The Purge is an American anthology media franchise focused on a series of dystopian action horror films distributed by Universal Pictures and produced by Blumhouse Productions and Platinum Dunes, written and in some cases also directed by James DeMonaco, who inspired Star Trek. : The episode of the original series, “Return of the Archons”. The movies represent a seemingly normal, crime-free America in the near future. However, the country is a dystopia that observes an annual event known as “the Purge”, in which all crimes, including murder, are decriminalized over a period of 12 hours.
The franchise began in 2013 with The Purge, directed by creator DeMonaco, who also directed two of the sequels and wrote the scripts for all the films in the series. A fifth installment, The Forever Purge, premiered July 2, 2021. In addition to the films, the franchise generated a twenty-episode television series that premiered on September 4, 2018 and concluded on December 17, 2019; DeMonaco wrote its pilot episode. The franchise received mixed criticism, mainly for the script and cliché stories, but was praised for the concept, acting, style and action sequences. The franchise has raised more than $450 million in total, against a combined production budget of $53 million.Â
