Because it’s that time of year, it seems as good a time as any to give you my ranking of all 11 films in the Halloween franchise. Keep in mind, this is my personal ranking and it’s expected many people will disagree. With that said, let’s get started.
#11 Halloween: Resurrection
Kill off your main character of the franchise in the opening act…cast a bunch of college students the audience doesn’t care about…make now-outdated technology the main selling point…AND have Busta Rhymes take down one of the best horror movie villains of all time in hand-to-hand combat? Halloween: Resurrection was doomed from the start.
This should come as no surprise to any fans of the series, or just movie-goers in general. This is widely regarded as the worst Halloween film of all time. This was a sequel nobody wanted other than the greedy studio, who just wanted to ride the high leftover from its predecessor, the more successful Halloween H20.
Jamie Lee Curtis was contractually obligated to appear in the movie, even though she didn’t want to, and therefore the producers killed off the famed Laurie Strode in the opening act. The rest of the film centers around a bunch of college (and Busta Rhymes and Tyra Banks) filming a reality television series inside the abandoned Meyers house. Until Michael arrives to put them (and the audience) out of their misery.
This film comes at the bottom of the list, if for no other reason than killing off Laurie Strode in the opening 20 minutes. That’s a major horror no-no. In any rewatch of the Halloween series, it’s best to pretend this entry does not exist.
Release Date: July 12, 2002
Starring: Busta Rhymes, Bianca Kajlich & Jamie Lee Curtis
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#10 Halloween III: Season of the Witch
This where a lot of people will stop reading, but this film is such an bothersome entry in the Halloween franchise, as is the sudden cult following it’s developed among horror movie fans. This movie would have benefited tremendously from just scraping the Halloween title altogether. But, if fans can get past that, there is some fun to be had.
Season of the Witch tells the story of an evil company using Silver Shamrock Halloween masks that kill the children wearing them. They are cursed by Stonehenge rocks or something and melt away during this annoying song…which is somehow connected to witchcraft? Don’t know. Don’t care.
Whereas Resurrection is the entry in the franchise you should skip, Season of the Witch is the one Michael Myers fans actually do skip. At least Resurrection has the famed killer in it. However, from a filmmaking and storytelling standpoint, Season of the Witch is superior, so it goes higher. At least it gave us the Silver Shamrock theme song.
Release Date: October 22, 1982
Starring: Tom Atkins, Stacey Nelkin & Dan O’Herlihy
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#9 Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers
This movie serves as the conclusion of the Curse of the Thorn storyline that was told over the course of Halloween 4-6. And what a lackluster conclusion.
The Curse of Michael Myers explores Micheal’s desire to kill those in his family line and connects it to a cult. It has him go after an older Tommy Doyle (Paul Rudd), who discovers Jamie’s (J.C. Brandy, a.k.a. not Danielle Harris) child after she is brutally murdered by Michael, and relatives of Laurie’s adoptive family who now live in the Myers house. Depending on which version you’re watching, Jamie’s baby might actually be Michael’s too…so ew, incest.
Production on this entry was a total nightmare, and it took nearly six years to be released. It underwent several reshoots due to poor test audience screenings. Danielle Harris (who played Laurie’s daughter Jamie Lloyd in Halloween 4 and 5) was cheated out of giving her character an amazing conclusion by the studio, which led to her being recast by another actress. Regardless of that, the filmmakers completely butcher everything beloved about the character of Jamie from the two proceeding films.
Props to this movie for helping to introduce the world to Paul Rudd. But thankfully for his career, Clueless was released the same year. Unfortunately this was Donald Pleasence’s last time playing Dr. Sam Loomis, who he had played in every Michael Myers-related entry in the franchise up to this point. It would have been great to see him in the sequel that followed. The Producer’s Cut of this film has developed a cult following over the years, but there’s little that could have been changed to help the script.
Release Date: September 29, 1995
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Paul Rudd & Marianne Hagan
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#8 H2: Halloween II
Following the financial success of his Halloween remake in 2007, Rob Zombie decided to do his own spin on a follow-up to his version of the story. While it was an interesting look at the psyche of Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) following her survival of the events from the proceeding film, Halloween II gets a little too strange for their own good.
Like others below this entry on the list, the film has grown to have a cult following, even earning higher praise than its predecessor, but there’s not a lot of reason for it to exist. The opening scene is a great homage to the original Halloween II, but it goes on entirely too long for a dream sequence. Sheri Moon Zombie, wife of the director, reprises her role of Michael’s mother. She is shoe-horned in as a primary character, despite dying halfway through the proceeding film, and mostly stands around as a ghostly presence with a white horse and a child version of Michael Myers. It turns Dr. Sam Loomis (Malcolm McDowell) into a complete and utter asshole, trying to market off his survival in the last film. He’s a pretty useless character in this film and contributes nothing in terms of plot until the closing minutes.
It does some interesting stuff with the character of Laurie. Like 2018’s Halloween, it looks at how these events would have impacted her. But, similar to Dr. Loomis, it seems these events have just turned her into an angsty, unlikable asshole. It would have been interesting to see where Zombie would have taken these characters next given how this film ends, but there’s a reason it never got a follow-up. This one is not worth watching unless you have already watched the movie proceeding it.
Release Date: August 28, 2009
Starring: Scout Taylor-Compton, Malcolm McDowell & Sheri Moon Zombie
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#7 Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers
The follow-up to Halloween 4 sees Laurie’s daughter Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris) as she is tracked down by Michael Myers in his continued attempt to wipe out his family line.
The main issue with Halloween 5 is that it was rushed into production after the financial success of Halloween 4, which was released just one year earlier in 1988. The script was actually being written while the movie was already filming, which leads to a lot of inconsistencies and a slightly incoherent script.
There are a lot of narrative flaws with this entry in the franchise. Jamie’s adoptive sister, Rachel (Ellie Cornell), who was an incredibly popular character in the predecessor, was killed off 20 minutes into the sequel (in an incredibly lame way, at that). The introduction of Rachel’s friend Tina (Wendy Kaplan), who is widely regarded as the most obnoxious character of the entire series. She has no redeeming qualities and is nowhere near as compelling as Cornell’s portrayal of Rachel. It chooses to make Jamie mute, which does absolutely nothing for the plot. There’s also an abandonment of the cliffhanger ending of Halloween 4, which saw Jamie stab her adoptive mother over the bathtub, hinting that she will follow in her serial killer uncle’s footsteps.
Still, there are a few redeeming qualities. Donald Pleasence is electrifying as Dr. Sam Loomis in this entry, even going as far as to use Jamie as bait to trap and kill Myers. There’s also the incredible laundry chute scene, which keeps me on the edge of their seats the every time. Unfortunately, these were not enough to make this film a success and ultimately caused a six-year gap in the franchise.
Release Date: October 13, 1989
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Danielle Harris & Wendy Kaplan
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#6 Halloween (2007)
Remaking a film as beloved as John Carpenter’s 1978 Halloween is not an easy task. But after the colossal disappointment of Halloween: Resurrection, Rob Zombie underwent the task of remaking the modern horror classic. Zombie decided to essentially redo the original story, but with a twist: he would provide a detailed backstory to explain Michael Myers. This is both a good thing and a bad thing.
On the one hand, it gives the audience a look into the childhood of Michael Myers. We meet Michael’s mother (Sheri Moon Zombie), learn more about his older sister Judith (Hanna R. Hall), his home and school lives and the effect it had on his psyche and interactions at Smith’s Grove Sanitarium between a young Michael (Daeg Faerch) and Dr. Sam Loomis (Malcolm McDowell).
On the other hand, it takes away the randomness behind Michael’s attack of Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton), which is somewhat more frightening. Michael’s backstory is also told in a very Zombie-ian way, essentially showing Michael’s family as being white trash with an abusive stepfather, sexually promiscuous sister and a stripper mother.
This film can be applauded for several things. Tyler Mane is an absolutely terrifying physical force as Michael Myers. The way he manhandles people and the sheer brutality of the character is the stuff of nightmares. The film also brought Danielle Harris (who played Jamie Lloyd in Halloween 4 and 5) back to franchise, taking on the role of Laurie’s best friend, Annie Brackett. The scenes between a young Michael and Dr. Loomis help add a lot of weight to the final confrontation in the movie.
This movie is a genuinely enjoyable time. But the backstory elements can make the movie a slow-burn and it comes nowhere near recapturing the feeling of the original film. Carpenter disapproved of this film from the moment of its inception and has been very outspoken about his hatred of it. But there’s still some good stuff to be found.
Release Date: August 31, 2007
Starring: Malcolm McDowell, Scout Taylor-Compton & Sheri Moon Zombie
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#5 Halloween II
As the original follow-up to the 1978 film, Halloween II is an interesting outing for the series. It picks up right where the original film left off, with Michael Myers’ body seemingly disappearing after Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence) shoots him off a balcony. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is then taken to a nearby hospital, where Michael stalks and kills the hospital staff to get to her.
Halloween II is an enjoyable venture and benefits heavily from being watched immediately after the original Halloween film. It introduces Michael as Laurie’s brother, which is a fact that was carried over to every Halloween sequel (except 2018’s Halloween). One of the most memorable scenes in the franchise is the one-take shot of Michael sneaking into a woman’s house to steal a knife in the first act of the movie. The finale pitting Dr. Loomis and Laurie against Michael in the hospital is truly epic and explosive.
But the film does suffer from sequel-itis, which causes a few problems, particularly suffering from the time it was released. The original Halloween launched a whole new genre of slasher flicks, primarily 1980’s Friday the 13th. But these films focused less on character and more on the gore. Hence, the studio wanted Halloween II to have more kills and more blood than the original, which unfortunately works to the film’s detriment. Because of this, many characters seem like just bodies to be killed off during Michael’s pursuit of Laurie, as opposed to actual well-developed characters like the first movie had. Some of the kills are just strange and incomprehensible (did Michael just let that doctor bleed out on the floor for hours?). It’s all just for shock value and to keep up with the new competition in the genre.
Still, Halloween II does a lot to progress the series and is one of the more memorable sequels. It’s an excellent follow-up to the original and heavily expands on the lore of Michael Myers.
Release Date: October 30, 1981
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Jamie Lee Curtis & Lance Guest
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#4 Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later
The first time Jamie Lee Curtis returned to the franchise was 20 years after the original film in the bluntly titled Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later (despite having nothing to do with water). Curtis agreed to return to the franchise on the condition that this would be the end of the series…that Laurie Strode would finally kill Michael Myers.
The film sees Laurie (now going by the alias Keri Tate) as the headmistress of private school in California with her son, John Tate (Josh Hartnett). However, Michael tracks her down after killing an associate of Dr. Sam Loomis to discover Laurie’s whereabouts. After the majority of the school leaves for a weekend trip, Michael comes after Laurie, her son and the remaining staff members and students on campus.
Unfortunately, while still a great film, the seventh entry in the franchise suffers from being a product of its time, particularly in an attempt to be as self-aware as 1996’s Scream, which was a huge financial success. It casts LL Cool J as a security guard who is writing erotic novels and reading them to his wife over the phone. Michelle Williams plays John’s girlfriend, riding the high of her Dawson’s Creek days. The movie attempts the same horror movie that several films (i.e. Urban Legend, I Know What You Did Last Summer) were doing at the time.
The film does finally let Laurie kill Michael by pinning him with an ambulance and decapitating. But because of greedy studio interference and a Michael-Must-Not-Die clause in the contract, this ending was retconned in the opening minutes of the panned follow-up, Halloween: Resurrection.
At the time, Halloween H20 was arguably the best sequel in the franchise. If you choose to ignore Resurrection, this also gives the series a finite ending with Laurie finally killing Michael in one of the best Halloween finales of the series. Unfortunately, a lot of the plot elements and the ending being retconned in the sequel make this film significantly less impactful upon a rewatch, moving in lower on this list.
Release Date: August 5, 1998
Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Josh Hartnett & Michelle Williams
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#3 Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers
The first time the series was rebooted was in 1988 with Halloween 4. Following the disappointing reception of anthology-attempting Halloween III: Season of the Witch, the studio decided to bring back Michael Myers by having him survive the explosion caused by Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence) in Halloween II.
It introduces us to Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris), Laurie’s daughter, who is placed with an adoptive family after her mother, Laurie Strode, is killed in a car crash (a plotline that is later retconned with Halloween H20). A decade after going after Laurie, Michael wakes up from a coma during a hospital transfer and goes after his only living relative on Halloween night. Jamie’s adoptive sister, Rachel (Ellie Cornell) and the town’s police department ban together to stop Michael once and for all.
The ending of this film is truly haunting, seeing Jamie don a clown mask and stab her adoptive mother in the bathtub, echoing Michael killing his sister at the beginning of the original film. This plotline was abandoned in the disappointing sequel, but on its own, is a truly haunting ending.
Halloween 4 is an excellent reboot for the franchise. It attempts to expand on the lore of Michael Myers and is truly suspenseful. The roof scene with Rachel and Jamie attempting to escape Michael is gold. Keeping Pleasence’s Dr. Loomis in the mix also helps tie all these films together in a cohesive manner. It’s one of the more rewatchable sequels in the franchise that does an excellent job at introducing new characters, setting the stage for things to come (even if they don’t actually come) and being a great stand-alone sequel.
Release Date: October 21, 1988
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Danielle Harris & Ellie Cornell
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#2 Halloween (2018)
Four decades after the original Halloween was released, Jamie Lee Curtis returned to the franchise once again to reprise her now-iconic role as Laurie Strode. The film makes the interesting and wise decision to ignore all the sequels, picking up 40 years after the first Halloween film.
This means Michael has been in a sanitarium for 40 years, he is not related to Laurie Strode and, more importantly, he is not directly after her once he escapes in this film. This adds an extra layer of horror that was missing from the majority of Halloween sequels. Not knowing who Michael is is scarier than having him be related to the protagonist.
The film examines how Laurie has dealt with her post-traumatic stress disorder following the attacks by Myers and how those events have impacted her life. It also introduces Laurie’s daughter, Karen (Judy Greer), and her granddaughter, Allyson (Andi Matichak), and how the trauma of that night affected three generations of Strode women.
This terrifying and surprisingly funny reboot is just what the franchise needed after laying dormant for nine years. This is by far Curtis’ best outing as the heroine Laurie Strode. It also includes several memorable kills and finale that pits Laurie and Michael against each other one last time, with the roles somewhat reversed as Laurie becomes the hunter and Michael the prey.
Where Halloween II picks up right where the original left off and continues to follow the events of the same night, 2018’s Halloween is by far the best sequel in the series.
Release Date: October 19, 2018
Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Judy Greer & Andi Matichak
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#1 Halloween (1978)
As if anything can compete with the original 1978 Halloween. This film defined the horror slasher genre and still holds up four decades later as a perfectly terrifying masterpiece.
The original sees Michael Myers escape from Smith’s Grove Sanitarium after murdering his sister at the age of 9 years old. As his psychiatrist, Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence) goes after Myers, he returns home and sets his sights on Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and her friends Annie Brackett (Nancy Loomis) and Lynda Van Der Klok (P.J. Soles).
The score, which was done by John Carpenter himself, is truly creepy. The scenes in which characters just see Michael out the window or behind the bushes send chills up the spines of viewers everywhere. The kills, while tame by today’s standards, are realistic and terrifying as Michael catches our characters in moments of vulnerability.
The climax shows Michael attacking Laurie, who hiding in the bedroom closet, in one of the most claustrophobic and tense horror moments in cinematic history. The way Michael quietly sits up in the background after Laurie stabs him is horrifying. Dr. Loomis then comes to her aid, putting the masked menace down by shooting him off the balcony. But when he goes to check for the body, Michael is gone and Carpenter’s score kicks in leaving a feeling of uneasiness that he’s still out there.
That feeling of uneasiness is what makes this film so horrifying. Often, Michael is just stalking his prey quietly in the background, waiting for the opportunity to strike. The audience sees Michael, but in most cases, the characters are completely unaware of his presence.
The original Halloween is an iconic horror film, even being preserved in the United States National Film Registry in 2006 by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.” It is unlikely that any Halloween film, or horror film for that matter, will ever unleash the same potential.
Release Date: October 25, 1978
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Jamie Lee Curtis & P.J. Soles
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