Halloween Ends (2022)

Score: 4 / 5

It's all over. Forty years after the original masterpiece, David Gordon Green revealed his revamped vision of what happens to the archetypal Final Girl after a lifetime of dealing with her trauma. And while designing a trilogy isn't groundbreaking these days, his approach to this franchise was certainly different than the onslaught of reboots, remakes, and requels of classic slasher horror that has dominated the genre for the last decade or so. As a planned trilogy, he could plan out exactly his brilliant steps: first, to fashion a Halloween that ensnared fans of the original due to proper character development and a straightforward and highly effective plot, and second, to then push the franchise to the edge of the possible and completely shock everyone with awe (and gore). And then, finally, to end it all. But how? Surely going into this film I wondered if it would be an all-out, balls-out brawl between Laurie Strode and Michael Myers. But certainly that isn't sustainable for a feature film, not least because the characters are much older than most horror protagonists. So what to do?

In what I think is a genius turn, here the writers continue their spin outward from Michael. First, we saw his evil firsthand and its impact on one woman and her family in a tightly wound exploration of generational trauma. Then, in Halloween Kills, we got the consummate slasher film about Michael, in which his evil is at its peak and radiates throughout Haddonfield, infecting others and leading them to mob violence and chaos. No doubt partly due to the pandemic, the final installment feels detached. While it would have been nice to have all three taking place on the same night, or even having this one take place on November 1, I'm okay with the bit of a break because it allows the characters to actually demonstrate growth and development. So this film picks up four years later as Laurie and her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) are fully settled into their new life together. But instead of just making yet another slasher in which Michael escapes, arrives, hunts, and disappears, here the filmmakers decide to pull the most unexpected and -- crucially -- realistic ending for these characters they possibly could have.

If Michael is pure evil, as several characters in the franchise have exclaimed over the years, then it stands to reason that he cannot die, try as Tommy and his mob did to prove otherwise in the previous film. You can't just have another installment where they fight and maybe finally Laurie figures out a surefire way to kill him. I mean, in some ways, that does indeed happen in Halloween Ends, and their final fight is pretty brutal to watch. But the bulk of this film, by far, is about the nature of evil and how something like Michael happened in the first place. Thankfully, they didn't go back in time and try to create an origin story for him or try to explain his motivations, his methodology, or even his uncanny ability to bounce back from deadly injuries.

Instead, we're introduced to a new character, Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell), who in the first scene is babysitting on Halloween night in Haddonfield. The year is 2019, a full year after Haddonfield's cozy neighborhood streets ran red with blood, and the town has not recovered. Fears of "the boogeyman" are more gripping than ever, yet the parents Corey is sitting for are unwinding a different way, heading to a party nearby. Corey's charge is a spoiled little brat who wants to watch inappropriately scary movies and play practical jokes; when one goes terribly awry, the kid accidentally falls to his death and Corey is immediately suspected of murder. This simple and chilling opening scene sets up what could be an annoying way to continue the franchise with a new baddie, as many pessimistic viewers will surely roll eyes about, but it works damn well as a reminder that this is kind of how the first one started back in 1978.

I still hate that Laurie's daughter Karen (Judy Greer) got killed off so unceremoniously and violently. I don't really understand how Laurie went from a paranoid survivalist to a thriving suburban house mom (house grandmother, I guess) in only four years during a pandemic and while Michael is clearly still out and about. I don't really understand how Michael survived four years in the sewers without getting caught or leaving or finishing what he started. But these points aside, I found the shifting focus onto Corey to be refreshing and terrifying, not unlike what we've seen in other sympathize-with-the-devil films lately like Joker. A bad thing happened to Corey -- who may or may not be slightly predisposed to some behavioral problems, as early scenes arguably suggest in vague, veiled ways -- and as a result, Haddonfield created a new monster. Michael's slaughter of no fewer than 31 people the previous year made everyone primed to see monsters; now they picked one, and between the hurting, angry parents and the anxious, angry bullies at school, they work in sync to vilify a lone boy who doesn't really fit in and can't quite catch a break.

So when an injured and scared Corey stumbles across the boogeyman in a drainpipe, it's not without some fascination that we see Michael Myers tolerate his presence and even coordinate attacks with him. In a twisted mentorship situation, Michael shows Corey his M.O. and encourages the young man to satisfy his violent urges in cruel and vicious ways. Meanwhile, Corey continues to date Allyson, whose own teenage rebellion lets her finally get to be a bit of a "bad girl" after living in her mother's perfect house and now her grandmother's overwrought attempts at cookie-cutter normalcy. It's not a very believable romance, and the two actors leave quite a bit to be desired, but it's a solid storytelling device.

I found this film, compared with the previous two, to be less focused dramatically but perhaps more focused thematically. I also found its editing and cinematography to be less effective and even occasionally lazy; one wonders if larger portions of this film fell to the cutting room floor during production, or if the writers had too many ideas and didn't prune properly. As a Halloween film, it's not really up to par with the others. But thank goodness for that, because another rote flick in the franchise would have killed it in a bad way. And it does have a badass fight between Jamie Lee Curtis and The Shape, so there's always that lovely inclusion. As a horror thriller about the creation of a new villain, it's really quite wonderful and unexpected. And I think that's the most satisfying way to end the franchise: something fresh and interesting that reinforces the series' concept of evil. It is impossible and unknowable and unpredictable, and most importantly, it is very catching.