Halloween, acting as a direct sequel to the first Halloween and initiating Blumhouse’s modern Halloween trilogy. That series will debut its final chapter in time for Halloween of 2022 with Halloween Ends.
Though the title and the marketing position Halloween Ends as the conclusion of the Halloween franchise, this is really a half-truth. Though it is indeed concluding the story that began with 2018’s Halloween (or, rather, continued from where the original left off), Halloween Ends will just be the end of one specific story in the series. This is a pattern that is impossible to miss when it comes to the Halloween franchise.
Since Halloween II, the Halloween series has been rebooted or retconned in some form or fashion no fewer the four times. Whether in Halloween III: Season of the Witch, Halloween: H20, the Rob Zombie-directed Halloween reboot movies, or the 2018 Halloween, shifting gears and switching continuities is as big a feature of the Halloween franchise as any superhero movie series. That also assures that Halloween Ends is just the latest example of that.
Halloween's Constant Retcons & Reboots Will Keep It Going After Halloween Ends
Halloween III: Season of the Witch took the series into a completely different story, with 2007’s Halloween being a ompletely fresh start. Both Halloween: H20 and the 2018 Halloween also act as direct sequels to the original Halloween, with no concern paid at any point in any of the retcons to maintaining fealty to anything beyond what they’ve already chosen. If that is already a roadblock to a definitive end to Halloween, so too is Michael Myers himself.
Since that fateful Halloween night in Haddonfield, Illinois in 1978, Michael Myers has been notorious for his refusal to die, which has given way to theories about Michael's potential death in Halloween Ends. There is no demise emphatic enough for Michael that Halloween Ends could possibly deliver that would prevent him from returning, and the Halloween movies are more than prepared to accommodate such a revival. Whatever Halloween follows Halloween Ends could and almost certainly would play by its own rules, as the whole franchise has, and simply set Michael loose on Halloween night once more without connecting itself to whatever Halloween Ends has planned for him.
Halloween Ends might be wrapping up the modern Halloween series’ specific battle between Michael Myers and Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), but in the grand scheme of the franchise, it is just concluding another offshoot story retconned from 1978’s Halloween. Michael Myers, as the Halloween movies have long assured the world, is a killer who never meets his end. With that and the restarts the Halloween franchise has repeatedly experienced either into direct sequels or Halloween anthology stories that could be used again, Halloween Ends is a title that makes no bones about being an oxymoron.
