Four years after Halloween Kills (2021), Michael’s legacy continues to wreak havoc in Haddonfield, but it’s all coming to an end – once and for all
**CONTENT WARNING: Violence, death, disturbing images**
Synopsis
It’s been four years since Michael was last seen. Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis) is truly trying to move on with her life, and encourages her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) to get together with town outcast Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell). Things take a turn, however, when Corey starts down the dangerously dark path of taking up Michael’s mantle.
Overview
I actually thought this one had a lot of potential. I get what they were going for, and had they pulled it off, it could have paved a way for the franchise to continue with a new set of characters next time around. Which, admittedly, did not exactly vibe with the title Halloween Ends. Unfortunately, the movie falls flat and ultimately undoes most of what they set up along the way.
**Spoilers below**
What Works
Right from the getgo, this movie went in a different direction than I expected. The opening sequence plays on all your expectations, clearly setting up a tragic turn to a night of babysitting. And it did indeed turn tragic, but what I found intriguing was that the tragic moment was actually purely accidental. This set up the foundation for the core storyline after a 3 year time jump moving forward.
As a result of the accident, Corey has become notorious in Haddonfield. Complete strangers see him, recognize him, and judge him before ever giving him a chance. There are a lot of parallels between Corey and Laurie (beyond just rhyming names). Laurie, too, is quite famous in town by now, and people have a tendency to judge her as well, as if it’s somehow her fault that Michael murdered a bunch of people and is nigh unstoppable. They even each have a separate moment in the film where they finally, finally allow themselves to have a good time and break out a smile after literal years of suffering, only for someone to immediately chastise them for doing so.
As the movie progresses, it becomes clear that Corey is targeted to essentially inherit the evil possessing Michael. In a way, this reminds me of Halloween 4-5, where at times it appears that Jamie (Danielle Harris) is doing the same. Another odd callback to Halloween 5 (1989) is the reveal that Michael has been hiding this whole time in a gully near a hobo. When the story first begins going in this direction, it drew me in because I could see the potential in truly digging into this plotline. Most of the Halloween films don’t dwell on this aspect, and Jamie doesn’t end up fully crossing this line the way Corey starts to here. Laurie can sense the change in Corey and tries to do something about it, which only adds to everyone’s assumption that she’s nothing more than paranoid after all her run-ins with Michael over the years.
What Fails
Given that Corey clearly has some of the evil possession inside of him, I assumed he was going to die at some point and get revived. This sort of happens at one point, but not to the full degree it should have. In the end, nothing really came of Corey’s storyline, which was disappointing since that was what the entire movie until then was pushing for. In fact, I was willing to overlook the general lack of Michael throughout specifically because of Corey’s part in the story. Granted, if they truly were going to officially pass Michael’s mantle on to someone new, I’m not sure Corey would have been a strong enough choice to support the entire franchise moving forward, no offense to Corey. But I still would have liked to see where they could have taken this idea.
There was simply something off about the whole movie that I could never quite put my finger on. Something about the acting/dialogue/reaction/pacing combo often threw me out of the movie, even though I usually couldn’t figure out what specifically put me off kilter. It also didn’t really *feel* like a Halloween film–although to be fair, the entire franchise is wildly varied in its content and tone so who’s to say what truly qualifies as a Halloween film? But looking back, this one was almost more of a character piece than a stalking slasher film that at least most of the Halloween movies incorporate.
This movie did something that no other film in the franchise did, something that you would think would have been a highlight: they finally found a way to stop Michael for good (hence the title). And yet… there was something weirdly anticlimactic about that moment. They way they went about it would have fit in way more in the context of Halloween Kills, considering they got the entire town involved, which was a huge factor in that one. In this movie, though, the townspeople were not super involved except to sometimes aggravate the main characters. Seriously, nearly every character in this movie is annoying, though that’s kind of the point, since the plot largely revolves around how crappy the townspeople behave towards Laurie, Allyson, and Corey. While I liked the concept that we were seeing how the events over the last few decades had impacted the town and their current attitude, it certainly didn’t make for the most enjoyable experience as I had to watch yet another person taunt or berate the main characters for the umpteenth time.
Conclusion
This is a very middle of the road movie for me. Certainly not the worst Halloween film in existence, but far from the best as well. I enjoyed the first half quite a bit, since it shifted in a direction I wasn’t expecting going in, and I liked exploring the lasting ramifications of past tragedy that Laurie, Allyson, and Corey were forced to face. It just didn’t pull through in the long run, and the tone was missing something the whole time. There was some intense violence at certain moments, but as a whole it didn’t incorporate the sense of danger around any corner like you should get from a film involving Michael.
Score 6/10
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