Nearly 45 years after John Carpenter gave the movie world Michael Myers and Laurie Strode, will Halloween Ends be The End? We hope so.

As they say all good things must come to an end, sadly for David Gordon Green’s trilogy, the sooner the better. What started as a near step by step copy of the original 1978 classic. Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t a disaster, just gave nothing new to an already ‘dead’ franchise. The 2021 sequel Halloween Kills there’s no words that can truly describe how bad it was. 2022 it all ends, with an anti-climax that’s not a bang but a whimper.

Let’s get one thing straight, Halloween Ends is a vast improvement to Halloween Kills. It’s ambitious effort compared to previous films, it’s also divisive and discordant.

Ends is set four years after the events of the previous incarnation. Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis) is living with her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) after the death of Allyson’s parents. Before we meet them, the film opens up on Halloween when Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell) babysits young boy Jeremy (Jaxon Goldenberg). Thanks to a freak accident Jeremy is killed and Corey the prime suspect.

Fast forward to current time we learn Corey was found not guilty, Haddonfield residents treat him like a pariah. He’s bullied, frown upon only to be rescued by none other than Laurie Strode. She takes him for medical attention to Allyson’s office the pair strike a chord, romance blossoms. Paranoia in the town increases, people still live in fear of The Shape (aka Michael Myers). Those fears come true and once again Laurie must face evil in one last stand.

13 is no lucky number for this franchise. Ends is very predictable which also leaves you wondering what was Michael Myers true purpose? After certain scenes you suspect Myers may not be the only killer. For a film franchise that made him a Horror icon, he’s hardly on the screen. When he is on the screen his dominance is relegated to something that’s nothing more than a cuckold.

Gordon Green still plays on myth that he’s more than human, Myers is a supernatural monster who never dies. Or is he the allegory for the evil that lives deep down in all of us? If you are expecting an ending to beat all endings think again. Pardon the expression it’s ‘mince’.

The glue that connects all the components of a film is the script, Halloween Ends script is sadly the weakest link. It moves as if they forgot to unleash the beast, moving at a snails pace. The cage door is finally opened about 35 minutes before the end of a 2 hour running time. The first half of the film all the focus is about Corey and his lame romance with Allyson. Campbell’s Corey was one of several new characters leaves you wondering if this is only the end of the road for Laurie and Michael.

The only gleaming light of Halloween Ends is Jamie Lee Curtis. Laurie Strode deserved a better ending. She is more than ‘who teased a man with brain damage and he snapped’ . Now a mature woman who knows what’s expected in taking out Michael. She is like Allyson and Corey plagued by the terror that terrorised Haddonfield. Laurie feels she is only one that can heal the trauma the townsfolk after the last films events.

This film will divide horror fans if Ends is any good, not the worst film ever, just a disappointment. With a conclusion with half-baked characters, and is an unfocused, incoherent mess.

★★ 1/2