Is it really the end of Halloween? Here’s how Halloween ends… ends

**Spoiler alert** for Halloween Ends, currently in theaters and streaming on Peacock. If you don’t want to know what happens and how it all ends, you should watch it first and then come back!

For 44 years, Curtis’ Laurie Strode has faced evil in the form of Michael Myers. She did not appear in all 13 films in the franchise. The character has appeared in most of them, with Curtis portraying her in seven films, including this latest one.

Now that it’s finally here, fans have already started making sense of the ending to the story, which has been trending high on Twitter all night. What they perhaps didn’t expect was that Michael Myers wasn’t as present as they might have expected. That said, “Michael Myers” definitely was!

Usually, in the final chapter of a movie trilogy, or even a long line of movies, all your favorite characters come together for a final showdown. It definitely happens, but so much of this movie is actually about a brand new character.

It makes perfect sense though, since this isn’t so much a story about this particular evil and fight between Laurie and Michael. Rather, it is about how evil is born and how easily it can fester and soar.

This film begins just one year after the events of Halloween Kills, on Halloween (of course). The audience is introduced to Corey Cunningham, a high school senior who is babysitting a ten-year-old boy named Jeremy.

Everything goes wrong when Jeremy locks Corey in the attic and accidentally flies him off the balcony when he frees him just as his parents are getting home. In the end, he is acquitted of any wrongdoing by the court, but the court of public opinion has other ideas.

With Corey’s backstory established, Laurie’s chapter comes into focus. She works on her memoir to try to get rid of the ghost of Michael and has to deal with all the horrors of real life as she tries to be there for her granddaughter Allyson.

The stories intersect when Allyson meets Corey. Bullied and harassed by practically the whole town for the past three years, he’s internalized increasing reach and anger. After being thrown off a bridge, he encounters Michael who drags him into a sewer.

He first escapes from Michael, then allies himself with him when all the abuse he’s endured in the city flips a switch in him. He begins killing the townspeople who have wronged him, even wearing a mask like Michael.

At the same time, he starts dating Allyson and the two decide that they need to leave Haddonfield, where all those horrific murders happened and are now happening again. Laurie, suspicious of Corey, tries to convince Allyson that he can’t be trusted.

However, Allyson stands by her husband and even blames Laurie for all the deaths Michael committed because Laurie didn’t kill him. Then it gets worse for her.

After hitting on Michael, Corey steals his legendary mask and attacks Laurie at her house. Laurie manages to turn the tables, but in one final act of cruelty, he injures himself, making it appear to Allyson that Laurie killed her boyfriend.

Throughout, Michael played little part in this story, although his influence on Corey was evident and enormous. But finally, the stage is set for the final battle between the real Michael Myers and the “last girl” he just couldn’t get rid of.

He rushes into the house to get his mask, easily finishing off Corey along the way. Then fans finally witness a truly epic battle between the monster and the grandmother. With a final helping hand from Allyson himself, the women kill Michael by slitting his wrists.

But this is Michael Myers, just bleeding from the wrists isn’t going to kill him, right? Don’t worry, they weren’t done with him yet. After parading his corpse around town for some reason, Laurie uses a massive compactor at the town dump to pulverize his body. So… that should do it, right?

The good news is that there is no last-minute resurrection, no hand reaching out of the car crusher, or any other dumb nonsense. In fact, Laurie finally seems to be getting her happy ending, as is her granddaughter.

Allyson sets off alone, leaving Laurie to finish her memoir. But Laurie bonds with Chief Hawkins, so there might be a chance it won’t be alone forever. As for Michael, the last thing we see is his mask in Laurie’s office.

Here’s the thing about that ending, though. It could be the end for Michael Myers, but that doesn’t mean Corey can’t come back and steal that mask and keep killing as “Michael Myers.” We’ve seen the real Michael keep coming back.

It feels appropriate that Michael’s story ends with Laurie as it would make her 44 year journey cheaper if this was just another chapter in Michael’s ongoing story. Theirs turned into a decades-long blood feud, and that feud deserves to end with both of them.

However, introducing Corey and having him don the mask as part of his own killing spree suggests that Halloween could be taking a new direction as a franchise. If not Corey, it could at least be about the mask. “Michael Myers” expands beyond a man. It’s like franchising a serial killer!

Another possibility, of course, is just another retcon or reboot for the franchise. You’ve certainly done many of these along the way. For now, fans can enjoy and complain and argue about how the long fight between Laurie Strode and Michael Myers finally came to an end.