In exactly one month, Winifred (Bette Midler), Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker), and Mary (Kathy Najimy) will make their triumphant return. The long-awaited Hocus Pocus 2 will debut on Disney+ next month, and director Anne Fletcher told Entertainment Weekly that the sequel will actually explain the origin of the Sanderson Sisters.
“The opening sequence of the movie, we get some history of our witches and Billy. We get a little kiss — pardon the pun — of the Billy aspect of it and the world that they lived in and what happened to the witches,” Anne Fletcher said. “I always missed that in the first one. Like, what are the witches the way they are? I did have that question, and the script came, and I loved the opening 1600s. I pushed that a little bit more, because I really wanted to point at, ever so slightly…. the idea that the 1600s and the now are the same. There’s no difference. I just want to poke at the irony of it. But, in the joy of the film you get to see the young version of them and have a great time and understand the what and why of what happened to them.” Fletcher added that Hocus Pocus 2 will have some “wonderful surprises in the mythology” of the Sanderson Sisters as their origin story blends with the modern-day teenagers (Whitney Peak, Belissa Escobedo, and Lilia Buckingham) who resurrect them.
“It’s been 29 years since someone lit the Black Flame Candle and resurrected the 17th-century sisters, and they are looking for revenge,” reads the official Disney+ press release. “Now it is up to three high-school students to stop the ravenous witches from wreaking a new kind of havoc on Salem before dawn on All Hallow’s Eve.” In addition to Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy, Hocus Pocus 2 will also feature the return of Doug Jones as Billy Butcherson, Winifred’s former lover who was brought back as a zombie in the original movie. A new poster for Hocus Pocus 2 was released earlier today, giving us a little tease before the movie is released on Disney+ on September 30th.