How Blumhouse's Jason Blum Really Feels About Production Details Being Spilled - Exclusive
When David Gordon Green took the reigns of the "Halloween" franchise for the 2018 film, it was a huge risk. For one thing, everything aside from the original John Carpenter film was completely jettisoned. On the plus side, that meant losing canon bloat like Michael Myers' strange connection to a group called the Cult of Thorn. On the potential minus side, the notion that Michael and Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) were actually brother and sister was also abandoned.
The gambit paid off. The 2018 "Halloween" film was a hit with both critics and fans alike, leading to a greenlight for two more Jamie Lee Curtis starring films in what will be a new "Halloween" trilogy. However, that doesn't mean there weren't controversies about the new film. One in particular concerns the character of Dr. Ranbir Sartain (Haluk Bilginer).
In the original "Halloween," Michael Myers' psychiatrist was Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasance), a man who understood his patient's evil and sought to destroy it. In 2018's "Halloween," Dr. Sartain sees that same evil and worships it.
The Sartain twist was not popular among all "Halloween" fans. It turns out, it wasn't popular with all the film's producers either. While interviewing Blumhouse CEO Jason Blum, Looper asked him about the public conflict over Sartain's character arc.
The disagreement over Dr. Sartain comes to light
In an interview with Comic Book Resources, "Halloween' series producer Ryan Freimann revealed he was not into the idea of Michael Myers' Dr. Sartain turning out to be evil. "I'm going to go on record and say I was never a fan of the Sartain twist from 2018, fought that one tooth and nail but sometimes you get outvoted," he revealed. "But fans react to certain things then it causes us to pivot certain storylines certain ways."
It's a bold decision to come out against a key element of a film you produced mere weeks before that film's follow-up is released. So, what does Jason Blum make of that statement? Is it good for fans to see passion for the franchise behind the scenes to the point of disagreement or is it bad to see how the proverbial sausage gets made?
"I think in an ideal world, it's not good," Blum said to Looper. "I think in an ideal world, you want to just see these things in a vacuum and appreciate them like that. But we don't live in an ideal world. So it's not something that ... It doesn't keep me up at night, because it just happens. So — and I'm actually not — there are some directors or some producers who are like 'You have to go into a bubble or into a cage to read my script.' And I always think that's a little self-important."
In the end, Dr. Sartain's story is told, but it's interesting to see that it's not just fans who still care about how that story played out years after "Halloween" 2018 was released.
"Halloween Kills" is in theaters and streaming on Peacock beginning October 15.