Halloween Kills producer Ryan Freimann opened up in a recent interview with CBR about how he fought to remove the doctor plot twist in the franchise’s 2018 film.
Halloween, follows the life of serial killer Michael Myers over the years. In the film’s 2018 reboot Myers escapes the institution he was locked up due to a bus transfer gone awry. Following his get away, he returns to Haddonfield, where he is originally from, to kill his sister Laurie Strode.
The reboot brought back original cast member Jamie Lee Curtis and the original film’s director John Carpenter as a composer. The person who didn’t return to the series was Donald Pleasance. Pleasance portrayed the role of Dr. Loomis until his death in 1995 from heart failure. In the remake, viewers were introduced to Dr. Sartain played by Haluk Bilginer.
Dr. Sartain was Myer’s second psychiatrist that was ultimately killed by him because of his dark nature throughout the course of the film. Freimann said despite the box office success the film achieved during it’s release, he expressed how the movies didn’t need the plot twist.
“At first, it was a thought of an economy of filmmaking where we could shoot both at the same time but, remember, that decision was made pre-COVID. We had monkey wrenches thrown at us left and right. Our goal is to still continue with the storyline but, as we’ve seen — I’m going to go on record and say I was never a fan of the Sartain twist from 2018.”
He added that he, “fought that one tooth and nail but sometimes you get outvoted — but fans react to certain things then it causes us to pivot certain storylines certain ways.”
Love the twist or hate it, in the end Halloween managed to bring in $255 million worldwide. It’s currently available to steam on Hulu for horror fans who haven’t somehow seen it yet.