David Gordon Green’s Halloween Kills is the sequel to his film Halloween, which picked up forty years after the events of the original Halloween (1978) and retconned all of the franchise’s weird installments. 2018’s Halloween capitalized on nostalgia, giving Jamie Lee Curtis’ Laurie Strode the Sarah Connor treatment because every young girl who gets attacked comes back in a sequel as a militarized, bad mom. Aside from its unstoppable, William Shatner-inspired killing machine, Halloween Kills has absolutely nothing in common with Terminator 2: Judgment Day. It has more in common with Terminator: [Enter Ominous Word or Phase Here] as it tries to revive a lifeless franchise—which is what we’ll explore today in our brutally honest review of Halloween Kills.
Cover Photo: Universal Pictures
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Halloween Kills Review
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Michael Meyers Rises Like a Phoenix
At the end of the previous film, the Strode women trapped Michael Myers in the basement bunker of Laurie’s house before setting it ablaze. Since fire isn’t going to work on an invincible man child the audience saw get shot a handful of times, stabbed, and ran over by a car, Michael swiftly escapes in Halloween Kills while taking out a handful of firemen. This sets him up as a truly unstoppable force and makes it feel like everyone is fucked. If the Olympics had a speed walking event, Michael would be a gold medalist— no matter how fast you run, he walks faster. It would seem the only thing he can’t do in this film is fly.
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Laurie Should Have Definitely Died in The First Film
Piggybacking off of its predecessor, Halloween Kills built its marketing around Laurie, highlighting lines like “I’m coming for you, Michael.” Instead of running into Michael at all, Laurie spends the entire film in Haddonfield Hospital speaking in metaphors with Officer Frank Hawkins, who feels really really really bad about stopping Dr. Sam Loomis from killing Michael back in 1978. Having been injured by Michael’s latest psychiatrist in the previous film, a bed-ridden Frank and his storyline serve next to no purpose in Halloween Kills. If these characters weren’t meant to be the focus, why keep them alive? Ah yes, a showdown in Halloween Ends.
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A Wannabe Negan
Aside from Frank, Halloween Kills’ opening flashback features Lonnie Elam, Tommy Doyle, Lindsey Wallace, and Marion Chambers, who are all survivors of the original Halloween film. When ringleader Tommy (Anthony Michael Hall) hears Michael is on the loose, he whips out his favorite baseball bat. For a bunch of characters who supposedly know about Michael, they’re not prepared at all. What Halloween Kills needs is a character with grenades, body armor, and an m240 bravo mounted in their truck. Tommy didn’t even wrap his bat in barbed wire.
Fun fact: Tommy was played by Paul Rudd Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers. Imagine him in this film...Obviously, he couldn’t either.
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Talk About Bad Social Commentary
The wildly-incompetent Tommy and his band of misfits are more a focal point than Laurie—who never even gets a chance to truly reunite with any of the returning actors from the original film. That warrants a gigantic “WTF.” One of the cool aspects of Halloween Kills is the fact that everyone is aware of Michael Myers and are essentially on the hunt for him as they chant “evil dies tonight!” Even the boyfriend in a skirt says he’s going after Michael. Unfortunately, this entire concept devolves into unnecessary and uninspired commentary on mob mentality once they decide to chase some random mental patient.
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Gone Are the Days of Stoners and Horny Teenagers (Takes Itself Too Seriously)
2018’s Halloween feels more like a traditional slasher than Halloween Kills. Sure, Michael gets shot in the head, shoulder, and whenever people go to check on him, he’s not there. Cue Halloween music. But the days of the classic slasher might be over. Where the older bad Halloween movies at least understood their own absurdity, Halloween Kills has no idea. It often takes itself way too seriously with dialogue so laughable you just want to tell Frank to shut up. We get it, bro, “it’s your fault.” Halloween Kills’ funniest characters are barely Little John and Big John, who live in Michael’s childhood home.
Side note: when Allyson finds the bodies of the Johns, why does she act surprised/sad to see them? You’re hunting Michael Myers in his childhood home and you don’t even know these people, don’t play with their corpses! Your boyfriend is about to get curb stomped in the stairwell.
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Overly Gratuitous (or Creative?)
The only one having fun with this movie is Michael, who gets real creative with his kills. The gore feels so gratuitous you have to force yourself to laugh to prevent from cringing.
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No Payoff
Yeah, well you didn't Laurie.
Almost every focal character in Halloween Kills gives their life facing their boogeyman. So, everyone who faces fear dies. John Carpenter’s Michael Myers is supposed to represent pure evil—he’s evil personified, which is why he seems unstoppable. By the end of a solid Halloween film, a one-liner is uttered and Michael is stopped (even if it’s only temporarily), adhering to the theme of good overcoming evil. There’s no such payoff in Halloween Kills. Nothing to be earned from all the seriousness, gore, and quite frankly, boredom.
In 2018’s Halloween, the sheriff asks “what are we going to do, cancel Halloween?” If that question had been asked in this movie, someone should’ve answered “YES” so everyone could’ve left the theater and gone home.
How dare they kill Judy Greer.
