[6] Janiak was afraid that shadowing a veteran director would affect her career as a female filmmaker as she did not want to be stigmatized.
"[8] In May 2015, Sony Pictures announced that Janiak would be writing and directing a remake of the 1996 horror film The Craft.
In July 2017, a trilogy of films adapting R. L. Stine's Fear Street series of novels was announced by 20th Century Fox, with Janiak set to direct and rewrite the scripts with Graziadei.
[16] Natalia Winkelman described the trilogy as "Scream meets Stranger Things built on a supernatural premise sturdy enough to sustain interest and suspense over nearly six hours", in a review for The New York Times.
[18] On July 19, 2021, it was announced that Janiak was set to direct two episodes of the upcoming crime drama miniseries The Staircase.
The murder of Maya Hawke as the character of Heather in Fear Street: Part One - 1994 is a nod to Drew Barrymore's death as Casey in the original Scream Film.
[21] Fear Street: Part Two - 1978 pays homage slashers of the 70s, such as Friday the 13th (franchise), changing the setting from a mall to summer camp.
Fear Street: Part Two - 1978 takes on a voyeuristic tone similarly to 70s slashers in its cinematography as the viewer often watches how the events of the film unfold from outside of a window or hidden in the trees through a handheld camera.
[23] The Fear Street Trilogy allowed Janiak to create a horror film that told the stories of outsiders.
[24] The Fear Street Trilogy also discusses things like police brutality and the planting of evidence through the interactions between Martin and Sheriff Goode.
This end reveal is Janiak's commentary about oppression by the powerful to maintain their status, rather than taking accountability for their own shortcomings.
We also see themes of love struggling to overcome these divisions with two of the main characters, Deena and Sam, and again with Ziggy and Nick in Fear Street Part 2.
[25] Janiak married fellow filmmaker Ross Duffer in Palm Springs, California, in December 2015.
The couple met in 2006 at a production company in Los Angeles, where Janiak was an assistant to the producer and Duffer was an intern.