Mass murderer Michael Myers has some unfinished business left over from last year’s Halloween, including making sure that the girls that survived would never live to see another Halloween.
Rob Zombie started remaking the Halloween franchise in 2007. The film mimicked the 1978 original by John Carpenter, but with a much more demented twist appropriate for Zombie, who has directed other horror titles such as House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil’s Rejects.
Zombie’s first Halloween remake gave a lot of insight into Michael Myers’ time in a mental institution after murdering members of his family. The gore was incredibly realistic and, while no remake will ever be better than Carpenter’s Halloween, it could easily stand alone as a decent film.
With Halloween II, however, Zombie completely missed the mark and ruined what credibility he earned with his first remake. The horror imagery in the movie is very realistic and can make anyone squeamish, so at least Zombie has that down. Unfortunately, the acting and the plot overshadow that aspect. Only those looking exclusively for blood-curdling gore will enjoy watching it.
The movie starts seconds after the first one ended with Laurie, Annie and Dr. Loomis being rushed to the ER and Michael Myers’ “dead” body being driven away by some coroners. While the victims are being stitched up, the coroner van crashes and Myers rises from the dead unscathed.
Laurie continues to be haunted by nightmares a year later and is left emotionally unstable, but she is able to accept the idea that Myers is dead and is never coming back despite the body never being found.
Meanwhile, Dr. Loomis is stuffing his pockets with money gained by selling a novel about Michael’s life and the terrible events that occurred the previous year, without any regard for the feelings of the victims themselves or their families. Though there is some speculation among reporters that Myers could still be out there alive, Dr. Loomis strongly assures everyone that Myers is gone for good.
Throughout the movie, Myers has recurring visions of his mother and himself as a child accompanied by a white horse, which at the beginning of the movie is explained as an interpretation of passion and rage in dreams. The film takes a psychological view, logically because Myers is a mentally disturbed serial killer, but Rob Zombie went about it the wrong way and just made it cheesy. The visions are telling him to find his sister and make them a family again. Apparently, to do this he has to kill his sister.
The identity of Myers’ sister is revealed by Dr. Loomis in his book, and she is terrified and angry at the thought of it.
Her emotional downward spiral is evident in the movie. Maybe she isn’t so unlike her brother after all.
Near the end, Laurie and friends go to a Halloween party and return to the house to a bathroom covered in blood and Annie bleeding out on the floor.
They call 911, but of course at that point it’s too late and Myers gets rid of the other friend and chases Laurie. The chase ends in an abandoned shack surrounded by police and Myers is “killed” yet again.
Whether he stays dead this time depends on whether Rob Zombie continues slaughtering the franchise.