The fact I am about a month late to doing this review says a lot about this film. Yes, I’ve been busy but I had a few problems with this film going into it. I mean to start with, the film didn’t have overly positive reviews which is never a particular drive to see a film, but even if the film wasn’t great, I loved the reboot film in 2018 so why wasn’t I more excited and itching to see it? I think it can be hard sometimes to make a second one in a franchise, when you know a third is coming, as what are the stakes when you know the villain is going to survive until the next one? The trailers were also a little disappointing, showing the different aspect of the film following the neighbourhood that Michael Myers has been murdering, rather than the only person we have with character, Laurie Strode.

Halloween Kills takes place immediately after where we left off a couple of years ago. Michael Myers has been left to burn in Laurie’s home, but somehow escapes and survives the ordeal. This time the focus is on the people of Haddonfield, who have lived with the nightmare of Michael Myers is there town 40 years ago and again on this Halloween night, as they decide they need to band together to take him down.

The film really feels like exactly what I was worried about. Without spoiling the film, it feels like a very pointless film. It has no stakes at all. The change of focusing more on the neighbourhood just feels like exactly what it is, just an excuse to have kills that don’t really matter. There is little character to the ones introduced that make us not care if they live or die, and in this franchise it means they are going to die.

It’s a horror film as long as it has some good scares and kills, audiences will be happy, unfortunately it only has one of those. It has plenty and plenty of decent kills, it is an 18 so it is very very bloody and has some over the top kills, that you would expect. But the scares which were in the first one, aren’t present in this one, which feels like the result of a rushed film. This one and the next one being Halloween Ends, which arrives next year, were shot back to back, but this feels like the studio demanded a trilogy when they only wanted two.

Overall, Halloween Kills is a disappointing middle ground, it has moments of promise, but they are only just enough to keep the movie from being boring, at least it has a short run time and we can move on to the next one quickly.

What did you think of Halloween Kills?

I’ve got a busy couple of weeks but will do my best do see what I can with priorities on Ghostbusters: Afterlife, King Richard and Spencer. So to keep up to date with the latest reviews and posts follow on Instagram @Floodersfilms and like on Facebook.