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Halloween Kills
By Jeffrey Anderson,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Brutal, gory, overwrought, shapeless slasher sequel.

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What you will—and won't—find in this movie.
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Halloween Kills
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Based on 16 parent reviews
Movie was great! Suspense and action with horror
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For 18 and up.
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What's the Story?
In HALLOWEEN KILLS, the story picks up just moments after the ending of Halloween (2018). An injured Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and her daughter, Karen (Judy Greer), and granddaughter, Allyson (Andi Matichak), ride away from Laurie's burning stronghold, with Michael Myers trapped inside. Laurie goes for surgery for her wounds, while Allyson's boyfriend, Cameron (Dylan Arnold), finds Officer Hawkins (Will Patton) and gets him to the hospital. Unfortunately, firefighters inadvertently free the killer and become his next victims. Then, in a bar, Tommy Doyle (Anthony Michael Hall), who survived Michael's attacks in 1978, riles up other residents of Haddonfield with stories of Michael Myers and starts forming an angry mob. Can Michael be stopped at last?
Is It Any Good?
Compared to his successful, well-crafted 2018 reboot, director David Gordon Green's sequel is its opposite: an unshaped, overwrought cacophony of shouting and dozens of tiresomely brutal killings. Green seems to have been inspired by the events of the original Halloween II (1981), which took place late on the same Halloween night as the original Halloween and was set largely in a hospital, where Laurie was being treated and where Michael Myers was heading. While that movie tried to re-create the feel of the original (and partly succeeded, thanks to John Carpenter's help as co-writer, co-producer, co-composer, and possible uncredited co-director), Green goes for an even more chaotic look and feel for Halloween Kills. Rather than an eerily empty, after-hours hospital, Green's hospital is filled with caterwauling, writhing, stacked-up people who must climb over one another to reach the exits.
The angry mob rises unreasonably quickly, so much so that it inspires aggravation rather than sad, weary understanding, and the rage-chanting ("Evil dies tonight!") becomes meaningless in the absence of any real character. (Two of the original actors, survivors of the 1978 movie, reprise their characters here, 43 years later, but the movie does little with them than point them out.) But it's the killings that bring this one down. Rather than a few well-placed, suspense-building deaths, this one lays them on one after another, in the dozens, almost constantly for 105 minutes, with little variation -- and with little to care about. This is less a movie called Halloween Kills and more a movie that has likely killed Halloween.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about Halloween Kills' violence. How did it make you feel? Was it exciting? Shocking? What did the movie show or not show to achieve this effect? Why is that important?
What does the movie have to say about mob mentality? What makes people susceptible to it? How can it be avoided? Is it ever a positive thing?
What is the movie's theme? How is Michael Myers equated with fear? How can fear, or hate, be defeated?
What's the appeal of horror movies? Why do people sometimes like to be scared?
How does this sequel compare to the previous movie, which "retconned" (i.e., made adjustments to retroactively justify continuity) all of the previous Halloween movies, including the original. You've likely heard of reboots, sequels, and reimaginings; which is this? Does it work?
Movie Details
- In theaters: October 15, 2021
- On DVD or streaming: August 2, 2022
- Cast: Judy Greer , Jamie Lee Curtis , Anthony Michael Hall
- Director: David Gordon Green
- Inclusion Information: Female actors
- Studio: Universal Pictures
- Genre: Horror
- Run time: 106 minutes
- MPAA rating: R
- MPAA explanation: strong bloody violence throughout, grisly images, language, and some drug use
- Last updated: June 20, 2023
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