Before Insidious: The Red Door arrives and complicates things further, it is worth looking back on the Insidious franchise timeline so far. The Insidious movies have an unclear timeline. This is mainly because the original Insidious ends with the death of Lin Shaye’s Elise, but this character became the series' main character afterward. As such, later Insidious sequels jumped back and forth in time to fill in the details of Elise’s life before the original Insidious.
What Happened In Insidious: The Last Key The opening scene of Insidious: The Last Key is the first event of the franchise in chronological terms. As a child in the 1950s, Elise displays an ability to commune with the dead. She uses this ability to open a red door, at which point a demon kills her mother. Her abusive father does not take this well. He begins kidnapping and imprisoning young women in his home and tells Elise that she imagines ghosts when encountering one of his victims.
What Happened In Insidious: Chapter 3 Insidious: Chapter 3 takes place during Elise’s short-lived retirement. Elise is approached by Quinn, a teenager hoping to contact her mother’s spirit. Elise tells Quinn she shouldn’t try this since the spirit speaking to her isn’t her mother but rather a demon. This demon, a withered elderly man, haunts Quinn. Quinn’s family hires Specs and Tucker, two opportunistic fake mediums.
After Insidious’s infamous demon corner scene, Josh visits the Further via astral projection. He successfully retrieves Dalton from the red-faced demon’s lair. However, before he can leave the Further, he is accosted by the Bride in Black. The Bride in Black seemingly lets Josh go, but the closing scene of Insidious sees Josh strangle Elise. Possessed by the Bride in Black, Josh unknowingly kills the Insidious franchise’s heroine.