The Pitch: It’s already late on Halloween night, and the house of Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is still there from Michael Myers ’trapping in a burning prison he spent years in. Yet that is not enough to kill the soulless demon monster with the tendency to murder; he escaped nary a scratch on him, running for some burning marks on his William Shatner mask. As daughter Karen (Judy Greer) and granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) rush an injured Laurie to the hospital, the rest of Haddonfield learns of the crash of the asylum bus carrying the escape of Michael, and a mob attempt to apprehend the killer. But is the force of the number enough to defeat the real evil?
Halloween continues: In the age of “legacies,” follow-up to nostalgic hits from the ’70s and’ 80s that show the return of old stars and the feelings of new directors, 2018’s Halloween a qualified achievement, close to Awakening of the Power spectrum than it is Terminator: Dark Fate. David Gordon Green, along with co-screenwriter Danny McBride and returning star Curtis, miraculously revived the old killer formula into something that, if not entirely successful, at least took the franchise out of the standard and treated Laurie Strode with a modicum of respect
But like any horror franchise, these are the next ones you need to worry about, and Kills on Halloween the goodwill of the first film burned so quickly in the light that it left the eyes of one of Michael’s victims. Moving is essential as an enlarged, episodic epilogue to the 2018 film, Killed Dancing around the Laurie / Michael vendetta is preferred, offering unsatisfactory side stories that are also doubly considered political commentary. Laurie, after all, is in critical condition after the events of the first film, so poor Curtis is confined to a hospital ward for most of the time the film breaks down; Don’t expect him to yell at Michael and fire shotguns this hour.
Kills on Halloween (Universal)
However, we repeat a few etc. characters from the first Halloween, and see how they have dealt with their individual traumas since the first Michael (and, according to this series’ canon, the lone) eruption in 1978. Tommy Doyle, the all grown up and played by Anthony Michael Hall, leading a group of recovered victims – including Marion Chambers (Nany Stephens) and Lonnie Elam (Robert Longstreet) – in an annual ritual to tell their terrifying story in the local water hole. But when they hear that Michael is behind the outside, they decide (inspired by Laurie’s example) to stand up to Michael as a community. “The wicked will die tonight!” they sang, took baseballs and baseball guns and all the equipment to use their invincible tormentor.
It is an act fairly intended to Say Something about Our Present Time; crowds of mostly white Haddonfieldians, shouting and screaming while waving guns around, returned on a specific January day to the Capitol. But it’s a confusing, similarly beaten story, especially since it’s less suited to this particular genre – of slashers, you want the people of the town gather to stop the evil man, because he relies on fear and division to get his victim.
However, Tommy’s posse turns out to be a crazy mob that, at one point, chases the wrong person, another who escaped from the bus crash that released Michael in the previous film. More of a hokey, obvious metaphor for watch brutality, it requires skips that are so quick that even the more slasher-jaded roll their eyes. (Not even after it was too late for people in town to think about whether the elderly, 5-foot-free schlub in hospital scrubs and no mask by Michael Myers looks anything like their target of 6’5 ″.)
Halloween Excitement: That said, there are a few distinct thrills to be found Killed‘still-torturous 100 minute runtime. The great advantage of having zero characters to worry about in this thing is that you’ll be happy with their delivery, and Green and Co. found it. the new methods to kill Haddonfield’s eye-popping residents. An entire firefighter took out the halligan bars and rotary saw, Green shooting most of the scene through the bloody goggles of the deceased victim.
A poor victim finds themselves ending the business with a broken fluorescent light tube (even if upset about how they proceed to kill is the old Black woman). The castback synth score of John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies is still exciting, even if they both played last hour and didn’t offer much appeal beyond nostalgic.
Kills on Halloween (Universal)
Halloween Shrugs: Aside from the awesome viscera and ooey-gooey sound scheme, though, there’s not much appeal. Kills on Halloween. Violent, visceral, and deeply nihilistic, like many good horror movies. But forget it really can frightening. And if you don’t tell us, at least focus us on the characters we’re thinking of or grow new ones to give us something to root for.
As in, KilledThe structure is a mess, confusing us from one small set of Michael-bait to the next, temporarily checking in with an almost comatose Laurie to see the bitter shift in belief. his victory. (Think about what, Will Patton’s adult man Sherriff Hawkins is alive too; it’s so bad that he didn’t do the rest of the movie.)
With this same focus on tertiary characters, Kills on Halloween feels like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had to die in horror movies. Instead, we get weird fragments with a quarrelsome elderly couple breaking Michael’s blade, or bands of Tommy survivors from the first film trying to avenge Michael without getting hurt. Laurie has been ready for decades.
Surprisingly, some scenes center around the aged gay couple who buy the old house of Michael Myers (Michael McDonald and Scott MacArthur), calling each other “Big John” and “Little John ”for no strange reason. They spent Halloween night eating canapés and watching Minnie and Moskowitz, before Michael naturally went home to see how they had changed color again. If they want to get The Gays favor for representation, let’s just say the rest of my community may be unhappy with the killing list at the close of the movie.
The Judgment: I know, horror movies are supposedly crazy-especially the ones that Green clearly pays homage to. But here’s the thing: they don’t there that you can You can fear nostalgia-wise horror without requiring every character to have knowledge of the state of a three-hole punch, I promise you. To try to play wink-wink at the silly ones followed by terror, Kills on Halloween victimized in the tropics they thought they were sending, which also made the quickest attempt to be a “topical” fall even more embarrassing.
It feels like the dark second chapter of a supposed third film to close in this never -ending trilogy. But who cares how it ends at this point? Decades of cultural osmosis have taught us that Michael Myers is immortal, but perhaps this film series will have to suffer a different fate. Tedium died tonight.
Where Is It Playing? Kills on Halloween three in theaters and at Peacock Oct. 15. Bring your mask, your knife, and a barf bag.
Trailer: