'Halloween Kills' Adds Anthony Michael Hall As A Grown-Up Tommy Doyle

Another familiar character is returning to the Halloween franchise – played by a new face. Anthony Michael Hall has joined the Halloween Kills cast as Tommy Doyle, a character who will be immediately recognizable to fans of the franchise. Tommy was one of the kids Halloween final girl Laurie Strode babysat in the first film. The character returned as an adult – played by Paul Rudd – in Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers.

Variety broke the news about Anthony Michael Hall joining the Halloween Kills cast as Tommy Doyle. There's no word on what part the character has to play in this new sequel, but his return is mighty interesting. In the original Halloween, Tommy Doyle was played by Brian Andrews. The character was eight-years-old in that film and spent the bulk of the movie terrified that the boogeyman would come and get him on Halloween night. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), Tommy's babysitter, assured the child that there was no such thing as the boogeyman. Little did she know that Michael Myers was on the loose. When we last see Tommy in Halloween, he's fleeing the house with his friend Lindsey Wallace, the two of them screaming their heads off in terror.

Tommy popped-up again in 1995's Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers. There, the character was played by Paul Rudd in his first feature role. In that film, the adult Tommy has grown up obsessed with Michael Myers and has an entire theory about what drives Michael's murders. It involves something called the Cult of Thorn, and trust me, the less you know about that nonsense, the better.

While I would've loved to see Rudd come back and play Tommy yet again, it's worth remembering that this new Halloween series completely ignores all of the sequels. The only previous events that exist in the current continuity are those of the original Halloween. That means Rudd's version of Tommy, and all of his obsessions, are null and void. That said, reports state that producers Blumhouse did approach Rudd about reprising his role, but Rudd was unable to due to commitments to the new Ghostbusters movie.

So what part will the Anthony Michael Hall's Tommy Doyle have to play in Halloween Kills? I honestly don't know. Will he still be traumatized from his childhood encounter with Michael Myers? Probably! Wouldn't you be?

Halloween Kills will bring back Curtis as Laurie Strode, with Halloween 2018 director David Gordon Green back as well. It's one of two sequels that will be shooting back-to-back, the other being Halloween Ends. Hall's casting announcement only mentions Kills, which suggests he might not make it into the follow-up film.Halloween Kills opens October 16, 2020.