The New ‘Halloween’ TV Series Has a Wild Way To Bring Back Abandoned Stories
There’s a strange problem facing the next Halloween project: the franchise has already gone back to the beginning several times.
John Carpenter’s original Halloween (1978) has effectively been used as a reset point for multiple continuities, most recently in David Gordon Green’s trilogy. Now, Miramax’s proposed television series is expected to do something similar.
And that’s why the show could benefit from looking forward instead of backward.
After the series was announced in 2023, then Miramax television chief Marc Helwig said it would be “a creative reset completely and going back to the original film,” with Carpenter’s movie serving as its “foundation.”
But that was more than two years ago, and there has been little movement publicly since. Reports have even suggested that Miramax may have abandoned the TV series in favor of a new movie.
If it’s still happening, though, the show needs a reason to exist beyond giving Michael Myers another variation of the same story. And an anthology format could provide exactly that.
Related: Ranking the Best (and Worst) Final Girls of the ‘Halloween’ Franchise
Rather than asking audiences to follow another new version of Laurie Strode’s relationship with Michael, the series could use its episodes to answer questions the movies left behind.
What happened immediately after the events of Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998)? What would have happened if Jamie Lloyd’s ending in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988) had actually been followed through? Could Rob Zombie’s Halloween II (2009) have continued without being abandoned? The possibilities are already built into the franchise.
Even Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) provides a template. That movie deliberately left Michael Myers out and was conceived as the beginning of an anthology series before the character returned in Halloween 4.
With the newly released Halloween: The Game from IllFonic already giving fans another way to revisit the classic mythology, the TV series has an opportunity to do something the movies haven’t: finally embrace the franchise’s increasingly confusing history.
What abandoned Halloween story would you most like to see continued? Let us know in the comments below!
