When the creative team of David Gordon Green and Danny McBride announced a three-part sequel production to horror classic Halloween (1979), it was difficult to anticipate precisely what sort of movie trilogy they had in mind. When their pre-existing works included the likes of Pineapple Express (2008) and Your Highness (2011) it was difficult to see the link between stoner comedy and violent slashers. Now that their Halloween triptych is complete – Halloween (2018), Halloween Kills (2021), and Halloween Ends (2022) – I cannot imagine anybody back at the beginning was accurately predicting the sorts of films that we got.

While Halloween was a solid revisionist sequel, Kills was an unexpected meditation on the effects of mob violence. If audiences were expecting Ends to get back on track to focus on a final one-on-one showdown between survivor Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and mass murderer Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney), they will be sorely disappointed. Both characters appear, and there is a final confrontation – the spoiler’s in the title – but once again McBride and Green – and co-writers Paul Brad Logan and Chris Bernier – have their eyes on something else. They do not even attempt to resolve what appeared to be a cliffhanger at the end of the last movie.

Halloween Ends picks up a crucial few years down the track. Laurie is finally trying to build a life for herself, living with granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak). Michael Myers is nowhere to be found, but the town of Haddonsfield continues to suffer in his shadow. When a young man Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell) is persecuted for a terrible accident, Laurie recognises first-hand his shift towards violence – even as he romances her granddaughter.

Curtis thankfully gets a lot more to do in this sequel than the last, as does Andi Matichak in her third turn as Allyson. Rohan Campbell gets some interesting work to do as Corey, and while his story has a tendency to stretch credulity that is more the effect of the screenplay than the actor. Will Patton also returns a Haddonfield’s former sheriff; it’s a small part, but as always he plays it well.

It does not take long for Ends to become the slasher movie its audience demands, however it is not necessarily the one many will have hoped for. A slightly loose screenplay takes a solid hour to arrive at the sort of narrative one might expect, and even then its character development feels abrupt and rushed. The core appeal of the Halloween movies, the slow unstoppable faceless killer, is actively downplayed. What is admirable, however, is that once again a stock horror sequel has been sidelined in favour of something more inventive and new. It may disappoint some viewers, but it is making something more interesting from what was already a tired franchise. I know which kind of sequel I prefer to see.