Warning: full spoilers follow for Halloween ends. Want to know if there’s a post-credits scene in the movie? We’ll tell you here: no, there’s no mid-credits or post-credits scene.
Halloween was rebooted (again) in 2018, promising a fitting ending to the Laurie Strode and Michael Myers story that began in 1978. And now, we’ve reached the end of this particular trilogy with Halloween Ends. Is it for Laurie for real this time? Who makes it out alive? When does evil die? !
We can confirm without any spoiler that Halloween is indeed over. So points for on-site delivery! But beyond that point, we’ll detail exactly what happens in Halloween Ends in full spoilers. You were warned!
(Read our Review of the end of Halloween when you’re done here!)
The end of Halloween explained
Halloween Ends begins on Halloween 2019, a year after the events of the previous two films. Michael Myers hasn’t been seen since that last fateful Halloween and is kind of the figurative bogeyman in town again. We meet Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell), a 21-year-old with a bright future who is babysitting a child named Jeremy. Long story short, Corey accidentally knocks Jeremy off a high stairwell and the kid dies. Corey then becomes the town’s pariah, the “kid killer”, and he’s never able to get rid of it, misses the realization of his dreams and ends up working in his father’s auto junkyard here. 2022, where we pick the rest of the movie up top.
Meanwhile, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) writes her memoir, noting how the town of Haddonfield has changed, steeped in grief, fear and paranoia following Michael’s attacks. She’s been trying to move on, living in a beautiful new home she shares with her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak). Of course, Allyson’s parents were killed in the attack on Michael Myers in 2018.
Laurie arranges a cute encounter between Corey and Allyson, and Allyson tries to bring Corey out of his shell at a Halloween party. But that night, he gets blown up by a bunch of – yes – marching band thugs, and ends up in a sewer that’s also Michael Myers’ hideout. Michael attacks him but something strange happens as the killer looks into Corey’s eyes, and he lets the child go. Corey rushes in and stabs and kills a homeless man almost immediately, either by accident or on purpose… it’s hard to tell.
Soon, Corey becomes something of a mini-Michael, working with the Shape to murder Allyson’s rude ex-boyfriend. He wants to learn Michael’s ways and it seems like all the darkness Michael has in him is transferring to Corey. Meanwhile, Corey grows closer to Allyson and decides with her to “burn him to ashes” and leave Haddonfield. Not great, Bob.
Inevitably, October 31 is coming. Laurie, who has come to sense that there is something wrong with Corey, confronts him, telling him that he needs to stay away from Allyson. He replies, “If I can’t have it, no one will.” He then goes off and kills a bunch of other people.
At the end, Laurie fakes a suicide attempt, but in reality she knew Corey was coming for her and she shoots him. After a struggle, he once again says, “If I can’t have it, no one can,” then he slits his throat. Allyson arrives at the wrong time and thinks Laurie did it.
Michael then joins this conversation and kills Corey for good before taking back his mask. He and Laurie get into a massive fight in the kitchen and she manages to pin his hands on the table with knives, stab him in the chest and through the armpit, and slit his throat. Oh, she also throws the refrigerator on one of her legs because why not. He puts his hands around her neck and she shouts “Do it!” as memories of previous clashes with Michael flash before his eyes, but Allyson rushes in and stops him. Laurie slits her wrists… and Michael is finally dead.
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But not dead enough apparently, as they strap his body to the roof of a car and drive to the scrapyard as the townspeople follow. There, Laurie throws the body of Michael Myers into a huge grinder, and we watch his limp form rip into small pieces. He is super, incredibly dead!
In the final moments of the film, we see Allyson wandering away from Haddonfield to be alone, and Laurie continues as well, tentatively reconnecting with Deputy Frank Hawkins (Will Patton), who had arrested Michael after his OG killing spree. We see Michael’s mask lying on a table in Laurie’s house, and the movie ends.
Is there a Halloween end credits scene?
No, there are no mid-credits or end-credits scenes in Halloween Ends. Sorry!
Halloween ends Easter eggs
No Halloween is complete without Easter Eggs! Wait, it’s a different, unrelated holiday.
- The main title font is the same one used in the first third Halloween movie, Season of the Witch. It’s the one that’s not about Michael or Laurie. These are… haunted masks.
- There are several direct homages and recreations to the original Halloween movie here. In the opening minutes, when Corey is babysitting Jeremy, the two are watching OG Halloween director John Carpenter’s sci-fi classic The Thing. Not only is it a nod to one of Carpenter’s best films, but it’s also a reference to a scene from the original Halloween in which Lindsay Wallace watches 1951’s The Thing from Another World (whose Carpenter’s film was a remake).
- Original Michael Myers actor Nick Castle appears during the costume party as a flasher. Don’t worry, he wears a real costume representing human guts. Nothing rude!
- Laurie writes her memoirs, titled Stalkers, Saviors, and Saw-Wen. Saw-Wen is the Celtic festival that eventually became the Halloween holiday we know today, but it has also been referenced in previous Halloween movies. In Halloween II, Dr. Loomis discovers that Michael wrote it on a blackboard, but there he translates the word as “lord of the dead”, which is not entirely historically accurate. In Halloween 3: Season of the Witch, the villainous Conal Cochran (Dan O’Herlihy) is a Celtic witch who plans a mass sacrifice of children on Halloween night. The holidays are also central to the plot of Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers. The eponymous curse is the Curse of Thorn, which in this film’s canon was the force driving Myers to kill.
- There’s a shot of Laurie looking up from her house to see Corey by a bush watching her from the sidewalk, only for him to disappear, which recreates a similar setup to Halloween 78 where she sees Michael in her backyard from her bedroom.
- Michael kills Allyson’s co-worker by impaling her on a wall, just like he kills Lynda’s boyfriend Bob in Halloween 1978.
- During their final confrontation, Michael’s face is reflected in Laurie’s knife. It’s a bit of a visual callback to the posters for Halloween 5, Halloween 6, and Halloween: Resurrection. It really is the closest trilogy to these films.
- The film ends with a series of shots of empty rooms in Laurie’s house, similar to the end of Halloween 1978…just much more serene now that Michael is dead.
- Blue Oyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper” plays over the end credits. The song plays on the radio in Halloween 78 as Laurie and Annie are driving around Haddonfield.
But what did you think of Halloween Ends? Was it a good… ending? Why didn’t anyone think of throwing Michael’s body in an industrial crusher before? Let us know in the comments! And don’t forget to check out our Halloween Multiverse Timeline!