Halloween Ends (2022) | Movie Review *SPOILERS* with Spoiler Free Review
well it finally happened we got the third and final installment in David Garden Green’s Halloween Trilogy this story has been playing out since 2018 and there was a huge amount of anticipation excitement and trepidation around Halloween ends so did it live up to the hype and did Halloween indeed end hi guys or welcome back to what the horror the channel where we talk about horror movies old and new so this is it guys Halloween did indeed end well the David Gordon green Trilogy ended at least who knows about the future of the franchise this is
a movie that while I was looking forward to watching it and seeing how they decided to close off this story it wasn’t my most anticipated watch of this year I do really like the Halloween franchise but it’s never been my favorite franchise and after Halloween kills I didn’t have too many expectations for Halloween ends however after re-watching the entire franchise in preparation for this film coming out I will say I have gained a new appreciation for the franchise as a whole and including this Trilogy and when I finally sat down to watch Halloween ends felt
genuinely exciting after watching Halloween ends though I’ve been left with a mixture of thoughts and feelings some good some bad look straight up I will say that I
always taken risks whether it’s no Michael Myers in Halloween 3 the addition of a cult in the thorn Trilogy or Rob Zombie doing a remake of the original Halloween ends is no different before I get into spoilers though I’ll do a very brief spoiler-free review in case you haven’t seen the film yet like I say I think Halloween ends will be another polarizing movie there are things to love here and things not done as well well as they could be if you are a die-hard Halloween fan then I would say just going open-minded and with
no expectations I think this version of Lorry is an incredibly strong one and Jamie Lee Curtis gives one of her best deliveries as the character it also has some interesting imagery and enough gar to feel like it fits into this Trilogy in that sense um but it’s not in the same Realms as Halloween kills in any stretch of the imagination overall I would say it’s definitely worth a watch but is it one of the strongest in the franchise probably not okay so now we’re going to get into the spoiler section of the review so consider
that your warning this film is unexpected I think the word is a lot of the choices they’ve made are surprising and it will be really interesting really interesting to see what people think to it and also how opinion on it settles after re-watches and with time passing for me personally again as a fan of Halloween but not a die-hard fan with huge expectations I liked this I did but there were parts of it that fell short and part that just left me confused I think they set out with something new and exciting and I was
into it the beginning was really strong they lost their way in the middle and me to be honest by the middle I thought no what wasted potential but they definitely managed to pull it back by the end but even then the end was so short and then the film’s over and you’re left just wading through your thoughts and feelings over what just happened over what you just saw okay so let’s talk a bit more in depth about the film and get into the positive and the negative aspects the first positive that I want to talk
about is that Halloween ends has a four year time Jump and I think they did a great job of transitioning from 2018 to 2022. one of my favorite aspects of Halloween kills was how they showed the town’s trauma and how the events of hello 1978 had left its mark on the people that lived there and Laurie’s intro or voice over not only transitions the time really well but also again shows the lasting effect of Halloween night 2018. in 2018 we were told how paranoid laurist Road was after her attack and now we see in this
intro the paranoia that the town of haddenfield is experiencing since Michael Myers vanished four years ago the next positive that I want to talk about is probably my biggest positive and the best part of the movie in my opinion and that is this movie’s Laurie Strode Halloween ends gives us yet another new Lorry this one feels like a mixture of both the 1978 Lorry and 2018 Lorry she’s still a fighter who is very much aware of the dangers out there and she stands up to bad people but she’s softened a lot more here what’s really
interesting is the humor that has been added to Laurie this time Jamie Lee Curtis is a brilliant comedic actor and she does a great job here she just has this fun twinkle and while some of the humor in the early part of the film may not be liked by everyone it made me smile the whole scene in the grocery store between Laurie and Frank was adorable and I loved how they added the little detail of her twirling her hair when she’s talking to Frank because she also did that in the original film as well it
was this lovely moment that showed us this softer side of Lorry That Was Then bookended by a confrontation outside by the sister of one of Michael’s attack survivors the woman from um Halloween kills for me this was a perfect way of showing that grief and Trauma never really goes away fully a person or a town can try to heal and move on but there’s always going to be a reminder somewhere that might pop up and just catch you unawares this portrayal of Lorry is for me the most interesting in Halloween 20 18 and kills she
was angry bitter and scared and that’s what drove her that’s how she survived this goal she had of one day killing Michael gave her something to focus on as a distraction from her pains and her losses and don’t get me wrong that Lorry was still interesting but it may have gone too far down the road into the badass superhero side of things you know kind of like Sarah O’Connor that’s Sarah O’Connor Sarah Connor and this one is just much more interesting to me this Lorry is trying to no longer hide in anger and all of
the obsessive training and preparing this Lorry is trying to rebuild a life for herself she set up home with Alison she’s got sober she’s trying to take part in normal everyday activities and we see that she’s also not hiding away from people anymore she leaves the house and she has people round she socializes there are scenes that show us the 2018 Lorry for example when she meets Corey and they slash the tires of the obnoxious high schoolers car but there’s much more of a vulnerability to this Lorry as we see in the scene in the
Star Car Park where we see this level of guilt and sadness sitting on Laurie after the confrontation and I think it’s especially important that that confrontation comes immediately after the cute scene with Frank because we’re being shown this conflict and balance that Laurie is trying to juggle if this is the last time we get Laurie Strode then I’m happy with the one we got and the ending that they gave her another positive for me and maybe I’m going to be alone on this island but I was happy actually happy with the ending they went with
I was genuinely worried that they were going to have the final showdown be between Laurie and Corey I thought it was going to be a past the torch type thing and I was so relieved when they pulled the focus back on Michael despite Harry’s ending just being cut short with no real wrap up to that story thread at the end of the day this Trilogy and franchise has been building to a showdown between Michael and Laurie so I am really glad that they gave the fans that I honestly had no idea um either who they
were going to kill off between the two of them between Lori and Michael and it really kept me on edge and kept me guessing through the whole final showdown there were so many shots that were framed in a certain way and and just looks a bit odd that I thought they were going to set it up for Michael to get the other hand and then for Laurie to turn it around on him so even when it had finished I wasn’t convinced it had finished if that makes sense and I think killing off Michael was the
right choice for this Trilogy anyway and I also liked how yes they killed him off but it wasn’t easy to kill him off it took loads of knives lots of energy and effort and in the end um the help of someone else as well because Michael should be hard to defeat but being that he’s human he should also be defeatable this Trilogy has kind of felt much more Lorry and haddonfield’s story rather than Michael’s so the parade of Michael’s body through the town makes sense it’s a sign for the town to start healing and for
them to be able to stop looking over their shoulder for the Boogeyman and I enjoyed seeing Laurie get the win and have the cathartic destroying of Michael’s body because did they destroy Michael’s body that bit in the crusher was there or something huh but Laurie over to win she lost her friends her daughter a huge chunk of her life to Michael Myers she was called crazy and a freak by people in the town and a lot of blame was placed at Laurie’s feet for all of the events she was accused of provoking him and causing
the deaths in the film set in 2018 so yeah she deserved a win what I enjoyed even more is that even though Michael Myers dies and the sun comes up the next day as it often does at the end of horror movies people are still hurt and injured and trying to heal from everything that has happened there are a lot of horror movies that end with everything being Rosy and peachy just because the Killer Is Dead with no lasting effect on the people this ending felt much more seated in realism and the final positive is
a joint one of the soundtrack and the opening credits I think the soundtrack is really really good not just the Classic Carpenter score but also just the selection of songs throughout yeah Don’t Fear the Reaper is at this point overplayed in horror movies but it’s um in this case it’s a nod to the inclusion of it in the original so I’ll give it a pass it makes sense and I thought the opening credits were great I loved the animation of the pumpkins you know one coming out of another um and I loved the fact that
the text font was the same from Season of the Witch perhaps that was a subtle hint to what was to come okay I don’t always have mixed aspects in my reviews but I have a major mixed aspect in this movie and that is of the character Corey Corey is a brand new character added in for Halloween ends we’ve not seen him before and having stayed away from any information on Halloween ends I had no idea they were going to add a new character in that would actually end up being as much of a lead as
Laurie and Michael more so in Michael’s case this Edition was a complete surprise for me but not a completely disliked one Corey’s Story begins in the cold opening and that scene is incredible in my opinion okay yeah it uses too many jump scares but apart from that I think it’s done really well it’s tapping into the whole babysitter thing which is historically tied to Halloween babysitters being victims of Michael Myers and the whole scene set me up thinking one thing would happen and then it turns it and some something completely different happens and what does
happen is so surprising and shocking but in a great way it surprised me so much I think I think I actually laughed out loud because I don’t know it’s just I think it’s the way the kid fell I don’t know I had no idea we would end up following Corey for so much of the film and just how integral the opening scene would be for the rest of the story um in the first third of the film I liked the addition of Corey and I enjoyed this new Direction I do appreciate it when slashes try
something new especially a franchise that’s been going as long as Halloween some of the things that they set up and some of the questions that were raised out of that were really interesting there’s this little niggling question I’ve did Corey actually kill the kid or was it genuinely an accident and why did Michael let Kari go did he see an evil in him that he sees in himself or did he see the potential evil that Corey could become but the problem is all this that they set up and questions that are raised don’t feel as
though they’re answered or wrapped up they set Corey up as a huge part of the story it’s the continuation of what was raised in Halloween kills are we born evil or did we become evil and then they you know they try to use the character of Kari to further explore this um Laurie even speaks to Corey about there being two types of evil when she confronts him in the house from the opening scene she says there’s the one that comes from outside is a threat to the safety and peace of the tribe and the one
that comes from within us that grows like an infection Laurie says this is the most dangerous one because we may not know that we’re infected or that it’s in US based on a comment Allison makes when she’s looking at the cut on kari’s hand and says um it’s infected the same wording that Laura used to describe evil I’m assuming we’re supposed to believe that Corey has been infected by evil rather than being born evil but honestly I’m just guessing as this thread of the story just feels like it’s cut short all of the questions that
are raised and set up feel like they go nowhere it feels like they just didn’t know how to end this thread the problem is they decide on a message for Halloween ends and it feels as though the story suffered slightly because of it I understand what they were trying to do with Corey and while I don’t think they nailed it with him I do actually love the message of the movie and the film’s final statement moment that evil doesn’t die it just changes shape all right moving on to the negatives let’s talk Michael Myers I’m
confused about what happened to Michael Myers the Michael Myers we had at the end of Halloween kills had wiped out a big portion of Haddonfield and was Unstoppable and unkillable as low explained that the more he killed the more he transcends this is a man who was shot six times and didn’t die he got up and walked away like it was nothing he’s been stabbed shot burnt fingers chopped off beaten and nothing he just keeps going the point of Michael Myers is that he’s Unstoppable and almost inhuman so why in Halloween ends is he now
living in a sewer tunnel and not just living but hiding all weak moldy and injured if he really does transcend with each kill then after the massacre of Halloween kills he should be near on Immortal I get that you could argue well he’s not Angry Anymore he’s not killing anymore so he’s grown weaker but why is he not angry and killing anymore again just like he’s Unstoppable in the sense of you can’t kill him Michael Myers is also an Unstoppable killing machine who just walks and takes out anything in his path he had Haddonfield on
their knees so why did he go into hiding the problem is the movie doesn’t answer this just like it doesn’t answer the question and story thread that was introduced in Halloween kills that of the obsession that Michael had to Judith’s bedroom window something would draw him to it and he would spend hours just staring out of it but was he staring in on himself or out at Haddonfield unless I’ve missed something obvious this idea just goes away I mean we find out in the opening that the Maya’s house was demolished so we don’t even have
that anymore uh uh I’ve just thought of something is that why Michael is in hiding because they took his home anyway I still feel none the wiser as to why Michael does what he does so we get weak old frail Michael and then something interesting happens he meets Corey but let him go why does he do that well we never find out but I guess it’s because of him seeing or sensing evil in him or passing evil onto him then we get the start of a very strange almost symbiotic relationship between the two Michael’s strength
grows back because Corey brings him people to kill and with each Bloodshed Michael convulses as he becomes more powerful so that ties into what Halloween kills was saying but why didn’t Michael just do it on his own why didn’t he just go out and kill to get stronger we even get these scenes where they’re killing together as a bit of attack team which was a bit odd but despite me listing all of these aspects all of the above of the character of Michael Myers in Halloween ends the truth is we don’t even get that much
screen time with the big fella I am surprised that they decided to make this decision of reducing the screen time of Michael and basically make Corey the new killer because it’s not as though we’ve not seen what happens when you make a Halloween movie without Michael Myers Season of the Witch didn’t have him and the fans were mad we also saw it in Friday Part 5 where the killer was Roy Burns and not Jason that one is often um considered one of the worst because Jason isn’t in it we also saw what happens when you
let someone beat up Michael in Halloween resurrection and yet we still got the fight between Corey and Michael in the sewers where Corey knocks Michael to the ground to be honest for me I think the main reason Michael Myers is in the negative section is because I didn’t understand why they made the choices they did with Michael knowing that it would annoy some of the fans and risk taken away from all of the positives that were in the movie okay moving on another negative for me is how throughout this Trilogy each of the installments doesn’t
feel as though it fits in cohesively with each other each one has had a distinct feel and style in characterization in its message and most notably in dialogue and it also feels as though there were a lot of questions left unanswered was Michael after Laurie or was it circumstantial why did Michael do what he did what was the lure of Judith’s bedroom window and my final negative is just a personal one to me and probably not one that many people will care about but I feel like they underused Cal Richards and Lindsay Wallace I was
really pleased that she survived Halloween kills and I was looking forward to seeing what they did with the character in Halloween ends and I was disappointed with what they did she just popped up once or twice as part of Laurie and Allison’s Social Circle this woman that was marking the anniversary every year with friends and wanted Michael Hunter down and finally defeated he’s now just hosting a Halloween party at her bar despite Michael being out there somewhere okay before we wrap up I just have some more overall thoughts that didn’t seem to fit in the
positive negative format but that I wanted to talk about anyway the first one being that Halloween ends feels very much like other horror movies more than it feels like a Halloween movie the romance storyline between Corey and Allison felt a bit like a tragic Gothic love story and reminded me of the Lost Boys at times mostly because of the motorcycle and but also because of them climbing towers and buildings which is like the bridge scene in Lost Boys And the film has a very strong feel of Stephen King’s stories like Christine and it you’ve got
Corey acting as the Arnie Cunningham who slides down a dark path after a run-in with Christine also known as Michael Myers in this film I mean they even have the same surname Corey and Annie Cunningham and talking of it one of my favorite bits in Halloween ends was the scene where Corey falls off the bridge while he’s pushed off the bridge and is pulled into the sewer tunnel by an unseen force and I thought it was genuinely creepy but it’s a lot like the scene in the 1998 where a boy is bent in two and
pulled through the tunnel I also picked up on a lot of references to addiction throughout the film Laurie is now sober in the scene where Alison comes home from the party Laurie says to her you can be angry and smash stuff but be careful it can become addictive she’s obviously talking about herself but it’s also what happens to Corey he becomes addicted to killing there’s also an implication that Alison herself is hooked on death and evil she sees something in Quarry that she’s attracted to and she says that he’s the only one who makes her
feel anything so why him is it because of what he is and what he does and also is this what happened to Michael is this the explanation for why he does what he does that he was addicted to killing because of the strength it gave to him okay guys that’s it that’s my review of Halloween ends I’d love to know your thoughts I’m also a little bit nervous to hear your thoughts and I have no doubt many people have thoughts on this film like I said I think it’s going to be a a polarizing one
but remember people are going to like this people are going to not like this people are just going to be indifferent but we can be respectful of each other whether that’s in the comments on here or just anywhere else if you’re a fan of Halloween then don’t forget to hit that subscribe button if you haven’t already because my next episode will be a tier list ranking of the entire franchise including Halloween ends and then my final episode for October will be another truly horror episode in the meantime though thank you as always for stopping by
I really do appreciate it take care of yourselves and I will talk to you in the next episode bye guys
