Review of Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998) by John G — 13 Nov 2011

Halloween H20 honestly has to be the most underrated Halloween sequel ever. To me, this was a very worthy sequel to John Carpenter's masterpiece as well as Halloween 2 as well.

Okay, so 20 years have passed since Michael Myers brutal Halloween massacre in Haddonfield, Illinois. The film focuses on Laurie Strode, Michael's younger sister and the survivor of the first two films. People thinking she died in a car accident few years after the Halloween murders, Laurie actually faked her death in fear of encountering Michael again. Since then, Laurie Strode is now the dean of a Northern California private school going by the alias of Keri Tate and is now living with her son, John and dating the school counselor Will Brennan. While it may be a great life for her, all is not well with Laurie. She keeps having nightmares that her serial killer brother will return and find her. Laurie's fears not only put stress on herself, but on John as well, who thinks Michael Myers is dead and thinking his mom is too stubborn to let her past go. But then on Halloween night, Laurie's fears are realized when Michael Myers resurfaces with a vengeance thanks to information he got from the house of his former enemy Dr. Sam Loomis and begins hunting and trying to kill Laurie, John, and his friends. Tired of fearing for her life, Laurie takes it upon herself to face her brother head on and enters a final confrontation in order to put an end to Michael Myers terror once and for all.

This film deserves way more praise than it deserves. Not only is Halloween H20 a good sequel, but it takes the Halloween franchise back to it's roots. This film completely ignores 4-6 and I am fine with that. I will admit I did like Halloween 4, but Halloween 5 and 6 were just plain awful. What I hated about Halloween 5 and 6 was how they gave Michael Myers a reason to kill. That whole Michael having the curse of thorn which gave him supernatural powers and drives him to kill his family was so stupid and ridiculous. What makes Michael my favorite horror slasher is that not giving him a reason to kill made him more interesting and him not being human, but more like a force of nature was completely awesome. And Halloween, Halloween II, and H20 do just that.

Jamie Lee Curtis returns to play Laurie Strode, which is the role that gave her a career. I loved how Curtis molded Strode's character into what she would be like after 20 years and did a good job in showing the pain and torture Laurie had due to the fear of facing Michael again. Josh Harlett did a good job in playing Laurie's son and played the part well of trying to move on with his life while living with Laurie's stress coming from the fear of her big brother. Lil Cool J was a good comic relief in the film and was fun to watch. Another actor who reprises her role from the original franchise is Nancy Stephens, who played Dr Loomis's nurse Marion Chambers in the first two films. It was so awesome hearing the original Halloween score again and the scenes it was used sent chills down my spine. The kills were very impressive and Michael was great in bringing the same intimidation and evil he had back then. Now this film is where the Halloween series should have ended. While Halloween Resurrection was a decent what if film, Halloween H20's ending was just brilliant and should have ended the series right there and then. Rob Zombie's Halloween franchise is just garbage and will never be as classic and scary as the original. Best Halloween trilogy to me is and always will be Halloween, Halloween II, and H20.