Halloween 2018: How is Laurie returning if she died in Resurrection?

Jamie Lee Curtis returning to Halloween is causing a lot of confusion for fans remembering her character’s death, but there’s a simple explanation for it.

Next October, Laurie Strode will go face to face with Michael Myers… one last time!

Earlier this week, the horror crowd got the surprise of their lives when Jamie Lee Curtis announced her return to the Halloween franchise. As her character Laurie Strode, Curtis is coming back to the series that made her famous on its 40th anniversary. You can’t get any more perfect than that.

“But, wait, didn’t Laurie die?” I’m seeing some fans question online. “I thought she died in Halloween: Resurrection,” others go on. Just go look in the comments section for any given social media post about this film, and you’ll see people asking the question. While it’s certainly a very valid question, there’s actually a very simple answer for it:

Halloween (2018) takes place in an alternate timeline.

Several months back, it had been reported that this new movie takes place in a new timeline, serving as a sequel to the first two movies. What this means is that, in this new movie’s continuity, no other sequels past Part 2 ever occurred — including H20 and Resurrection. So Laurie Strode is still alive and well in this new alternate timeline, meaning writers Danny McBride and David Gordon Green had the freedom to bring her back.

Let’s just all agree that this movie never happened.

Really, this is nothing new for the series. Part 3 diverged with a new story completely unrelated to Michael Myers. Parts 4, 5, and 6 created a new timeline stemming from the first two, revealing Michael to be part of a cult. Then, H20 and Resurrection  threw out Parts 4 through 6 to create a third timeline branching off the original two films. They’re just doing this same thing once again, but with John Carpenter overseeing things this time, chances are they’ll get it right.

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It’s unanimous with horror fans that Laurie’s anti-climactic death in Resurrection is a total disservice to the character. Curtis herself called it a “joke”, only doing the role because of contractual obligations. So even if this creates some confusion initially with the fans, I’m 100% down for a do-over. The character deserves a proper ending to her story.

The new Halloween hits theaters on Oct. 19, 2018.