Two years on from unleashing anarchy across the four corners of America, Universal and Blumhouse’s cult horror franchise returns in 2016 with the release of The Purge: Election Year, and a spine-chilling new trailer for the ultra-violent threequel released today heralds the country’s darkest night of the year.
Opening with serene shots of regular citizens pledging their support of the annual 12-hour event, if previous Purge movies danced around social commentary, Election Year is embracing its timely release window with two bloody hands.
Because once that emergency broadcast system is sounded, Washington D.C. is placed under lockdown, and it isn’t long before Elizabeth Mitchell’s Senator – one campaigning to bring about an end to the Purge – is being hunted by a pack of bloodthirsty crooks.
Returning to the fray for Election Year is Captain America: Civil War star Frank Grillo as Leo Barnes, the protagonist who took the moral high road two years ago and is aiming to start afresh as Mitchell’s stern head of security. But as today’s trailer attests, Barnes is soon left facing a desperate struggle for survival on a night when society is at risk of consuming itself whole and help is but a wishful afterthought.
Also starring Elizabeth Mitchell as the endangered Senator, Edwin Hodge, Betty Gabriel, JJ Soria and Mykelti Williamson, The Purge: Election Year is barrelling down on its July 1 release. Below, you’ll find the latest, evocative one-sheet.
Expanding the universe introduced in the hit franchise that electrified the culture and earned $200 million at the worldwide box office, Universal Pictures’ The Purge: Election Year reveals the next terrifying chapter that occurs over 12 hours of annual lawlessness sanctioned by the New Founders of America to keep this country great.
It’s been two years since Leo Barnes (Frank Grillo) stopped himself from a regrettable act of revenge on Purge Night. Now serving as head of security for Senator Charlie Roan (Elizabeth Mitchell), his mission is to protect her in a run for president and survive the annual ritual that targets the poor and innocent. But when a betrayal forces them onto the streets of D.C. on the one night when no help is available, they must stay alive until dawn…or both be sacrificed for their sins against the state.