Total Film recently interviewed director David Gordon Green about HALLOWEEN KILLS, his upcoming sequel to HALLOWEEN 1978 and HALLOWEEN 2018, and a couple days ago we took note of a quote from that interview in which Green said that HALLOWEEN KILLS is about "the outrage of Haddonfield". Now that entire interview has been revealed online, showing that Green went on to say franchise heroine Laurie Strode is not the main character in this sequel.
HALLOWEEN KILLS picks up at the exact moment the previous film ended, just like 1981's HALLOWEEN II (which is not part of the '78 / '18 / KILLS canon) picked up at the end of the original film. And just like in that HALLOWEEN II, Laurie will be spending the bulk of HALLOWEEN KILLS in a hospital bed. Green said,
She's a voice of both insight and reason that is trying to give a volatile community some sense of purpose in this film."
While Laurie remains the "emotional core" of the film, it's her granddaughter Allyson who steps up to become the main character this time around – and also to become the ringleader of the mob of angry locals who gather together.
When we met her, she was a very relatable, lovely girl-next-door type of character. Allyson here, just hours later… she is ignited. She is, in some ways, leading the charge, and is one of the more bloodthirsty of the group. Whereas (her mother) Karen, who has dealt psychologically with her mother more intimately, is trying to resist those temptations."
Green wrote the HALLOWEEN KILLS screenplay with Danny McBride and Scott Teems. The film stars Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, Andi Matichak as Laurie's granddaughter Allyson, Judy Greer as Laurie's daughter Karen, Robert Longstreet as Lonnie Elam, Dylan Arnold as Allyson's boyfriend / Lonnie's son Cameron, Kyle Richards as Lindsey Wallace, Anthony Michael Hall as Tommy Doyle, Nancy Stephens as Nurse Marion, Charles Cyphers as Leigh Brackett, Jibrail Nantambu as scene stealer Julian, child actress Victoria Paige Watkins as a character named Christy, and James Jude Courtney as Michael Myers. Nick Castle, who played Michael Myers in the original HALLOWEEN, is also in the cast, possibly making another masked cameo like he did in the previous film.
Green said there are also some "strange" returning characters from HALLOWEEN 2018 that haven't been officially confirmed yet.
Originally scheduled to reach theatres on October 16, 2020, HALLOWEEN KILLS has been pushed back to October 15, 2021 due to the pandemic. That puts it on a date that had been reserved for another sequel, HALLOWEEN ENDS, which Green will be directing from a script he wrote with McBride, Paul Brad Logan, and Chris Bernier. Now HALLOWEEN ENDS won't reach theatres until October 14, 2022, but Green is still hoping to start filming soon.
We're going to film this fall, hopefully! It's a very different movie than KILLS, and both HALLOWEENs. The script feels very fun. For me, it was essential to say, 'Here's a conclusive episode to my trilogy.' I'm trying to bring closure to my 'Laurie Strode versus Michael Myers' storytelling."
We have quite a while to wait for both of these movies, but we'll keep you updated on them whenever we hear more information.