Four years after the events of last year’s Halloween Kills, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is living with her granddaughter Allyson Nelson (Andi Matichak) and is finishing writing her memoir.
Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney) hasn’t been seen since. Laurie, after allowing the spectre of Michael to determine and drive her reality for decades, has decided to liberate herself from fear and rage and embrace life.
But when a young man, Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell; The Hardy Boys, Virgin River), is accused of killing a boy he was babysitting, it ignites a cascade of violence and terror that will force Laurie to finally confront the evil she can’t control, once and for all.
IF you bought a ticket to Halloween Ends, the 13th film in this horror franchise, chances are you know what you’re going to get.
The original 1978 Halloween film is a slasher classic which introduced audiences to the evil killer Michael Myers, also known as The Shape. The 2018 instalment, also called Halloween, is a direct follow-up to the 1978 original and the first entry in a sequel trilogy that ignores the continuity of the other sequels, and leads into 2021s Halloween Kills and now Halloween Ends.
Jamie Lee Curtis returns as Laurie Strode, the iconic role she first played in the 1978 original as a 17-year-old babysitter who survived Michael Myers’s murderous range on Halloween night.
The main draw to this sequel trilogy is Laurie’s preparation and paranoia for Michael’s eventual return after 40 years, and how she, her family and the town of Haddonfield react to his new reign of murderous chaos.
Laurie is taking care of herself mentally, and you can feel both her strength and trauma throughout the film – she is trying to move forward but the evil she faced will always be a part of her life, and part of Haddonfield.
It’s admirable how Halloween Ends differentiates itself from its two immediate predecessors through the character of Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell), whose experience with evil we see unravel. Corey is viewed suspiciously by the town, and Laurie and Allyson can relate to him.
Allyson is a bit too eager to be in a relationship with Corey – she may be scarred from her horrifying experiences in the last two movies, but does that mean she has to make absolutely baffling decisions?
They changed her character to serve both Laurie’s and Corey’s arcs, which was disappointing as she could hold her own in the last film.
The drama between characters also drags on a bit, and not enough time is given to the final showdown between Michael and Laurie, which is what most cinemagoers paid to see.
Fans will fill the cinemas for the kills and while there’s some decent ones, like most horror sequels there’s a sense of diminishing returns. The film did something very different and interesting with the Corey character, but other than that, I think most people will see what’s coming a mile away, including the ending, which isn’t groundbreaking, but is a nice send-off for the characters.
Ends may be the weakest in the sequel trilogy, and probably the least scariest, but is still a fun time in the cinema for fans.
Halloween Ends is rated MA15+ for strong horror violence, blood and gore, and is currently screening at Sale Cinema.
