The slasher franchise that began its run in back 2009 with the horror hit The Collector still has horror fans talking more than a decade later. Now, after all these years of waiting, a third film in the franchise, The Collected, is finally happening, according to director Marcus Dunstan. The filmmaker is finally able to answer the pleas of fans who have been left wondering what had happened with the slasher film series, and revealed (while promoting his new film #AMFAD: All My Friends Are Dead, which will be released on August 2) to Comicbook.com that the rights issues which have held the horror threequel back have now been resolved:
“If anybody wanted to know what was up with The Collector, less than 24 hours ago, after five years of legal entanglements, The Collector is free. The Collector’s coming back, and it’s going to be mad scary…wait until you see that sucker hit.”
The Collector spawned a follow-up in 2012 named The Collection, with the terror caused by the titular slasher killer taken to new heights and transforming the cult horror hit into a franchise. At least, that was the initial plan, with the creators confirming several years ago that a third film was underway. In 2019, it officially started shooting, but a few mishaps caused it to enter development hell, with Dunstan losing the rights to do anything related to The Collected.
Dunstan continued, and teased that The Collected will be the “best” outing in the series so far and will explore the “pitch, pitch dark.”
“We weren’t to trespass into that until it could be the best one. Every next movie has a chance to be the best movie …
#AMFAD: All My Friends Are Dead
has humor, has hope, has other emotions, and really uppercase humor for a while to get us through the character development, then we use it more sporadically to keep people off rhythm.The Collector
has been about that space in the darkness where you have two choices, terror or heart. And there’s a mental place to go for everybody … We’re going into the pitch, pitch dark.”
The Collector Has the Potential to Take on Slasher Icons Jason, Michael Myers & Freddy Krueger
In The Collector, Arkin O’Brien is a handyman who works for a very wealthy family. His wife has gotten into some financial trouble, and Arkin decides to indulge in some stealing. He breaks into the home of the Chase family, but apparently, someone has gotten inside first. A clever assassin has filled the house with lethal and ingenious booby traps that will lead to the demise of anyone who dares enter. While critics didn’t exactly love it (the film has 29% score on Rotten Tomatoes), the film had a good run financially, making over $10 million from a $3 million budget.
Originally conceived as a prequel to Saw, which would depict John Kramer’s origins before turning into Jigsaw, The Collector had all the potential to be a modern slasher franchise. Lead actor Josh Stewart captivates as Arkin, a role he played in both movies, and everything points to him returning to play the character again in The Collected. We’ll just have to wait for Dunstan to finish up with #AMFAD: All My Friends Are Dead and hope that The Collected enters production soon.
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In the sequel The Collection, Arkin is back in the game after barely escaping from the Collector. He is hired by a wealthy man to help a team of mercenaries after a young woman IS captured by The Collector. Arkin complies, seeing success in the mission as a fresh start, but the memories of the previous events prove to be too much of a burden. The film’s box office takings were not as good as its predecessor (though it did fare better with critics at 37% on Rotten Tomatoes), but producers still believed in the concept enough to throw around ideas for a third part.
When comparing the two films, the second one is more of a collection of ultraviolent segments centered around a very disturbed individual. The first one, meanwhile, had a certain appeal for fans of slasher franchises who saw in the Collector a killer who would be able to stand against the other slasher icons thanks to his insane ability to build traps.
The Collector
is available to stream on Tubi, and
The Collection
is available to stream on Plex.
