Halloween Franchise TV Rights Scored by Miramax

It's been a year since Halloween Ends landed in theaters and seemingly brought an end to the decades-long conflict between Laurie Strode and Michael Myers, but the franchise isn't ending anytime soon, with Deadline confirming that Miramax has secured the TV rights to the Halloween franchise. This update follows reports of weeks of negotiating and bidding among various studios who all hoped to secure the lucrative rights to the series, which launched back in 1978 with the John Carpenter-directed film, which he co-wrote with Debra Hill. It's unclear at this point what Miramax's plans might be for the franchise or where a potential TV series could debut.

With Miramax owning both the TV and film rights to the franchise, the outlet claims that the hope is to launch a shared universe of movies and TV series inspired by the franchise.

"We couldn't be more excited to bring Halloween to television," Miramax's Head of Global TV Marc Helwig shared in a statement. "We are thrilled to expand our long and successful partnership with Trancas and the brilliant Malek Akkad in introducing this iconic franchise to a new form of storytelling and a new generation of fans."

Akkad added, "Trancas International Films is extremely enthused to be expanding our long-standing relationship with Miramax, and we look forward to working with Marc Helwig and the entire team in creating this new chapter."

In the original film, the masked murderer Michael Myers stalked the streets of the suburban Haddonfield, Illinois, with the teen-aged Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) managing to survive the stalker, thanks to the help of Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence). In the 40 years since that first movie, the original movie has earned multiple sequels and reboots, some of which continue the narrative of their predecessors and some of which create an all-new mythology. 

Carpenter and Hill, however, never aimed to create a long-running narrative focusing on Michael Myers and Laurie Strode. The pair begrudgingly agreed to develop the first sequel, Halloween II, in order to put an end to Myers. Halloween III: Season of the Witch then pivoted away from the Michael Myers storyline for an entirely original tale about an evil mask maker, though fans didn't react well to abandoning Myers, who then became an integral component throughout the rest of the franchise.

Horror franchises Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street have both previously been adapted into TV shows, though both served more as anthology programs with self-contained narratives as opposed to a continuation of the big-screen mythology.

Stay tuned for details on the future of the Halloween franchise.

Are you excited for a Halloween TV series? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!