The most important part of any gift you send out there in the universe is the ribbon you tie it all up in to make it nice and neat…

While Halloween Ends is hardly perfect (it was never going to be) It manages to stay true to not only the spirit of all the films but also in paying off some of the ideas that just felt a little silly in the last installment of this franchise.

Four years after her last encounter with masked killer Michael Myers, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is living with her granddaughter and trying to finish her memoir. Myers hasn’t been seen since, and Laurie finally decides to liberate herself from rage and fear and embrace life. However, when a young man stands accused of murdering a boy that he was babysitting, it ignites a cascade of violence and terror that forces Laurie to confront the evil she can’t control.

Let’s be honest with ourselves for a second, this narrative needed a little bit of separation rather then it all taking place in one fateful night and with Halloween Ends pushing us past the events of Halloween Kills (4 years past) we see a town of Haddonfield that is simmering in its pain and angst.

That’s what ultimately makes it so effective as we see Laurie being the one trying to push past the spectre that was (and still very much is Michael Myers).

Writer/Director David Gordon Green has a solid enough track record as a storyteller that the prime idea that he placed in the audiences head about the concept of evil being much more than the personage of Myers pays off in spades as we see a town and its personages in pure turmoil not knowing where to direct their anger and their fear.  It’s a nice story telling device that allows these characters and this narrative arc to have closer while still leaving the door open to pick up the mask once again.

Green allows the town itself to become a character and as we become introduced to the players in it all, we see a genuine allegorical meaning rise up which exists in all these horror stories.

The fear of insignificance and unimportance that simmers in humanity is never more apparent than it is in America’s small towns and that’s where the idea of a ‘Michael Myers’ can stir and take on a life of its own.

This comes through in the kills and the setups for violence throughout the film because while some of it starts in a fairly muted and almost justified matter, the further on in the story we get, the crazier the kills actually become.

Jamie Lee Curtis does a stellar job as our eternal heroine Laurie who is actually trying to push past the pain of all the past events in the face of a town that she’s ultimately brought down to her level while Andi Matichak matches Jamie Lee’s energy as the granddaughter of our favourite badass who is looking for purpose in the wake of the mass angst of this entire town.  Rohan Campbell brings fresh energy to the scenario as a young man looking to pick up the mantle of hate and death from a new unexpected mentor.

Ultimately, Halloween Ends gives us enough grizzly action to put this saga of Michael Myers to bed once and for all while still giving us a stern reminder that if we’re not careful, it’s far too easy for someone to pick up that mantle of evil once more.