'Glee' Star Leads a Chilling Group Therapy Session in Sneak Peek at New Horror Thriller
Ryan O'Rourke is a Senior News Writer at Collider with a specific interest in all things adult animation, video game adaptations, and the work of Mike Flanagan. He is also an experienced baseball writer with over six years of articles between multiple outlets, most notably FanSided's CubbiesCrib. Whether it's taking in a baseball game, a new season of Futurama or Castlevania: Nocturne, or playing the latest From Software title, he is always finding ways to show his fandom. When it comes to gaming and anything that takes inspiration from it, he is deeply opinionated on what's going on. Outside of entertainment, he's a graduate of Eureka College with a Bachelor's in Communication where he honed his craft as a writer. Between The IV Leader at Illinois Valley Community College and The Pegasus at Eureka, he spent the majority of his college career publishing articles on everything from politics to campus happenings and, of course, entertainment for the student body. Those principles he learned covering the 2020 election, Palestine, and so much more are brought here to Collider, where he has gleefully written on everything from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to Nathan Lane baby-birding sewer boys.
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In 2026, horror belongs to the online creators. While Danny and Michael Philippou have led the charge over the last few years with back-to-back horror hits in Talk to Me and Bring Her Back, this year has seen YouTube giant Mark "Markiplier" Fischbach, The Backrooms creator Kane Parsons, and that's a bad idea channel co-creator Curry Barker launch their theatrical filmmaking careers with massive success. Another director whose origins trace back to the online video-sharing platform is now about to get his chance to shine with a disturbing, yet darkly hilarious film that's earned high marks on the festival circuit. At its center is a Glee star in her chilling first turn as a horror lead.
Independent Film Company and Shudder are bringing Breeder, the sophomore feature of writer-director and JouleThief YouTube channel creator Alex Goyette, to theaters tomorrow. It stars Daniel Doheny as Russell, a broke college student desperate for research funding, who's offered an opportunity with an eccentric, highly-regarded poodle breeder named Patti, played by Dot-Marie Jones. To receive the money he needs, he heads out to her remote ranch for work, but the "project" she needs help with has nothing to do with miniature poodles. She's moving on to breeding humans, and Russell needs to be a good stud, or else he'll be put down. Ahead of its release, Collider can exclusively share a sneak peek that shows the emotional manipulation at play in a group therapy session that teases both sides of the villain.
The footage opens on Patti sitting with her adoptive "daughters" in a room that looks more like a stable. Her attention is focused on Yara (Lillian Doucet-Roche), who was evidently abandoned by her mother. Patti continues to push Yara, asking her over and over again to say exactly what she wanted to ask her mom, only with more force in every utterance. Her aggression ultimately pushes the young woman to break down, screaming "Why did you leave me?" at the top of her lungs before crying and leaning into her caretaker. Suddenly, the poodle breeder's softer side comes out as she comforts Yara, assuring her that it's good and cleansing to cry. The way each of the women act and the room they're all kept in, however, hints that Patti's kindness is the same as that she gives to her poodles and all serves a purpose in her twisted breeding project.
Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes What Is Your Biggest Horror Nightmare? Elm Street · Chucky · Scream · The Conjuring
Four horror franchises. Four completely different ways of scaring you. One waits until you fall asleep. One makes sure nobody believes you. One is already in your group of friends. And one is in the house with your family. Answer eight quick questions about how you actually watch horror, and find out which nightmare was built for you.
😴Elm Street(Freddy Krueger)
🧸Chucky(Child's Play)
📞Scream(Ghostface)
🕯️The Conjuring(The Warren Files)
01
Which horror scene makes you cover your eyes? Four classic images. One of them is worse than the others for you.
02
You are home alone and you hear a noise. First thought? Everybody has one. It arrives before you have decided anything.
03
Which horror movie rule would you break first? Everybody thinks they would survive. Almost nobody actually does.
04
Something genuinely frightening happens. What do you do? Not in a film. In your actual living room, tonight.
05
How do you actually watch a horror film? Be honest about this one. Nobody is checking.
06
Somebody offers you serious money. Which do you still refuse? The amount does not matter. There is one on this list you are not doing.
07
Which feeling stays with you a week after the film? Good horror does not stop when the credits do.
08
Something wakes you at 3am. What is the worst possibility? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your nightmare.
The Lights Just Went Out Your Nightmare Is…
Four franchises, four completely different ways of getting underneath your skin. This is the one built out of your particular fear, why it works so well on you, and what it would leave behind.
Elm Street
Your nightmare does not wait outside the door. It waits for you to close your eyes, which you are going to have to do eventually, because nobody has ever won that particular argument.
- Freddy is horror's cruellest idea: a threat that lives in the one place you cannot guard, cannot lock, and cannot avoid forever.
- You are the one who is fine during the film and wide awake at two in the morning. Your own head is where this does its damage.
- These films understood exhaustion as a horror engine. The kids on Elm Street do not lose because they are weak. They lose because they are tired.
- You can lock every door in the house. You still have to sleep.
Chucky
Your nightmare is not really the doll. It is the face of the person you tell, and the way they decide, very kindly, that you have imagined all of it.
- Chucky works precisely because he is absurd. That is the trap: the more accurately you describe him, the less anybody is going to believe you.
- You are the one shouting at the screen because the characters are not listening. You know that feeling from real life too.
- The franchise is at its best when the adults in the room are the real obstacle, and you have met those adults.
- By the time somebody finally believes you, you will have handled most of it on your own.
Scream
Your nightmare has your number, knows your name, and has almost certainly been inside your house before. The worst part is that you already know them.
- Scream is the only one of these where the killer takes the mask off and turns out to be somebody who was at the party.
- You are the person who calls the twist out loud before it lands. You watch people the same way you watch films.
- The franchise made the rules of horror part of the plot, which means the survivors are the ones paying attention. You would be paying attention.
- Everybody is a suspect, including the person who just offered to walk you home.
The Conjuring
Your nightmare is not really about you. It is about the people asleep down the hall, and the feeling that whatever is here is not interested in leaving.
- The Conjuring films are domestic horror. The house, the family, the perfectly ordinary room that quietly stops feeling ordinary.
- Your instinct is to get everybody into one room. Your fear is protective rather than personal, which is rarer than it sounds.
- This is the one franchise where belief is the weapon. The people who come through it are the ones who are not alone and refuse to be.
- Whatever is here did not come for you. It came for the household, and you are the one standing in the hallway.
'Breeder' Lets Dot-Marie Jones Shine as a Horror Villain
Jones was nominated for three Emmys during her time as Glee's Coach Beiste, earning widespread recognition for a role that let her show off both her singing chops and emotional range. In the eyes of critics, though, Patti is another tour de force from the actress. Breeder currently has a strong 92% score from critics on Rotten Tomatoes since its Tribeca Film Festival premiere, with most citing Jones as the standout for her ability to swing from warm to cold, calculating, and violent. She, Doheny, and Doucet-Roche are also joined in the weird and freaky feature by Maddie Phillips, Tanaya Beatty, and Paige McGarvin.
Breeder arrives in theaters on October 28 and will appear on Shudder after a limited release. Check out our exclusive sneak peek in the player above.
- Release Date
- October 28, 2026
- Runtime
- 97 minutes
- Director
- Alex Goyette
- Writers
- Alex Goyette
- Producers
- Brian Mitchell, Byron Austen Ashley, Chris Wilkinson, Ian Start, K. Asher Levin
Cast
-
Dot-Marie Jones
Patti
-
Maddie Phillips
Ainsley
-
Daniel Doheny
Russell
-
Tanaya Beatty
Haley
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.