Paramount Pictures just released a new trailer for Ti West’s Ebenezer, starring Johnny Depp as Scrooge. The film marks Depp’s comeback to the big screen after a highly publicized 2022 legal battle, making this adaptation even more intriguing. The trailer evidently suggests West is bringing horror sensibilities to the familiar Christmas tale, but with a darker and psychological twist never seen before. 

Based on the classic novel by Charles Dickens, the story follows the wealthy, cold-hearted, and misanthropic businessman Ebenezer Scrooge. The snowy, bleak streets of early Victorian London set the atmosphere where Scrooge is haunted by three spirits to give him a terrifying vision of his past, present, and future. 

Nathaniel Halpern wrote the screenplay. Emma Watts produced the film with Adam Bohling, Stephen Deuters, Jason Forman, and David Reid serving as the executive producers. Other cast members include Daisy Ridley, Sam Claflin, Ian McKellen, Rupert Grint, Andrea Riseborough, and Tramell Tillman.

West’s Ebenezer is aggressively marketed as “The name you know. The Story you don’t,” and the director has a reason for it. Dickens placed Scrooge at the center of strong/gothic elements, where corpse-like ghosts, spirits, and visions of death haunt him. Scrooge is obviously frightened, but the overall story still can’t be read as a typical horror narrative, and this is where West’s Ebenezer comes in to create a difference. 

Several adaptations of A Christmas Carol have been made, including musicals, animated, and live-action versions like A Christmas Carol (1938), Scrooge (1951), Mickey’s Christmas Carol (1983), The Muppet’s Christmas Carol (1992), and A Christmas Carol (2009). West’s version has Victorian sets, supernatural effects, and striking cinematography that will hopefully make the film feel like a fantasy epic. 

And obviously, with West’s background in horror, including The House of Devil (2009) and The Innkeepers (2011), Ebenezer aims to explore his intimate redemption and life choices with a horror touch. While talking to Entertainment Weekly, West explained, “I’ve always thought no one’s really made the movie version where the ghosts are a little bit spooky.”

This time, however, West wanted to give Scrooge a personality the audience may not have fully understood before. While the classic tale portrays him as a miserly, unpleasant man, West’s humor and occasional logic give Depp’s Scrooge a behavioral rationale for his actions. His performance encourages audiences to look for the “gray areas” in his character and recognize that some of his arguments aren’t necessarily wrong. At times, you might even find yourself thinking, “Wait, he has a point.”

West isn’t changing how Scrooge has been interpreted; instead, he is trying to help us understand the man before we label him “bad” and condemn him for his actions. At first glance, there may seem to be little change to Scrooge or the story penned long ago beyond West’s darker horror treatment. But look at it from the other side, and a more interesting possibility emerges: we get to understand why Scrooge believes he is right. 

West has promised that Ebenezer will remain faithful to Dickens rather than become a radical reinterpretation. After all, the most compelling question isn’t why the monster is bad, but why the monster believes he is right. And that may be exactly what West wants us to discover. 

Ebenezer is slated for a theatrical release on November 13, 2026. 

Analysis Courtesy of Madiha Ali

Feature Image Courtesy of Paramount