Halloween Ends is a 2022 slasher film directed by David Gordon Green and starring Jamie Lee Curtis. It is the final film in the David Gordon Green trilogy and it’s quite underrated.

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“Come and get me, motherfucker“

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Four years after the events of ‘Halloween’ in 2018, Laurie has decided to liberate herself from fear and rage and embrace life. But when a young man 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. Although the sequels never quite matched the first reboot movie, I actually liked ‘Kills’ to a degree and I certainly appreciate Ends and what it does for the franchise. Thus, I find the critical reception of this movie to be needlessly harsh.

Whereas the 2018 movie hewed closely to the original film while mostly being concerned with family trauma of the Strodes, its sequel did something entirely different as it focused on mob mentality that was executed through a series of uncharacteristically brutal kills for the franchise. As for this last entry, once again Green does something unique with it, this time around focusing on a wholly new character who becomes an accomplice of Michael Myers and in effect the continuation of his evil.

And that theme I actually really liked here. The movie explores that evil will always find new ways to exist. This entry is also crucial in establishing once and for all that Myers is an immortal creature. How he forged this connection with this troubled teenager was intriguing, and although not explained extensively, these elements made for the most fantastical of all Halloween movies.

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The problem with Halloween Ends is that it takes its sweet time to get there owing to a very slow beginning and an entire first half that drags and is filled with many annoying plot points and characters with those bullies being atrociously written 80s movie stereotypes. But then in the second half it switches gears and it finally finds its groove, becoming a highly entertaining slasher flick in its own right.

I actually really liked what they did with Corey. His backstory was very interesting and how he both figuratively and literally connected with Myers was fascinating. Yes, the actor playing him did give a mediocre performance, but the character largely worked. Introducing another protagonist in a way this late in the game was never going to fully make sense, but Green executed him much better than you could hope for, resulting in a story that was surprisingly meaty and engaging.

But the movie thankfully did not forget to include Myers and he was a lot of fun in the third act. The final confrontation between him and Laurie was superb and so memorable. It was also funny how ridiculously violent and over-the-top it was. The choice to eventually return to Myers as the biggest villain of the movie was the right one and it really paid off.

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Jamie Lee Curtis is wonderful as Laurie and her story is once again quite moving. Her granddaughter also got a solid arc and the dynamic between the two was quite emotional. All the other characters failed to register and they should have been disposed of in a film filled with way too many personalities. The kills are quite creative in the third act, but otherwise not really scary. The movie is technically uninspired, though for the most part serviceable.

Though obviously flawed in many ways, Halloween Ends mostly concluded this reboot trilogy in a satisfactory manner. This is an underrated entry in the series that admirably does something different by introducing an interesting new character with a solid arc and connecting him with Myers in an intriguing way. The fantastical elements have never been more pronounced than they were here while the kills are also quite creative. It takes its sweet time to get there owing to a slow, messy smart, but the second half is so much fun that I ultimately really liked this movie.