Draft:Wheels on the Bus (film)

Development

After directing his segment in V/H/S/85 titled "No Wake", a young Guy Caspár pitched his horror film idea based on his close personal life experience based on his 5-minute University of Arizona student short film of the same name, "Wheels on the Bus", which had been uploaded onto YouTube in June 2019. Fear of traveling being a main part of his childhood fear and anxiety, he used this as the subject of the film. He also took influence by watching a segment from a Treehouse of Horror episode of The Simpsons where Bart faced a similar situation with a living creature infiltrating the bus (which in turn was also inspired by an episode of The Twilight Zone). Caspár also cites the following films—Duel (1971), Jaws (1975), Alien (1979), The Shining (1980), Christine (1983), Runaway Train (1985), The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Speed (1994), Seven (1995), Joy Ride (2001), and Death Proof (2007)—as its main influences. The film's climatic scene was also inspired by the famous motorcycle sliding scene from Akira (1988).

Shortly after filming his segment for V/H/S/85, he pitched his short film to various film producers and was initially greenlit by both producers Walter Hamada and Roy Lee, who were still employed at Warner Bros. during January 2022, and was originally set to be distributed under the New Line Cinema banner. However, Hamada was unenthusiastic with the corporate mismanagement of the studio (such as the cancellation of Batgirl and the situation during production of Black Adam), so he resigned position and took such projects the were in development along with, such as Wheels on the Bus, in favor of opening up his company, 18Hz Productions (which he co-founded with Bradley Pilz), as part of a multi-year production deal with Paramount Pictures. Lee still remained active as producer under his Vertigo Entertainment banner throughout production.

Filming and post-production

Pre-production began in the first week of December 2024, as Caspár reported that casting was underway and was holding auditions for a role of a 12-year-old boy. Avon Linston had no experience in acting and wanting to focus more on prepping for high school by studying for law. However, his parents convinced him to star in commercials, TV shows and films, so after a successful Zoom call with Tuscon's talent agency, he was immediately cast in the main role in his big screen debut, as well as his recurring role in the Disney+ original series, Percy Jackson and the Olympians.

In wake of the January 2025 Palisades Fires, he confirmed that this was originally the location he was going to shoot, but was instead delayed due to the tragedy. He also stated that it might be outside of California until further notice, but the studio did confirm that they "still had more time" for the film to be ready. Ultimately, it was announced on February 12 that the California location was instead set for Berkeley, which was already one of the film's settings anyway.

Principal photography began in May 7, 2025 with the rest of the cast revealed. Production designer Ryan Bowser, who had previously worked with him on the "No Wake" segment in V/H/S/85, remodeled the name into something else when renting the Mercedes-Benz Caetano Levante 3 bodied Scania K410EB6, in order to cut cost. Benjamin Kirk Nielsen, who also previously worked with him before, serves as the film's director of photography. Jeff Habberstad and Vic Burns served as the only stunt doubles, as he was against the idea of needing to have stunts in his film, but he went with using them anyway due to the film's nature and setting.

In order to have a complex money shot of a scene, Caspár filmed film minutes of actor Cary Elwes bruising himself to get his memory of a living organism out of the child's mind once finally Avon Linston believed his own stories. The scene was then cut for two minutes instead during post-production from the film's editor Andy Canny. This was requested to be cut by the director in order to appeal both the studio and the Motion Picture Association in fear of receiving an NC-17 rating. Filming was completed on June 27, 2025, only lasting for over seven weeks. The visual effects for the creature were primarily done, using shaders and ray tracing in Autodesk Maya, by VFX artist John Gajdecki, who had frequently done visual effects for James Gunn.

Music

Jeremiah Fraites composed the film's music. Caspár originally wanted no music just to fit the film's tone and tension, as he wished to wait until the end of the film to add a portion of his favorite classical music composition piece, "Gloria" by Antonio Vivaldi, as a tribute to Runaway Train. During post-production however, he quickly changed his mind after watching it without music and thought that test screening would be a disaster if this ever happened. As such, Fraites was hired to score portions of the film.

Marketing

A teaser trailer was released on February 25, 2026 and was screened (along with both red and green band trailers of Scary Movie) in showings of Scream 7. In addition, the film had a surprise preview during Paramount's panel at CinemaCon 2026 in Las Vegas, Nevada, with writer and director Caspár, producers Hamada, Pilz and Lee, and most of the cast also attending. On May 18, the film received an R-rating by the MPA for "terrifying images, bloody violence and strong language".

Critical response

The film's reception has been positive based on its premiere at South by Southwest.

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 95% of 46 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "An absolutely terrifying rollercoaster ride from beginning to end, Wheels on the Bus is a daunting flick that reminds those with anxiety, and will keep going round and round at the edge of your seat for over a whole hour and a half."

Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 80 out of 100, based on 11 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.