In our current decade, there aren’t too many new horror franchises that have impressed me, but one that I feel’s worth mentioning is that of The Purge. If you’re unfamiliar, it’s set in the not too distant future where all crime is legal for one night each year. Basically, the elected officials see this as a way of keeping the crime rate down – and we’re given the impression that it’s actually working.
What works about this concept is that it not only produces much in the way of tension, but it also feels very “real,” forcing us to consider if society could ever go to this extreme. Furthermore, it also serves as a social commentary of sorts, with the sequels more so feeling like the proper realization of this idea.
Quite surprisingly, the franchise will be spilling over to TV, which I actually found to be a good idea. Personally, I believed a real time format similar to that of 24 would work best, but we learned a few months back that the small screen spinoff will explore what happens on the other 364 days of the year.
Recently, producer Jason Blum sat down with Den of Geek, laying out how they plan on exploring the psychology of this world:
“We’re working on kind of exploring what it’s like to live the rest of the year in a world where you can kill someone on a certain day of the year. It definitely makes you think twice if you’re driving and you give someone the finger or something like that. So we’re definitely thinking about different things that might happen in a society where killing was legal 12 hours a year.”
Sounds pretty intriguing, doesn’t it? Additionally, he hinted at how some sly folk may attempt to weasel their way around Purge Night itself:
“There are a lot of things that you don’t think about. You could commit a murder, and then somehow make it seem like it happened on Purge Night and get away with it. There are a lot of things that you can do with that idea, and we’re trying to think of all those different situations in that world.”
The Purge is set to air on both USA and SyFy in 2018.