David Gordon Green’s Halloween retconned the mythology of the eponymous series by ignoring the existence of every sequel to John Carpenter’s original. Now, Green’s Halloween Kills goes one step further by essentially rewriting some of the events that occurred in Haddonfield on that fateful 1978 Halloween night in order for its storyline of survivors confronting their lingering guilt and trauma in the present to make sense.
Bafflingly, the film even largely undoes the seemingly indestructible bond connecting Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney) and Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) that its predecessor went to such great lengths to establish. These are bold moves, no doubt, but they lead to a sequel that’s muddled and overstuffed, and which, despite all its callbacks to the first Halloween, moves even further away from that film’s remarkable narrative efficiency and visual lucidity.
The most notable and disheartening of these changes can be found in the film’s flashbacks to 1978, with the hijinks that play out between a younger Officer Hawkins (Thomas Mann) and a new character, Pete McCabe (Jim Cummings), lending the proceedings the same sort of neurotic energy that Cummings brings to his own work, including Thunder Road and The Wolf of Snow Hollow. As with the comedic bits from Green’s prior film, these digressions feel painfully out of place, serving only to undercut the menacing presence of Michael Myers.
These and other such moments play like extended comic routines, from the bickering of an older interracial couple (Lenny Clarke and Diva Tyler) to the shenanigans of a gay couple (Scott MacArthur and Michael McDonald) trying to make the most of living in Michael’s childhood house. These players are all here merely to be ground into mincemeat by the implacable Michael, whose killings are far more vicious than in the earlier film. But as far as improvements go, his revitalized brutality is arguably the only successful one.
Picking up immediately after the last film, which ended with Michael engulfed in flames thanks to the efforts of three generations of Strode women, Halloween Kills finds Laurie confined to a hospital bed, recovering from surgery after being stabbed in the gut. Thus, the series’s most compelling protagonist is often pushed the sidelines, delivering lines like “I’m coming for you, Michael,” only to lay back down when the pain of moving is too great to bear.
Stepping in for Laurie as Michael’s most formidable foes are four survivors of his ’78 killing spree: Lonnie (Robert Longstreet), Marion (Nancy Stephens), Lindsey (Kyle Richards), and Tommy (Anthony Michael Hall). This group, who’ve formed tight friendships in the 40-plus years since they first stared down Michael and lived to tell about it, start out as well-meaning vigilantes out to end his reign of terror once it’s revealed that he’s still alive and dispatching people. But as expected in the world of Halloween, their best intentions are mostly for naught.
The weight of these four victims’ anguish and their renewed fear of Michael could have added some intriguing insight into the damage that Michael caused to Haddonfield. But instead, their rising paranoia gives way to stale commentary on the dangers of mob rule as rallying cries of “Evil dies tonight!” summons a vengeful horde whose efforts predictably do more harm than good. It’s an odd turn for the series to see Michael’s latest killing spree overshadowed by the bloodlust of frightened townsfolk. But when one character utters, “Now he’s turning us into monsters,” it becomes clear that the filmmakers don’t seem particularly interested in the existential role that the series’s central villain plays this go-around.
Indeed, Green and co-screenwriters Scott Teems and Danny McBride can’t even make up their minds about whether Michael is just a kid who “snapped” or a near-supernatural embodiment of evil itself. Although it hardly makes a difference considering all the bone-headed actions taken by many of Michael’s latest victims, most of whom we’re introduced to minutes, if not seconds, before they meet their gruesome end. Even the established characters who attempt to step into Laurie’s shoes repeatedly make decisions that would be considered stupid or reckless when dealing with a potentially violent man on the loose, let alone the lurching killer who’s long haunted their town and has survived everything from bullets and fire with relative ease.
As such, Michael’s carnage, despite the relentless blunt force with which it’s delivered, lands without much of an emotional impact. At one point, Laurie says, “Fear, that’s the true curse of Michael.” And while it’s fear that sends Haddonfield’s populace into a panic and leads to the death of an innocent man, it seems even more justified than usual considering the dozens of corpses that Michael has left behind in just a matter of hours. But whether or not the more dangerous monster is Michael or the townspeople ultimately seems beside the point, though the final scene certainly picks a side, and in time to ensure another sequel.
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