Set in the remote Canadian winter wilderness, the story revolves around a group of former summer camp counselors who are forced to return to the isolated campground to retrieve evidence of a crime they committed in their youth. Before long the group, and the camp’s latest inhabitants, members of a spiritual retreat with their own secrets to hide, find themselves targeted by someone – or something – out for horrific revenge.

Leslie Hope (24,NCIS, Suits) leads a large ensemble cast comprised of returning actors including Paula Brancati (Sadie’s Last Days on Earth, Degrassi: The Next Generation), Jim Watson (The Strain, Between), Christopher Jacot (Rogue, Eureka), Joanne Vannicola (Being Erica), Jefferson Brown (Rookie Blue, Degrassi: The Next Generation), and Dean McDermott (Ecstasy, CSI). New cast members this season include Lovell Adams-Gray (Lost & Found Music Studios, Dead of Summer), Kaitlyn Leeb (Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments, Heartland), Rebecca Liddiard (Houdini & Doyle, MsLabelled), Melinda Shankar (Degrassi: The Next Generation, How to Be Indie), Sebastian Pigott (Rogue, Revenge), Paulino Nunes (Designated Survivor, Brooklyn), Madison Cheeatow (Heartland, Sadie’s Last Days on Earth), Ty Olsson (The 100, Supernatural), and Simu Liu (Kim’s Convenience, Taken).

Scanners and Videodrome director David Cronenberg is to star in a new series of horror anthology Slasher for AMC streaming service Shudder.

The streamer has ordered a new eight-episode installment of the series, which has run for three seasons on platforms including Chiller and Netflix.

Slasher: Flesh & Blood, produced by Canadian production company Shaftesbury, will air exclusively on Shudder in the U.S., Australia and New Zealand in 2021 with second window runs in the UK and Ireland and Canada, where it will first air on Hollywood Suite. Production is underway now in Ontario, Canada.

Slasher: Flesh & Blood follows a wealthy but dysfunctional family gathering for a reunion on a secluded island. Their old wounds and competitive rivalries flare up when the family realizes a masked killer is on the island, intent on cruelly picking them off one by one.

Cronenberg, who has acted in other projects including Jason X, will star alongside Paula Brancati, Jefferson Brown, Patrice Goodman, Sabrina Grdevich, and Christopher Jacot, who have starred in other seasons of the show as well as newcomers including Rachael Crawford (Heartland), Jeananne Goosen (The Walking Dead), Sydney Meyer (Departure), and Alex Ozerov (The Americans).

Slasher was created by Aaron Martin, who exec produces alongside Christina Jennings, Scott Garvie, David Ozer, Thomas P. Vitale, and Ian Carpenter, who also serves as showrunner. Adam MacDonald is director.

“Slasher is clever, bloody, scary and fun, and adding David Cronenberg to the mix will take this new installment of the series to the next level,” said Craig Engler, Shudder’s general manager. “We couldn’t be more excited to work with Aaron Martin and the team over at Shaftesbury to bring Slasher: Flesh and Blood to Shudder members.”

“We are so thrilled that Slasher will be brought back to life on Shudder,” added Shaftesbury Chairman and CEO Christina Jennings. “We know the fans of the show weren’t ready to say goodbye, so we are eager to bring them the goriest, scariest chapter of this anthology yet.”