How Halloween Kills Reframes The Entire Franchise

Since the first Halloween movie sliced and diced its way into theaters in 1978 the characters sitting at the head of the slasher table have been Michael Myers and Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis). It's hard to imagine one without the other, even if there is a string of subpar Halloween films that tried to do just that.

When the franchise was reimagined in 2018, director David Gordon-Green created a direct sequel to the first movie, once again returning to the central story of Laurie vs. Michael, revisiting the trauma of that Halloween evening decades ago. In the latest film, though, a much different story is being told. Halloween Kills isn't about Michael Myers vs. Laurie Strode. Instead, it's about Michael vs. an entire town of people who feel they have been wronged by the supposed boogeyman--including the young children Laurie was babysitting in that initial film.

"Tommy and Lindsay we're obviously going to be traumatized from their horrific encounter with the boogeyman, protected by their babysitter," Green explained when speaking to a small group of press about the film. "How do they respond to that evening's catastrophe decades ago?"

That question is central to Halloween Kills, with actress Kyle Richards returning to play Lindsay and Antony Michael Hall stepping in as Tommy. Fans of the franchise get to see how those characters, who seemingly never left Haddonfield after the events of the first movie, turned out.

"For me, it's just a fun playground," Green told GameSpot. "It's taking characters that have been established that have been around for 40 years to check in on them and invent what they're up to and how they've evolved."

Richards couldn't agree more, explaining during a group interview, "Who I was at eight years old is very different from who Lindsay is now. And thankfully, I had someone to help me, you know, create this character Lindsay [in] David Gordon Green."

It's not just who the characters are now that is explored in the film. though. It's the trauma the entire town of Haddonfield has been put through since Michael's first killing spree. "The first movie is about [Laurie's] trauma," Curtis said. "This is a movie about everybody else's trauma. This is a movie about the collateral damage, the concentric circles of trauma and grief and rage and violence that have been perpetrated by Michael to this entire town."

So while the tale of Michael and Laurie may continue to be the throughline of future films, she's not alone in the fight. It's not just her daughter and granddaughter at her side, but the entire town of Haddonfield. That should make for a pretty vicious battle.

Halloween Kills is in theaters on October 15.