Every Movie In The Halloween Series, Ranked

While going down an Internet Rabbit hole, I came across this piece by Alexandra Ramos: Halloween: Every Movie In The Horror Series, Ranked

I'm delighted to find a writer who is into Horror and Sci-Fi as much as I am since it seems the two
genres rarely cross (and please don't bring up Jason X).

Halloween Movie Source, the Halloween fanboy I follow on Twitter (@sourcehalloween) often asks people to rank their moves and it's cumbersome to do in the character limit constraint.  So I think I'll take this opportunity to do my list and schedule it for October.

I pretty much agree with Ramos' list but with some slight exceptions.  So working backward from



Worst to Best 

• Rob Zombie’s Halloween II (2009)
• Halloween Kills (2021)
• Halloween Ends (2022)
• Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988)
• Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers (1989)
• Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers (1995)
• Halloween (2018)
• Rob Zombie’s Halloween (2007)
• Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982)
• Halloween II (1981)
• Halloween: Resurrection (2002)
• Halloween H2O: Twenty Years Later (1998)
• Halloween (1978)

Note: My criteria are mostly would I watch it again and perhaps that is what I should call this list because I find myself watching everything from #3 down over and over.

13.  Rob Zombie’s Halloween II (2009)

In all (un)fairness, I have not seen this one from start to finish.  I've read the Movie Pooper script and have seen enough clips to justify putting this at the end.  This was a missed opportunity, but then again so was the 2007 remake as well.  I might try to watch it to give a more complete review but for now, I think they should have gone with the alternate ending.

12.  Halloween Kills (2021) 

Even the most casual viewer has to ask, just how long is Halloween night in Haddonfield?  I didn't like the First Responder slaughter scene or the subsequent murder of the interracial couple who did nothing wrong (breaking rules I'll get to later).  And while I really liked both the "Officer McCabe Down Flashback Scene" and that Tommy, Lindsay, and Nurse Marion from the original are back, their roles were wasted.  

11. Halloween Ends (2022)

Like Resurrection, this is really two movies in one.  We have the anticlimactic end of Michael and the tragic story of Corey's descent into evil.  It would have been better to introduce Corey's arc in Kills, perhaps replacing that awful Haddonfield mob scene at the hospital.   Allyson has now lost both her parents to the Shape, yet there is barely any acknowledgment of this.  Karen died for nothing.

10 - 8. Halloween 4, 5, 6 (1988, 1989 and 1995)

These three movies are the same three movies with different actors and slightly different plot lines. They rely more on gory kills than the Cat and Mouse game that Michael is famous for.   They are failed attempts at rebooting the franchise while exploring the Samhain mythos behind Michael's power and his terrible family reunions.  

7. Halloween (2018)

As far as retconning goes, this one really retcons.  Nothing after Halloween 1978 exists in this universe.  And so the premise that Michael Myers is a serial killer worthy of a visit by British Podcasters seems a bit far-fetched since he only killed 5 people in this timeline.

Also, Michael and Jamie are not siblings.  So it begs the question, why would he bother coming after Jamie after 40 years?  And while I respect that PSTD does things to a person, after the first couple of decades, wouldn't you breathe a little easier?  

6. Halloween (2007)

One of the things that bothered me about the original Halloween storyline was Jamie being Michael's sister (obviously and admittedly retconned).    But looking at the timeline, Judith was a teenager, Michael was six and Jamie was apparently one.  That's a lot of Oops Babies.  Zombie reboot attempted to smooth the edges with a more plausible backstory.  And yet, I'm not likely to rewatch this one anytime soon (see my tweet).  

5. Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982)

Should we even include this one-off?  It only ranks this high in part because the previously listed were that bad.  This was an attempt to resurrect the concept of the Halloween anthology series and as far as early 80s sci-fi/horror goes, it wasn't half bad.  They should rebrand and reboot this as simply Season of the Witch, with a slightly more pausable plot.  

4. Halloween II (1981)

Remember that broken rule I mentioned?  In this movie, Michael breaks the Don't Kill Innocent People rule.  Michael only kills teens who are having sex and thus are horrible babysitters, or people who get in his way of killing horrible babysitters.  But in this movie, he kills an innocent babysitter and several nurses who did nothing to him.  

3. Halloween: Resurrection (2002)

Like Halloween Ends, this was also two movies in one.  This movie gets a lot of hate from fans because it had some horrible acting.  But if you can look past that, the plot was unique and innovative for the time.  Watching Michael kill people on the internet in real-time.  If you skip the last 10 minutes, it's a decent movie.  

Notes: Tyra Banks must have a hella of an agent to get an offscreen kill.  Also, Busta Rhymes.  

2. Halloween H2O: Twenty Years Later (1998)

This is the movie that brought Jamie Lee Curtis back to the franchise.  Its reconning ignores all the previous sequels and is a direct sequel to Halloween II.  It also brings back Nurse Marion (briefly) and had a cameo by Jamie's real-life mom, Janet Leigh.  It too has a rapper.

I recently re-watched this movie and what I noticed is the Three Acts Rule.  In the First Act, Michael kills, just like in the original.  In the Second Act, he has the opportunity to kill but doesn't.  He steals car keys from a mom with a child in a roadside rest station but doesn't kill them.  He also passes on killing the Rapper Security Guard even though it would be in his best interest to eliminate this threat. 

1.  Halloween (1978)

Naturally, this would be Numero Uno.  It's the movie that launched the slasher genre.