David Gordon Green brought brand-new footage from his Blumhouse-produced Halloween to Universal’s Hall H panel at the ongoing San Diego Comic-Con. The film, which Green cowrote with Danny McBride, represents something of a fresh start for the Halloween series, in the sense that it functions as a direct continuation of director John Carpenter’s original 1978 slasher movie Halloween and ignores every sequel released since then. As such, the “final girl” from Carpenter’s horror classic, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is still alive and well in Green’s take on the property.
Halloween 2018 also picks up in real-time, 40 years after masked killer Michael Myers (who is no longer Laurie’s brother in Green’s film) went on his initial murder spree in the small(ish) town of Haddonfield, Illinois. It’s a bit early for a new trailer just yet, given that the first Halloween trailer has only been out for six weeks or so at this time. Nevertheless, Green and select members of his Halloween crew brought never-before-seen clips from the movie to show off exclusively to the Hall H crowd at the International Comic-Con, in addition to fielding questions from the panel moderator and crowd.
Both Curtis and Green were present during Universal’s SDCC panel to discuss the movie and introduce the new Halloween footage. First, they showed a sequence that was filmed as an extended tracking shot and follows Michael (who is played primarily by James Jude Courtney) as he walks around Haddonfield and through two houses on Halloween night, murdering nearly everyone he encounters along the way. The only people he doesn’t kill on his “trip” are some kids trick or treating and a baby who begins screaming shortly after Michael slaughters their mom… with a hammer. Michael then continues on his way to the next house, where he stabs a woman with a knife (pushing the blade completely through her neck).
Curtis set the stage for Michael’s killing spree ahead of this clip when she noted “What makes Michael Myers so terrifying is the randomness.” The sequence was then followed by a Halloween trailer that included some extended beats, but was otherwise identical to the initial trailer for its first half. However, the second half was much more action-packed and culminated with Myers crashing through a window and grabbing Laurie, right before the video comes to a dramatic halt with the film’s title card. The trailer was then followed by a Q&A with some audience members, leading to a touching moment where a fan told Curtis how Halloween saved his life when he was attacked by a stalker. (Curtis hugged him afterward.)
All in all, it sounds like the Halloween footage shown in Hall H did the trick and further established that Green is aiming to create a horror/thriller that’s more suspenseful than gore-driven, much like Carpenter’s first movie. That should come as all the more welcome news for Halloween fans who are eagerly awaiting this movie, in the hopes that it restores the larger franchise to its former glory at long last.
MORE: Every Halloween (2018) Update You Need to Know
- Halloween Release Date: 2018-10-19
