Halloween Kills producer Jason Blum has vowed no circumstance could cause the film to be delayed again after its release was pushed back to 2021 earlier this year.
Halloween Kills is the second film in a sequel trilogy to the original Halloween horror film released in 1978 and the 12th movie overall in the series. It is without question one of the most influential horror film franchises in Hollywood history.
For more than 40 years, Michael Myers has been an unstoppable and terrorizing force for evil in the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois. The popularity of the film franchise has led to numerous spin-off products from companies looking to leverage the success of Halloween, from books to comics and a string of merchandise, but nowhere is it more evident than in the gaming industry.
Myers has featured as a fearsome killer in countless gaming titles since the auspicious, perhaps not completely legit, Halloween game released for the Atari 2600 five years after the original film. The highlights include marquee AAA titles like Call of Duty: Ghosts and Dead by Daylight but there are plenty of other examples. There is even a Halloween slot game at some online casinos like NetBet and Mr Green that allow players to try games using bonus offers.
Due to circumstances out of the production team’s control, which resulted in the majority of cinema’s shutting their doors around the world, the decision was taken to delay the release of the film until next year. Despite the decision no doubt being the correct one, Blum has categorically stated it will be released in October 2021 come hell or high water.
The planned timeline of the film will see it pick up straight up where the critically acclaimed Halloween (2018) left off, with Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), Allyson Nelson (Andi Matichak), and Karen Nelson (Judy Greer) running away from Strode’s burning home. According to one of the movie’s writers, Danny McBride, the film will take place on the same night as the first entry to the new trilogy.
Another writer, Scott Teems, revealed bold plans for Halloween Kills, saying it was a bigger, badder, and meaner version of the 2018 film. This claim was somewhat backed up by Blum in a separate interview when he described one scene from the movie as the most violent thing he had filmed in many years. Indeed, even Curtis has made public jokes about how much fake blood was required to complete filming of the sequel.
The modern sequels to the Halloween franchise have also taken on the narrative task of delving deeper into the characters, the relationships between them, how the events of the films have affected them mentally, and attempt to unpack what is happening in Haddonfield. It is certainly a bold direction for a scary movie franchise to take but it was one of the elements Curtis was most excited about when returning to shoot the sequels.
“It’s very much part of today’s fabric. There’s a lot of rage internal in the town and that is sort of what drives the story, the communal rage which feels timely,” Curtis said, according to ET.
They are delving so deeply into the history of the situation apparently characters that have not been seen since the original 1978 film are likely to appear. According to McBride, circumstances in the sequel will bring many of the characters together, including some of the originals, in an attempt to take down Michael once and for all.
However, since we know going in this is just the second film of a sequel trilogy, we can pretty much assume they will fail, but it certainly whets the appetite thinking about how they might try, and fail, to take Michael down.
It is just a pity we have to wait until 2021 to find out, but, in the meantime there are plenty of other options to keep the hairs on the back of our necks standing on end this Halloween.
