat with Elizabeth, Searra, and Mike about their work on Lineage has been a thrill. They may not be Texas locals, but the next time they’re in town, I definitely owe each of them some BBQ or Tex-Mex. Until then, I’ll be waiting eagerly for more spooky conversations and my seat at the theater when the Abaddon doors creak open one last time.
Jessie Hobson