When the new Halloween hit theatres on October 19th, it revived not only the Michael Myers’ series but also the slasher genre. Michael Myers, the same mass murderin’, Captain Kirk white spray painted mask wearin’, kitchen knife stabbin’, nutcase who influenced many slasher films in history becomes the same guy to bring the genre back to life.

The wild success of the original John Carpenter’s Halloween which debuted back in 1978 when on to spark the influence for other great slashers such as Friday the Thirteenth, Scream, and I Know What You Did Last Summer.

The original Halloween also contributed to the downfall of slasher films by releasing nine mediocre-to-awful sequels. The nine sequels were considered flops because it deviated away from what sparked the success of the original. Let’s break them down.

Before I knock the Halloween franchise, I want to knock the slasher genre. The genre died (no pun intended) when the movies stopped being about the plots/storylines or even the “slasher”. It became about what new gory ways the slashers could be seen killing people and how many topless chicks could get absolutely mulled by the slasher. Things got so stale that in the Friday the Thirteenth series, they sent Jason to space to kill people, taking a trip to Manhattan, etc. A lot of this cooled the genre as a whole until it was briefly revived by Scream in the late 90’s before going stale again.

Now here’s how Halloween contributed to the downfall of slashers (i.e nine crappy sequels).

The second Halloween tries to spin the story with the “Laurie is Michael’s sister” narrative which felt like a redundant story in Hollywood (looking at you Empire Strikes Back). Also Laurie Strode somehow has Chris Kyle accuracy with a pistol, shoots Michael in BOTH of his eyeballs in two shots and somehow he still is able to swing his knife at her. If I were Laurie, I’m ceding and letting Michael take me out in that moment if two eyeball shots at point blank with a pistol doesn’t kill him.

The third movie in the franchise might’ve been a good standalone film had it not been titled “Halloween”. When you see that in the title, you’re wanting to see Michael Myers do his thing. You don’t go to a John Mayer concert to see the warm up bands only. No matter how good they are.

The series just takes weird turns when it brings back Mr. Myers: The fourth, fifth and sixth installments of the series get into some weird cult background stuff for Michael. Also without the Laurie Strode, it just isn’t the same. Paul Rudd couldn’t even save the series. Really nothing else to say about these three.

Halloween H20 and Resurrected, the seventh and eighth installments of Halloween brought back Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode. H20 was a fine movie and is one of the better sequels of Halloween but immediately was followed up by the dumpster fire of Resurrected.

I don’t like to consider the next installments part of the Halloween franchise although they technically are Rob Zombies adaptions of a reboot. I won’t waste my time on these but they really whiffed as the movies were very dreadful (even for a movie which features the masked guy) and gave too much backstory to Michael. The movies were generic Rob Zombie flicks’ with a Michael Myers’ Snapchat filter over them. Not good.

Now that I’ve ripped the entire Halloween series (minus the original). The first movie was magical the way we felt instant dread anytime Michael appeared on screen. We see him in broad daylight standing by the clothesline, driving a car, and lingering around all night. We see him everywhere and it was part of the ride.

As scary as Michael appeared somehow this vulnerable high school babysitter was invincible against him. Laurie Strode is like Rudy Ruettiger from Rudy. When Laurie demasks Michael at the end it’s like the last scene is Rudy where he finally gets to play and he sacks the quarterback like he’s Aaron Donald and then gets hoisted up on his teammates shoulders. This created the formula for a great slasher film.

The new Halloween literally uses the same formula and the results were pretty much the same as the first.

The best part about this sequel is it cuts out all other sequels in the series. Instead of a vulnerable Laurie Strode, however, we get a gunslinger badass Laurie Strode. Plus we get to see Judy Greer play a role where she’s actually cool or something. The three generations of grandmother-mother-daughter worked in the defeat of Mike. Laurie and Michael flipping roles was a great touch. The movie had the halloween night tone that the first had. No over complications, the premise could be figured out by the 30 second Instagram trailer. Laurie and Michael had some unfinished business.

Blumhouse Productions was smart to talk John Carpenter and Jamie Lee Curtis into helping with the sequel it was the best way to get the same formula as the original. The movie flowed and made since. It hit a lot of notes from the original while still making the movie new and refreshing.

Only since The Force Awakens have I been more excited to see old characters take the big screen again. Side Note: RIP the poor podcasters. Brutal way to go and I’ll never use a gas station bathroom if it’s accessible from the outside of the building again (idk if I ever have actually used one like that but I surely won’t now). The music was faster paced, the deaths were more brutal (but it worked).

The biggest and maybe only real knock on the movie is honestly the ending. The coolest thing about Michael to me is how humanizing Michael appears. In the original, Michael is shot and falls off a second story balcony before disappearing into the night. You can still kind of talk yourself into believing that he could’ve survived the wound and fall before he wandered off if he was a human. He’s not some weird looking dude that hangs out in your dreams or a weird creature with a hockey mask.

Unfortunately, the new movie chose to literally burn Michael alive. I wish they would’ve deferred to having his body go missing in some way. They didn’t really leave it open ended even though after the success at the box office during opening weekend Blumhouse will have 76,221,545 reasons to make a sequel. Michael surviving that ending, would literally make him immortal. Killing some of the magic for me.

Now it’s just a matter of time before more slasher franchises run it back and take another crack at a modern day slasher. In fact Blumhouse is trying to buy rights to more franchises. Also rumblings of a Lebron James produced Friday the Thirteenth sequel could be in play. Not sure if the new LA Laker star knows how to make a slasher but one thing is certain, this Halloween movie will be the return of the slashers as we know them.