History Film / HalloweenKills

** One of the kids that menaces Lonnie at the start bears a strong resemblance to Chucky from the ''Film/ChildsPlay'' series.

** After trapping Michael in the burning house in the previous film, the HappyEndingOverride occurs when the Strodes realize too late that ''setting a house on fire'' would naturally get a response from the fire department, thus providing Michael the opportunity to escape.

* SuperPersistentPredator: [[spoiler:Subverted. Despite everyone believing he'd come for her, it's ultimately revealed that Michael ''isn't'' obsessed with hunting down Laurie, with Hawkins outright confirming to her Michael only attacked her in the previous film [[ForWantOfANail thanks to Dr. Sartain bringing Michael directly to her]]]].

** Even more so in the present than the previous film, as the police are utterly unable to stop Tommy whipping the town into a mob, or the hospital rampage that sees the other escaped person commit suicide as the only means of escaping them (the sheriff is seen sitting despondently on the stairs after the latter). The only ones to come off positively are the badly injured Hawkins and the one deputy who helps out the Strodes at several points.

* TraumaCongaLine: All of Haddonfield is now suffering at Michael's hands. In the course of a single night, Michael escapes his imprisonment and kills 18 people before then escaping the death trap specifically designed to kill him, whereupon he goes on another murder spree. [[spoiler:Among the dead are ''kids'': a young boy on a hunting trip, and a prankster trick-or-treater. Then, when Haddonfield is riled into a mob, they end up being responsible for the death of an innocent man. Finally...they ambush Michael, only for him to get up and murder them ''all''.]]

* AbstractApotheosis: A DiscussedTrope. Laurie believes that the more Michael kills, the less human and more unstoppable he becomes, considering his ultimate form to be "the essence of evil."

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Most of the deaths qualify, but Michael stabbing an old woman through the neck with a broken fluorescent light bulb is especially savage.

** A novelisation-only one, but Lonnie reveals while musing on Tommy's many issues that he's actually got a Thorn rune tattoo - which, was of course, a major plot point in [[Film/HalloweenTheCurseOfMichaelMyers his other appearance as an adult in the franchise]].

** "Evil dies tonight!" It starts off with a RousingSpeech by Tommy and then becomes a SurvivalMantra for the town. However, it twists into a MadnessMantra as it becomes evident that the town's desire for justice has crossed over into bloodthirsty mob-mentality scapegoating.

** The firefighters in the opening try to take on Michael. The Shape makes short work out of all of them despite their best efforts and being armed.

** Vanessa gets too close to Michael and chooses to fire one-handed when she does so. [[spoiler: He just kicks the car door on the gun, causing her to discharge it into her own face and kill herself]].

** Lonnie's son Cameron has also cleaned up his act after cheating on her and destroying her phone in the previous movie. Here, he's much more concerned with Allyson's well-being and even joins her and his father in taking up arms against Michael.

* ActorAllusion: [[Creator/JimCummings1987 Jim Cummings]] plays a less-than-competent sheriff's deputy, a role he'd written for himself in his two previous films.

* AdaptationalBadass: In previous ''Halloween'' films, Michael almost always avoided confronting large, equipped groups, preferring his usual ambushes and attacks on single people (''[[Film/Halloween4TheReturnOfMichaelMyers Halloween 4's]]'' offstage massacre of the police being a rare exception). Here, he doesn't hesitate to face off with groups many times his number head-on, and proves strong and efficient enough to easily win [[spoiler:twice]].

** "Evil dies tonight!" It starts off from a RousingSpeech by Tommy, and then becomes a SurvivalMantra for the town. However, it twists into a MadnessMantra as it becomes evident that the town's desire for justice has crossed over into bloodthirsty mob-mentality scapegoating.

** When Michael charges the fire brigade outside, the one holding the hose tries spraying him with it, which doesn't phase him because it seems to only be little stronger than a garden hose. In real life, firehoses have such high pressure that getting blasted with one is something that can seriously injure regular people, and even someone as inhumanly tough as Michael Myers would probably at least be taken off his feet.

** [[spoiler: Lance Tivoli, another mental patient, appeared briefly in the previous film's opening scene as the weird guy with the umbrella. Here, a whole sub-plot revolves around him being mistaken for Michael and getting chased by an angry mob]].

*** In the original, Michael's first stop upon arriving back in Haddonfield was to return to his childhood home (Laurie briefly stopping there is where he first saw and started stalking her). [[spoiler:This movie shows that he did the same thing after being shot by Loomis, being apprehended on the front lawn of the Myers house, and in the present day, Lonnie correctly ascertains that he's been making his way back there since coming back to town.]]

* ImmediateSequel: While it takes a while to actually continue from the previous movie's ending (before the credits it shows the immediate preceedings of Michael's capture in 1978, and after them other people during Halloween night in 2018), it ultimately comes down to the Fire Department unwittingly heading off to Michael's rescue.

** As in [[Film/Halloween5TheRevengeOfMichaelMyers the fifth film]], Michael's involved in a brutal pitchfork stabbing scene - only this time it's the Shape on the receiving end.

** Because Michael, both in-universe and in real life, is synonymous with his iconic mask, very few people have seen or remember what he looks like without it. When another escaped inmate from the same mental hospital comes looking for help, some of the younger citizens mistake him for Michael and the rest of the crowd blindly attack and chase him. Scared and backed into a corner, the inmate jumps out of a window to his death to escape the mob, and finally seeing his mangled corpse up-close causes them to realize all too late that this man wasn't Michael.
** Laurie is in no shape to go out and continue going after Michael due to having just gotten surgery for her stab wound, and during the hospital riot she ends up pulling her stitches. Injecting herself with painkillers only takes her so far before her body reaches its physical limits.

* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: [[spoiler:Karen winds up ambushing Michael and impaling him with a pitchfork. She could easily finish him off while he's incapacitated, but instead decides to wait for him to get up so she can lure him into a crowd of Haddonfield citizens ready to ambush him. After the resulting beatdown, Brackett ''is'' about to finish things with a pointblank headshot -- but they wait too long and Michael springs back to life, massacring them all.]]

* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Tommy has this reaction when he realizes he and the mob led [[spoiler:an innocent mental patient to kill himself]]. The mob itself collectively has a similarly horrified reaction once they calm down.

* TookALevelInKindness: Lonnie Elam has mellowed considerably since the original, having grown from a {{Jerkass}} bully to being friends with Tommy, Lindsey, and Marion due to their shared experiences with Michael. He later reminisces with Allyson about her father, clearly trying to soften the blow a little for her.

** [[spoiler:Michael's first ever murder was his sister Judith, in her bedroom. His last kill here is Karen, in the very same room, with even the way Karen's death is shot hearkening back to Judith's murder.]]

* AccidentalSuicide: Vanessa - the woman in the nurse costume - is approaching and shooting at Michael when the latter pushes a car door in her face, causing her to accidentally shoot herself.

* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace: Oddly ''weaponized'' by Michael Myers. [[spoiler:While Vanessa seems to have a good understanding of how to handle a firearm, Michael manages to open the car door in a way that causes her gun to be bumped towards her while aiming and ready to fire, making it so that she shoots herself in the head by accident.]] Amusingly lampshaded in the novelisation where [[spoiler:the text notes Michael has no idea how astonishingly lucky the sequence of events that killed Vanessa were -- nor does he care, as he moves on to kill even more people]].

** When Vanessa scrambles out of the car to get a better shot at Michael, she seems to just disappear while Michael kills everyone inside. When she finally starts firing, she charges at the car from across the street while blind-firing at it, excusable for an inexperienced shooter, but the really stupid part is when she gets too close and then chooses to fire one-handed. [[spoiler: Michael just kicks the car door on the gun, causing it to discharge in her own face]].

* BroadStrokes: Even though this continuity ignores Halloween II, brief archive footage from that film is shown of Brackett viewing Annie's body. We don't see Loomis's part in that scene so it doesn't contradict the 1978 flashback story.

** "Evil dies tonight!" starts off from a RousingSpeech by Tommy, and becomes a SurvivalMantra for the town. However, it twists into a MadnessMantra as it becomes evident that the town's desire for justice has crossed over into bloodthirsty mob-mentality scapegoating.

* BloodierAndGorier: While the first film had its bloodier moments, this film ramps up the gore to Rob Zombie levels.

* RazorApples: A group of trick-or-treaters shows Little John and Big John that one of the candies they provided contained a blade that cut through one of the kids' mouths, complete with a pile of vomit containing the razor. [[WoundedGazelleGambit It's only a cruel prank]], so when the couple goes to check, another youngster enters the house behind them and steals all the candy they have left. Guess they decided on "trick" AND "treat".

* ImmediateSequel: While it takes a while to actually continue from the previous movie's ending (before the credits it shows the immediate preceedings of Michael's capture in 1978, and after them other people during Halloween night, 2018), it ultimately comes down to the Fire Department unwittingly heading off to Michael's rescue.
* ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy: Many characters are shown missing their shots, mostly with justifiable circumstances. A young Frank Hawkins shoots at Michael from a distance and barely misses, and then [[spoiler:accidentally kills his own partner trying to save him from Michael]]. Vanessa is a relatively inexperienced shooter who tries shooting at Michael in the dark while moving, and misses each shot, but gets visibly close multiple times. And Marion just fires her gun all over the place in the car without nearly any caution, enough that even Marcus and Vanessa call her out on it.
* ImprovisedWeapon: Michael at one point removes a fluorescent tube from its light fixture, breaks it, and proceeds to stab an old lady to death with it.

* ArtisticLicense: The firefighters perform a full smoke dive to the burning building at the start of the film, in spite of it already being up in flames and without knowledge of any survivors trapped inside. Normally, fire brigades don't endanger their people needlessly in such situations and focus only on preventing the fire from spreading to the surrounding area.

* EyeScream: Three of them -- Michael shoving the halligan bar in a firefighter's eye (from the victim's point of view!), later shoving a knife up into the eye of someone who tries to strangle him, and finally brutally gouging out the eyes of Big John with his thumbs.
* FailedASpotCheck: When news first comes in of the killings, Tommy's in the bar when the TV shows Michael's face ([[TheUnreveal blurred out in the background, of course]]), but he's lost in his inner thoughts. Later, one of the reasons things escalate so badly in the hospital is because ''Tommy doesn't know what Michael looks like under the mask'', leading to the wrongful death of the other mental patient when Tommy doesn't listen to Laurie and Karen trying to tell him it's not Michael.

* HappyEndingOverride: Michael Myers escapes from certain death in a burning house [[NiceJobBreakingItHero thanks to the intervention of the Fire Department]].

** Karen calls out Tommy for inciting the mob which leads to the other mental patient's death when he's mistaken for Michael.

* RazorApples: A group of trick-or-treaters shows Little John and Big John that one of the candies they provided contained a blade that cut through one of the kids' mouths, complete with a pile of vomit containing the razor [[WoundedGazelleGambit It's only a cruel prank]], so when the couple goes to check, another youngster enters the house behind them and steals all the candy they have left. Guess they decided on trick AND treat.

* KickTheDog: Michael seems to prolong [[spoiler:Cameron]]'s death just to make Allyson suffer.

* AnthropicPrinciple: Apparently, in the whole town of Haddonfield there is no weapon or tool that can cause damage more severe than a superficial puncture/slash wound, let alone a person who is able to use such weapons. So no matter how much prep time the citizens of Haddonfield have to fight Michael Myers, at best they will arm themselves with a small-caliber pistol that can inflict only superficial wounds.

** Laurie lets out one when she sees fire trucks heading in the direction of her house.

** Allyson lets out multiple "No!"s as she watches [[spoiler:Michael brutally murder Cameron]].

*** As in ''Film/Halloween2018'', [[spoiler:Karen's triumphant "Gotcha!" signifies Michael being lured into a trap. This time, it doesn't end so well for her]].

* TakeMyHand: One of the firemen who arrives to the scene of Laurie's burning compound holds his hand out over a hole in the floor where another had fallen through into the basement, shouting for him to take it. [[spoiler:Unbeknownst to him, the only person alive down there at the moment is Michael, and he does take the fireman's hand. We don't see what happens next, but nothing good is insinuated.]]

** In the original film, Michael's first stop upon arriving back in Haddonfield was to return to his childhood home (Laurie briefly stopping there is where he first saw and started stalking her). [[spoiler:This movie shows that he did the same thing after being shot by Loomis, being apprehended on the front lawn of the Myers house, and in the present day, Lonnie correctly ascertains that he's been making his way back there since coming back to town.]]
** Lindsey believes that as a kid, Lonnie was the only kid brave enough to have gone nosing around in the Myers house, something he confesses is untrue. We actually saw Dr. Loomis scare him and his friends off when they tried this in the original film.
** Michael attacks Nurse Chambers in her car by slamming his hand against the window, just like in the first movie.
** Hawkins notes he didn't make the moves on Laurie because "you only liked Ben Tramer," a character alluded to in the original ''Halloween''.
** When Loomis attempts to kill Michael in the flashback, he utters "purely and simply evil" under his breath, as if to justify murder with his philosophy explained earlier that night.
** Just like in the first movie, someone tries to rip off Michael's mask while struggling with him.
** As in ''Film/Halloween2018'', [[spoiler:Karen's triumphant "Gotcha!" once more signifies Michael being lured into a trap. This time it doesn't end so well for her]].
** Before the Haddonfield citizens and Michael square off, Brackett repeats one of his lines from the 1978 film: "You know it's Halloween. I guess everyone’s entitled to one good scare."
** Karen briefly sees the specter of [[spoiler:Michael as a little boy staring out his sister's window, clad in the same clown outfit he wore the night he murdered Judith]].
** In a flashback scene, [[spoiler:Michael attacks the deputy with a rope, which is one of the items Sheriff Bracket mentioned was stolen in a hardware store in the original Halloween]].
** The 1978 film ended with a shot of the Myers house. [[spoiler:This film reveals that that's where Michael went after surviving being shot by Loomis and where he was finally captured.]]
* ChainsawGood: A firefighter attempts to use a buzzsaw against Michael-- only to have the saw redirected into his face.

--->'''Laurie:''' NO! No, no! OH, LET IT BURN! '''''LET IT BURN!'''''

** Confirmed in the Blu-Ray extras 'kill count' section.

->''[[Music/GhostBand Though my memories are faded, they\\

It's a hunter's moon]]!''

** "Evil dies tonight!" starts off from a RousingSpeech by Tommy, and becomes a SurvivalMantra for the town. However, it twists into a MadnessMantra among the population as it becomes evident that their desire for justice has crossed over into bloodthirsty mob-mentality scapegoating.

As for the cast, Creator/JamieLeeCurtis returns as Laurie alongside Creator/JudyGreer and Andi Matichak as the second and third generations of the Strode family respectively. James Jude Courtney also returns as Myers. Other members of the cast include Creator/AnthonyMichaelHall as Tommy Doyle and [[Series/TheRealHousewives Kyle Richards]] returning as Lindsey Wallace.

The film premiered at the 2021 Venice Film Festival on September 8 and was released October 15th, 2021, both in theaters and on Creator/{{Peacock}} (the latter for a 60-day period).

* AbstractApotheosis: A DiscussedTrope. Laurie believes that the more Michael kills, the less human and more unstoppable he becomes.

* AndThisIsFor: Marion Chambers tells Michael "This is for Dr. Loomis." when she has Michael dead to rights with her gun. [[spoiler:Unfortunately she's out of bullets after firing at him earlier, and he swiftly stabs her to death.]]

* AscendedExtra: A couple wearing a doctor and nurse costume appear briefly in the previous film. Here, Marcus and Vanessa play larger roles in helping to hunt down Michael, [[spoiler:though neither of them survives when they actually encounter him]].

* DramaticAmmoDepletion: [[spoiler:After attempting to shoot Michael various times, Marion readies a shot with a badass PreMortemOneLiner...only to pull the trigger on an empty chamber. With no backup plan, she quickly becomes Michael's next victim.]]