An uncertain future, supernatural suggestions, and a 40-year-long story arc coming to a
close. There's a lot to unpack in "Halloween Ends" – including the way it actually ends.
At the start of "Halloween Ends," Jamie Lee Curtis' Laurie Strode is doing her best to
move on with her life. No longer hidden away from the world, Laurie starts writing a book
about her experiences with Michael Myers, while living with her granddaughter, Allyson, played
by Andi Matichak. However, Laurie still senses there's darkness infecting Haddonfield, Illinois.
Before long, all of her old fear, paranoia, and readiness to fight start to re-emerge.
But by the end of the film, Laurie seems to have finally been able to put those things to rest,
at least for the most part. She's killed her boogeyman, destroyed his body,
and gone back to work on her book. She even lets Allyson leave Haddonfield to start a
new life. "Halloween Ends" suggests that Haddonfield's most determined
survivor has undergone a rebirth of sorts, but that she's still a little
haunted. Serving as a reminder that Laurie will never stop looking over her shoulder,
it's revealed that Laurie has Michael's mask, which is sitting on a table in her office.
Allyson Nelson grew up with the paranoid specter of her grandmother
looming over her. While Laurie tried her best to offer love and protection,
it's clear that Allyson's view of the world has been informed by her upbringing. Like Laurie,
Allyson is trying to move on from the darkness of Haddonfield's past,
but she now has her own inner darkness to contend with. Not only is Allyson wrestling
with the deaths of her parents at Michael's hands in "Halloween" and "Halloween Kills," she's also
forced to overcome her romantic relationship with Corey Cunningham, the new local boogeyman.
At first, Allyson is unwilling to believe her grandmother's claim that she's heading down a
very dark path with Corey. However, she ultimately realizes that Laurie
was right to warn her, and a brand-new serial killer was hiding in plain sight.
But the solution, when all the fighting is over and both Michael and Corey are dead, isn't to keep
hiding or to lock herself away in Haddonfield like her grandmother once did. Instead, Allyson leaves
her hometown behind to start fresh somewhere else. While she seems hopeful, it's clear that
Allyson is all too aware of the true evils of the world, and well equipped to take care of herself.
Following the losses at the end of "Halloween Kills," the pool of Michael Myers survivors has
shrunk considerably. One major player who stuck around for "Halloween Ends,"
alongside Laurie and Allyson, is Lindsey Wallace, played by Kyle Richards. Of course,
in 1978's "Halloween," Lindsey was Annie Brackett's babysitting charge.
"Her babysitter, Annie Brackett, was executed that night."
Lindsey managed to hide from Michael in "Halloween Kills" and survive. Four years
later, Lindsey seems to have a pretty good life. She's running a local bar,
throwing festive Halloween parties for the locals, and even growing closer to Laurie
and Allyson. But when violence starts to creep back into Haddonfield, Lindsey is swept up in
the Michael Myers hysteria once again. However, Richards' character doesn't play as big a part
in "Halloween Ends," and she doesn't face the same level of violence that follows Laurie and Allyson.
By the end of the film, Lindsey stands as one of only a handful of
survivors of the original 1978 massacre, alongside Laurie. As far as we can tell,
it seems like she'll remain in Haddonfield where she'll be an important part of the town's future,
particularly since she knows how to move on from tragedy.
Will Patton's Deputy Frank Hawkins was one of the men who arrested Michael Myers on Halloween night
in 1978. In "Halloween Kills," we learned that Frank and Laurie once had a strong flirtation
that could have turned into something more if they weren't both so damaged and reluctant.
"I always liked you."
In "Halloween Ends," Frank and Laurie run into each other in a grocery store,
and it seems like it might finally be the right time to pick up where they left off. At the end
of the film, following Laurie's gruesome battle with Michael Myers, Frank stops by
Laurie's house. The pair sit together on her front steps, and it's suggested that
Laurie might finally be ready to take a chance on romance now that her boogeyman is behind her.
While it's unclear whether or not they'll actually get together,
viewers are left with a sense of hope for a potential shared future.
"Halloween Ends" is based around the story of Corey Cunningham, a local Haddonfield kid whose
world was shattered on Halloween night in 2019. Corey was responsible for the death of a child
he was babysitting, making him a town pariah and leaving him with a lifetime of lost dreams.
However, Corey's guilt is eventually eclipsed by his desire to understand his own darkness and go
deeper into it, something he's able to do when he crosses paths with Michael Myers in a sewer drain.
By the end of the film, Corey has essentially proclaimed himself the new Haddonfield
boogeyman. He even goes so far as to steal and wear Michael's mask, in an attempt to
get revenge on all the people who have wronged him. Of course, Laurie is smarter than Corey,
and manages to stop him in his tracks. After leaving a path of bodies in his wake,
Corey becomes integral to Haddonfield's tragic legacy. But for now, at least,
it's unclear whether he is a new boogeyman or just a footnote in the story of Michael Myers.
Haddonfield is a town that's been rocked by an absurd amount of tragedy over the
course of 40 years, and it's taken a toll. Even with Michael Myers gone,
the town continues to suffer what feels like an ongoing series of accidents, deaths, suicide,
and other tragedies. There's a darkness in Haddonfield, which Laurie witnesses even
when she does something as benign as going to the grocery store. It's also revealed that some
of Michael's survivors and their families blame her for provoking the killer to more violence.
Michael's death at the end of the film, and the ceremonial crushing of his body at the junkyard,
temporarily puts an end to this darkness. But viewers are left with more questions about the
future of Haddonfield, such as, will the town ever truly be free of the specter of evil? Will
more people like Corey Cunningham rise up to take Michael's place? Or is Haddonfield finally
able to live in a world of safety and security once again? It's an understatement to say that
the town's been through a lot, and the road to any sort of recovery is bound to be very long.
Though Michael has seemingly died in other "Halloween" films, none of them quite matched
the death he was given in "Halloween Ends." After being pinned to a table by Laurie and Allyson,
Michael was bled to death through several cuts to key arteries along his body. But
as Allyson astutely noted, Michael Myers still wasn't quite dead enough.
With the support of local law enforcement and much of the town,
Laurie and Allyson took Michael's body to the nearby junkyard. There, they placed him in a
grinder and crushed him to pieces. While his body is destroyed, everyone is left wondering whether
Michael Myers can ever really be killed. In "Halloween Kills," Laurie theorized that Michael
Myers seemed to possess a superhuman ability when it came to killing and cheating death.
"The more he kills, the more he transcends into something else."
"Halloween Ends" seemingly demonstrates Laurie's theory. In one particular scene,
Michael kills Allyson's ex-boyfriend, and his body seems to almost immediately
recover some of its strength. But we're never told where Michael's
immense strength comes from, or whether someone else can actually access it.
While Corey seems to believe that he can take over for Michael,
and perhaps acquire some of that power, his fast demise suggests otherwise.
Michael Myers is dead. The ending of "Halloween Ends" makes that clear by showing us his corpse,
then crushing that corpse up in a brutal piece of junkyard machinery. The film is intent on making
sure that this Michael Myers timeline is complete, and that Laurie Strode's fighting days are over.
Except not all of Michael is really gone, at least not the version of Michael that emerged
when he pulled on his mask and became "The Shape." The final shot of the film reveals that the mask,
battered and burned, is still present in Laurie's house as a dark souvenir of her victory. Laurie
probably wanted to keep the horrifying object because she didn't want collectors or copycats to
get their hands on it. It's also worth noting that she could have destroyed the mask, but she didn't.
Laurie's decision to save the mask raises a number of intriguing questions. For one,
we're left wondering if the mask might hold power over Laurie now that it's in
her possession. Michael never wanted to remove the mask, and he would stop
whatever he was doing to pull it back down if someone tried to take it from him. Plus,
Michael's apparent transcendent abilities while wearing the mask suggest that it's more than just
a face covering. If so, Laurie may have made a terrible mistake in keeping the mask as a trophy.
Haddonfield is a relatively small town that's been rocked by some serious tragedies through the
years. In fact, Corey Cunningham is the second major mass murderer to come out of the town in
40 years, and his killing spree is inextricably linked to the devastation caused by Michael Myers.
In 2018's "Halloween," a pair of true-crime podcasters came to town with a specific
focus on the town's 1978 tragedy, proving that there was widespread interest in the
case. And in "Halloween Ends," Laurie Strode completes her memoir about Michael Myers,
and it seems likely that the book will throw Haddonfield into the national spotlight
once again. As Haddonfield looks to a future without the serial killer, will Laurie embark
upon a book tour to promote her work? Will the town's various true-crime stops become tourist
destinations? Basically, following Corey's murder spree, and the death of Michael Myers,
Haddonfield's profile is on the rise, even if the trilogy has come to an end.
"Halloween Ends" represents an interesting benchmark in the history of the "Halloween"
franchise. It's not the first film that has attempted to kill off Michael Myers. For instance,
Michael and Dr. Sam Loomis were blown to smithereens in 1981's
"Halloween II," and they both managed to return in the fourth film. In 1998,
Laurie decapitated Michael with a fire ax in "Halloween H20." However, this version
of events was retconned in 2002's follow-up, "Halloween: Resurrection." Michael's deaths
didn't seem as final and definitive in those earlier films as the one in "Halloween Ends."
"Well may he never, ever, rest in peace."
Whether Michael's dead or not, fans clearly still have an appetite for the "Halloween"
series. But as for where the franchise might go next is currently unclear. While
Jamie Lee Curtis seems to be well and truly done with playing Laurie Strode,
there's a possibility that the series could be rebooted in the future by a different studio.
Blumhouse no longer has the rights to the franchise, having agreed to deliver only
three films. But producer Jason Blum and original creator John Carpenter have both
suggested that as long as "Halloween" films make money, someone will want to make more of them.
"Halloween" could also live on without Michael. 1982's "Halloween III:
Season of the Witch," which doesn't feature the serial killer, has developed a cult
following in the years since its release. In fact, some fans have even wondered if
new films in the franchise could actually revisit the "Season of the Witch" timeline,
or take some other radically new approach. Regardless of what happens next, it's clear
that the "Halloween" franchise is never really over, as Michael Myers always comes back.