The linked THR interview discusses the endings of the Pumpkinhead films.
A town for monsters, a different room for suspense
In an October 18 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, filmmaker Jem Garrard and Tubi executive Josh Van Houdt explain their connected R.L. Stine films. Redhaven links monster stories including Afraid of Clowns; The Babysitter moves into young-adult suspense.
The interesting distinction is creative rather than administrative. A town that can accommodate different monsters offers one kind of continuity. A teenager left responsible for somebody else's home offers another kind of fear altogether. Trying to sell both through a single, undifferentiated promise of more horror would miss what makes them useful companions. The monster movie encourages discovery; the babysitting thriller makes an ordinary responsibility feel dangerously beyond your competence.
What the pumpkin guts actually tell us
The interview's discussion of permissible vegetable gore gets to a surprisingly serious question: what does a younger audience need to see? Garrard and Van Houdt describe working within a boundary that allows pumpkin innards rather than human blood. That is a practical restriction, but it can also push the filmmaking toward texture, timing and suggestion. A broken pumpkin can be comic and unpleasant at once. The image has somewhere to go beyond measuring how much damage a body can sustain.
Gremlins remains a useful comparison because its creatures are both threats and badly behaved comic performers. Their destructive energy creates a rhythm of anticipation and release. Coraline works differently: a welcoming alternative world becomes frightening through the conditions attached to its welcome. Neither model needs constant bloodshed to make a child feel that a situation has slipped out of control. The fear comes from recognizable desires turning into traps.
That is the real opportunity for these Stine films. A child wants independence, wants adults to listen, wants to solve a problem before admitting how bad it has become. Those wants can sustain a story. Recognizable book titles cannot do the same job by themselves. If the young characters become delivery systems for references their parents remember, the films will have preserved the packaging and misplaced the audience.
A shared world should not become homework
Garrard says the stories should remain accessible individually, while leaving room for returning characters. That matters more than the fashionable promise of a cinematic universe. For a first encounter with horror, narrative clarity is an asset. A viewer should be able to understand who is in danger, what they want and what choices remain, without remembering which cursed object appeared two films earlier.
Redhaven can provide continuity through places, local habits and a sense that ordinary life keeps brushing against something peculiar. That is a more inviting use of a shared setting than an endless chain of explanations. The town can become familiar while the particular danger changes. A cameo then rewards attention instead of charging an admission fee in prior knowledge.
The Babysitter tests the opposite skill: how long can one situation hold? The opening of When a Stranger Calls offers a useful comparison. The strength of that comparison lies in restricted information. A young person hears something, interprets it, tries to restore normality and discovers that the familiar room now has a different meaning. Suspense depends on controlling those changes, not simply adding louder interruptions. A phone call can make the room feel exposed without changing a single object inside it.
Different ages need different dramatic stakes
A monster adventure can let friends assemble a solution together. A babysitting story can isolate its protagonist precisely because she is supposed to be capable. Moving between those forms gives the adaptations a reason to exist beyond multiplying installments. It also creates a useful test: does each film understand the particular insecurity beneath its premise?
Tubi's plan sounds strongest where it treats Stine as a source of different dramatic engines. A shared town, a creature and an unanswered phone are not interchangeable attractions. Build each film around its own pressure, give its characters meaningful choices, and the connections can remain a pleasure. The universe will survive without another orientation session.