Is Another Halloween Sequel Happening, Or Did Halloween Ends Really Wrap It Up?
Despite what Anthony Michael Hall's Tommy Doyle wants you to believe, evil doesn't always die tonight. Most times, it lives to be rebooted over and over again.
After forever changing the horror landscape and delivering a rather inconsistent series of movies, "Halloween" returned once again in 2018. David Gordon Green rebooted the franchise with the awkwardly titled "Halloween" and its sequels, which promised to deliver the ultimate, final confrontation between Michael Myers and Jamie Lee Curtis' Laurie Strode. Green's reboot trilogy followed an older Laurie, who struggles to cope with the trauma of the horrific attack she experienced 40 years prior at the hands of the silent masked killer Michael, as well as the toll it took on her family. The trilogy also explored the impact Michael has on the larger Haddonfield community upon his return (prompting them to seek mob justice), in addition to the notion of an heir to Michael's evil.
The reboot trilogy ends rather definitively. Michael Myers has his arteries sliced open, and his body bled out before the citizens of Haddonfield take his corpse to a huge metal grinder that crushes the boogeyman to pieces. The film provides closure to the characters and to the audience, with no chance of Michael Myers returning. But what if there's more? Evil doesn't die, but does The Boogeyman? This is what we know.
What the crew has said about a Halloween sequel
In September of 2023, Bloody Disgusting reported that producer Malek Akkad had started "actively shopping the rights to the 'Halloween' franchise around Hollywood." (While the film rights are co-owned by Miramax, Akkad's company Trancas International Films was previously the sole owner of all television rights.) The report also stated that A24 and Miramax were the two main parties fighting for the rights, with A24 seemingly in the lead. A24, of course, is currently developing a "Friday the 13th" TV series for Peacock, so adding a "Halloween" show wouldn't have been a huge leap.
Deadline has since learned that Miramax has locked down the "Halloween" TV rights and intends to use a new "Halloween" TV series to "potentially launch a cinematic universe spanning film and television." The next question is whether it will be connected to Green's trilogy at all.
In an interview with ComicBook.com, producer Jason Blum said he was "Very sure ['Halloween Ends'] was our last 'Halloween,' and now [...] You know, I've been thinking, Halloween is coming around, the actual holiday, and I don't know. I don't know. It's anybody's guess."
Even if "Halloween Ends" didn't make a big splash at the box office, the trilogy was a big success for Blumhouse. Given how "The Exorcist: Believer" has turned out to be the polar opposite for Blumhouse and Green, the idea of more Michael Myers may start to look enticing (assuming Blumhouse can work out a deal with Miramax).
How a Halloween sequel could happen
The "Halloween" franchise is arguably the horror franchise that can most easily return to our screens no matter what. Michael Myers may be dead, but the entire story of Green's trilogy could be retconned as a dream. It doesn't matter. The fact is, this franchise has already been rebooted so many times before, fans are used to canon and continuity being flexible.
Indeed, just look at the third "Halloween" movie, "Season of the Witch." That film was a reboot of sorts, unconnected to its predecessors except by title. Then, after six movies, "Halloween H20: 20 Years Later" rebooted the timeline once again and picked up in real-time(-ish) from the events of "Halloween II." Green's trilogy did the same thing, erasing "H20" and all the other films except for the very first "Halloween" film. Who is to stop the franchise from doing that again?
That being said, the story of Laurie Strode is (probably) truly over, at least the one we saw in Green's trilogy. But that doesn't mean Laurie cannot return. Rob Zombie already reimagined the franchise once before with his two "Halloween" movies, which shared the bare bones of the originals while changing enough to be their own thing (and dividing viewers). A "Halloween" TV show could do the same, reimagining any or all sides of the franchise to tell its own story while carrying on the legacy of The Shape.
Either way, we can safely say the reports of evil's death have been greatly exaggerated.