The Big Picture - ‘Halloween Ends’ and the 'Halloween' Movie Rankings

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

‘Halloween Ends,’ the third and allegedly final installment of David Gordon Green’s legacy sequel 'Halloween' trilogy, debuted this weekend in theaters and streaming on Peacock. Chris Ryan joins Sean to talk about the new film, the year in horror, and to rank all 13 'Halloween' films. Host: Sean Fennessey Guest: Chris Ryan Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Would you bet a few thousand dollars that you could sink an eight-foot putt? What about ten grand that you could win a drag race against a Camaro with a thousand horsepower? If you bet two million dollars, could you bet it all on one football game? Maybe you wish you could, but you probably wouldn't. Gamblers is about the people who did. From the Ringer Podcast Network, listen to Gambler Season 2 on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Sean Fennessey, and this is The Big Picture,

a conversation show about Halloween ending. Halloween ends the third and allegedly final installment of David Gordon Green's legacy sequel, Halloween, debuted this weekend in theaters and streaming on Peacock. Joining me today to talk about the new film, The Year in Horror,

and to rank all 13 Halloween films, the PJ Souls to my Jamie Lee Curtis. It's CR Chris Ryan. I kind of always saw myself as a Loomis in your life. You know, just keeping you sane or keeping you safe or keeping everybody else safe from you.

You have Loomis and Halloween 4 energy, which is to say you're running around town with a gun shooting at imaginary figures. That's you on every podcast. How are you doing, Chris? I'm doing great, man. What a time to be a Philadelphian. I know that you, it's kind of your second city. It's your adopted home.

I got nothing bad to say about Philadelphia this weekend because they absolutely smoked the Atlanta Braves. And for that, I applaud them. We sure did. As of right now, though, my allegiance is returned to New York. I was home in Philly for the last couple of days. So I am feeling very autumnal.

You know, the leaves are changing. They're blowing around. It's getting cold. All the decorations are up. So this is a perfect time to do this pod. Was there Haddonfield energy in Philadelphia? Did it seem like a murderer named Schwarber was stalking the streets?

I was curious about this. Haddonfield, Illinois, right? Shot mostly or usually in California or South Carolina. Pasadena famously is where the house is. Do you think that we've done enough with Haddonfield?

Oh, you're already launching the reboot? Well, we can wait if you want, but I just think we should start pitching a Jace Haddonfield expanded universe content. Okay, let's do that at the end of this conversation. And also, let's make sure that Blumhouse and the Akkad family has our number

and know that this is wholly owned IP by Spotify, okay? JMO Productions. JMO, man, we're sleeping. Yeah, JMO Pro. Is someone is someone gonna grab jmo prod.com while we do this we have like a lot of we have bots out there that'll make sure that doesn't happen that you have bots for sure let's talk about horror before we get into halloween ends okay what a fucking year for horror it's cranking right now the movie business is in a state of disarray as always but this genre which every year you and I devote a handful of episodes on this show, more this year than usual to this wonderful

genre, this everlasting, ever-revivifying genre of movie, got a lot of good stuff this year. I made a list off the top of my head. It's a good list. It's also just infecting all the other genres in a way. Yeah. You know? Like, certainly we got a new Scream movie this year, which I think you and I

both really liked a lot. I think the new Scream is actually in production. Scream, is that six now? Yes. Is coming? Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, which I think might end up

being the last good MCU movie. That was basically a horror film. Yeah. For the second act, especially. We got Nope, which I think in some quarters would be considered like a conspiracy

thriller or a science fiction movie but really is built around the structure of a horror film steelbergian horror that's right say yeah barbarian you and i spent one hour explaining that entire film to amanda dobbins on this pod smile now we haven't talked about smile on this pod and i still haven't seen it i haven't seen it either so this is a huge error on our part. I'm sorry about that. It really is. I have an excuse, which is that the day that the film opened, I contracted COVID-19. Yeah. And so I'm over it.

And so my plan tonight is to go out and see the film. I will. Maybe I'll go with you. But I just watched 42 hours of sports. That's why. That's my excuse. But this movie is a sensation. Yeah.

It has been a huge box office success. And people seem to really like it and it certainly sounds like a smile extended universes around the corner. X and Pearl, the two A24 films from Ty West that both came out this year that were both pretty critically acclaimed

and seemed to do pretty solid box office for independent horror films. Prey, which is a Predator movie. Which we loved. And was great. And I guess it's kind of a soft horror. Yeah, it's action horror.

Action horror, yeah. The Invitation, another film I still have not seen yet, but which did very well at the box office this year. Resurrection. Terrifier 2.

Yeah, so this is a Shudder one, right? It's not. I believe it's produced by Dread Central. This is a crowd-funded sequel to a very low-budget horror film that came out about six or seven years ago.

And it is a very gnarly, very intense... I don't even know. I'm not sure what the... It's sort of splattercore. It's sort of Herschel Gordon Lewis-style, like 60s, messy, disgustingness. Yeah, so like exploitation grind stuff earlier than that. But with really, really, really like Tom Savini inspired high level practical effects.

There is a kill in the first film. And I'm not seeing the second film yet. And I will see it this year. And it has been an independent film sensation. It's done really good business around the country showing in specialized theaters. The first film has a couple of kills that are even by our standards. Elite.

Grizzly. Good. I mean, truly grizzly. So I look forward to Terrifier 2. Watcher was a film that popped on Shudder earlier this year.

Really liked it. Sundance movie that you liked with Micah Monroe, our girl. Werewolf by Night, another MCU thing. It was pretty good. Pretty good. Pretty good.

Not great, but pretty good. Yeah. There was a Hellraiser reboot, which I didn't really care for that much, honestly, but that premiered on Hulu. That was the yassification of Hellraiser, right? It was. It was a trauma film about recovery with the Cenobites,

which is, you know, I guess that's certainly something you can do. Two other A24 movies that are kind of soft horror, Men and Bodies, Bodies, Bodies. Orphan First Kill, which I thought was pretty quality. Yeah. Honestly.

Yeah. Um, I'm paramount, right? November 23rd, we get a little film called bones and all. Yep. I spoke to Luca Guadagnino last week about telling him I was skipping his movie. Um,

no, you did mention during the horror draft that you are out on cannibalism. Yeah. Stop. Yeah. Uh, this is a cannibal drama. I didn't even watch the trailer.

Um, let me think about this. Mark Rylance is in it? He's in lots of stuff. Did you go see the one where he like makes the suit for the mafia? I did.

The outfit. Yeah. Yeah. I watched it. It was okay. Okay. You didn't watch that one? I missed it.

I thought you were one of the world's foremost Rylance heads. I think he's really good but it's not like I watch it. I think Mark Rylance will like do a movie if

they like give him a nice phone call and a box of chocolates. Did you see the film Don't Look Up? Yes. Do you remember him in it? No. What is he? He was sort of like a Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, sort of Elon Musk figure.

Did you like him in it? I thought he was funny. I thought he was doing something unique. I feel like Mark Rylance was on the precipice of being like Anthony Hopkins after Bridge of Spies. And I think he's just one of our, he's like an amazing actor. But we'll just kind of make some weird choices sometimes. What I need now is for you to invite Mark Rylance onto the watch and tell him that you don't watch all of his films. You pick and choose. You think Mark Rylance watches all of his movies?

That's a very good question. I don't know. I'm not sure what he does in his spare time. In addition to all of these films, most of which were released in theaters, most of which are in many ways

powering the non-mega-franchise box office this year. We mentioned this when we had Alex Ross-Perry on the draft last week, but Shudder is humming. The best streaming service. It is consistently so reliable

between catalog and original films and this year they have released us for 25 original films. I've watched about 20 of them. I'd say about 13 of them were pretty damn good.

Yes. That's an amazing hit rate. Yes. And it's like, so here's my, here's my thesis. I want it to bounce off. Okay.

This is the last movie genre. It's the only, it's the only defense we have against IP superheroes. And it is a true movie genre in the sense that superhero movies are in conversation with themselves. Right? Like they're about multiverses, shared universes. How are we going to build upon franchises, tease out the next one. Actually, stuff that horror probably used to do really well when it was like, here's movie number five with Michael Myers, movie number 10 with Jason. But horror is in conversation with the rest of the world. And it brings out and reflects

our anxieties now. And those anxieties can be modern parenting, dislocation when you're traveling, Airbnbs, the pandemic, Zoom, boyfriends. That's the stuff that movies should be about. It should be about what it's like to be alive at any given moment. And the coolest thing about horror is that while we bemoan pretty much the hollowing out of the independent film movement, the ability for people to be like, I'm going to max out a credit card, make a movie, put it in a festival, and then it's going to get a theatrical run.

Horror's doing that. It's an abundance genre. It is action comedy, thrillers, sci-fi, supernatural, ghosts, gods. Anything you can think of, they've got a horror movie about it and probably one from the last 15 months. It's pretty remarkable. I mean, part of the reason for that, as we've talked about in the past, is that it's a cheaper genre. Sure. And so there's a lot of productions ongoing. It's a hell of a way for young filmmakers to get into the business because there's a lot of loose money around this genre because people know that they can probably

make their money back. And so people are more likely to, you're more likely to take a chance on a young filmmaker. There are people like me who still look at the iTunes horror new releases and I'm just like, okay, I'll give it a shot. Shudder though is, is, is upending that. I mean, I feel like they're actually sucking up one 10th, two 10ths of those films that you would have seen five or six years ago. I mean, I wrote down just a handful of the movies that they've released this year. Your mileage may vary on all of these releases, but I thought all of them had something to recommend them. I'll just give you my list. I don't know if there's anything else in addition to this that you dug, but Speak No Evil, which is probably the most demented movie of the year. I've talked about it a couple

of times. That's my favorite horror movie of the year. That movie, people are very mad that I recommended it on the show. Yeah, but they're mad because it's terrifying and I'm a dad or it's terrifying and I care about my tongue. But they're not mad because it's a bad movie. Yes, it worked. That's the issue. Hellbender, which is a very small family-made kind of psychedelic horror movie that I liked quite a bit. The Sadness, which is probably the most upsetting COVID-19 film I've seen. Right.

It's an allegory for COVID-19, but it is like a similar to the Terrifier, but in a slightly more realistic way. Incredibly violent and grim. Glorious, which is literally a movie about a god in a glory hole in a bathroom starring Ryan Quantin from True Blood. That I thought was actually pretty clever. What Josiah saw, who invited them, you just mentioned last week.

Saloom. Saloom's cool. Really, really, really interesting movie that is like part sort of warlord African drama, part supernatural.

Yes, exactly. It has a real From Dusk Till Dawn vibe of like, basically mercenaries looking for a place to hide out. And when they get to that place, they find out they're in hell, essentially. That's a very, very good film. Senegalese, actually.

Mad God, which is a... I don't know if you've seen that film. I haven't. It's a stop motion animation, but it's from Phil Tippett, who's one of the masters of practical effects and worked on Robocop and Jurassic Park and any number of films. Deadstream is a found footage comedy that just premiered last week. There's a Dario Argento movie called Dark Glasses that just premiered last weekend as well. And then I haven't seen this yet, but now VHS 99. I can't wait. I'm waiting for my wife to get back from New York so we can watch it. Because this is something that I do with as a couple, which is also another

thing that is kind of nice is that a lot of movies now have kind of become stratified where it's like, I have movies I watch with you. I have movies I watch with my wife, movies I watch by myself because nobody else wants to see them with me. But it's really cool to have that elemental primal, like, you know what would be fun right now is to go to the theater for two hours and get mildly scared or terrified. And yeah, the Shudder thing is now for me the way I think most people kind of think of Netflix. They're like, well, let's just see what's on Netflix on Friday. And that's how I go to Shudder. And usually they're curated library stuff. Even if I only watch 15 minutes of it and I'm like, it's not my vibe. But sometimes they find

something from 2002 or 1996 or 1978. I'm like, yeah, I've never even heard of this. This is awesome. Yeah, I just watched Four Flies on Grey Velvet, the Argento movie the other day. I also watch pretty much all the ancillary content they make. I'm currently watching the 101 Scariest Moments in Horror Movie History,

even though I've seen every single movie on the list. And it's like an old school VH1 clip show, but I'm enjoying it. I watched The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs. Like, I will watch almost anything that they program. And the thing is, is that I don't want to jinx this because I don't want it to get, like, upset. But, so the comment section for the movies

is essentially, like, you get raided by skulls. But if you scan it and you don't look too deeply because you don't want to get spoiled you can see like some people are like very like didn't scare me for shit but it's like you can kind of get a sense of whether or not it's any good

or if it's going to look like crap and I don't know it's like a very useful community it's a positive community yeah it's people who want to find something now obviously horror fans are incredibly loyal

in the first place, and will seek out almost anything. And we always make these episodes in part for them. But it's interesting because just like last year and just like 2018, there is a big, noisy sequel of a historic legacy franchise

horror film, and that's Halloween Ends. So let's talk about it. This is David Gordon Green's third film. I think we're both big fans of his in general. He was on the show last year to talk about Kills. It is ostensibly that final installment that I mentioned. I'm just going to read the plot in case anybody hasn't seen the film and they want to hear about the setup.

So it takes place four years after her last encounter with masked killer Michael Myers. Laurie Strode is living with her granddaughter and trying to finish her memoir. Myers hasn't been seen since then, and Laurie finally decides to liberate herself from rage and fear and embrace life. However, when a boy named Corey Campbell, who stands accused of murdering a boy that he was babysitting,

enters her family's world, it ignites a cascade of violence and terror that forces Laurie to confront the evil she can't control. So, what do you think of Halloween Ends? I think that this one is my favorite of these DGGs. Well, I would say this one and the first one were my favorite of the DGGs. Most Halloween movies,

but specifically the David Gordon Green movies, I think I need a little bit of distance from because when I first saw the first one, it was so off in terms of how I thought of Halloween. I think it'll be a consistent conversation topic is people have their idea of what Halloween should be and anything that deviates from it really upsets them. Strangely for me,

I'm like more of a carpenter originalist, but more aesthetically than anything else. So I really like Season of the Witch because it feels very, very Carpenter. And Tommy Lee Wallace is a Carpenter collaborator. This didn't feel that way to me. And some of the tonal stuff that he does, which wildly swings, I think intentionally,

from really broad comedy to grotesque violence, but never truly scary. Like it's, some of it is almost like torture porny, but not like, Oh, I'm really like spooked or really like what's the, the tension is unbearable. So anyway,

that's a long way of saying like you go into these movies, you have your preconceived notions of what Halloween movies should be. And then you see, and you're kind of like, huh? I think you liked kills more than I did. I saw it. So I saw than I did. I did. I saw it. So I saw Ends pretty much in a vacuum.

I hadn't really watched any of the trailers and I saw it in a big theater with big noise. And this movie does a real turn. So for the, I guess, are we spoiling it? We didn't spoil it. It's streaming on Peacock at this point. So it's not really a Halloween movie. Not, kind of hardly at all for long stretches. Right. And that threw me off in the beginning,

but I was also kind of like, I'm just so interested to see what they're doing here. Now, do I feel like they necessarily made all the connections and read all the progressions? Like, no. But there was something in this movie that I really, really liked. I didn't care for it.

I actually felt like I was a little bit on an island defending Halloween kills for a couple of reasons. One, I'm a huge fan of David Gordon Green just purely as a filmmaker and sort of like the tone that he sets in a movie, which you're right, is completely different from Carpenter. I thought it featured some of the more ingenious kills that I'd seen in a slasher in a long, long time. I think where people quibbled with it was the conflation of sort of mob mentality and mob violence and trying to make a comment about our contemporary culture and using a Michael Myers movie to do so. Obviously, many Halloween movies are reflective of our society,

but they don't necessarily attempt to allegorize that thing. For me, it worked. I was interested in it. I was interested in the dynamic. I liked the way that they kept Laurie and Laurie's family at the center of the struggle. So moving into this film, which for long stretches features neither Laurie nor Michael Myers and is largely oriented around this Corey Campbell character, it didn't connect. I don't know. It felt to me like a movie that needed a different, like another pass or needed another,

like it needed to be slightly more refocused to make the core tension of the story, which is Laurie and Michael, even more at the forefront. Now you might be saying to yourself, we've been seeing Laurie and Michael

for literally 50 years in this franchise. Like how much more Laurie and Michael can we take? That's fine, but I don't know who Corey Campbell is and I wasn't connected

to his story at all. And I think the way that they found, the way that they connected Michael and Corey didn't work. Like, it just didn't work. And if it doesn't work

and you don't feel like there is any kind of natural fit there, then it feels like two movies running on different speeds. Isn't it funny how, like how if you listen to House of R and you listen to Mal and Joe talk about the logic

or how a plot in House of the Dragon may have fallen short because of the literal reams of information that they have processed, the show, the books, the theories, the histories. And they're like, well, she would have done this in this moment, or this would have been more like that because the political alignment. And then in this movie, it's just like, well, if he just stares at him, he just becomes Michael Myers. Yeah. I mean, I'm going to explain it to try to make it make more sense to me.

And we're like, fuck. Yeah. Okay. We have to accept it, right? That's the thing. And obviously horror movies have supernatural tension and curiosities and not everything is logical. In fact, some of the best horror movies ever made are not logical. So pinning this movie against the wall because it doesn't make sense is not totally fair. But the point is, is that this character is introduced in what I thought was a really, really effective first five minutes.

It was like bracing. I thought it was tension packed, not necessarily scary, but a nice little piece of filmmaking, like a nice short story. It was like a modern day Shirley Jackson story or something. And we use that entryway, which is to say, Corey is this babysitter who gets locked in a room and he bursts the door open in the room that he's locked in and he accidentally hits the kid that he's babysitting and knocks him over the banister and he falls and dies almost entirely

almost right in front of the children's parents as they return home for the night very very exciting opening very upsetting opening in a lot of ways and then we're essentially

in Corey's story and Corey we quickly learn is an outcast in his community because of this he doesn't go to prison but he is largely considered you know

someone who is now an outsider officially he's bullied by high school kids he was going to go to college for engineering he is largely considered someone who is now an outsider, officially. He's bullied by high school kids. He was going to go to college for engineering, and now he's working in his dad's scrapyard. Body shop. He's bullied one night by a bunch of kids. Let's just take a quick pause

there. The people who bully him, this was the time in the movie that I really got pulled out. They're in the marching band. He is getting harassed and marauded by four kids in marching band who are like rich kids. But it's like

in the history of the United States of America has anyone ever gotten bullied by people in the marching band? Was this an attempt to subvert our notion of what the marching band is? I couldn't figure out what the point of this was. Was that like a joke about how it wasn't the football team? I guess. Anyhow, he's bullied by these kids.

He's actually thrown off a bridge in a fairly violent sequence. And when he finds himself under the bridge, he discovers a kind of cave. And in that cave, he discovers, hibernating, I guess, for four years, Michael Myers. Michael Myers doesn't kill this kid, Corey. In fact, we see... for four years, Michael Myers. Michael Myers doesn't kill this kid, Corey.

In fact, we see... Did you find that Michael Myers was reflective of your time with COVID? Minus the murderous rage. Yes. I think otherwise... Rebuilding your strength. Yeah. The demon in the ADU.

Adopting a mask to protect myself at all times. Yeah, that's true. There's a lot in common there. Corey and Michael are face-to-face, and Michael is, for whatever reason, not stabbing Corey. I think because what they're saying is that he has identified a liked-minded outsider. True love.

And maybe a fellow psychopath. And as you said, they look each other in the eye, and somehow when Corey's reflection appears in Michael Myers' eye, he accepts his murderous intent? He's taking on the shape is what I thought of it. The shape, the idea of Michael and this pure evil, which

part of the problem with having seen all these films and caring about them is that it is impossible to track because so many of them backtrack on their own continuity of like... What is Myers? track because so many of them backtrack on their own continuity of like... What is Myers? Is Myers a force of evil? Who's the man in black?

All this stuff. But in this movie, essentially, Michael is more of a force for most of it than he is an actual physical manifestation. So he's in this sewer and he gives Corey the darkness that's inside of him. And Corey slowly loses himself and seems to have... sewer and he gives Corey the darkness that's inside of him and Corey slowly loses himself and

seems to have a kind of tractor beam for Laurie's granddaughter and they kind of start a very like basically Badlands-y kind of teen romances like we're going to burn this place to the ground and ride out on a motorcycle, literally.

And Allison seems to be increasingly under his spell. And I guess it's worth mentioning here that in the same way that everybody has their reasons for liking Halloween movies, usually it's Michael. Sometimes it can also be Laurie and Laurie's strength throughout these movies. I've always been pretty fascinated by Haddonfield. I've always been pretty fascinated by Haddonfield. I've always been pretty fascinated by this suburban place

that in David Gordon Green's conception is much more of a little bit of a run-down, strip mall-ier kind of area. It kind of feels almost like, I don't know, just some place off a highway in Ohio. It's slightly more low- rent than what you imagine. It's not suburban paradise. And Allison's working in like a hospital,

but she can't get a promotion because her boss is like sexually harassing her. It's essentially sexually harassing her coworker. And it's like, there's all this stuff where it just seems like a shitty place to live. And beyond the fact that Michael Myers terrorizes it, it's just like not a great place to live. And beyond the fact that Michael Myers terrorizes it, it's just like not a great place to live. And in a lot of ways, this one is about escaping Haddonfield

and wanting to get out of Haddonfield. And I thought that that was a really interesting idea. So I'm going to attempt to locate what I think is perhaps an inspiration in the story that rubbed me the wrong way. And I may be overreading it, but since the story, the Corey and Michael connection, is clearly this sort of easily communicable concept of evil. That if you are cast aside

by a certain group of people, that you are more likely to turn to the dark side. Yeah. You know, that Corey, when he makes this mistake at the beginning of the film, and accidentally kills this child.

Which, in and of itself, is a really interesting scene because there's something wrong with that kid. Yes. It's at least presented that they're like, this kid has been muttering to himself in his sleep, is having nightmares, is being difficult. There's all this stuff about don't let them watch scary movies. Instead, they watch The Thing. It's a great, great sequence. But there's a little bit of ambiguity. It's like, what's up with this kid? Did this kid have Michael in him or something? But also there's this sense that Corey, while he is ostensibly innocent of manslaughter in this case,

is literally screaming, I'm going to fucking kill you to a 10-year-old boy while he's locked in a room and is so violent that he has the ability to kick the door down. Now, you could say that this is the incident that kind of sets off everything inside of Corey's character. But again, if this is a incident that kind of sets off everything inside of Corey's character. But again, if this is a stretch,

tell me. But it feels a little bit like Kyle Rittenhouse inspired. You know, like there is a real like if you take a young person at a critical time of their maturation

and you expose them to a way of thinking, the results can be very violent. Yeah. I thought school shooter, but sure. Like I thought that this is where where mass murderers come from.

This is where people who... And I don't agree with it, and I'm not saying they thought it through, but I'm saying that's... I'm sure they thought it through, but I'm just saying I don't know if I buy it. Well, the reason that I raise this, and I think it's so important to try to unpack,

is because in Kills, the idea of the mob mentality as a reaction to a murderer, I think it's so important to try to unpack is because in in kills the idea of the mob mentality as a reaction to a murderer I think is made more coherent societal analysis sense than the dangers in our lives can potentially come from the supernatural connection to a slasher villain like that seemed to kind of trivialize something that actually felt deeper and maybe more serious and maybe didn't... It felt like a way to flip explanation

in a practical way for something that is obviously a massive crisis in our country. I think you're getting at the sort of core issue with this movie and with, I think, IP horror movies or maybe IP movies in general,

is that you're just going to serve too many masters. So they have to make a Laurie movie. They have to make a Michael movie. Then the movie that they obviously want to make is River's Edge in Haddonfield with these two kids who are ostracized from the town who want to leave it in ashes as they drive out. And they basically start to do that. You know, like they basically start to exact their revenge on the town with Michael as their avatar.

And I thought that was the part that I was most interested in. And I think that's the part David Gordon Green was most interested in. That was the part, that was the movie you could see, oh, he would make a really cool Bonnie and Clyde type movie if he didn't have to also put Michael. And then also this latest trilogy is really about the deification of Laurie. Right. Well, it's about making Laurie in some ways like a Brene Brown figure, inspirational. She's telling her survivor's tale. She's writing her memoir throughout the film.

One of the complications of the story that I also didn't think really worked was the idea that Laurie, who still for some godforsaken reason lives in Haddonfield,

just fucking moved to Maui. Like, what are you doing? Right. It would be amazing to just see, like, Michael Myers on, like, a spirit air flight to Honolulu.

Because he's fucking going. Again, you're spoiling sequel material here. But she stays in Haddonfield and she attempts to match up Allison with Corey. It's a, yeah. And she knows that Corey did this to this kid and is a damaged person. And so what she's trying to do is identify a fellow survivor, somebody who's been through something traumatic and put them together. That's dangerous.

That's not actually what people who have struggled need is to be with somebody else who has struggled, especially at this critical turning point of their lives. Like it's a very odd, there are a couple of plot decisions. It doesn't seem like if you had gone through your daughter being murdered by Michael Myers, that you would be like, who, who's a little bit on the edges of society that I could hook my granddaughter. Yes. Now, maybe that speaks to the pathology of Laurie Strode that keeps her locked in these problems. And that's how you would explain it. I don't really know. Again, these are a series of issues that I bumped on throughout the film. I will say, once again, though, for me, I didn't care as much about the Over the Edge or the River's Edge or the, you know, 1950s delinquent style movies like the Blackboard Jungle style movie that they're trying to make here.

Like, if that was its own movie directed by David Gordon Green, I would have been interested in it. But I really liked that first five minutes. Like I said, and I did like the conclusion of the movie. I did like the final showdown between Laurie and Michael. And I did like the absolutely, truly visceral to the blood and bone conclusion. Yes.

And which is a, basically a, uh, like a Baroque painting of carrying Michael's crucified body on the top of a car hood and then putting him into a

industrial like chipper. Yeah. Yeah. Like a wood chipper. His carcass is ground to me at the end of the film.

And part of it is because it gave a true sense of finality and of course all slashers there's no finality and Michael Myers will be back for sure. But I liked that they were willing to go as far as possible

especially as i've been revisiting the halloween movies they work pretty hard to make sure you don't see michael die yes you know that he does we don't see his body get we don't see his limbs get sliced off so his head get cut off one is is it one that she traps him in the floor and burns him or two? Is it kills? That's at the end of the first David Gordon Green

is that he is burned alive underneath and then he is sort of stabbed but escapes. He's like stabbed to death by the mob at the end

of kills but then escapes anyway. Right. So that's it. That's the end of the David Gordon Green trilogy and now he's off to make what I think is a trilogy

of Exorcist films I think he's a really brilliant filmmaker it's just sometimes these movies really live or die by their scripts and if you don't really dig where they took the story and in this case unfortunately I just didn't dig where they took the story it didn't work for me yeah there's a lot of funny stuff you had mentioned to me

the music is very it's like very much mid 90's like the kind funny stuff you you had mentioned to me the uh the music is very it's like very much mid-90s like the kind of stuff that you and i would have grown up listening to in high school and stuff and dead kennedys and you know it was well but it's set in 2022 in in suburban illinois yeah it was david gordon green's teen years just set in the world of michael myers and um that's that's cool like i that kind of authorial intent is I'm down with that in general

I just it didn't really satisfy those expectations that you're talking about which is that you want a certain thing from these films we go 50 full minutes without Michael Myers

to start the film and then we go a long long long stretch without Laurie and then it kind of wends its way back

film is not a huge success at the box office. Which they're also saying is possibly because it was on Peacock. It was also a huge sports weekend

for a variety of other reasons. It was a bit Kills was a big success at the box office despite also streaming on Peacock. But Peacock now has

50% more subscribers. There are more people. I would imagine that a bunch of people signed up for Peacock to watch this movie. No less of an authority than Bill Simmons texted us on Thursday night having for whenever it was that it first went up on Peacock. And he was like, I'm done.

So Bill should be at the movie theater seeing Halloween. That's a really interesting thing about it too. Because you'd imagine with the streaming services, even if they windowed it like two days. Two days. Get that first weekend. Just put it out Sunday morning. Yeah.

I wonder if they would make significantly more money for a franchise that has diehards like us, where we will see it the day it comes out. Because they didn't just premiere that movie on Thursday at midnight or Friday morning at midnight. They premiered it, I think, at 8 p.m. Eastern on Thursday. Which means if you were there on Thursday night, you didn't have to worry about this movie for the rest of the weekend. And in fact, if you're going to go to the movies on Saturday, you might have just gone to see Smile instead.m. Eastern on Thursday. Right. Which means if you were there on Thursday night, you didn't have to worry about this movie for the rest of the weekend. And in fact, if you were going to go to the movies on Saturday,

you might have just gone to see Smile instead. Yeah. And it was an interesting decision. I mean, it's something that obviously NBC is and Comcast is pushing so much of their weight into a streamer. I like watching horror movies on streamers. I don't really, you know,

seeing it with a crowd is obviously a great experience, but I've watched 90% of the horror movies that I've seen this year at home. Yeah. I think it's been that way for the last five years. I mean, I think for as much as something like Barbarian will come along and the fact that it was in a theater and the fact that it was a don't read anything about this, you have to go see it kind of movie, but it didn't make a difference. My experience of Barbarian was no different or better than my experience of Speak No Evil,

which I watched on my TV at home. Right, right. You know? Mine was, but I watched Speak No Evil during Sundance, which was not maybe the most ideal Sundance movie. I watched it at midnight during Sundance. Oh, I didn't know you had already seen it. Yeah, I saw it in January.

Oh my God. Yeah, I saw it. I've seen a bunch of this year's horror movies, nine, ten months ago. This is an interesting one. I mean, I really wonder, how long do you think it'll be before there's another Halloween movie? I don't know what the state of the rights are for this.

Cause it's so like the Halloween rights. Blood House retains, right? Yeah. But it's like the Akkad family has it, right? Like it's a moneymaker. It's still a moneymaker.

I think this will eventually wind up, I mean, these movies, the David Gordon Green movies are going eventually wind up, I mean, these movies, the David Gordon Green movies are going to wind up making like $700 million, right? Yes, they've done very well. This movie did pretty well overseas too. I think that ultimately,

it'll be like another three or four years. I hope that they don't do something where it's like, well, why don't we try like a series? But this kind of gets into the, why do you watch Halloween movies? Why are there 13 of these? And I think that there are say somebody like Bill

who would literally watch every two or three years a movie where Michael Myers kills a bunch of people and then does he die at the end? And I don't mean to say that Bill is not in it for story or anything like that

but I think Bill is like it's Michael. If your movie doesn't have Michael, that's a failure of the film. For me, I think it's more vibe and it's way more like the slow tracking shot of leaves blowing across the street and the synths playing and the feeling like there's something very evil underneath the surface of this,

like relatively nondescript suburban town. Like what is it about Halloween that you gravitate towards you think uh it's genuinely the collision of both of those things because i do not loomis um i'm not against loomis i like all the loomis films even when donald pleasance was clearly completely inebriated yeah the production of those movies um i i like michael as a central figure in a story because I think he is so fungible you can make him

this kind of supernatural indestructible looming vision of death and doom or you can make him just a very disturbed guy who just is very very strong

and both of those are kind of compelling ways to tell those stories I will say before we get into trying to rank all of these films there is a historic

sliding doors moment that would have been able to, I think, regurgitate and reimagine the Halloween vibe that you have put your finger on without telling the same Michael Myers story over and over again. So you're referring to Season of the Witch, which was

Halloween 1 and Halloween 2, Carpenter's very involved with Rick Rosenthal, and did he direct parts of two? Like, kind of? I think by producing and working on the screenplay, it's still his vision, if not his execution. So then his right-hand man, essentially,

one of his editors, Tommy Lee Wallace, does Season of the Witch. And their idea is like, and this is, you know, early 80s, but they're like, what if we did an anthology series? And then in these anthologies, there could be spinoffs of the they're like, what if we did an anthology series? And then in these anthologies, there could be spinoffs of the spinoff, basically. And it's a genius idea. It's not

unlike saying like, this could be the new Twilight Zone, is that there's something about Halloween as an idea, not Michael Myers, but the season, the holiday, the day, that time in October that lends itself to this atmosphere. And we could tell all these different kinds of contained stories. But even within Season of the Witch, you know, this guy stealing part of Stonehenge, it's just a completely insane movie. But you could see where they were going with it.

And then they kind of reverse course and go back to Myers and Fore. So this movie has been reclaimed quite a bit in the last 10 or 12 years as a real fan favorite and if you saw it at a young age and you are now in a position where say you're talking to a microphone about movies you would say Season of the Witch is great and it doesn't really have the baggage of a Michael Myers

movie because Michael Myers isn't in it and furthermore it's not a slasher. It's basically kind of a witchcraft paranoia sci-fi movie. Yeah but it has that kind of, you know, that sense of very cool dread that Carpenter is just so good at. And when you see the doctor running down the hospital hallways with a steadicam shot and like that, it just really feels like a Halloween movie, even though Michael's not in it. I think there is a case to be made that it is actually the last Halloween movie. You know,

it is the last one that really captures that exact tonality that you're describing, you know, four and five attempt to kind of revive the story. But most of those key players are no longer involved in it, even though it's still attempting to tell the Laurie Strode, the Strode family story. It's an interesting one because if it had worked and it didn't really do that well, it wasn't a bomb. It made $14 million. But the thing is, is that they needed to do this for Halloween 2, not Halloween 3.

By making Halloween 2 and building yet another film around Michael Myers. And I'm not blaming anybody for doing that because I'm sure that the money told them that was the right thing to do. But by doing that, it just made it too hard for audiences to accept the idea of a new

anthology universe that you're constantly spinning off and spinning around. So, I think we're, I think it's Michael from here on out. You know, I don't think that there's going to be

a Corey Campbell spin-off anytime soon. The funny thing is, is that they've done so many different versions of Michael now. And we've had so many different treatments of these characters. And we've had so many different treatments

of these characters. And what do you do with Michael without the Strode family? Like, are the two interconnected? Is Michael only powerful if he's chasing some offshoot of this core group of people? I don't know.

Because we've already had a kind of reinvention and reimagining of this story by Rob Zombie. And so maybe that is the answer. Maybe the ultimate answer is just to try to get as far away from the Strode family as possible. And maybe just to move to a different town. You know, Halloween 3 famously takes place in Northern California, and it doesn't lose that essence that you're describing. Yeah.

I mean, and H2O is not in Haddonfield. That's true. That's true. She has moved, althoughO is not in Haddonfield. That's true. That's true. She has moved, although it is still Laurie, obviously. What's your idea for Haddonfield the series?

Well, I just don't think we're looking enough into their athletics. They've obviously got this marching band. And what kind of role does the marching band play? Do the marching band guys

bully the football players? Is this like an NIL issue? What are you saying? I want to know just like is that a place where you go, what kind of offense does that guy run? Are they a ground and pound kind of place

or is it a spread? Are those kids all going to Illinois or Northwestern or are they going out to Wisconsin? Where are these kids getting recruited? What happens when the college coach comes to town to watch the Haddonfield Knights play. And then the marching band is beating the shit out of the offensive line in

the locker room at halftime. Let's just say for, um, the sake of conversation that the neighborhood that you live in, in Los Angeles, on the East side of Los Angeles, uh, there were North of 60 murders in the span of five years.

Uh, would you stay? Would you live there? No. You'd move, right? Yeah. Wouldn't everyone leave Haddonfield? Yeah.

It does seem like Halloween Kills got most at the heart of what it would be like to live in a town where that happened. There's some stuff in Halloween Ends that I kind of like, which is essentially Laurie is trying to move on with her life a little bit and is writing this book and sort of maybe thinking about starting to date again and is out and about in Haddonfield. And she's smiling one day and a woman is just like, you're fucking smiling. Because of his obsession with you, my mother got her neck slashed. And this idea that she can never escape what has happened to her is actually a pretty fascinating one.

But that is the movie I wanted to watch. And when that sequence happens, that revealed a tension that maybe we don't think about as much, which is the actual problem of her staying, which is a movie. That is actually one of the reasons why I got stuck with this movie

because I could see the movie. It was a Halloween movie that would have worked. And also, I think because they are so committed to, like, Laurie has to be this steadfast person who's always believed in Michael and always wanted to defeat Michael.

They list out on some fun stuff they could have done. So, Laurie Strode, like, going Carrie Lake and being like, I'm going to be, like, the crazy mayor of Haddonfield. That would have been great. That would have been great. And what if and being like, I'm going to be like the crazy mayor of Haddonfield. That would have been great.

That would have been great. They did it. And what if everything was like, we live in a security state here because of Michael. And so I've like hired all these crazy cops. And like,

then there's like, that would be awesome. I mean, just spitball. You just, you just, you just pitched another sequel. I mean,

that would, that would have been better. I think there was something funny about how bad Laurie's book sounded. I mean, that would have been better. I think there was something funny about how bad Lori's book sounded. You know, every sentence that she wrote in the book. I'm not sure if that was purposefully bad.

I think it was purposefully bad, but it was very, very hackneyed writing. But you're right, that there was more opportunity. Do you think that's a self-pub? Is that PDF straight to Amazon? Or do you think she's got like Hatchet? No, ring her books.

Ring her books, yeah. Which has been really exciting for us. That would be really fucking funny if we just published Lori Strode's memoir. Amazon or do you think she's got like hatchet is like you know ringer books yeah which is really exciting for us that would be really fucking funny if we just publish Laurie Strode's memoir honestly another idea

we should probably take off Mike imaginary memoirs from our favorite characters what if that was like the last thing Bill wrote is he just

instead of writing a sequel to a book of basketball or a column he was just like I'm gonna write in the voice of Laurie. It's incredible. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express.

Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. Okay, do you want to rank these movies? Okay. There's 13 of them. I'm going to list them all

for the folks at home so they can get re-familiarized. I can jump in and try and... Halloween, of course, is the original film released in 1978. Probably in that

five or ten most important movies that ever happened to me. Oh, for sure. Just getting me hooked on so many different kinds of things. Yeah. And Carpenter as a filmmaker as well. And the Carpenter run

from 78 to like, I mean, honestly, 90, but like 78, at least 385 is just... All the way up to like Escape from L.A. It's basically Howard Hawks. Almost all those movies.

Yeah, he's basically one of my favorite directors. Halloween 2, you already mentioned. Rick Rosenthal, his aide to camp. Halloween 3, 3 1982 four years later from the original halloween 4 six years past the return of michael myers in an attempt to kind of rebuild the myers mythology the jamie trilogy right yes this is jamie lloyd who is the daughter of laurie strode but who is living with foster

parents and is haunted by the idea of Michael Myers throughout the film. Dr. Loomis also returns in this movie. Halloween 5 is a direct sequel to that film. It is released actually

less than a year later in an attempt to capitalize on the success of 4. Then another six years pass, and then we get the very strange The Curse of Michael Myers. This is the Paul Rudd one.

This is the Paul Rudd film. The Tommy one where he's stealing babies. He plays Tommy Doyle and he's stealing children. And this Tommy Doyle and he's stealing children and this is closer to that sort of like druid cult mythology

around the history of Michael. And then 1999, I think, has become a kind of nostalgic fan favorite. H2O, 20 years later.

Not my favorite. I know you and Bill are big fans of this one. It's closer to Scream. It was very much like a reaction to Scream and I thought it was probably

I don't I don't without being sacrilegious because obviously the first is the best this is my favorite use of Jamie Lee Curtis interesting

so it's her and Josh Hartnett Michelle Williams is in this and she is a principal at a boarding school where her son

Josh Hartnett goes and she is very overbearing in a sweet way towards her son Josh Hartnett goes and she's very overbearing in a sweet way towards like keeping Josh Hartnett safe because somewhere out there is Michael Myers. She knows it.

And he's like, you got to get over yourself. I want to go to college. Like I want to grow up. And it's a great setting for this. For Michael to be terrorizing boarding school kids. And it's just the right amount

of scary versus fun like LL Cool J plays like the security guard it's very enjoyable um this film has an uncredited rewrite from Kevin Williamson which is why it feels so much like a scream film Halloween Resurrection follows that which is a semi-sequel to the events of H2O in which the original house is transformed into like a live cam streaming show. Yes.

Which I will say conceptually is way ahead of the curve as an idea in execution. I think it's like Busta Rhymes is in this. Very poor.

Busta Rhymes rules in this movie. A trick or treat motherfucker followed by a roundhouse kick. One of the better moments in this franchise, honestly. And I will not besmirch Busta as an actor,

but boy, the writing is bad in this movie. And this was also, it's kind of fun to look at these because each movie is sort of representative of where horror might have been at that time.

And I think that late aughts was a little bit of a tricky time for horror. Yeah, I mean, this actually came up when Alex Ross-Perry was on the pod.

We talked about how in our youth, we didn't really have a ton. The early to mid-90s were really bad. Yeah. Scream changes everything, but then there's like

a little bit of a Scream hangover. And you're watching like Final Destination 3. Yes. I will ride for some of the final destination is good man yeah yeah the first one the fourth one there could be literally 62 final destinations i'd probably watch like 54 is it being rebooted now i feel like it must be there's a flaw in death's design man um that brings us do you ever have fd moments like when

you're like in the world out in the world I like to put people in FD moments yeah you like to just loosen the screws on roller coasters just a little bit

you like to release a bunch of geese into an airplane I like to get airplane pilots liquored up before putting them on planes

do you ever have like a moment where you're like fuck this could go really wrong in my life yeah sure yeah like in a where you're like, fuck, this could go really wrong? In my life? Yeah. Sure.

Yeah. Like in a final destination way. Like the one time I rode a lime scooter, I felt like that. You know? Were you like flying down a hill in San Francisco? Those things fucking go. Those are, they're so fast. They don't tell you this is like a fucking Kawasaki.

So you're asking me if I've had any near death moments? No, just, but like when you're, so I was on this scooter and I could see a guy coming from down like one of the hills in Los Feliz. And I was like, here I am. And like, then as I was riding, I was like, I didn't really think about breaking, you know, I didn't really think about like what it takes to slow this thing down. And because I was on a scooter and having fun, I wasn't really thinking about traffic rules. And this guy missed me by like five seconds. Not five seconds, like five feet.

And I was doing like 35 miles per hour. What year was this? This was three months ago. Don't you remember? You got on a Lime scooter three months ago? Yes, because people kept leaving them outside my place. So I was just like, you know what? I've never ridden one of these.

Are you serious? Yeah. This should have been content. So I was just like, you know what? I've never ridden one of these. Are you serious? Yeah. This should have been content. So I was just scooting back and forth. I think Phoebe took a picture. She didn't put it up on Instagram? It's stupid.

I almost died. And it would have been the worst. Can you imagine CR dies on a Lime Scooter? Can you imagine the tribute pod you would have to do and just be like, this fucking moron

got hit by a Prius? You never cease to amaze me. I thought I knew it all. But here you are getting on Lime Scooters almost dying. Yeah. In the year of our love of 2022. And let me tell you, electric cars out there, they are dangerous to Lime Scooters because you can't hear them coming. Wow.

That's a great take. To answer your question, no. Okay. I've not been on a Lime Scooter in my life. So like when you're driving behind like a logging truck you're not like sure i've imagined a log hitting your face awful fate yeah i've thought about that but i've never actually been in a moment where i thought it was all gonna end it always happens to me when i um if i'm on the highway and a guy is trucking like one of those prefab like trailer houses i'm always like god this, this thing. What if it just fell on me?

It would be like a Buster Keaton movie, right? Where you went through the window and you were totally fine. Yeah, but then I'd go through the window and then I'd get hit by a logging truck. Or a truck carrying lime scooters. I did have a moment. When I was 15,

I learned how to snowboard. And by learned, I mean didn't learn. Because I went snowboarding with a bunch of friends who were very good at snowboarding. And I knew how to ski. And they're like, it's fine. It's just like skiing.

A bunch of 15-year-old guys weren't really supportive and trying to tell you how to do it. And in fact, I flew off the mountain and went off. You know, like sometimes on a ski mountain, there's a ledge, like a side ledge. I do. You dip right into the forest there and there's a big steep drop. Went down one of those once. Not a good day for me. Didn't break any bones, thankfully.

But as I was going down, that's probably the most scared i've ever been in my life all right so we gotta get final destination on it in a ski resort i was recapping halloween movies before we got into this my bad um speaking of death defying we have to wait five years till 2007 before rob zombie comes big rob comes through and rob makes two horror movies i don't know if we've devoted enough time to rob filmmaker on this show. He has a movie out right now that is available on Netflix called The Munsters.

This is an almost two-hour adaptation, sort of origin story, of The Munsters, the 1960s television show. And it's very faithful to the tone of The Munsters. There are fans of everything. Yeah.

Somehow there is a Munsters community that is finally feeling seen. It's weird. By Rob Zombie. And they're just like, you really honored the original text. We got to find our Munsters.

What's our Munsters, man? I think it's really like, it's probably like JT Lancer style like cop shows from the 80s that we like. I was just thinking Last Boy Scout.

Oh, okay. You know, it's like, it's got to be something like that that has that kind of like hard-bitten, super sarcastic was just thinking Last Boy Scout. Okay. You know, it's like, it's got to be something like that that has that kind of like hard-bitten, super sarcastic tone but is not winking. Right. It's like, we're going to actually

blow a guy's head off in this movie. Anyway. I like, I like, don't love the zombie films but I really admire, this feels like him fully realizing a horror vision. And I like what a pivot it is from the previous films.

And so they're interesting kind of in the mix here. And then we get this trilogy of DGG movies that started in 2018. So the Rob movies are like the people of Haddonfield and the people around Michael were truly horrible people. And everything around him is trauma. He was abused psychologically, physically. I think a lot of people had a very visceral reaction to how unsympathetic Haddonfield was. Because so much of what makes Halloween so incredible as a first movie is the 50 minutes

of really pedestrian everyday life that you get to witness. Of just like, she's going to school, and now she's coming back from witness of just like she's going to school and now she's coming back from school and now she's going to try and go out and like you're just like oh I really feel like I understand the rhythms of this person's life that then get upset by Michael showing up this movie the Rob Zombie movies

are you kind of just don't leave with anything with anything approaching like that was fun which you do for a lot of Halloween movies. No, they're truly upsetting. I mean, and that's largely in keeping with the tone and kind of conclusion

of all of Rob Zombie's horror movies. The earlier ones are slightly more fun. House of a Thousand Corpses. Devil's Rejects. Devil's Rejects. They're rollicking.

Yeah. They're kind of rollicking like hillbilly grindhouse movies. This is the kind of shit you like. Yeah. But then like when you're

watching Lords of Salem, you're just like. Yeah, he's more in literally interested in Satan. I guess I have to bury myself alive after this. Yeah, right.

The Halloween movies are interesting in part because they defy your expectations. Not even just of Haddonfield, but like of Dr. Loomis, for example. You know, Dr. Loomis

transforms from this sort of crazed and wide-eyed haunted figure who is pursuing the goodness, the safety of the world, to this like really venal, monstrous, self-serving jerk, especially in the second film that Malcolm McDowell plays. And even Laurie Strode by the end of Halloween 2 is, you know, she's become like inculcated somehow.

She is a part of the evil history of this story. And I don't know. I mean, it's hard to compare those two movies to the rest of these movies, even though they feature Michael Myers in a lot of sick kills because they're working at a very different frequency. But they have their defenders

and they also have people, some people hate these movies. Well, this is also like around the time there was like a couple of Platinum Dunes reboots of like, so there was like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre one.

There was a pretty good Jason around this time, right? Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Nightmare on Elm Street were all rebooted around this time. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, all three of them are very slick. All three of them are very sort of like circa 2005 music video director style.

Yeah, like Marcus Nispel. Marcus Nispel is kind of the king of those films. They're like a little too glossy and prefab for me, but they often have good kills. The zombie movies are mangy but beautiful, you know, like there really is a lot of technique technique. Thank you. Yeah. It is very artistic.

The movies, even though they are very dire. Um, and then, like I said, Halloween, Halloween kills and Halloween ends concludes the 13 films. So this kills your favorite of the DGGs. I was thinking back when you were just talking earlier about you showing up at the restaurant Salazar the night that you and your wife Phoebe saw the first David Gordon Green film. Your wife also a big fan

of Halloween films. Yeah, none of these movies. She was not a fan of that first film, I remember. And, you know, at the time we were producing the Halloween podcast series with Amy Nicholson, which is I think a really wonderful series. And everybody participated in that, you know, John Carpenter, Bl is, I think, a really wonderful series. And everybody participated in that. You know, John Carpenter, Blum.

We talked to everybody. Jamie Lee. And I think I was very open to the reboot of this franchise and also came in being a huge fan of David Gordon Green. And I liked it as basically like a table setter

with the idea that there was going to be more and more of these. Kills, I still think think has a good idea. And that has never really been done in a slasher movie before. Whether or not you like the execution of that idea, whether you're fully on board. I think you said something very smart when we were talking about this the other day, which was that by killing Laurie's daughter,

they kind of took the air out of the balloon of this franchise. Yeah, I also thought Judy Greer would have been the logical person to hang this trilogy around. And maybe the next trilogy. Like there was a way to kind of like, I can't see a future series with Alison and not Jamie Lee Curtis, but I could have seen it with Judy Greer and Alison. Well, they've done everything you can do with a human being with Alison now. Yes. She's literally fallen in love with a demon, nearly committed murder, and then fed Michael Myers into a wood chipper. Like I think she's

gone through the hero's journey. Yeah. Like, I think she's gone through the hero's journey. Yeah. Kills I probably need to revisit. I've only seen it once. When I saw it, I liked it. Ends, as you know, I did not like.

13. What's the worst Halloween movie? I think it's Resurrection. Yeah. I think you're right. I've watched it. If I was like, it's 12.45 a.m.

and I want to go to bed at 1.15 or 1.30, what would be something really stupid to watch? I would watch that, but I would probably never turn it on otherwise. I just revisited it recently

and I will say, to its credit and to the credit of a great many Halloween films, it's about one hour and 27 minutes. Yeah. And I do appreciate that about this franchise.

How long was Ends? Longer than that. One hour and 50 minutes, I believe. Okay. Which is too long. And you can tell there's too much story that they're trying to squeeze. I agree with you about Resurrection.

That's the worst. Okay, so that's 13. I would posit that Ends is 12 for me. I really, really didn't care for it. Okay. Now, it's not getting above 10 for me personally. What else is on your list of low-ranking films? I would probably say the second Rob Zombie movie is pretty low just in terms of just a bad time at the movies for me. It's one of my favorites oh okay so you like that more than the first one

yeah but because of what you just said okay which is like it is the ultimate feel bad movie it's like there's nothing

there's nothing redeeming about it yeah it is the thrilling feel bad conclusion of one director's epic vision of something yeah

people definitely hate it I'm willing to negotiate let's find this is really hard so I it's a personal taste problem yeah conclusion of one director's epic vision of something that people definitely hated. I'm willing to negotiate. Let's find it. This is really hard. So it's a personal taste problem. Yeah. I guess like, let's start here. What, how do you feel about the Jamie movies? And would you say, do you like the Jamie movies or the DGG movies better? Um, I would split them, but they're kind of near the bottom. Okay. me too. Like, I would say it probably goes ends, five, kills, four, H2O. You know what I mean? And then six.

No, see, H2O has got to be much higher. Okay, we can negotiate. How about this? I'm gonna... You can do ends here. I appreciate the fact that you had a very strong reaction to this. You know me. I don't want to kill anything on this show if I don't have to.

I felt like there was a flaw in the design. A flaw in death's design? Maybe I just aped that from you. So Final Destination, should we try to buy that IP? You think that you and I could afford that? I don't know. How's your portfolio? Well, Jeff and I, one of our? You think that you and I could afford that? I don't know. How's your portfolio? Well, Jeff and I, one of our co-workers, Jeff and I,

we've been looking at very low-level English soccer teams because the pound is falling. You're sort of welcome to Rexham. We would have to do a lot of debt. You know, there would be a lot of debt. It would basically be like they're buying into our vision and then we just saddle them with like a ton of debt. I see.

Which the English love. Okay. Sort of a Netflix-style operation you're looking to launch. A 20 year plan. Are you the Ryan Reynolds in this equation? No, I'm more Rob. Ryan's like, he's like, you know, he's like, I've never watched soccer before, but this seems like a good use of my money. Should we buy the Final Destination IP? If you could buy any IP, what would you do? What do you think you would do the best with? I think there have not been very many Good Friday the 13th movies, and that's the one that I think is right. It's also

the one that hasn't been made in a long, long time. We haven't been back to camp in too long. Yeah. I think that there is real, real opportunity. Do you know how amazing it would be to do Camp Crystal Lake but with helicopter parents? Who are like, my child is allergic to this nut butter. We're already off to a great start here, Chris. They gotta free this story.

The rights are very confused. And once they free it, great things are going to be happening. Alright, so you have Resurrection and Ends 1312. I think that why don't we start from the top and go up? Because I want to just have the

H2O and Season of the Witch conversation real quick. One thing that is clear is that the original Halloween is number one. This is the easiest number one in the history of number ones. So Bill put H2O number two.

I think that's really strong having just rewatched the movie. Like that feels... I'm not even sure that I would rate it above the first DGG Halloween, honestly. Oh, I would.

It's a much better... I think it's a much better made movie. It just feels like such a relic of its time. It's like the Jodi Lynn O'Keefe character snapping pop culture references and stuff. It's just like... It's very like...

We just finished the rewrite and we're shooting today. It does feel that way. But at the time, it was hip. Okay. Can we break up the duopoly of the first two movies somehow? Or do you go one and two as the top two? My addled hipster brain has got three higher than two, but they're really close.

All right, we can agree on that. That would be a controversial take. People are going to hate us. Let's put Season of the Witch number two. Okay, that's great. I love it. It's just a fun watch. That would be a really fun explain this one to Amanda movie.

We can try about like there's also i really want to teach your daughter to go eight more days till halloween silver shamrock man the irish queen let's go silver shamrock uh okay is halloween 2 number three then yeah i mean halloween 2 is is a very very good slasher. Halloween 2 also features the hot tub kill, which is one of my favorite kills in the history of movies. Okay. Now,

you would lobby for H2O at 4. I would. I'll give it to you. Thanks. But then you're going to have to give me a little latitude as we get through this. Yeah,

I just hope my wife doesn't see this because she's going to be really mad that I didn't put H2O above Season of the Witch. She's like, what the fuck are you

talking about? You have to be your own man. I am. You have to just not worry about her takes. She can put her takes on Twitter, on Instagram.

She's the one who's like, watch out for that electric car while you're on your lime scooter. That's a good point. She's saving my life out there. Wow. She's sort of your reverse Michael.

Yeah. She's your protector. Okay. That leaves us with two David Gordon Green movies, two Rob Zombie movies, two Jamie Lloyd movies. How do you feel about Curse? I really don't like it.

Okay, so let's put Curse in the back half there. Well, that's not true. Is it 11? That's very strong. It's not very good. It's very confusing. This is the problem also with being in the age that we are

because it's like it almost feels sacrilegious to be rating Rob Zombie and David Gordon Green movies above even though it's like it's not like it's a John Carpenter film but like up to six is essentially like how I grew up.

Yes. You know what I mean? So like to me it's hard to see those movies through New Orleans. The Jamie movies are actually the movies that I remember the best because like that's when I was like in my oh I get to watch those movies through new audiences are actually the movies that I remember the best because like that's

when I was like in my oh I get to watch a horror movie I would rate 4 pretty high and in fact I think I saw this could be wrong and if it's wrong I apologize

but you know there are a couple of different scenes that feature characters watching movies in this film and I think that Corey's dad

or stepfather I'm not sure who he is is watching Marked for Death the Seagal movie and that movie was directed by Dwight H. Little who also directed dad or stepfather, I'm not sure who he is, is watching Marked for Death, the Seagal movie. Yeah. And that movie was directed by

Dwight H. Little, who also directed Halloween 4. Keep an eye out for my Tashin book on Dwight H. Little coming 2024. Can you name any other films

directed by Dwight H. Little? Did he direct a Powers Booth movie? Let me see. I'm not seeing that. I would like to give you a couple of the titles that he made.

He made a film called Free Willy to the Adventure Home. Okay. That's the sequel to the film Free Willy. He did Murder at 1600. Yeah. He directed the filmed adaptation

of Tekken. What a fucking king. Remember how good Tekken was? That was a tremendous game. I loved Tekken. He made a Phantom of the Opera movie. He directed Broken Arrow? No.

That's John Woo, bro. It came up on his credits here maybe he worked on it he might have been producer possibly he was a producer of broken arrow the john woo john travolta christian slater film it's a good movie it's a nice house uh okay i'm just gonna recap for the very confused audience we have at 13 halloween resurrection at 12 halloween ends at 11 halloween the curse of michael myers then going back going to recap for the very confused audience. We have at 13, Halloween Resurrection. At 12, Halloween Ends. At 11, Halloween The Curse of Michael Myers. Then going back at 1, we have the original Halloween. 2, we have Halloween 3. 3, we have Halloween 2. 4, we have Halloween H20

20 years later. I'm going to say at 10, I'll go 10, Zombie. The first Zombie. The first Zombie. Then I'm going to kills at nine and the DGG Halloween let's say you want to say that seven I'll say Halloween to the

zombie Halloween to I'll give you at eight okay and then let's do the original DGG at five at five that's interesting and then we've got four and five I guess five goes to seven and four DGG at five at five that's interesting and then we've got four and five I guess five goes to seven and four goes to six

yeah what do you think no I like that do you prefer five or four can you remember what's what what's the the man in black

is mostly in six or is he mostly in five six six um four features one Sasha Jensen who we would later see five years later in Dazed and Confused in six or is he mostly in five? Six. Six. Four features one Sasha Jensen who we would later see

five years later in Dazed and Confused as Dawn. Right. Also features one of my favorite kills which is Kathleen Kinmont who gets the shotgun

through her stomach and then gets mounted to the wall. It's a pretty crazy kill. Kind of, that gets, there's an homage to that in Halloween Ends.

Yes. Another wall mounting kill. Although, there's a lot of wall mountings Ends. Yes. Another wall mounting, mounting kill. Although there's a lot of wall mountings. A lot of them throughout this series, yeah. This is a, this is a complicated list. I don't know if we got this right. I'm going to read it back to you, okay? 13, Halloween Resurrection.

12, Halloween Ends. 11, The Curse of Michael Myers. 10, Rob Zombie's Halloween. 9, Halloween Kills. 8, Halloween 2 from Rob Zombie. Number 7, Halloween 5, The Revenge of Michael Myers. 10, Rob Zombie's Halloween. 9, Halloween Kills. 8, Halloween 2 from Rob Zombie. Number 7, Halloween 5, The Revenge of Michael Myers. Number 6, Halloween 4, The Return of Michael Myers. Number 5, David Gordon Green's Halloween.

Number 4, Halloween H20, 20 Years Later. Number 3, Halloween 2. Number 2, Halloween 3, Season of the Witch. Number 1, Halloween. If I wasn't here, if this was a solo pod, what would you change? Would H2O be much lower?

It would. How much lower? It would be in the eight or seven range. I just rewatched it and it has all the pieces and it doesn't work to me. There's a lot of time spent with Adam Arkin and Jamie Lee Curtis.

Come on. See, this is the thing. You say you want to know about what Jamie, lot of time spent with Adam Arkin and Jamie Lee Curtis. Come on. See this is the thing is that like you say you want to know about like what Jamie you want to know what Laurie Strode would be like and then when she

has a love interest and she's working a cool job as a principal. I want to just want Michael back. I wanted 40 days and 40 nights Hartnett. I wanted Hollywood

Homicide Hartnett. You know I didn't want this this young punk wet behind the ears. This is right after The Faculty. He's basically playing the same character. They should have gotten

Shannon Sossaman in this movie. That's what it really would have put a shit over the edge. That would have been really quality. H2O, I'll try it again. It's only October 17th. I'm watching so many

horror movies, CR. So many. Is Season of the Witch crazy to put two? I don't care. Okay. We've got to mix it up. Variety is the spice of life.

I would argue that the first hour of that movie, before we truly get into there is a microchip in this Halloween mask that makes snakes come out of your eyes and it's from Stonehenge

and there's an evil Celtic. Everything you just said rocks. Yeah. It's all cool, but when you actually... The first hour where it's like the guy lights himself on fire,

they're all coming to kill us, all the dread, all this, and was it Tom Lewis? Tom Atkins. Tom Atkins going around being like, with his weird, like, I drink a lot, and I seem to have had a lot of one-night stands. Yeah, Dr. Dan Chalice. He's like a Robert Mitchum character. He's great.

It's like a detective who's baffled as to what's going on with this conspiracy. Is it a true Halloween movie? I mean, it could have been. It should have been. And to me, it's just as much a true Halloween movie as the DGGs or any of them. Carpenter was involved in this movie.

It feels like a Carpenter movie at times. Man, I don't know if we did right or didn't do right. It's really hard to say. I think that this is, it's interesting that this one is the one that's produced 13 and that has stuck with us. Maybe it's all a matter of rights, you know? But if you had told me around Halloween 6

that they're going to still be cranking these out, I would be surprised. It's interesting that they think about these things. It seems to be thought of in these batches. And I think that's a point that we maybe didn't make. It's like, should these be a series of one-offs that reinvent the character every single time? Or do you like the sort of more serialized storytelling that happens across the multiple sequels? I'm glad you brought this up because I did write this down. So Halloween movies essentially need to reboot

every two films. Sometimes they reboot after one, but mostly they reboot after two. After two, we get the attempted anthology approach

that we talked about. After five, we get the Paul Rudd as grown-up Tommy Doyle. After Resurrection, Rob Zombie takes over for two movies. You could make the case

that David Gordon Green should have only made two and that they should have reset. And in fact, they may have painted themselves into a corner by having a finalizing trilogy, the kind of Avengers endgame of Halloween movies is how this movie kind of ends.

And I don't know, might've been one too many. We'll see. Haddonfield streaming soon on, is it on Mubi? When is it? When is your, that's your first show? Paramount Plus. Paramount Plus. Me and Taylor Sheridan oh wow finally yeah and it's like mayor of Kingstown esque you know okay did you watch the trailer for the Stallone series for Tulsa King it was on during the Eagles Cowboys game if you notice that wow nothing but Kings present that evening

how did it look I didn't watch it it looks enjoyable it looks a little bit um not hammier but like more comic than I thought it was going to look. I think it's like a real fish out of water thing. The famed comic star of Oscar, Sylvester Stallone. We know that that's really where he's most comfortable. And basically the George Cukor of our time, Terrence Winters, writing it. Is that true?

Yeah. Oh my word. Okay. Maybe I'll watch that. CR, any closing thoughts? Where can we find you? The Watch on Monday and Thursdays. Hopefully to do some Sixers podcasting coming up. How exciting.

Yeah. What's your over-under pick for the Sixers this year? 51. I think it's... Yeah. I think they'll have a

good regular season. How do you think the Knicks will do? I don't think they'll do bad. It's going to be a weird season. I think there's like a

lot of like, there's a lot of ellipses out there. I'm not sure all the coaches are going to be in place. I think there's a lot of ellipses out there. I'm not sure all the coaches are going to be in place. I think there's some hot seats. Can I interest you in Evan Fournier? Yeah, what do you want? Embiid? I think Embiid and Maxi straight up for Fournier.

Maybe I'll give you Fournier and Isaiah Hartenstein. Yeah, because we want to replace the big man. Before we go, tell the audience the horror movie you're most looking forward to watching in the next couple of weeks. And also, you know what we should do? I don't care if the end's the end of the podcast.

What's the regimen? Is it one horror movie every weekend? Is it... I mean, now you're on your 30 horror movies of... I got COVID, so I had so much time yeah I mean I literally think I've watched 40 horror movies this month already um I watched uh I watched one that I was really excited to watch over the weekend I guess I should have probably been sharing some of these but let me just pop out my diary like it's like I think for some people

they're like what maybe they're newer to the genre maybe they're like you guys seem so enthusiastic about it so what should i like fire up i've been trying to get a real true mix of classic legacy films so i watched a lot of halloween films i watched a couple of jason films after our conversation on the horror movie draft i watched dominion the exorcist prequel the paul schrader film not the renny harlan film i not the Rennie Harlan film. I watched Amityville 2, The Possession, per Alex's recommendation,

which I thought was pretty cool. Very Italian, almost Giallo or Lucio Fulci kind of inspired. I watched Laura Hasn't Slept, which is a short film

that is available on YouTube from Parker Finn, the director of Smile, to prepare for Smile, which I thought was pretty nifty, just six minutes long. And I watched a bunch of David Lynch, to prepare for Smile, which I thought was pretty nifty, just six minutes long.

And I watched a bunch of David Lynch movies to prepare for the pod. But the one that I watched that was pretty nifty, it was more of a kind of a thriller slasher, not totally a horror movie, but it was part of Criterion's 80s horror collection. It's an Australian movie called Road Games. Are you familiar with this?

No. So, Stacey Keech and Jamie Lee Curtis, 1981. Right on the sweet spot for both of those actors. collection it's australian movie called road games are you familiar with this no so stacy keach and jamie lee curtis 1981 right in the sweet spot for both of those actors i'd never heard of this movie until this was added to the this collection uh truck driver who's playing kind of a cat and mouse game with a serial killer and he's trailing him all around the australian countryside he's transporting all of this meat, this frozen meat, in the back of his trailer. But he gets ensnared

in this kind of thriller chase. Again, I don't know if it totally is horror, but it was really, really effective. It's from Richard Franklin. Interesting.

Who went on to make Psycho 2, and he made a movie called Patrick before this that is a really good Australian thriller. So that's pretty cool. That's a weird recommendation.

I don't know what else is on my list. I mean, I'm stoked for VHS 99. That's the one I'm jacked for. Yeah. I mean, 94 was great, I thought. I really liked it a lot. There's always at least two entrants in every VHS movie. 94 had the sewer one, right? It did, yes. It was like the homeless people. Yes. The sewer, which is sort of like the local broadcast news reporter following the sewer. I also thought the one set overnight in the funeral home was so scary and brilliant. Yeah.

I love the VHS movies. Anything else you're excited about? No, I mean, you and I both saw Significant Other. Yeah, that was fun. That's on Paramount Plus and it's Jake Lacey

and Micah Monroe. I wouldn't call it necessarily like a horror movie, although it's a little bit more of like a psychological thriller without giving anything away. Sci-fi. But I find that

when I watch movies with my wife, horror movies featuring couples is always really fun because you can be like, what would you do in this situation kind of thing. Interesting.

Or you would be like this. I'm fairly certain that Barbarian hits VOD They're so smart. in a week. Yes. And that's a really good idea. Yeah.

Because my advice to people at home is, again, if you haven't listened to the pod in which we talked about it, fire that one up at home. Yeah. It's going to work really well. CR, thanks, man. My pleasure. Go Phillies. Bobby, can you, can you like make that into an NFT? Thanks to, thanks to Chris. Thanks to Chris.

Thanks to Bobby Wagner for his work on today's episode. Later this week, complete and utter change of pace. Amanda Dobbins is back. We're going to review the new Julia Roberts, George Clooney,

rom-com reunion, Ticket to Paradise. We're also going to build the Julia Roberts Hall of Fame, which is frankly a little scary for me. We'll see you then.