"Evil dies tonight," the residents of Haddonfield bellowed in Halloween Kills, but we always knew that wouldn't be the case. Halloween Ends was confirmed at the same time as the sequel and this time, we've been promised that it really is the end. Honest.
Whether that is the case remains to be seen (and will likely tie into the box-office returns), yet Halloween Ends is definitely the end of the reboot trilogy. It's also set to mark Jamie Lee Curtis's final outing as Laurie Strode, which isn't a spoiler as it doesn't mean Laurie dies, something she's already done in the series anyway.
In the world of Halloween, the timeline can be moulded to fit whatever idea might come next. However, that doesn't mean Halloween Ends can't be approached as a finale, because that's definitely what the marketing wants you to think.
But if this really is the end of the eternal battle between Michael Myers and Laurie Strode, then it's a lacklustre finale which, for the most part, seems to forget it's meant to be an ending at all.
Where Halloween (2018) and Halloween Kills took place on the same night, Halloween Ends leaps forward four years. Michael Myers hasn't been seen since the violent events of that fateful night, and Laurie is trying her best to move on.
She's living with her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) and writing her memoir, choosing to embrace life rather than live in fear. The town of Haddonfield can't move on though and with the boogeyman nowhere to be found, their new pariah is Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell).
In the effective cold open, set one year earlier, we see the events that led to Corey being accused of killing the boy he was babysitting. It was an accident, but the legacy of Michael Myers has infected Haddonfield which has "turned in on itself". There's always got to be somebody to blame, and Corey is the unfortunate soul.
And when Laurie sticks up for Corey when he's being bullied (town pariahs have got to stick together, after all), it sets in motion a series of events that'll lead Laurie to confront the evil that has haunted her entire life.
If your biggest Halloween Kills complaint was that it was just a series of killings in place of a plot, then Halloween Ends is the reverse of that. For the final outing, David Gordon Green has slowed things down for a different kind of Halloween movie, but it only really leads to other problems.
The marketing has made a big deal of it being the final battle between Laurie and Michael, but the movie isn't really that. It gets there eventually and it's brutal when it does, but ends up feeling tacked-on rather than the satisfying culmination of a tension-filled build-up.
Instead, Halloween Ends is about something else altogether, and that will prove frustrating for fans. Like Halloween Kills, it expands the mythology and legacy of Michael Myers, putting a new-ish spin on the series. We've seen similar takes before, although if we pointed out the Halloween sequels Ends closely resembles, it could be a spoiler.
There's nothing wrong with trying something unexpected, especially in a series that has sustained for so long. But despite some impactful moments of gore (a tongue severing, in particular), there's not a set piece that will linger in the memory and they're largely devoid of tension or scares.
Were Halloween Ends the middle part of this particular trilogy or a standalone instalment, you'd write it off as an interesting, if unsuccessful, attempt at something new. But the movie's position as the culmination of the franchise exacerbates its failures as it's not only not giving you what you expected, it hasn't replaced it with something compelling either.
Through it all, Jamie Lee Curtis still captivates at Laurie and gets to show off something different to the rage-fuelled Laurie of the previous two movies. She even gets to be happy for one brief moment (a rarity for her throughout the entire Halloween franchise), but when the time comes for her to get violent and deliver a one-liner, she's as good as ever.
Halloween Ends does eventually come to the face-off that it's promised and delivers on it in bloody style. We've seen many Laurie vs Michael variations before, but Green finds a fresh angle on it to add a definitive flourish.
It's not enough to save the movie from being an underwhelming final chapter though – and if this is truly the end, then Halloween fans might have wished this timeline was erased too.
Halloween Ends is out now in cinemas.
![Halloween Kills Boxset [DVD] [2021]](https://hips.hearstapps.com/vader-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/1643111399-41E2zhty40L._SL500_.jpg?crop=1xw:1xh;center,top&resize=320%3A%2A "Halloween Kills Boxset [DVD] [2021]")
