'Halloweentown 5' in Early Development at Disney Channel and Disney+

Disney Channel gave an entire generation some fairly unreasonable expectations about Halloween. Finding out your grandmother was a witch meant getting to follow her home to a town full of monsters, where being obsessed with the holiday was completely normal. Halloweentown understood the appeal immediately, and Debbie Reynolds made a very convincing argument for sneaking onto that bus.

The original movie was released in 1998 and introduced Kimberly J. Brown as Marnie Piper and Reynolds as her grandmother, Aggie Cromwell. Three sequels followed, taking Marnie from discovering her powers to attending college at Witch University. But the movies stopped in 2006, leaving the franchise without a new installment for two decades.

That could finally change. TheWrap reports that a fifth Halloweentown movie is in early development at Disney Channel and Disney+, with Lily Houghton and Ryan Koehn developing the screenplay. The new movie will use the characters created by Paul Bernbaum, although Disney has yet to reveal what would bring the Cromwell family back together. Houghton comes to the project after writing Forbidden Fruits, this year's horror comedy starring Lili Reinhart and Lola Tung, while Koehn's credits include working as a writer on the Gossip Girl reboot. With the script still in development, there is no release date to put on the calendar, and the biggest question for longtime fans remains unanswered: Who is playing Marnie?

Will Kimberly J. Brown Return for 'Halloweentown 5'?

Brown played Marnie in Halloweentown, Halloweentown 2: Kalabar's Revenge, and Halloweentown High. Sara Paxton then took over the role in Return to Halloweentown, making the fourth movie the only installment without its original lead. Neither actress has been announced for the fifth movie, so Brown's return is still something fans can hope for, rather than something Disney has officially announced. There might be no announcement regarding who will bring Marnie to the screen again, but Brown has already made her position pretty clear. Speaking in an interview earlier this month, Brown said, "I have told Disney I'm down." Her willingness to return does not confirm her involvement, but it does mean a reunion would have an enthusiastic original Marnie on the other end of the phone.

All four Halloweentown movies are streaming on Disney+.