As Halloween Kills works its way through its namesake holiday season, one is to wonder what became of this franchise and how did it come down to needing a fresh reboot to bring such an iconic horror series back to the forefront? This new iteration of a Michael Myers trilogy ignores all but John Carpenter’s first classic. But what happened to all the loose ends and plot holes that came from the iteration of sequels we received over the decades? The biggest issue being the confusing and abrupt ending to Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers. Now, there is an explanation for the stark ending and the mysterious Man in Black.
After Halloween 4 celebrated the 10th anniversary of the franchise and the return of Michael Myers after missing out on the third film, Halloween 5 was quickly rushed into production. This was before the script was even finished, which is where the train started falling off the tracks already. This immediately made the whole production a fly-by-your-seat fiasco. Ideas were pitched like having Michael and Lorie both be killers (thankfully that was scrapped quickly).
Another was to turn Myers into Frankenstein’s Monster of sorts, a misunderstood soul who was now a gentle giant being hunted for his past. The whole film reeks of a rushed production, including the Man in Black, who was added halfway thru without even having a proper backstory. There were talks of him being Michael’s twin brother or an alter ego.
It would take six years to get some semblance of an answer, albeit not a great one. They decided to turn the Man in Black into Dr. Terrance Wynn, the man who ran the sanitarium that Myers escaped from in the first film. It would then turn out that Wynn was actually the head of the Cult of Thorns and he had marked Michael with a curse that drove him to kill his family and thus give the cult power. This led fans down the terrible rabbit hole of a supernatural Myers that was confusing at best. All in all, it was a huge fail.
Luckily, the franchise is back to its roots and with well thought out plots to get us there. But, Halloween 5 marks the leap off the deep end for the franchise (albeit an already wonky one by then) and its all due to a rushed and jaunted production.
What are your thoughts on Halloween 5? Let us know in the comments below!