This Halloween season welcomes back the iconic masked murderer, Michael Myers, as he returns in the 2018 reboot of “Halloween.” There are 10 sequels to date, making this one the eleventh in the series. The quality of said sequels are up for debate.
The series took strange turns that original Director John Carpenter and fans didn’t quite expect with the original slasher film, and that is not a good thing, from Rapper Busta Rhymes using martial arts and cursing out Michael Myers, to the strange demonic twists and cult-like backstory that fans accepted half-heartedly. There was also a gruesome rendition by Director Rob Zombie, who has such projects as “House of 1000 Corpses” and “The Devil’s Rejects”. The movie wasn’t completely awful, however, the overwhelming sexualization and grit made the prequel feel out of place in the series. The only reason horror fans tolerate the hot garbage that were the sequels is because Michael Myers has been the boogieman for as long as anyone can remember.
The Halloween series remains a classic in the horror world. The 1978 movie inspired slasher films for decades to come and completely terrified audiences. The horror genre was innovated, and while the movie is dated now, it was an instant classic among horror fans.
Since then, the multiple sequels and prequels transformed Michael Myers into this insane, overpowered, humanoid demon man. They’ve made him invincible through the power of the devil, they gave him a cult following in a hospital, they gave him family issues with an abusive step father and a stripper mom, a baby sister (Laurie Strode) and a big sister who was a bully to him.
When more is added to a character it usually makes the story even better than it was before, not so here. Myers was a mash up of different directors and writers adding to the story and making this huge mess of a character. While many fans are angry they stripped away Michael Myers’ story after the second movie, I am personally relieved.
It felt too good to be true when it was announced that John Carpenter had stepped back in to fix his beloved series from the inevitable mess it became. While he won’t be a director, he will be the composer and executive producer with Jason Blum, the CEO of the Blumhouse Production Company, who has produced films such as Get Out, Insidious, Paranormal Activity and Happy Death Day. Halloween will be directed and written by David Green with additional writers Jeff Fradley and Danny McBride. This new Halloween throws out the plots of the films following the second film and focuses on the first two movies.
Jamie Lee Curtis returns as Laurie Strode, 40 years after the second movie. She has a family and has been prepping for Michael’s return. Michael Myers is in a mental asylum after his Halloween murder spree and escapes during a bus transfer. He then inevitably returns to Haddonfield to finish what he started.
The movie comes out October 19 and hopefully will be the last installment to the series. Finally, we are going to get the sequel to Halloween one and two that the series deserved from the beginning. With an 83% score on Rotten Tomatoes, horror fans’ hopes are high for the new installment.
Go watch the first two Halloween movies, grab a movie ticket and get ready for a thrilling nostalgic horror film on October 19.
