The Exorcist is proof that no franchise, no matter how moribund, will always get another chance at box office glory.  After proving time and again that they could not make a successful sequel, Warner Brothers let The Exorcist property languish on the shelf.  In the years since the equally  uninspiring prequels were released in 2005-06, an interesting thing happened.  Rival studios used the original movie as a template for their own demonic possession movies.  While those movies were not on par with the movie that inspired them, they were usually profitable.  (2010’s The Last Exorcism was inconceivably profitable.)  This steady stream of success is probably what led Universal to purchase the rights to The Exorcist, with the justification that if knock-offs could make money, a small-budget Exorcist movie rooted in the lore of the original certainly could make a healthy profit.