As we did for The Nun premiere a few months back, my brother, his wife and a friend of mine grabbed a couple of brewski’s and some solid appetizers to get us ready for the newest addition to the Halloween series.  Michael Myers and Laurie Strode are back and so is the hype.  As a long time fan of classic horror, this film comes with many expectations and hopes.  That is just the nature of the game, especially when there is a long time fanbase behind a certain franchise.  So when you hear people say how much they enjoyed the new installment into the Halloween series, that is saying something.  When you have a character as iconic as Michael Myers, it makes it more difficult on the creatives behind the film due to the outside speculation and expectations.  But when they pull it off, the result is glorious.

And they pulled it off…  I had a fucking great time watching this movie as did everyone around me.  This time of year is by far my favorite and when a film like this blesses the big screen, it makes it all that much better.  It allows you to embrace the Halloween season and the darkness surrounding it.

So lets start with the podcasters that open up the movie and give us a perspective on what has been going on since we last left Michael Myers and Laurie Strode.  The ambitious couple felt it was time to visit the man himself in the mental hospital accompanied by a brand new Dr. Loomis.  Dr. Sartain welcomes the podcasters into the courtyard in which his patient is chilling at and confront him to attempt to make him speak.  Good luck with that.

This opening scene is beautifully shot and immediately has you feeling uneasy.  The podcasters can’t get him to speak, but they trigger a reaction from the rest of the patients around him and then fully understand that they are dealing with something unlike they could have imagined.  I thought this was a creative way to start this film and it had me excited for the rest.

Now it is time that they go to meet the one and only Laurie Strode.  And of course, she doesn’t give them much content as she is dismissive and focused on staying prepared for the inevitable.  Which is, as you may have guessed by now, Michael’s escape and pursuit of Laurie.

The bus crash scene was well done even though it was very predictable.  It was cool to see it through the eyes of two normal people as a son and father stumble upon the wreckage and witness a number of mental patients wandering around the night.  We are left wondering where Michael is and who he is going to kill on his way to Laurie.

This is where shit starts to get real as I initially thought that these two podcasters were going to be a big part of the film… Until they get slaughtered at a gas station bathroom…  Michael finds his signature outfit and takes back the mask that the couple had been holding in the car.  The fact that they died this early in the film was actually exciting because it surprised me to a point and had me questioning which characters were going to step into the spotlight.

Laurie’s family was an interesting group of characters and even though there were some strange scenes between them, like the dinner scene in which Laurie randomly shows up to further explain that shit was going to go down only to be ignored and shut down by her daughter, who now has a family of her own.  That scene felt rushed and pretty random but it didn’t affect my take on the movie as a whole.

Laurie’s granddaughter became the focus of the story as she and her friends are stalked by Michael and eventually killed off in a gruesome fashion.  David Gordon Green did an excellent job directing the film and truly paid homage to the original.  I felt myself smiling and feeling some nostalgia as they recreated the long take of Michael running into a group of trick or treaters then turning his attention to the shed on his right.  He then, of course proceeds to murder the lady in the house with the hammer found in the shed so that he can get ahold of his beloved murder weapon.

The simplicity of this film was perfect and mirrored the original in a brilliant way.  They did not try too hard during the creation of this film and that was what I was worried about before seeing it.  They stuck to their guns and remembered why people like Halloween in the first place.

Now let’s talk about the twist… Yes, I am talking about the moment in which Dr. Sartain decided it was a good decision stab Officer Hawkins in the throat after they hit Michael with the car in order to put himself in Michael’s shoes to understand him more.  Now, I believe the intentions behind this scene were pure as they wanted us to know that Dr. Sartain was driving himself insane while attempting to figure out why Michael does what he does but the road they chose to take to interpret this was somewhat strange.  They then made it much worse as he puts on the mask and throws Michael into the backseat with Laurie’s granddaughter.  At this moment, I legitimately thought the doc was going to start butchering people for the rest of the film… Thank god that was not the case, but the fact that thought came across my mind threw me off a little bit.

The climax was high action and well done, but I think some people were expecting a little more when it came to the confrontation between Michael and Laurie.  It didn’t bother me too much but I definitely can understand that take.  This is a 4 star movie with great acting and direction.  Again, it was the simplicity of it all that I enjoyed the most.  Entertainment is the focus of movies like this, and I was pretty fucking entertained.

Thanks for reading and be nice to each other.