According to actor Stephen Lang, Don’t Breathe 2 will see Norman Nordstrom, a.k.a The Blind Man, pay for his sins. Lang donned the role of The Blind Man for the first time in Fede Alvarez’s 2016 home invasion thriller, Don’t Breathe. The film carved its way into the imaginations of horror fans not only because of Gulf War veteran Norman’s brutal kills but also for the dark secret lurking in his basement.
The original Don’t Breathe centered its story on a trio of cat burglars in run-down suburban Detroit who break into Norman’s house to steal the settlement money he received when a rich girl accidentally killed Norman’s daughter in a hit and run. Retreating into his basement when Norman wakes up, Alex (Dylan Minnette) and Rocky (Jane Levy) are horrified to discover that Norman has kidnapped the rich girl who killed his daughter and impregnated her against her will to provide a replacement for his daughter. Norman later attempts to force the same fate upon Rocky when the girl is accidentally shot but is thwarted by Alex, allowing Rocky to escape with the money and get out of Detroit.
Now, with Don’t Breathe 2 bringing even more brutality to theaters on August 13, Stephen Lang believes that the sequel will force The Blind Man (who we now know as Norman) to reckon with the evil of his past. The new film will see Norman take center stage to rescue a young girl when a group of unknown criminals kidnaps her, and in a recent interview with Comicbook.com, Lang explained that this journey would balance out Norman’s moral scale by the time the credits roll. Lang said:
Norman has his issues. Norman is troubled, definitely. I think that the Norman of the new, of the sequel … He certainly has gone through the fire. He’s learned some very hard lessons. It seems to me that he’s paid, to an extent, for some of his sins. He hasn’t paid fully, the price is not fully paid. Hopefully, it is by the end of this.
One significant change that Don’t Breathe 2 makes from its predecessor is the change in focus from Rocky to Norman. Though it’s unclear if Norman will fully ascend to the level of hero in Don’t Breathe 2, the marketing has thus far positioned him as the sequel’s protagonist in the sense that he’s the central focus of the movie. This framing has raised questions among some fans as to whether audiences are meant to forget the sins from the previous film and allow him to seek some redemption, particularly because Don’t Breathe’s twist was arguably designed to prevent us from siding with Norman against Rocky’s crew in the first place.
Lang’s comments do raise further questions about how Norman may pay for his sins. Allowing him to atone for what he did in the first film fully could be too big of a pill to swallow for some fans, with some wondering if a face turn for Norman goes against Don’t Breathe‘s original concept. Other fans, however, may welcome Norman to the ranks of movie villains who become heroes if the bad guys in Don’t Breathe 2 prove just as bad (if not worse) than he was in the original. Knowing that the sequel will see Norman on a mission to rescue a surrogate daughter character, the film may force him to reckon with the one he already lost and the evil he committed to try and replace her. Audiences will see exactly how Norman pays for his sins when Don’t Breathe 2 hits theaters on August 13.
Source: Comicbook.com
- Don’t Breathe 2 (2021)Release date: Aug 13, 2021
