BACKGROUND
After getting off to a good start with their Disney Channel Original Movies in the late 1990s, Disney Channel was ready to keep churning out new movies for its viewers.
To be honest, I think they released too many in the first two years of the 2000s, with many of these not being remembered by the majority of Disney Channel watchers. But in amongst this massive list, there have been a few movies that have stood the test of time.
One is Zenon: The Zequel (2001), the first official DCOM sequel, coming out in January 2001, after its original movie Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century premiered in 1999. Another is the first sequel to Halloweentown, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, also premiering in 2001, but in October, for the spooky season. Since the original Halloweentown was successful and memorable, featuring legendary actress Debbie Reynolds in one of the leading roles, it made sense for Disney Channel to make a second movie.
Halloween has become even more of a holiday now. Events run at theme parks and the like for weeks on end, sometimes beginning in August; people decorate their house for the season, with merchandise and candy heavily promoted in supermarkets throughout the month of October; and movies themed to Halloween or just horror are frequently airing on TV or in movie theatres all around this time. It’s not easy to get away from Halloween. Plus, it’s a time that seems to specifically interest children, so it makes even more sense for Disney Channel to ride that Halloween band wagon all the way.
That doesn’t mean that I didn’t like Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge though. I felt that more had to come from the Halloweentown series, with the Piper children only just discovering their powers on that one Halloween night. There had to be more chances for Aggie to help train Marnie, and there had to be more to come from the town of Halloweentown itself. In the case of this sequel, once again, evil threatens Halloweentown, but evil is also coming to the mortal world, with a surprising new villain joining the mix.
It was a sequel that did what all good sequels should do: build on the characters and setting of the original movie, upping the stakes, and making everything just that bit more tense and scary. However, not everyone agrees with me on this. Although some felt the sequel was very good, bettering the original in some ways, there were more mixed reviews and negative comments for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge than I’d expected.
PLOT
At the start of Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, Marnie Piper, the teenage witch that isn’t Sabrina, gives us a recap of her and her family’s confrontation with Kalabar, the former Mayor of Halloweentown, and his eventual defeat, after attempting to convince the residents of Halloweentown to conquer the mortal world once and for all. She reveals that all happened two years ago, and now she, her sister Sophie, her brother Dylan, their mother Gwen, and grandmother Aggie Cromwell, a former resident of Halloweentown, all live together in the human world in harmony. Well, sort of.
As a Halloween party goes on downstairs, Marnie stays upstairs trying to avoid getting in the middle of an argument between her mother and grandmother. Gwen, although deciding that she wanted to train Marnie as a witch at the end of Halloweentown, continues in her crusade against magic and Aggie’s supposed corruption of her children, not allowing Aggie to use any magic even to impress the children at this party. Marnie eventually decides she’d best join the party, but not before she has a feeling that someone is watching her…
After a further disagreement with her daughter, Aggie goes off to her room, which is full of magical artefacts and her much-treasured spell book, to look into her crystal ball and check up on how Halloweentown is doing. Sophie comes in to check on Aggie and the two talk about the town, with Sophie saying if Aggie misses it so much, she should go visit that night, since the portal between the human world and Halloweentown is only open on Halloween. Aggie says it would be harder to go to Halloweentown for just one night and then have to leave again. Besides, her and Marnie are planning on living in Halloweentown for a full year next year, right after Marnie finishes high school. Sophie and Aggie return to the party, as Sophie senses someone strange is coming. They head back, disguising Aggie’s bedroom door so no human or stranger can find it.
Meanwhile, Gwen and Marnie have been arguing, as Gwen believes the kids are turning against her. Marnie says they aren’t but that she is a witch and deserves to have proper training. Gwen warns Marnie that there will come a time when she will have to choose once and for all whether she lives as a witch in Halloweentown or remains in the mortal world; she can’t have it both ways forever. Dylan has been attempting to interact with girl from school, even asking one, Cindy, to the Halloween dance at the school that night, but his uptight, nerdy ways seem to be off-putting to her.
Randomly, a teenage boy and his father just wander into the Pipers’ kitchen with snacks. They have just moved in down the street and saw there was a party going on, so wanted to turn up and introduce themselves. Um, that’s pretty rude to show up somewhere without an invitation, especially without even knocking on the front door! But the family don’t seem to mind and welcome teenager Kal and his father Alex. Marnie takes Kal on a tour of the house after he flirts with her a bit. She shows him her room, which Kal thinks is boring and doesn’t match up to her personality at all. Not wanting to look boring, Marnie decides to show Kal her grandmother’s room. Inside, Kal shows off his knowledge of witchcraft and the two discuss magic together. But when Kal takes an interest in Aggie’s spellbook, Marnie thinks they’d best get back to the party, as she doesn’t want to reveal that she is a witch and that the spellbook is very much real. As Marnie turns away, Kal simply shrinks the spellbook and takes it away with him without Marnie seeing, proving that Kal is a warlock.
Downstairs, Kal quickly makes his excuses and leaves, giving Marnie a rose as a parting gift and asks if she’ll be his date for the dance. She gladly accepts. Kal goes outside, and we see him at the bus stop, where the Halloweentown bus would normally run from on Halloween night. Instead of getting the bus, Kal opens a portal and walks through it.
Back at the party, Aggie sees that her magic bag isn’t working. Believing something is wrong, she wants to return to Halloweentown to check it out. Marnie says she’ll go with Aggie, and Sophie wants to go too. They tell Gwen that they are off to Halloweentown, with Gwen being distracted by Alex, who did not leave the party with his son. Weirdo. But she’s not too distracted because she tells Sophie she’ll have to stay at home with her. Marnie can go though. Just before leaving, Aggie hands a headphone, a walkie-talkie that looks like a skull, to Dylan, saying this is how they can communicate between the worlds. Gwen is then asked to go to the Halloween party by Alex. She says she will. Alex bumps into Dylan on his way out and Dylan hears a small “ribbit” like a frog, seeing an actual frog on the carpet as Alex leaves. See, this guy really is weird.
At the bus stop, Aggie and Marnie don’t see any sign of the Halloweentown bus coming and even when Marnie tries to magically summon the bus, it doesn’t come. So, they call up the portal themselves, seeing it is four hours until midnight, so they must return to the mortal world by then, or else the portal between the two worlds will be closed until next year.
Back in Halloweentown, Aggie and Marnie see that Halloweentown has changed considerably. There is no pumpkin in the square, and everywhere is devoid of colour. Even the residents are starting to turn grey, and as they do, they become boring and ordinary. A teenager rudely bumps into them both, with Marnie recognising the boy as goblin Luke who she met two years ago in Halloweentown. She confronts him but gets no answers. Aggie sees that everyone here is turning human, at least, the Halloweentown definition of human, whereby everyone is boring and ordinary. No offence taken, I guess. Aggie says she has a similar spell in her spellbook so they can just look up how to reverse it. Aggie calls Dylan on the headphone and asks him to get the book from her room. Dylan and Sophie both go up there, but they say her spellbook has gone. This leads Marnie to admit that she went to Aggie’s room with Kal – but that he was with her all the time so couldn’t have stolen it. Sophie says he must’ve been the stranger she felt coming earlier on.
Marnie and Aggie try to reopen the portal to the human world so they can confront Kal, however, it won’t open. They are trapped in Halloweentown, realising that the issue with her bag was a ruse to get them here. Kal then talks to them through the stone block that has replaced the Halloweentown pumpkin. He proudly admits casting the spell, and playing with Marnie’s feelings, although their date still stands. Now Marnie realises that because he gave her a rose, Kal is actually Kalabar’s son, a secret son that no-one knew about. Kal has cast this spell in order to finish Kalabar’s plan to punish humans and defeat the Cromwells. Kal asks Marnie to join him in his quest and be all powerful. She refuses.
With that bombshell, Marnie and Aggie head over to Aggie’s house, signalling for Benny the cab driver. However, this spell has affected Benny. Instead of being a skeleton like he was in Halloweentown, he is now human, and a very slow driver too. Marnie brings Luke along. They wonder how far Kal will go, since he has already broken the Code of Merlin by stealing spells, because he mentioned a big finale in the mortal world. At Aggie’s house, they see the “Grey Spell” has affected it, making the house ordinary. They start searching for Aggie’s second spellbook but, no luck. Aggie starts to lose hope. Marnie begs her to stay positive. During her ramble, they randomly see that the spell on Luke has been reversed – but Marnie has no idea what she did or said to reverse it. But they have more pressing issues and at least Luke isn’t just standing around, saying “whatever” any more. Aggie decides her spellbook must be lost, which means it has to be at Gort the junkman’s house because that’s where everything lost goes. They get back in Benny’s cab to go there.
At the Pipers’ house, Gwen won’t listen to Dylan and Sophie’s concerns about Alex. Alex returns to the house in a frog costume and he gives Gwen a horrifying mask to wear to the party as her costume. Gwen suddenly realises she can’t go to the party because Sophie has to stay home. Dylan volunteers to babysit so Gwen can still go.
In Halloweentown, the three get to Gort’s and see the Grey Spell has affected him, making him much calmer than his normal miserable self. They start searching for the book, but Gort says he sold most of his junk at a yard sale recently. The spell then turns Aggie grey. Needing to find this junk, they try to quickly leave, but find they’ve been locked in by Kal. He appears in the fireplace and confirms that Aggie’s powers are draining and they have no hope left, although he tells Marnie their date still stands. She ignores him. Aggie says she remembers a spell that turns humans into monsters. She wonders if this is the spell that Kal plans to enact in the mortal world. They have to hurry.
Meanwhile, Sophie has been researching magic and she believes that Alex is a golem, having been created by Kal purely as a distraction and a henchman for him, who will do whatever is asked without question. She goes further to suggest Alex is a golem made up of frogs, which would explain Dylan’s interaction with him. Sophie convinces Dylan to go to the party to warn their mother, and they hop on a broom to get there.
At Gort’s and still stuck, Marnie wants to find a different way of reversing the spell other than saying the spell backwards, since they don’t know what it was. Knowing that Marnie, Luke, and Aggie are trapped, Marnie thinks that a loophole would be to time travel. Aggie writes the time travel spell down for Marnie before fully turning grey, and joins Gort in pairing together mismatched socks – like boring humans do, apparently!
Luckily, Marnie recites the time travel spell and they go back in time – by five minutes. So, she tries again – and they go back to prehistoric times! On her next attempt, she finds herself alone in the house. Kal appears and says it’s just them, having put everyone else in limbo. He threatens Marnie’s mum and leaves. She says the spell again and finds herself in Gort’s house with all his junk, Luke, and Gort back to his angry self. They are told to leave, but Marnie warns Gort that he’ll end up with a neat house if they aren’t allowed to look around. This is enough for Gort to let them stay!
After searching the whole place, they don’t find the book. Gort eventually pipes up and says he sold the spellbook to Kalabar years ago. It becomes clear that Kal stole the other spellbook so they’d be unable to reverse the spell, making their search here a complete waste of time. Luke tries to move their focus back to how his Grey Spell was reversed. They write down what Marnie can remember of what she said just before, but nothing sounds like a spell. Luke sees that she said “trap a” at one point and asks if a spell can be just one word. Marnie doesn’t see any harm in trying, so she says “trapa” at Gort, and the spell reverses! But they only have 15 minutes to get back to Aggie and get back to the mortal world to stop Kal. Marnie searches for the piece of paper she wrote her time travel spell on, but it’s gone. Gort says if something gets lost here, it is gone forever. After many attempts at remembering the spell, which does all sorts of weird things to Gort, he says he has a wizard’s time line right here. They get on Marnie’s broom which she summons and ride down the time line.
Back in the mortal world, at the Halloween party, Dylan and Sophie attempt to tell Gwen that her date is a golem made of frogs and that Kal is actually Kalabar’s son, so Alex isn’t his dad but she doesn’t listen. Sophie conjures up a fly to prove this. The fly interests Alex and he quickly eats it, grossing Gwen out and showing that her kids were right. She puts her mask back on as a disguise and tries to search for Kal. Kal is actually up by the ceiling and ready to cast the Creature Spell, to turn all humans into the monsters they’ve dressed up as. He fuses Gwen’s mask to her face, making her a target for the spell.
In the time line, Marnie and Luke make slow progress so she takes a detour into a black hole. Luckily, it doesn’t destroy them and takes them back to Aggie and Gort in present day. Marnie uses her “trapa” spell to turn Aggie back to normal. Knowing there isn’t much time left, they quickly open the portal to the mortal world and see the Halloween party, and all the students about to finish their countdown to midnight – which lasted a full minute, for some reason. What’s wrong with counting down from ten? The portal closes right at that moment, leaving Marnie trapped in Halloweentown with no way home. Aggie tries to tell Marnie that they can figure something out, but that isn’t good enough; what state will home be in by the time a whole year rolls around? It’ll feel even longer in Halloweentown!
Back at the party, as expected, humans have turned into creatures, including Dylan’s crush Cindy who is a real vampire now! Sophie tries to call Marnie but can’t get through. Marnie then calls her; saying they need to change the portal rules. Marnie tells Sophie they have to try and open the portal themselves, even though Halloween has passed. The portal didn’t always exist so it must be able to be reopened. There isn’t a spell to do this, so they’ll have to make it up themselves. With enough magic and belief, Marnie, Luke, and Aggie on one side in Halloweentown, and Dylan and Sophie in the mortal world, recite the spell together, eventually leading to the portal between the two worlds reopening. Marnie, Luke, and Aggie step through and confront Kal. She demands Aggie’s spellbooks back. Kal offers them up, covering them in electrified vines. Marnie believes that her good magic is stronger than Kal’s evil and manages to retrieve the books. Kal’s magic vines consume him and make him disappear in an electrified flash. Luke warns he’ll likely be back.
Aggie then finds the Creature Spell in her book and recites it backwards to reverse it. Luckily, the humans don’t remember anything of what just happened, thinking it was all some sort of prank for Halloween! Gwen is finally able to remove her mask and is reunited with her children. Marnie says now they can open portals between worlds whenever they want, she won’t have to choose between the two anymore. Aggie takes Marnie, Sophie, Dylan, and Luke back to Halloweentown with her, to finally reverse the grey spell. Even Dylan gets a go, returning Benny to his skeleton form. After the spell in Halloweentown has been reversed, the residents celebrate. Aggie then asks Marnie if the World Wide Web has anything to do with spiders. Marnie jokingly says maybe it’s time Aggie’s training started!
CHARACTERS & CAST
Unlike Halloweentown, where all the main cast work together in their fight against Kalabar, in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, the family is mostly split into two groups, kept apart by the new villain, Kal, with one side remaining in the mortal world, and the other team trapped in Halloweentown, trying to figure out how to stop Kal.
Marnie, now 15 years old, has clearly begun to mature as a witch, wanting to spend more time with her grandmother Aggie in Halloweentown so she can continue her training. Aggie, although liking spending more time with her grandchildren by living with them in the mortal world, still misses Halloweentown, and can’t wait to return there. The plan is for the two of them to live in Halloweentown for a whole year soon so Marnie’s training can be completed. However, as fate would have it, and thanks to Marnie’s instant trust in a boy just because she has a crush on him, the two end up in Halloweentown earlier than they expected. On learning that Kal has used a “Grey Spell” on Halloweentown and its residents, turning everything dull and boring, Marnie and Aggie have to figure out how to stop Kal enacting the Creature Spell over in the mortal world, halting his plans to turn all humans into horrifying creatures. They believe they have a plan, but when they start searching for Aggie’s spellbook, in the home of junkman Gort, Aggie loses her powers and also turns grey, leaving Marnie to work out how to stop Kal basically on her own.
Luckily, and to avoid Marnie having to talk to herself for most of the movie, she does have goblin Luke to help her. Luke and Marnie first met at Halloweentown two years before, where Luke aided both Kalabar and then Marnie. Here, Luke is first under the Grey Spell, which Marnie manages to, accidentally, reverse. After that, Luke assists Marnie in her time travelling and search for the spellbook. When they realise there is no hope of getting the spellbook in Halloweentown, he encourages Marnie to shift her focus to reversing the Grey Spell, being instrumental in figuring out the word that reverses it, with Marnie sceptical that “apart” can even be a spell. He also helps Marnie and Aggie open the portal, with his belief that Marnie and Aggie’s powers can do so being his role, since Luke doesn’t have magic. Marnie then uses her strength and good magic to overcome Kal’s evil.
Kimberly J. Brown, Debbie Reynolds, and Phillip Van Dyke returned to reprise their roles as Marnie Piper, Aggie Cromwell, and Luke respectively for this sequel.
Meanwhile, in the mortal world, Marnie’s siblings Dylan and Sophie have to deal with their mother Gwen and her cynicism about magic. Despite Gwen seemingly accepting magic in her children’s lives at the end of Halloweentown, two years later, Gwen is back to hating magic and not being able to get on with her mother Aggie. She thinks that Aggie is turning her children, particularly Marnie and Sophie, against her, with plans to take Marnie away to Halloweentown forever, meaning a life as a mortal is no longer an option for her. Gwen finds herself distracted in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge by a man coming in to her life. She is quite taken with Alex, believed to be Kal’s father, and even when Dylan and Sophie work out that he is a creature called a golem, who will follow the orders of its master, in this case Kal, Gwen refuses to believe them – right up until Sophie tricks Alex into revealing his true identity by eating a fly. Then, and only then, does Gwen believe her children: that something very bad is going to happen if they don’t stop Kal. After Gwen gets turned into a monster by Kal’s spell, Dylan and Sophie are on their own. Until Marnie calls them via Aggie’s headphones, and convinces them to help her reopen the portal to the mortal world, despite Halloween technically being over and the portal closed. Thanks to Sophie’s strong magic, and Dylan’s eventual belief, this works. The two end their time in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge by helping Marnie and Aggie reverse the Grey Spell in Halloweentown.
Judith Hoag, Joey Zimmerman, and Emily Roeske all reprised their roles from the first movie here, as Gwen Piper, Dylan Piper, and Sophie Piper respectively.
Alongside the main cast, there were some new additions to the cast for this sequel. The most important of which is Kal. At the start of this movie, we are meant to believe that Kal is just an ordinary teenage boy who has moved into the same street as Marnie. But things are never that simple, and it is quickly revealed that Kal is a warlock, after he steals Aggie’s spellbook and opens a portal to Halloweentown. After trapping Marnie and Aggie in Halloweentown, he slowly reveals his plans to them, by appearing randomly, like in a concrete block and in Gort’s fireplace. Marnie quickly figures out that Kal tricked her into thinking he was just an ordinary boy who liked her, and works out that Kal is Kalabar’s son, a secret son that apparently nobody knew about. What did Kalabar do then, keep him in a basement or something? To be honest, that would explain a lot about Kal’s mental state… Anyway, Kal wants to enact revenge on the humans, for leaving all the residents of Halloweentown in exile, something that his father tried to do in the first Halloweentown. It’s unclear what he gains by turning the residents of Halloweentown human though, other than stopping Marnie from getting much help, I suppose… But as with most villains, his evil is thwarted by the good of the heroine, in this case, Marnie. She manages to reverse all his spells and retrieve both of Aggie’s spellbooks, causing Kal to be taken up by his evil magic and he vanishes, although we are led to believe Kal may one day return.
Kal was played by Daniel Kountz, who had previously been cast as Ray Wood in the Lifetime movie Fifteen and Pregnant (1998), starring alongside Kirsten Dunst, before his role in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. He later had guest roles in numerous television series in the early 2000s including Crossing Jordan (2001-07) and 3rd Rock from the Sun (1996-2001). Kountz now works as a realtor, doing acting projects from time to time as well. Apparently, some fans have commented on his listings before, saying things like “Don’t trust him. He’ll turn your house grey” [1]. This sounds quite funny if you’re a fan of this film, but is perhaps more irritating than amusing when it’s your career being commented on!
Kal’s “dad” in this movie is supposedly called Alex. Alex is just a cover for Kal, pretending to be a father and son who have recently moved house. Whilst Kal goes about casting his dark magic, Alex’s task is to distract Gwen Piper for as long as possible, because Kal knows, with Marnie and Aggie trapped in Halloweentown, Gwen is the only witch strong enough to defeat him in the mortal world. Had Sophie and Dylan not been so observant, and Sophie not had that whole “sixth sense” about sensing danger, this might’ve just worked, since Gwen is so against magic that she can’t even consider that magic may’ve come into her perfect mortal life. To be honest, Alex doesn’t even do a good job of pretending to be human; he’s so weird, I can’t see how Gwen didn’t see it. For example, Alex is overly focused on Gwen, something that is just stalker-like and not cute; he appears in a frog costume for Halloween – what adult man does that?; and he seems to leak frogs. This is because Sophie works out that Alex is a golem made of frogs, a golem being basically a slave, unable to think for itself and following commands. I guess Kal underestimated just how smart Marnie’s little sister is.
Peter Wingfield was cast as Alex, having appeared as Methos in Highlander: The Series (1992-98) from Season 2 onwards prior to his role here. He went on to appear as Dr. Ivan Slavicky in Catwoman (2004), and later was cast as Dan Clifford in the long-running British medical drama Holby City (1999-2022) from 2006 until 2009. After this role, Wingfield decided to transition from acting into the medical profession[2].
Another new character in this sequel, who is important to the plot, but not overly helpful to Marnie, is Gort. Gort lives in a very messy house in Halloweentown, surrounded by the town’s lost items. Unfortunately, his grumpy demeanour, and junk-filled life, are switched out when Gort comes under the Grey Spell. Instead, he is nice and has sold all the junk cluttering up his house. This isn’t helpful to Marnie and Aggie, who need to search his junk for the spellbook. Gort is more fixated on matching up socks, something that Aggie helps him with when she is hit by the Grey Spell too. Marnie then has to time travel back to an earlier time, where Gort hadn’t sold everything. But when they arrive at Gort’s house in the past, he does not want trespassers there, and orders Marnie and Luke to leave. He only allows them to stay when he hears that in the future, he will become clean and organised, something that Gort does not want to ever happen to him! Gort is a fun addition to the cast, especially as he hinders the mission to defeat Kal without even knowing it or even trying. He just wants to live alone with his junk. Is that so much to ask?
Gort was played by Blu Mankuma, who has had a career in voice acting, voicing characters in animated series like Spider-Man Unlimited (1999-2001) and Sonic Underground (1999), as well as voicing the character Bubba in Firehouse Tales (2005-06) for Cartoon Network. A random cast credit which especially interests me as a big fan of Disney’s The Santa Clause movies is that Mankuma appears as John Pierce, one of the teachers at the faculty Christmas party who receives the game Toss Across in the Secret Santa, in The Santa Clause 2 (2002).
Finally, Benny the cab driver makes a return for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. However, he is not a skeleton anymore, and therefore not an animatronic robot as he was in Halloweentown, because Benny has been turned human by the Grey Spell. He is also no longer full of jokes and laughs, instead being a very slow cab driver with nothing very interesting to say. Richard Side was cast as Benny. Side went on to create, write, and produce the Canadian radio comedy show The Debaters (2006).
MUSIC
Unlike Halloweentown, which relied solely on its musical score as its soundtrack, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge incorporates some pop music for use in its party sequences, as well as a song for its End Credits. This is the case for the majority of other Disney Channel Original Movies, where pop music is playing as background noise for some scenes and sequences. However, most DCOMs, especially not more recent ones, do not credit most of the songs used in their films, whereas Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge has credited them, despite not ever releasing an official soundtrack for the film.
This list of songs should have made it easier for me to work out what song is playing when, however, that has not been the case, as much of the party music is not audible, and many of the songs are unavailable to listen to online and away from the movie, so I’ve been unable to match most of them to a scene.
But I have worked out a couple. The most obvious song used is “Witches Brew”, written by Scott Urguhart, and performed by Casper, because this is the End Credits song that plays right at the end of Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. It’s a pretty decent song, and sounds like something you’d hear in a DCOM. And I mean that in a good way.
When Dylan and Sophie first arrive at the school Halloween party, the song “Radio Rainbow” is playing. This song was written by Melissa Lefton, Scott Spock, Graham Edwards, and Lauren Christy. It was performed by Melissa Lefton. This track should have appeared on Lefton’s album Melicious, due for release in August 2001, but the album was cancelled and never officially released. Two other tracks from the album, “My Hit Song” and “I Love Life” did appear in the movies On the Line (2001) and The Princess Diaries (2001) respectively, and were included on those movies’ soundtracks.
Outside of that, four other songs are credited, which must either be playing during the Pipers’ Halloween party at their house at the start of the movie, or at the school Halloween party. However, as these songs are not particularly audible, or have no real obvious lyrics matching them to the song titles listed in the credits, and they are not available online to listen to, I don’t know which one appears in which scene. But for anyone interested, the song, “The Lesson”, written and performed by Albert Fox, is credited. Musician and composer Fox has gone on to work alongside Mark Mothersbaugh, composer of the score for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, on the music for TV series like Summer Camp Island (2018-23) for Cartoon Network, What We Do in the Shadows (2019-24) and Time Bandits (2024) for Apple TV+.
Two further songs were written by Stanley A. Smith for the movie, and these are titled “All The Way” and “Let’s Party”. Smith also co-wrote the other credited song “Girlfriend” with J. A. Manges, with this song being performed by The Sha-Shees. Stanley A. Smith continued to write and produce music for other DCOMs including The Luck of the Irish (2001), with J. A. Manges; Double Teamed (2002); and Tru Confessions (2002). He also composed the music for the TV series The Bernie Mac Show (2001-06) and the sitcom Are We There Yet? (2010-13). The Sha-Shees are credited as performing songs for other DCOMs as well, such as “Back N’ Forth” for Get a Clue (2002), and “You Can Do It” from The Other Me (2000).
Returning to compose the score for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge after his work on Halloweentown was Mark Mothersbaugh. Mothersbaugh went on to write the music for various films, including animated movies like Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and its 2013 sequel; all four of the Hotel Transylvania films; and some of the LEGO film franchise, like The LEGO Movie (2014) and its 2019 sequel. He also wrote the music for comedy movies like Happy Gilmore (1996), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), 21 Jump Street (2012) and 22 Jump Street (2014), amongst many other credits.
Although the score for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge was not publicly released, with the Halloweentown score only being made available in 2023 for the film’s 25th anniversary, there is one track from the Halloweentown soundtrack that actually only appears in the sequel. This track is “Benny’s Cab”, which plays as Benny the cab driver is called to take Marnie, Aggie, and Luke over to Aggie’s house so they can search for her spellbook and reverse Kal’s Grey Spell. You can also hear the well-known Halloweentown theme tune right at the start of Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, as Marnie recounts the events of the first movie and catches viewers up on the two years in between.
PRODUCTION
With the success of Halloweentown, and a myriad of possibilities for a new story, it was likely that a sequel would shortly come to Disney Channel. Well, it took three years, so it wasn’t turned around as quickly as other Disney Channel DCOM sequels, but it wasn’t a long wait.
Jon Cooksey and Ali Matheson, co-writers of Halloweentown, returned to work on Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, making the story darker with a very determined villain to go up against Marnie. Cooksey and Matheson had previously worked on the original Rugrats (1991-2004) before co-writing Halloweentown, and went on to create the Canadian supernatural drama series The Collector (2004-06) together.
To go alongside this new story, complete with scary monsters and riskier conditions, like being trapped in Halloweentown forever, a new director was brought in for Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. This director was Mary Lambert, who directed the horror movie Pet Sematary (1989), based on the 1983 Stephen King novel, and its 1992 sequel. It would seem that Disney Channel wanted a director who wasn’t afraid to make this Disney Channel movie a little bit edgier, and Lambert succeeded in that. I would say it is the scariest of the four movies. Outside of that, Lambert had also directed various music videos such as Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” and “Like a Prayer” and Janet Jackson’s “Nasty” and “Control” in the 1980s prior to working on Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. More recently, Lambert has directed the Netflix Christmas films A Castle for Christmas (2021) and Best. Christmas. Ever! (2023).
Another change of direction for the sequel was that filming did not take place in St. Helens, Oregon again, despite this being the setting for Halloweentown itself, somewhere that the characters return to in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge. It would seem that Fantasy Gardens, in Richmond, British Columbia, in Canada was chosen as the new location of Halloweentown for this second film. It does feature a lot of red-brick buildings which transport the area to a different time, like Halloweentown is supposed to make you feel, however, only a tiny area was used for filming and it lacked all the colour and whimsy of St. Helens, making it only too obvious that the filming locations between the two movies were quite different. The rest of the movie was filmed in other areas of British Columbia, Canada. It is not known why filming was moved to Canada, though I would assume it had something to do with budgets or tax. There are plenty of Disney Channel movies filmed in Canada nowadays, so had Halloweentown not been such an iconic location, this may’ve gone unnoticed by viewers, but it was noticed and criticised by some.
Most sequels like to inject some more energy by adding new characters, and Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge is no different. Although it would perhaps have seemed like Kalabar was returning, given the title, it was in fact his son Kal who would be enacting the revenge. Speaking of the title, I noticed in the credits of Halloweentown that Kalabar was spelt “Calabar”. For the sequel, I had assumed that an official spelling of this character name was confirmed as “Kalabar” given the title, but no, you’ll still see “Calabar” in the End Credits. Weird…
Anyway, back to Kal. Obviously, Daniel Kountz was cast as Kal, however, there was a chance that Jared Padalecki, who was cast as Dean Forester in Gilmore Girls (2000-07) around this time, could’ve been hired instead, as Kountz remembered seeing Padalecki at the Disney building when he went for his final audition. But not being cast as Kal didn’t slow Padalecki’s career down, as he went on to appear as Trey in the Mary-Kate and Ashley film New York Minute (2004) and be cast as Sam Winchester in the series Supernatural (2005-20). He also starred as Cordell Walker in the crime drama series Walker (2021-24) for The CW. Kimberly J. Brown couldn’t comment on this casting, as she stated she did not screen test with either Padalecki or Kountz, only meeting Kountz just before filming commenced.
Kountz enjoyed his time working on Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge and remembered a specific time with Debbie Reynolds during a night shoot. Kountz said it was around 1am and the cast were all so tired, so Reynolds decided she’d be the one to bring up the energy in the room with her spirit and joy. Kountz said she always had so much energy on set, dancing, singing, and telling jokes. Everyone loved working with her, and the whole cast still reflect on how special it was to have worked with a true legend in the industry[3].
Another moment Kountz remembered from the set was that although the Creature Spell was scripted, the spell where Kal opens the portal to Halloweentown after stealing Aggie’s spellbook from the Piper house was not. Kountz initially read in the script that Kal would say a spell at this point, but he believed it would be written for him by the time of the shoot. However, it was not, and director Mary Lambert asked if he was ready with his spell just before shooting the scene. Not wanting to look unprofessional, Kountz had to improvise something, and used a German song from his choir days as inspiration[4].
RECEPTION
Following in the Disney Channel tradition of releasing lots of new, vaguely spooky content for Halloween, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge premiered on the channel in the US on 12th October 2001, three years after Halloweentown first debuted on Disney Channel.
On its premiere date, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge drew in 6.1 million viewers, this being almost double that of Halloweentown which reached 3.4 million[5]. Although many viewing figures are not available for most of the DCOMs released in the late 1990s and early 2000s, it would appear that Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge was the most-viewed DCOM premiere at this time. This is likely due to the fact that Halloweentown was so loved on its release that many fans of the first movie were eager to see a sequel, as well as Disney Channel improving their original movie content within those three years.
Although both Halloweentown and its sequel received many positive comments, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge does seem to have more negative reviews than Halloweentown has. For example, fans of Halloweentown were quick to notice the filming location for Halloweentown in the sequel was not the same, with the area being much smaller and not looking anything like Halloweentown in the first movie, even after the Grey Spell was removed. It was small and didn’t look as whimsical or special, taking away some of that enjoyment and magic that viewers felt watching the ornately decorated town in Halloweentown. There were also fewer interesting settings in Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge compared to the first, as most of the action takes place in the Pipers’ house, Aggie’s house, Gort’s house, and the school gymnasium. This probably has a lot to do with the location being moved from the picturesque town of St. Helen’s in Oregon to Canada. The story was criticised for some obvious plot holes as well, such as if time travel was such a big part of the story, then why such a race to get back in time for the portal. Others also said that in Halloweentown, we are told that time works differently between the two realms, with time moving slower in Halloweentown, and yet it would appear time is moving at the same pace in the sequel. I didn’t really pay attention to that and just assumed they were using Marnie’s watch to keep track of the time. Maybe they had been in Halloweentown for longer than just those four hours. But I don’t like to think about plot holes too much to be honest.
Another point to mention is that by 2001, more young viewers had been able to read the first Harry Potter novel and this meant there were more comparisons between the two. Obviously now most people have seen or read all the Harry Potter movies or books so there would be comparisons, but it is important to remember that the film Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone did not come to theatres until November 2001, so after Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge premiered, meaning that Harry Potter had not reached a wide audience so Disney Channel wouldn’t have stolen any story ideas by this point, though of course, viewers could still see Halloweentown as lesser than Harry Potter.
Moving on to the positive comments. Many enjoyed returning to these characters and felt that it was a decent sequel, if not a great one. The story was said to be more mysterious and spookier than Halloweentown’s, which I agree with. I felt that Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge had a lot more at stake than Halloweentown, with the villain going some way to enacting his plan, whereas Kalabar didn’t have much chance to do anything at all. Halloweentown seemed to be introducing a world to viewers, whereas with the sequel, they could explore the battle between light and dark magic more. Fans of the Halloweentown series like to look back on these films with nostalgia, saying that Disney Channel don’t make movies like this anymore, however, no doubt if you were watching Disney Channel in the late 2000s and during the High School Musical era, you’d think that time was the best, like I do.
Much like Halloweentown, despite not receiving awards for the movie itself, Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge saw two of its young stars nominated for their performances, both at the Young Artist Awards. Kimberly J. Brown was nominated once again for Best Performance in a TV Movie (Comedy or Drama): Leading Young Actress for her role as Marnie, with Joey Zimmerman, who played Dylan, being nominated in the Supporting Young Actor category.
LEGACY
Following on from Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge was a further sequel, and the third film in the franchise, Halloweentown High, which was released in 2004. However, I don’t think it is unfair to say that Halloweentown and Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge feel like a complete series, with some cast members not returning for the third film, or their roles being lessened. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that the first two movies were released as a double-feature on DVD. The two also frequently air on the channel Freeform over the Halloween season during Freeform’s 31 Nights of Halloween event, along with numerous other Disney and other family-friendly Halloween movies. These are the only two in the Halloweentown series to make the 2025 schedule.
Potentially the most exciting pop culture moment to come from Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge though is that Kimberly J. Brown, who played Marnie, and Daniel Kountz, who played Kal, have since gotten married. This has been a very exciting moment for fans, especially since Marnie and Kal are enemies in the sequel movie. The two have appeared at events and conventions together, with other members of the cast, where they talk about their experience working on the Halloweentown movies, as well as their relationship’s effect on Halloweentown fans.
Brown and Kountz love seeing how much these movies have meant to people and are proud to have been even a small part of these people’s childhoods. They have also both poked fun at how strange their relationship may look to those who have watched Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, with Brown posting a video showing herself watching her character Marnie say “I’m in control of my future and it doesn’t include you” to Kal from the film. Brown then comments “Well, this is awkward” as Daniel Kountz walks in to the room behind her, which obviously references the fact that Brown’s future clearly does involve Kountz since they were engaged at this point in 2022[6]. The pair reconnected after meeting up in 2016 for a spoof video for Brown’s YouTube Channel where a reporter catches up with Kal as he waits to be released from a rehab facility for evil witches and warlocks[7]. Brown and Kountz married in 2024 and a year later, the two acted together in Haul Out the Halloween (2025), a new addition to the Haul Out the Holly movie series for Hallmark, starring Lacey Chabert and Wes Brown. The film premiered on 11th October 2025. I would’ve liked to have seen it but the UK don’t have the Hallmark Channel, and I don’t trust VPNs, so I guess I’ll have to see if it pops up somewhere here next year.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Personally, I think Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge is marginally better than Halloweentown, because of its stronger and more engaging story, with a devious villain who gets quite close to achieving his evil plans.
The sequel had almost double the viewers who tuned into the premiere of its predecessor, showing that, although there was a three-year gap between the two films, the appetite and interest for Halloweentown stories was still there, making a third film seem obvious and extremely likely.
Watching both Halloweentown and Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge, sometimes back-to-back, over the Halloween season has become a tradition of many. With this tradition, these two movies will be viewed by current and future generations for years to come.
REFERENCES
[1] Credit: Christi Carras, ’22 years ago, ‘Halloweentown’ became a spooky classic. Its stars still feel the love’, LATimes.com, 30th October 2020.
[2] Credit: Jake Penkethman, ‘REAL LIFE: I starred on Holby City for three years, now I’m practising medicine for real reveals former star’, TheSun.co.uk, 15th June 2023.
[3] Credit: Kelly Martinez and Alexia Fernández, ‘Kimberly J. Brown Admits She and Daniel Kountz ‘Never Sat and Watched’ the ‘Halloweentown’ Movies (Exclusive)’, People.com, 17th September 2023.
[4] Credit: Stacey Grant, ’23 Surprising DCOM Secrets Even Die-Hard Fans Didn’t Know’, Seventeen.com, 25th October 2017.
[5] Credit: Denise Martin, ‘Disney bewitches young aud’, Variety.com, 23rd October 2006.
[6] Credit: Tamantha Gunn, ‘Kimberly J. Brown and Daniel Kountz Poking Fun at “Awkward” Halloweentown II Scene Is Pure Magic’, EOnline.com, 27th September 2022.
[7] Credit: Kimberly J. Brown, ‘“Realm Are They Now?” Following Up w/Kal from Halloweentown’, Kimberly J. Brown Official YouTube Channel, 29th September 2016.
The Disney Purist 