THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
It took 40 years for Halloween to get a sequel that would be considered as an equal. Due to that film’s box office success, which surpassed the gross of the 2007 remake, it was a given for more sequels to come along.
PLOT
Halloween Kills takes place immediately after the events of the 2018 film. The Strodes (Laurie, Karen and Allyson) are heading to the hospital after surviving conflict from Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney/Nick Castle/Airon Armstrong). However, firefighters tend to put out the fire at Laurie’s home that was used to trap the slasher. Little did they know that he was still alive. He then takes advantage of escaping after killing every firefighter in his way. Deputy Frank Hawkins is found alive by Cameron Elam (Dylan Arnold), surviving Doctor Sartain’s attack. By the time he is taken to the hospital, Laurie recovers from an emergency surgery. The town gets alerted after Cameron alerts his father Lonnie, who encountered Myers as a child in ‘78, of what happened to Hawkins. Tommy Doyle, another person who survived Myers’ first attack, takes this chance to inspire the town to confront the Shape and end his reign of terror for good. The new mob includes: Lonnie, Lindsey Wallace and former nurse Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens), who also luckily survived their encounters against him. When the couple Vanessa (Carmela McNeal) and Marcus (Michael Smallwood) attempt to head home, mental patient Lance Tovoli (Ross Bacon), from the crashed bus, steals their car and crashes it. This incident makes everyone believe he is Myers because no one has seen him unmasked since he was a child. When Allyson finds out that her grandmother's tormentor is still out there, she plans to join her boyfriend and his father to avenge her now deceased father, Ray Nelson, against her mother's wish to stay in the hospital. Karen doesn't tell Laurie of the news, in order to allow her to recover. Michael continues to take more lives when killing the local caretaker Sondra (Diva Tyler) and her husband Phil (Larry Clarke). During the mob's search for him, Vanessa and Marcus join Chambers and Lindsey, finding an empty playground with two kids. Lindsey warns the kids to go home as they quickly see the Boogeyman reveal to take the life of another kid. He then kills Chambers, Vanessa and Charles, while Lindsey is able to successfully hide. Tommy does find her and takes her to the hospital. Since Allyson and the Elams arrived separately, they deduce that he is planning to return to his childhood home, that is now in the residence of the couple, Big John (Scott MacArthur) and Little John (Michael McDonald). By the time Tommy takes Lindsey to the hospital, he tells Laurie that Michael is still alive and does plan to stop him, getting her blessing in the process. She does plan to get up and hope to help,but Karen keeps her from leaving. Tovoli does get spotted by the mob in the hospital, but the Strodes are the only ones to notice that they are chasing the wrong man. Karen does try to help him escape from the chaos, but he chooses to take his life by jumping out the hospital window. She then decides to go with Tommy to find her daughter. As Laurie stays, Frank admits to failing to execute the Shape in '78: He inadvertently shot his partner Pete McCabe when encountering him and stopped Samuel Loomis (Tom Jones Jr./Colin Mahan) from shooting him down, allowing him to go into custody. She chooses to forgive him because she understood his intention to do the right thing. Allyson and the Elams do find the childhood home of the serial killer, only to discover the home owners to be killed. Cameron and Lonnie get killed by Myers as well and before he could do the same to Allyson, Karen saves her daughter by stabbing him from behind with a pitch fork and stomping on his head. Knowing that he'll get up, she takes off his mask and lures him to another trap: He gets beaten by Tommy's mob which included officer Leigh Brackett (Charles Cyphers), father to the deceased Annie. After being beaten, stabbed and shot, he still gets up and kills them all, including Tommy. This is only possible because according to Laurie, he only gets stronger with the more people he kills. Karen recalls the story of his endless gaze from the bedroom that formerly belonged to his sister Judith. She goes up to the same room, only to be killed by Michael. Just as Laurie looks out the hospital window, the film ends with Myers looking out Judith's window once again.
THOUGHTS
I could've taken the chance to check this out in theaters, but I have been so used to watching the entire series at home, I caved and subscribed to Peacock for this film. Was it worth it? I totally think so. You can easily look at this as another typical slasher film where our villainous star is more violent than ever. However, the team of Jason Blum, David Gordon Green, Danny McBride & Scott Teems make it hit different. It does so because this time, we finally see Haddonfield as a whole, how other citizens handled the trauma from ‘78. I found it to be a smart direction that kept me invested. It knew when to get gruesome, while also laying out its emotional impact. That impact hits in a big way when calling out the ramifications of mob mentality. Seeing what happened to Tovoli reminds us that we all want to stand up for what we believe in, but we also have to consider how we approach it. Then again, we're still here because of the Boogeyman himself. Seeing the resilient aspect of him, resembling the supernatural form, is not something I was expecting. I didn't mind it because maintaining the mystery of him still works. Aside from him, we still have a good cast that holds this movie down as well. Laurie Strode is on the bench due to her injuries, but Jamie Lee Curtis reminds us through her performance that her determination to stop her tormentor will never go away. I do wish she had another chance to intervene, but her sitting out on the action made sense because no one is immortal here. Judy Greer displays Karen at her most conflicted: She finally understood how dangerous Michael is firsthand and because of that experience, she wants to avoid him as much as possible rather than finishing him off, like her mother would have. She is afraid to take a risk, but realizes that they are sometimes worth taking. Her death definitely caught me off guard because it happened so fast, it's hard to process what you see, like 1960's Psycho. It is a bummer that she is gone, but what matters at this point is that her daughter is safe until Michael makes his next move. Speaking of which, Andi Matichak shows Allyson at her most determined. With her father gone, she refuses to allow the terror continue to reign any longer and becomes as strong willed as her grandmother. She may have not finished off Michael, but only time will tell on how she'll pull it off. Frank Hawkins is another character who shows to be highly conflicted. From the flashback, the young Thomas Mann shows him to be confused with morals after one accident changing his life. And the returning Will Patton expressing such regret that we fully understand. Having said that, it disappoints me that he didn't have a bigger role in Halloween Ends. Since I'm mentioning the flashback scene, I gotta say it was cool seeing Jim Cummings appear as Pete McCabe. I loved him in Thunder Road and I appreciate that Hollywood has taken notice of him. Going into his performance, I believe he owned it as a knowledgeable person who knew something was off with young Michael. From his eyes, he spoke the most volume. When Michael first cornered him, he felt the fear Judith had and when Hawkins accidentally, you can tell he understood it was all an accident. Since this timeline only evolves around the original film and nothing else before the 2018 sequel, it made sense that minor characters would make an impact as well. Kyle Richards is the only child actor from the first film to return to the series and it was a pleasant surprise, while the others were respectively re-casted. She's not a timid girl anymore because this time, despite the fear she has deep down, she chooses to be brave like Laurie and stand up. I didn't think she'd last when her group got slaughtered but when she smacked Michael with a pillowcase full of bricks, I wanted her to live forever. Lonnie was a minor character from the first film that I didn't think I would care about until now. Due to his new backstory, we feel through the performances of young Tristian Eggerling and older Robert Longstreet that acting tough doesn't mean you really are such. The character learned that the hard way in '78, become haunted by it in the process. When Michael came around, you bet your ass that he overcame his fear when confronting him, although he lost his life in the process. Last but not least, Anthony Michael Hall depicts Tommy as the most vigilant of the survivors. He comes off the most traumatized that night because he wished he was capable of doing something about it instead of running. 40 years later, he got his chance to be a leader like his babysitter once was to him. Although he briefly loses control of the mob, you respect how he inspires the town to take a stand. His death bummed me out the most because you just wished he had his chance to feel complete. With him gone, there really is no telling if the town of Haddonfield will take another stand if Michael attacks again after this. Despite enjoying myself, I can admit that this has as much flaws as any other slasher sequel. Like I don’t want to hate on Marion Chambers, but she is unable to drive the plot like the other returning characters. I don’t understand how she befriended with the others when she never met them that night. And her saying “This is for Loomis” is a stupid reference to The Curse of Michael Myers because it ain’t even canon. Meaning, Michael didn’t kill him in this timeline. So it doesn’t make sense for her to say that. The trippiest part of the opening has to be how Michael first avoids Hawkins in '78? Did he hop over the fence or did he unlock and lock it back? I can't help asking since he doesn't make a sound when he walks away from him. I then wonder how close is Sondra from Laurie's house? Whenever we saw her house in the last film, it looks isolated from the neighborhood. With that being said, it's hard to believe her husband saw the fire when they're likely miles away from each other. I even want to laugh if Tommy being concerned of Lonnie having unpermitted guns because it didn't add up. He was willing to bash Michael with a baseball bat before he even knew he was aiming at the wrong guy. Also, why would Sheriff Dorsey (Omar Dorsey) or Deputy Graham (Brian F Durkin) think it was a good idea to tell the Strodes that Michael survived the fire? If you want to contain the situation, start with not telling the victims of what’s happening, to avoid the panic. Michael getting jumped was a cool callback to The Return of Michael Myers, but how did no one else aim for damaging his brain? Karen does stomp on him, but no one thinks about decapitating him or even shooting his head like Hawkins did. I don't want Allyson want to die, but I can't be the only one who thought she should've died after Michael smashed her head. Seeing how strong he is, it is hard for me to believe he didn't kill her. And why were Big and Little John unaware of the news that Michael was in the area? Everyone had a wireless emergency alert on their cellphones, so they had to know something. Especially since they live in his childhood home, they should’ve had some kind of concern. I've said before that I hate continuity errors, so you can expect my head exploding when Michael is grabbing Marion's head from above the car roof, you can see a ring in his finger, when we all know he ain't a married man. The stunt man should've put that away and he knows that because that ruined it for me. I want to respect Lonnie wanting to have a numbers advantage on Michael, but I don't like that he was comfortable with Allyson and Cameron sticking around. If he really wanted to minimize casualties, don't get the teens involved. I wanted to enjoy Lindsey connecting with Tommy when she got rescued, but it would've been more sweet if it was seeing them on the road having that conversation because they were wasting time. Lindsey may have not a severe injury compared to Laurie, but they could've ran into Michael again and they would've been screwed. And why would painkillers be left in the open for Laurie to take without permission? It's pretty pointless since she doesn't leave the hospital at all. It was cool that Michael knocked on both doors of his house to sneak in, but how did he get up the stairs without making any noise? He is strong enough to climb up them, but I don't think he go that far to be stealth. That's more confusing than neither Big or Little John hear the trash can get knocked over when he snuck in. And if it couldn't get any more stupid, neither of them make a break for it when they know he's dangerous. Even if they didn't know yet it was him, it's safer to run than to defend your home. That is more annoying than Tommy not warning them that he came back. And lastly, I was indeed caught off guard that Michael would get the jump on Karen, but how did he sneak in for the second time without anyone noticing? I mean one officer should’ve kept an eye on her to avoid her getting killed. That confused me more than Karen being able to figure out where Allyson went since she didn't seem to contact her whereabouts the whole time. That is way too lucky of a guess. However, I still think you can have a good time, once you ignore all of these flaws. To wrap up, Halloween Kills is a pretty wild sequel that lives up to the name. As a fan of this slasher series, check this out when you can.
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