Back in 1993, The Nightmare Before Christmas was released, a movie that is debated each year, is it a Christmas or a Halloween movie? For the longest time a sequel has been rumoured, could it now finally be coming?
The original followed Jack Skellington, the pumpkin king of Halloween Town, who is bored with doing the same thing every year for Halloween. One day he stumbles into Christmas Town and is so taken with the idea of Christmas that he tries to get the resident bats, ghouls, and goblins of Halloween town to help him put on Christmas instead of Halloween — but alas, they can’t get it quite right.
Being well received and a financial success, Disney had always harboured plans of releasing a sequel but producer Tim Burton kept saying no. He has always said the film is fine the way it is, and adding a sequel would just be dubbed as a cash grab possibly ruining a cult classic.
With its 25th Anniversary coming up, a manga pop publisher Tokyopop has secured licensing rights to The Nightmare Before Christmas. Before we get our hopes up, this is not a movie sequel instead it will be written as a comic book. The Nightmare Before Christmas: Zero’s Journey will follow Zero’s (Skellington’s Dog) adventures as he gets lost in Christmas Town. Zero’s Journey will be released as single-issue comic books before being put together in a traditional volume. It will also be released as a full-colour issue before being changed over to black and white “pocket size manga” trade paperbacks. The comic series will be written by DJ Milky and illustrated by Studio DICE.
For years Disney has been pushing for a sequel to the animated classic, and while this may not have been what fans had in mind, it’s certainly the next best thing.
THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS: ZERO’S JOURNEY will be released sometime in 2018, keep an eye out!