Warning: Major spoilers ahead for Halloween Ends
The first moments of Halloween Ends take the original Halloween’s iconic opening scene and flip its premise on its head in what might be the slasher sequel’s most inspired move. Halloween Ends avoided a lot of over-familiar tropes, but the final chapter of the Halloween saga still fell victim to some clichés. Viewers who hoped to see Laurie finally shoot Michael (as the trailer for Halloween Ends promised), for instance, would be sorely disappointed as the original Final Girl still refused to take the advice of Scream’s heroine and simply put a bullet in the villain's head. However, one extremely effective subversion of slasher movie clichés came in the opening scene of Halloween Ends.
Arguably the strongest sequence in the sequel, the opening scene of Halloween Ends flipped the original Halloween’s famous beginning by having a babysitter kill a child (albeit accidentally) instead of vice versa. While the death in the opening scene of Halloween Kills was entirely unintentional, the tragic accident still played a part in the backstory of the movie’s main antagonist. As such, the sequel managed to establish the more sympathetic new Halloween Ends villain Corey Cunningham with a neat inversion of the original Halloween’s introduction of Michael Myers.
Halloween Ends Breaks A Slasher Rule
From its opening scene onwards, Halloween Ends makes it admirably clear that the movie is not following the standard slasher movie blueprint. Where Micheal Myers usually didn’t kill children (something that the child being babysat, Jeremy, points out to his babysitter Corey), tragic accidents aren’t as discerning in their choice of victims. As such, in a legitimately shocking and stomach-churning moment, Corey accidentally sends Jeremy falling to his horrific death in the first few minutes of Halloween Ends. From here on out it is obvious that Halloween Ends won’t be replicating the standard set-up of slasher sequels since, already, the movie has broken one of the sub-genre’s unspoken rules.
Why Halloween Ends Changes The Original’s Premise
While 2018’s Halloween reboot succeeded largely because the movie was a straightforward, suspense-driven sequel that replicated the tone of the original movie, Halloween Ends takes a more ambitious and divisive route. Halloween Ends opts to explore the difference between "inherent" evil (if there is such a thing) and evil that is learned or conditioned via social pressure. Corey’s ostracization after the death of his young charge leads him to be brutally bullied, which eventually leads to him nearly dying after an assault. This results in him joining Michael Myers on a killing spree but, unlike the original Halloween's villain, his motives are clear and understandable.
Where the original Halloween used its opening scene to prove that there is nothing scarier than a killer who has no motive and no reason for killing, Halloween Ends contrasts Corey with Micheal as the sequel uses its opening scene to illustrate the sort of tragic circumstances that can send characters on a dark, but all too understandable path. Michael’s in-built, inexplicable evil is the exact opposite of Corey’s recognizable, reactive anger. However, by the end of Halloween Ends, the original Halloween villain and his new protégé are no longer so dissimilar, proving that both different parts lead to the same destination.