After Leprechaun: Origins fell flat with fans, the popular and surprisingly durable little murderer now takes another swing at a franchise reboot with Leprechaun Returns.
“Be Careful What You Wish For,” reads the poster tagline for what’s set to be the eighth installment in this horror comedy series, as the malevolent star of the property looks ready to crawl out of that wishing well to cause more chaos. What’s more, this new synopsis suggests that the carnage will be unfolding in that most classic of slasher movie settings, a sorority house:
The deadly, wisecracking Leprechaun is back in all his gory glory. When the sorority sisters of the Alpha Upsilon house decide to go green and use an old well as their water source, they unwittingly awaken a pint-sized, green-clad monster. The Leprechaun wants a pot of gold buried near the sorority house, but first, he must recover his powers with a killing spree—and only the girls of AU can stop him.
Though this new movie certainly looks more geared to please the fans than Origins, the Leprechaun who’s making this “Return” won’t be the same one viewers know from previous installments. Filling the well-polished shoes of Warwick Davis (and briefly, Dylan “Hornswoggle” Postl) will be Linden Porco, who explained earlier this year that he didn’t feel a strong need to recreate the performance that Davis brought to the first six films, telling Slasher Radio Podcast, “I think everything in this movie is my own.” Porco did, however, admit to taking some influence from another famous movie psycho:
“I modeled it actually after… you know The Dark Knight?… with Heath Ledger…as soon as I thought of the Leprechaun, I thought of the Joker. So I sort of modeled the Leprechaun after that. Heath Ledger was absolutely outstanding in that movie. I just sort of modeled it after him a little bit. And put my own spin on it as well. I’m pretty happy with my performance in it.”
This new spin may take some getting used to for long-term fans, but for what it’s worth, they’ll still be getting a familiar face in Mark Holton, with the Pee-wee’s Big Adventure star reprising his role as Ozzie for the first time since the original 1993 Leprechaun. Sadly, it doesn’t look like Jennifer Aniston has done the franchise the same favor.
You can find out if Leprechaun Returns justifies the reboot when it comes to Digital on December 11th.
