Sorority Row (2009)

After a revenge prank gone wrong results in the death of one of their number, a group of sorority sisters resolve to cover up their friend's death and go on with their lives. Skip forward eight months and would-be scapegoat Cassidy (Briana Evigan) is looking at a bright future with valedictorian boyfriend Andy (Julian Morris) while cover-up mastermind Jessica (Leah Pipes) clings to her ambitions of marital bliss with Senator's son Kyle (Matt Lanter). Alas, it soon becomes apparent that their friend's death isn't much of a secret when the Theta Pi receive threatening communications from the deceased and bodies start piling up.

"Sorority Row" is a deeply unserious slasher movie that favors one-liners and makes its characters so infectiously bitchy that you're not sure if you wanna see them die horribly or continue fight among themselves while ancillary characters bite it. If you think about the contrived narrative and the dumb decisions the characters make for more than a minute you're likely to start punching holes in the movie, but why would you want to when it's so much fun in its own skin-deep way? Leah Pipes is a standout as the ruthlessly ambitious Jessica, whose dedication to sorority sisterhood hinges entirely on her own ambitions and ultimately plunges her and her friends into very deep trouble when she makes it clear that reporting the movie's tire-iron-wielding killer to the authorities simply won't cut it. Meanwhile, Briana Evigan is great as Cassidy, an unexpectedly strong final girl who elevates an otherwise shallow movie. Throw in some creative kills, an appropriately grand finale and dialogue you can't help but eat up and this is just a very fun slasher movie. Hardly "Halloween", but as knowingly camp slashers go, it's one of the good ones.

Halloween Ends (2022)

The concluding chapter of the David Gordon Green "Halloween" trilogy and presumably the final run-out for the Jamie Lee Curtis version of Laurie Strode, "Halloween Ends" feels less like a natural conclusion after 2018's "Halloween" and 2021's "Halloween Kills" than a glorified fan film. Sure, it hits a few decent beats in its own Dollar Tree "Christine" kind of way, and it obviously has higher production values than your average fan project, but it's severely mismatched with its immediate predecessors and commits the sin of sidelining Michael Myers in service of a not-always convincing narrative about evil changing shape. That Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell, giving a fairly good performance), victim of band kid bullies and recipient of a tragic backstory, takes precedence over the series' primary antagonist is fine up to a point, but having Michael mugged and fully replaced in the lead-up to his final showdown with Laurie is a case study in jumping the shark and negating one's own ending. Then there's poor Allyson (Andi Matichak, in over her head), reduced to moron status after strong showings in "Halloween" and "Halloween Kills" as her doomed romance with Corey hinges as much on her utter obliviousness as it does on their shared trauma. She gets a bit of redemption in the closing minutes but, again, it's negated by Green's over-indulgence. Throw in a lot of truncated kills and this one's a disappointment. If "Halloween Kills" was a wonderfully cartoonish slasher then "Halloween Ends" is a bloodier-than-average 'bad boyfriend' movie. I don't think it's half as terrible as many have made out but I can certainly understand why franchise fans find it maddening.

Halloween Kills (2021)

The "Texas Chainsaw 3D" of the "Halloween" franchise, David Gordon Green's "Halloween Kills" is dumb as hell but also a blast. Delivering the right kind of fan service with its flashback scenes to the night of Halloween 1978 and the right kind of slasher fun in the brutal present-day actions of a GOATed incarnation of Michael Myers, this superior sequel to 2018's "Halloween" only loses points for the dopey social commentary Green tries to shoehorn into an otherwise unserious slasher movie with Tommy Doyle's (Anthony Michael Hall) "Evil Dies Tonight" mob. Set on the same night as the previous movie, it sees Michael Myers survive the fiery inferno that was once the Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) compound, offing the attending fire crew in one of the franchise's most exhilarating scenes before continuing on a collision course with the citizens of Haddonfield that sets the stage nicely for the trilogy's concluding chapter. As I've said, this movie is dumb as hell, and if you're inclined to pick it apart you'll find plenty of ammunition. But for me "Halloween Kills" is just too satisfying an experience to dwell on its flaws, especially when its chaos is shot and scored as beautifully as it is. This is a "Halloween" movie with great gore and great rewatch value.

Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998)

The first timeline reset after the mess that was "Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers", "Halloween H20: 20 Years Later" finds Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) living under an assumed name as the headmistress of a boarding school in California, still fearful that her brother Michael Myers is out there, ready to come after her again, twenty years following his original massacre. She may be a psychologically scarred functioning alcoholic (making this one of the least endearing iterations of the character in the franchise) but Laurie is correct about Michael. After dispatching of Nurse Marion (Nancy Stephens) from "Halloween" and "Halloween II" back in Haddonfield, Michael heads west in search of his sister, eventually finding her in one of the drabber entries in the "Halloween" saga. The cast (including Michelle Williams and Josh Hartnett) here is fine, but the characters they portray are paper-thin, the version of Myers they have to contend with watered down, and the storyline they're stuck in is as uninspiring as they come. And while it's nice to see Jamie Lee Curtis back in the franchise, the filmmakers do the Laurie character a disservice by turning her into a lush bore, even if they do give her a solid final act to work in. "Halloween H20: 20 Years Later" ultimately isn't any worse than "Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers" or "Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers" from a technical standpoint, but it desperately lacks their charm and will mostly appeal to viewers who like their slashers rote. For me, it ranks near the bottom of the franchise.

Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers - The Producer's Cut (1995)

Leaning all the way in to the ludicrous "Thorn" subplot introduced in "Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers", the Producer's Cut of "Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers" subtracts some of the best scenes from the theatrical version in favor of lore-building exercises equal parts stupid and hilarious. This isn't to say that it's all bad; what's left from the original cut outshines most of the new material, but this cut does do a better job with Jamie Lloyd (J.C. Brandy) even if it does also confirm that her baby is the product of incestuous relations with Uncle Mike. And I suppose if you're down with the "Thorn" silliness, you might just dig the sight of what was a beastly version of Michael Myers being thwarted by rocks and a dab of blood. Doctor Loomis (Donald Pleasence) inheriting Wynn's game at the conclusion may just go down as the funniest scene in the entire franchise, too. By the standards of effective slasher movies, however, the producer's cut of "Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers" is a disaster, despite a subset of franchise fans insisting that it surpasses the more generic version audiences initially received. I didn't hate this movie as much the second time around as I did when I originally saw it, but I'll still rank the theatrical cut way above it.