LET’S HOPE
Movie Review – Halloween Ends
Review by Ray Schillaci
I’m writing this as a warning to anyone considering renting or purchasing the new end of the trilogy of Halloween. All the hate that was leveled at Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (some of which was not deserved) should be redirected with a double salvo of disgust to Halloween Ends. The 2018 Halloween was a great direct sequel to the original classic written by Jeff Fradley, Danny McBride and David Gordon Green (who also directed). The sequel, concocted by Scott Teems, McBride and Green, had issues, but it still provided some scares and I decided to at least give it a pass for effort. But, this finale to the Michael Myers legacy is a complete waste of time and utter trash.
It took four writers, Paul Brad Logan, Chris Bernier, McBride and Green, to squeeze out this turd and they all must have been high when they were doing it. I can see the writing meetings or perhaps they were just scattershot ideas, grinding out how they had to come up with something really different as the cannabis clouds filled their room.
Let’s have more drama, more character development. What if we have Myers possess another twenty-something and have him go on a killing spree. Yeah, less Michael and more 20-something psycho, and then we’ll throw in a big climax with Jamie Lee vs. Michael! Yes, but it’s not a big climax. In fact it’s rather dull. The drama and character development feel like a really bad CW soap opera. And, the “new hook” with the young guy being possessed is the worst idea since Exorcist II: The Heretic.
Halloween Ends is so true to its title. The viewer just keeps asking, when the hell will this end? David Gordon Green’s final stab at the Halloween series is a limp-wristed back hand across the face of everyone who looks forward to a good scare. The only surprise is the beginning which feels so uncharacteristic from the other two films since it takes place in 2019 when a 21 year-old Corey Cunningham is babysitting a young prankster on Halloween and the night ends in disaster. It’s an effective shocker that almost feels like it belongs in another movie. Eventually, it feels like it was shoehorned in for the purposes of introducing us to the young man that will get possessed by Michael Myers.
How? Why? By this time, the writers don’t care and neither does the director. They are determined to make a slasher film with flimsy dramatic ties and characters we could care less about. It’s three years later, Haddonfield still feels the overwhelming dread provided by Michael Myers’ shadow even though no one has seen Myers for the last three years. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is writing a memoir (shades of the Scream franchise) and she’s bought a new house and is living with her granddaughter, Allyson, who is now working as a nurse.
From there it’s all downhill to maudlin territory. Allyson meets up with the much picked on Corey, the former babysitter. They are attracted to one another and go to a Halloween party where Corey is confronted by the woman he babysat for. This leads to a lame argument between Corey and Allyson. Corey leaves her and meets his bullies once again. He’s thrown off a bridge and dragged into a sewer where he encounters Michael Meyers, who for some reason does not kill him. They’ve somehow bonded. I kid you not.
What transpires afterward is a by-the-numbers “how to choose those needed to be killed.” The whole would-be slasher film from there is an after thought. You may be wondering when do we get to Laurie Strode? Oh yeah, she’s practically an afterthought as well while given more drama with her daughter and hints that she may have deeper feeling for Deputy Hawkins.
I can’t take much more of reminding myself how awful this movie was. David Gordon Green and his writers were given everything: a star, a sizable budget (32x more than X and Pearl, 7.3x more than Barbarian and 11/2x more than Smile) and a far bigger publicity budget than any of the other films mentioned. Yet, none of that inspired David Gordon Green and his writers to come up with anything better than regurgitated ideas that could not even amount to a decent horror trope.
Green has announced his sequel to The Exorcist with the uninspired Halloween Kills scribe Scott Teems and plans for a remake of yet another Hellraiser movie. This in itself is terrifying to horror fans. Once again, you’ve been warned. Halloween Ends should be skipped over altogether. It’s not worth wasting your time over. Jamie Lee Curtis and Michael Myers deserved so much better than being treated like cash cows being led to the slaughter.
Visit Ray’s blog at themonsterinmyhead.com
Directed by: David Gordon Green
Release Date: October 14, 2022
Run Time: 111 Minutes
Rated: R
Country: U.S.
Distributor: Universal Pictures
