Back in 2018, we gathered ‘round the fiery jack-o-lantern to discuss the ending of David Gordon Green’s Halloween. Michael Myers’ survival was all but guaranteed—after all, Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends had already been announced, so there was no way slasher’s freakiest Shatner mask was going to incinerate in Laurie Strode’s (Jamie Lee Curtis) booby-trapped basement.
Halloween Kills, however, throws a few more curveballs at the viewer—not necessarily regarding Michael’s fate (because, obviously, Halloween Ends still has to happen), but dishing out surprise farewells to a lot of other characters, not to mention giving us a new motivation for Haddonfield’s boogeyman. Now that Halloween Kills has been out in theaters and on Peacock for a few days, we’re busting out the fun-sized Snickers bars for some spoiler-filled Halloween Kills chit-chat.
Last things first, that ending, in which Judy Greer’s Karen—the daughter of Laurie Strode, and easily the most level-headed person in all of Haddonfield, wanders upstairs in the Meyers house to gaze out of Michael’s favorite window—and pays for it with her life. This, after snatching Michael’s mask and taunting him with it... so that he can be set upon by a mob led by a baseball bat-wielding Tommy Doyle (Anthony Michael Hall)... which lays him out for around two minutes before he rises up and massacres all of them. Including Karen. Nooooo!
That would make a certain amount of sense if Halloween Kills was still following the general Halloween narratives of “Michael’s preferred targets are his own female family members”and/or “Michael’s preferred targets are people connected to Laurie Strode.” But this continuity, which has already made it clear that Michael and Laurie aren’t siblings, now walks back the idea that Michael is obsessed with finishing what he started in 1978—something Laurie believed so strongly was true that she spent practically her entire life preparing for his return. Halloween Kills tells us he mostly wants to go home, which means Karen was just in the way I guess.
What did you think of Halloween Kills’ take on Michael’s motivation? Were you surprised that Karen died? What else did you like or not like about the latest entry in the series—and what do you hope to see in Halloween Ends? Who else is ready to give Michael Myers a break and re-watch Halloween III: Season of the Witch instead?
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DISCUSSION
The protagonists in this movie were SO. DAMN. STUPID.
Upon hearing that Michael Myers is on the loose, the whole town splits up and goes hunting for him, in groups of two or three, with baseball bats and pipes. A couple of them are carrying pistols, but they are the worst shots in the world. There’s a scene where three people are trapped in an SUV, with Michael Myers standing on the roof, and an elderly woman who is hunting Michael Myers shoots out every window in the SUV, making Myers’ job super easy.
There’s another scene later in the film when Judy Greer spears Michael Myers in the back with a damn pitchfork, and lures him to a dark alley where Rusty Griswold and the rest of Haddonfield is waiting for him. They proceed to beat the ever-living hell out of Myers with bats, clubs and fists. He’s even shot by the one guy who brought a pistol. So Michael Myers, who is 61 years old in this movie, suddenly recovers from being beaten, stabbed and shot and easily kills the 20+ people who’ve surrounded him. He then heads back to his childhood home, which is surrounded by police (where the hell have they been this entire film?!) and somehow sneaks into his bedroom, where Judy Greer is... uhh... waiting for him? And he kills her.
I remember when the movie’s reviews first started coming out, and they weren’t great, I thought “It’s a slasher movie. It can’t be that bad.” It’s that bad.