Whether you revisited Poltergeist 2 on Scream Factory’s brand new Blu-ray this week or you haven’t watched it since you were a kid, I’m willing to bet you have a vivid memory of the film’s antagonist, Reverend Henry Kane. Played by Julian Beck, who was dying at the time the sequel was shot (he was diagnosed with stomach cancer two years before production began), Reverend Kane is undoubtedly one of the most bone-chilling villains in the entire history of the horror genre; and now that he’s in high-def, he’s surely giving the world nightmares all over again.
But did you know that Reverend Kane almost got his own prequel?
As relayed in Poltergeist 2, the backstory of Reverend Kane is nothing if not an interesting one. A reverend/cult leader in the early 19th century, Kane led his followers underground by telling them that the apocalypse was near, but it was all a lie. Kane’s real plan? To kill them all and then himself, allowing him to harvest their souls and, in the process, gain supernatural powers. Sort of like Freddy Krueger, Kane was so evil that in death he did indeed obtain otherworldly powers, transforming into the inhuman “Beast”… the nightmarish apparition in the original Poltergeist.
As it turns out, Kane’s doomsday hideout was directly underneath the Freeling family’s home, which serves to explain why Kane targeted Carol Anne across the three films in the Poltergeist franchise; he sensed her supernatural abilities and planned on using her to draw more souls to himself and become even stronger. Cause ya know, I’m pretty sure that’s how that all works.
It’s all compelling stuff from a storytelling standpoint, and according to an industry insider by the name of Macklin Crux, Kane’s backstory was at one point going to be given its own film.
As relayed by Poltergeist 3: The Website, Crux says it was being developed in the early ’90s:
I was at Universal in the early ’90s and I heard about Poltergeist 4. Someone told me about a new script that was being developed about the pre-story: Kane and his followers. Kane was a healer (like an exorcist), a good-looking man who was a preacher who had fallen and was going to go to California to rid himself of the “demons”. We were on the “western” lot when it came up. I remember “a Psychological thriller with less effects”.He also notes that Kane’s backstory was going to tie him directly to Carol Anne:
The development would make some sort of connection to the Freeling family of the future. Carol Anne was the great-great grand daughter or something equally ridiculous. I don’t remember if someone suggested it or if it was part of the original story but the “Freeling Family” of the past escaped Kane at the end and were the only survivors. They were protected by an Indian medicine man. Sound Familiar? It should! This was originally part of the original Poltergeist property and elements (Kane, Indian medicine man, Family Clairvoyance, etc) were incorporated into Poltergeist 2.Horror fans tend to have an aversion to origin stories, as they mostly accomplish the undesirable goal of making villains less scary, but if you’re asking me, a Reverend Kane prequel would’ve been an interesting way to breathe new life into the franchise. The character is the most compelling aspect of Poltergeist 2, and his backstory is certainly meaty enough to warrant its own film.
Alas, the idea seems to have been killed before a script was ever written.
