‘A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting’ Netflix Movie: What we know so far

Welcome to an ongoing preview of the upcoming Netflix Original movie A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting where we’ll be taking you through everything you need to know about the development of the movie, who’s going to be starring, who’s behind it and the release date which is now set to be in October 2020.

Let’s kick off by taking you over the source material for the movie. The book trilogy is all about monsters that disrupt our protagonist’s new gig as a babysitter. It comes from writer, Joe Ballarini who also serves as the screenwriter for the upcoming movie too.

Here’s how the book is described by the author:

The Last Kids on Earth meets Goosebumps in this hilarious new series about a secret society of babysitters who protect kids from the monsters that really do live under their beds!

Netflix is currently also producing another title by Walden Media with Baby-Sitters Club getting a full 10 episode season order at Netflix. The announcement for that series came in March 2019 and we’re also expecting to hear more on that in 2020 and perhaps even a release date too.

As of the time of updating, A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting is set to hit Netflix on October 14th, 2020.

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First look at A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting

In mid-September 2020 we got some first look photos for the new upcoming movie. You can see them in the gallery below.

 

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Production history for A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting

It’s been a long road to get A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting onto the big screen. Walden Media first picked up the movie rights long ago but Netflix’s involvement began in April 2019.

Alongside the announcement Netflix got the rights to the movie, it was reported that Rachel Talalay will be the director.

Among the movies and series, Rachel Talalay is known for include directing episodes of Doctor Who and Sherlock for the BBC. She also directed Freddy’s Dead from 1991 and Tank Girl from 1995.

The movie began production back in August 2019 with the first day of shooting taking place on August 30th.

My lens is bigger than your lens: #1stDayOfShooting. pic.twitter.com/apdF7C7cbg

— Rachel Talalay (@rtalalay) August 30, 2019

Once the shooting started, Rachel Talalay did tweet out some onset pictures including one of two director chairs but beyond that, we only got news of filming via a few filming reports. As reported by KFTV, the filming for the production took place in Vancouver, Canada which has generous tax credits for productions.

In November 2019, Rachel Talalay shared a Tweet with the caption “Filming completed!”. That now means the series moves into post-production meaning there’s still quite a lot of work to be done before the movie is ready to be released.

Filming completed! pic.twitter.com/7gv5DWcBph

— Rachel Talalay (@rtalalay) November 17, 2019

 

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Who’s starring in A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting?

In early September 2019, Netflix announced via their media center the bulk of the cast lineup for the upcoming movie. When the cast was announced, the writer of the book and movie had the following to say: “Behold, a dream come true. For real.”

#Pose star @IndyaMoore & @TomFelton join Tamara Smart, Alessio Scalzotto, Oona Laurence & Ian Ho in "A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting" — a new family film directed by @rtalalay about a secret society of fierce babysitters who protect children from a world of monsters pic.twitter.com/F9IGlf1Exh

— Queue (@netflixqueue) September 4, 2019

Among the key cast members include Tom Felton who is mostly known for his role in the Harry Potter franchise playing Draco Malfoy.

The other cast announcements include Oona Laurence (Lost Girls), Tamara Smart (Artemis Fowl), Alessio Scalzotto (Rim of the World), Ian Ho (A Simple Favour) and Indya Moore (Pose).

More cast announcements came in later months which include Linden Porco, Momona Tamada, Ashton Arbab and Samantha Schimmer.

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Will there be sequels to A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting?

Once Netflix has adapted the first book it may choose to move onto adapting the next two from Joe Ballarini. As per other sequels, Netflix greenlights depending on how well the first movie is received.

The second book which would be the next adaptation is called Beasts & Geeks and the most recent entry is called Mission to Monster Island.