The Saw Is Spinning Again: Hand-Animated Rotoscope Reimagining of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Now in Production

More than 50 years after Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre carved its name into horror history, Leatherface is getting a wild new makeover. No cheap filters. No automated shortcuts. No AI-generated funny business.

Dark Sky Films and Exurbia Films are producing a fully hand-animated, rotoscoped reimagining of the 1974 horror masterpiece, currently planned for release in 2027.

Rotoscoping is an old-school animation technique where artists trace live-action footage frame by frame. It helped shape classics such as Snow White, Cinderella, The Lord of the Rings, Heavy Metal, and Fire and Ice. Now, that painstaking process is being used to drag the Sawyer family’s nightmare into an entirely new visual world.

Leading the production is Animation Director and Art Director Paul Beck, whose work with filmmaker Richard Linklater helped push modern rotoscoping forward. Beck served as a lead animator on Waking Life, A Scanner Darkly, and Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood.

“The original Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a masterpiece that changed cinema forever,” Beck said. “Our goal is to honor its legacy through the timeless art of hand-drawn rotoscoping.”

That means every movement, expression, shadow, texture, and blood-soaked detail will be handled by actual artists. Fam, somebody better get these animators some coffee because tracing Leatherface frame by frame is not light work.

Beck is joined by Lead Animator Max Peake, special effects animation supervisor Nate Bayless, and Background Artist Jeremy Martinez. Together, the team is building a world that preserves the raw performances and suffocating atmosphere of Hooper’s original while transforming the film into something horror fans have never experienced before.

Audiences will receive their first look during the annual Texas Chain Saw Day on August 18. Participating theaters will screen a behind-the-scenes featurette featuring early hand-animated footage from the project.

The full animated feature is expected to arrive in 2027.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre did not need glossy effects or a massive budget to terrify generations. It felt dirty, dangerous, and way too real. Reimagining that madness through handcrafted animation is a risky swing, but it is also the kind of bold experiment horror needs.

Leatherface is coming back, mi gente. This time, every rev of that chainsaw is being drawn by hand.