Reviews
TRICKS ALL AROUND, NO TREATS: A Spoiler-Filled, King-Sized Review of ‘Halloween Ends’

For a point of reference on how baffled and taken aback I was by this movie: I, no joke, felt like I was dreaming this film up midway through the screening at my theatre. Regardless of whether you enjoy it or not, you will be captivated by this movie the whole way through. And that’s all there is to say that won’t spoil things. Skip to the bottom for my summary review and to avoid the
SPOILERS AHEAD
I’m not going to do my usual synoptic blurb I put at the front of my articles. Having to sum up Halloween Ends is a confusing task. The movie itself is a confusing question of whether a roadmap was made or not by Danny McBride and David Gordon Green following the triumphant ending of Halloween (2018) and the fun, but admittedly mindless roller coaster ride of Halloween Kills.
Ends makes little to no sense with the tracks laid by the first two films in the trilogy (quadrilogy, if you include the original ’78 film) and can only be described as a feverish script being performed by delirious actors, all filmed and edited by unsteady and shaking hands. In short: Michael’s mythical reveal of immortality at the end of the last movie is all but glossed over in favor of a plotline where he has to get his strength back through the murders committed by an ersatz of The Shape in the form of newcomer Corey Cunningham (played by Rohan Campbell).
I think?
I say I think because the movie, unlike previous dabblings into the occult with the likes of The Cult of Thorn, Halloween Ends never truly tries to explain how Michael’s newfound legend status power-up works, or really what the point of any of this is. If he’s fueled by the paranoia and fear of the citizens of Haddonfield, he should be operating at peak condition by the beginning of the film and slaughtering in droves. If he’s only fueled by Laurie’s personal demons and fear of him, he shouldn’t be able to lift a finger and should still firmly be in that sewer that Corey drags him out of to go on a vengeful, Punisher-esque series of kills to try and clean Haddonfield of evil people. If that is his goal, again, unclear. Because what does Michael even need any more than to finish his contractual obligation to be in this? His hatred of Laurie seems to be a fairly low priority, in a movie all about finishing their legendary feud.
Beyond the fact that they’ve given a dog-eating silent psychopath a partner in crime (which is a Halloween franchise sin if I could ever think of one), how Michael even goes about choosing Corey as a vessel for his evil influence doesn’t make any sense, as most of this film doesn’t: things simply happen until they don’t need to. Corey’s involuntary manslaughter of a child and being bullied by local teens somehow baptizes him in evil to become the apprentice of The Shape…until it isn’t enough, and Michael kills him. Relationships shift in this film on a dime, as do motivations and any general sense of direction as it tries to navigate to the promised clash that was all we really saw in the promotional material for this film.
The movie takes great actors and gives them a clammy, terribly written script to work with that turns all of their characters into buffoons whom all sound like Tim and Eric characters, or worse, true crime show hosts waxing philosophical about the nature of evil. Their dialogue and the placement of the scenes are so asynchronous to the movie’s pacing that it feels all too fast and all too slow all at the same time.
And so sadly, the biggest victim in Halloween Ends is one of its most promising characters. The movie, for some bizarre reason, discards the wonderfully charismatic Andi Matichak and Allyson with her. Allyson was a complex character who thanks to this film goes from the inheritor of a terrible burden, the burden of fighting off an immortal evil, a bearer of unfortunate and violent history, to being a side character in her own film. A woman with as little screen time as they could give her, who becomes the dawdling, flat love interest for the film’s newly introduced main antagonist. It’s vexing how shafted she gets by this screenplay.
I wish I could say on a technical level it redeems itself with some cool kills and gory effects, but it has three interesting ones out of a dozen or so forgettable murders that happen in this film, even if the rest are well-done practical effects. The camera work is nauseatingly bad, with random little zooms and distracting camera movement littered throughout it. The film doesn’t aesthetically fit with its sister entries, with lighting that feels overexposed. And beyond the cut-in montage of all the times Laurie and Michael have fought to remind you what is at stake here, the editing is nothing to write home about.
When it tries something new, it flops face first into a pile of pumpkin guts at the expense of 2018 and Kills; when it attempts to evoke the old films, it helplessly fails at pulling your heartstrings. In the end, every person in Haddonfield follows a car with Michael Myers strapped to the hood, performing a sort of macabre 5k fun run for capital punishment before they toss his mutilated body into an industrial-sized car shredder in a junkyard. And really, is there a more appropriate metaphor for how this movie treats the potential of the films that precede it than that?
BOTTOMLINE: For the most part, the entire movie is a wheezing, asthmatic crawl to the finish line on the final third of the course. Halloween Ends is a true-blue disappointment. Its raisins, razor blade apples, and Necco wafers all in one bite. And while I encourage you to watch every movie I review and see how you feel about it yourself; I have to warn you that you will most likely be upset with this if you’re expecting a more thematically cohesive David Gordon-Green’s Halloween trilogy.
Reviews
‘Shadow of God’ Review: A Bold Indie Horror That Falls Short

Whether they land or not, it’s hard not to appreciate how impressive it is that Shudder gives a platform to myriad independent films. While Screambox struggles to finish the race, Shudder is doing a victory lap. Even the greats trip up occasionally. Shadow of God is a film I heard minor rumblings about across the interwebs, and as someone who isn’t into exorcism-like films, it still piqued my interest enough to seek it out. Then I watched it.
Shadow of God: A Promising Premise Falls Flat
Shadow of God follows alcoholic exorcist Mason Harper (Mark O’Brien) as he travels back to his hometown following a death during an exorcism. Mason meets up with his ex-beau, Tanis Green (Jacqueline Byers), who gives him a place to stay while he’s back. The semi-happy reunion between Mason and Tanis is cut short when the dregs of Mason’s deceased father’s cult learn of his arrival. Everyone’s faith will be tested as something more sinister than anyone could imagine rears its ugly head.
It feels like there was a disconnect between writer Tim Cairo and director Michael Peterson, as Shadow of the God feels nothing more than scattered parts of better films clumped together into a heaping mess of something. While full of awful dialogue, Cairo’s script tells a compelling and somewhat unique take on the religious horror subgenre. The bones of a better film exist deep within the script. A rewrite (or three) could have helped to trim the fat and identify the elements of the story that truly work. On the other hand, Michael Peterson seems to have little to no control over whatever he was doing here.
Digital Effects Ruin Emotional Depth
The real issue with the film is the unfortunate digital effects slapped on before the final cut. Any semblance of an okay film quickly flew out the window with the slapdash effects. Nothing takes you out of a well-crafted emotional moment like a giant, badly composited white light shooting out of someone’s forehead. I was so checked out by the end that my final note written about the film simply says, “barn effects BAD.” To be completely honest, I don’t even know what I meant by that.
Not a singular solid performance graces the screen during this hour and 27-minute series of images. I get that independent films face difficult and unique challenges that larger budget films don’t. But the performances feel as if the cast were given the script seconds before the scenes were shot. Mark O’Brien was a huge sell for me with this film, as I adored him in Ready or Not, and it feels like [maybe] his agent dropped the ball on this one.
The Potential Buried in Shadow of God
Reviews
‘Jurassic World: Rebirth’ Review: Show Me Your Teeth

It has been just three years since Jurassic World: Dominion put the latest trilogy in the franchise on ice with the bite force of a smurf, but like any money-maker in Hollywood, no IP stays extinct for long. Universal decided to revisit the franchise’s roots, heading back to the lab to poke and prod at its barely fossilized remains in an attempt to mix up its DNA enough to warrant a reboot. Jurassic World: Rebirth promised a thrilling return to form – a journey into dino-infested waters that put the terror back in Tyrannosaur. With horror-adjacent auteur Gareth Edwards (known for Monsters and Godzilla) directing and writer David Koepp (who adapted Jurassic Park and The Lost World), returning after a nearly thirty-year absence, expectations were colossal.
What they delivered is a glossy, crowd-pleasing theme park ride into nostalgia that never fully commits to genuine horror or the deeper scientific soul of the 1993 original. It’s enjoyable for fans who love every iteration unconditionally, but it is sure to frustrate those with a more critical eye who expected something closer to a cold-blooded classic.
Jurassic World: Rebirth – A New Chapter or Nostalgic Retread?
For those needing a refresher on the events leading up to Rebirth, you can snag yourself an honorary degree in paleontology with our handy Jurassic Horror 101. After closing out the first reboot trilogy with a whimper, Universal needed to steer the narrative away from pseudo-science and half-baked existentialism toward a more visceral experience; nothing will compare to Spielberg’s masterpiece, sweetie!
The elements for success are all here: Edwards has a strong resume in titanic horror, Koepp is the man behind the original film adaptation, and the fresh faces of Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Bailey, and Mahershala Ali bring star power to the tropics. Yet, whether due to studio interference or simply buckling under nine tons of pressure, they still haven’t figured out how to catch lightning in a bottle twice.
Dinosaurs, Big Pharma, and a Tropical Mission
Set five years after dinosaurs were left to coexist with humans, we learn that the prehistoric beasts are once again facing extinction, both physically and metaphorically. Unsustainable living conditions within Earth’s rapidly changing ecosystems are eliminating them faster than an ice age, and – perhaps in a nod to our apathy in a digital world – the humans around them largely do not give a damn. As dino merch turns to ash and people avoid the roaming beasts like an invasive flash mob, pharmaceutical company ParkerGenix recruits mercenaries Zora Bennett (Johansson) and Duncan Kincaid (Ali), along with soon-to-be-unemployed paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis (Bailey), for an adventure their wallets can’t resist.
It seems that dinosaurs are still thriving on small islands surrounding the equator, and ParkerGenix has discovered within these surviving creatures a medical miracle that may provide a cure for heart disease. However, this being a Jurassic movie, our beautiful trio is tasked with retrieving this biomaterial from an island overrun by failed genetic experiments abandoned by the infamous company that started it all – InGen.
Rebirth’s script does touch upon the ethical dilemmas of serving Big Pharma for a seven-figure payout. Still, these moral quandaries are explored no more deeply than a child kicking at sand on the beach, hoping to uncover something shiny underneath the silt. Thematically, the franchise has painted itself into a corner since 1993. The existential wonder, quiet pathos, and scientific stakes have since been mined dry, which makes the shift toward more human-scale horror a welcome pivot. Two reboots in, we may never see a film that so effortlessly balances terror and philosophy as the original did. So, while I could continue to rip the script to shreds, why bother? Instead, let’s get to why you’re really here and tear into the horror of it all.
Does Jurassic World: Rebirth Deliver on Horror?
As is common with blockbuster films, Rebirth finds itself at odds with its behind-the-scenes talent and the studio executives at Universal. They clearly chose Edwards for his experience with films of kaiju proportions, and Koepp’s portfolio includes its fair share of bangers, including 2025’s critically acclaimed Black Bag. The marketing heavily features the newly hatched D-Rex, a “Xenorancor rex” level monstrosity that by all accounts should be the scariest thing this franchise has ever seen. However, the cold open, which includes a Final Destination-like mishap that allows the D-Rex some bloodlust, is all too brief. And that is the film’s biggest flaw: They have to let it linger, and they don’t.
A certain sense of style and cinematic flair that horror’s best know how to use is simply missing. Is this a creative misstep, or is the studio afraid to alienate families? The hallmark sequence that strands our heroes — a franchise staple — lacks the dread felt in the original’s historic T-Rex attack or even the epic trailer cliff dive from The Lost World. Since the human characters in these movies survive far more often than they should, they could at least leave us a bit shaken after such a spectacle. That said, the film does include a tense river raft sequence from Michael Crichton’s novel that fans have been begging for since the 90s, and it is undoubtedly the movie’s highlight.
CGI vs. Practical Effects in Jurassic World: Rebirth
I could overlook the lack of scares, or at least choose to politely ignore them, if they had gone back to basics and incorporated quality practical effects. Most are aware that OG’s lasting reverence is at least partly due to its extensive use of lifelike, tangible dinosaur prosthetics and robotics. In 2025, a solid combination of quality CGI and practical magic would go a long way. Backed by Edwards’ love of lighting a dramatic silhouette, the D-Rex does have some ominous and visually impressive moments as we catch glimpses of her amidst fire and fog. Then you see mother monster full frontal without the filters, and it feels like catching sight of a sweaty drag queen after a summer brunch performance.
The editing does the film’s attempts at horror no favors either, exhibiting strange spatial logic during tense beats where dinosaurs seem to vanish between cuts and human characters appear to ignore the massive beasts that were chasing them moments earlier.
A Love Letter to Jurassic Fans
As mentioned, fans of the franchise do have a lot to love here, despite Rebirth flopping in the horror department. Instead of the over-the-top fan service found in Dominion, we are given plenty of self-referential nods and visual echoes, from mirror messages to rescue flares and raptors in the kitchen. The excellent score by Alexandre Desplat likewise resurrects a familiar tune that accompanies a sequence featuring mutated Brachiosauruses that look ripped from Annihilation, which almost brought a tear to the eye of this longtime fan. What the movie lacks in scares, it makes up for in charm, and moments like these, along with a central trio of likeable characters, are enough to keep the formulaic plot moving along.
It’s no surprise that Wicked’s Jonathan Bailey, as the eager and inexperienced Dr. Loomis, is as charming as ever. The flitters of interaction between him and Johansson’s gruffy mercenary, Zora, are endearing, and Mahershala Ali’s characterization of Kincaid rounds out the trio with enough wit to establish them as the reboot’s next generation. A paper-thin backstory helps us understand why these would-be heroes are risking their lives for the better part of two hours, leaving room for improvement in potential sequels.
There’s also a forgettable family with the personality of wet rags who get caught up in the action, serving more as catalysts for set pieces than as developed characters. Still, their scenes provide some comedic relief through Gen Z’s himbo boyfriend, Xavier (David Iacono), and a cute baby dinosaur named Dolores (could a Labubu crossover be on the way?).
Is Jurassic World: Rebirth Worth Watching?
Overall, Jurassic World: Rebirth is more entertaining than innovative. It won’t convert any skeptics into dinosaur enthusiasts, but true fans can find plenty to enjoy in this sweaty jungle romp. It’s predictable and lacks the horror elements that readers of Horror Press crave, but I had a good time despite it all. The franchise still has teeth, albeit buried deep within its gums. Hopefully, Universal will allow some creatives the freedom to yank them out in bloody glory for the next one.
Jurassic World: Rebirth is now in theaters!