Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later

(1998)
Director: Steve Miner
Writers: Robert Zappia, Matt Greenberg

Halloween H20 retcons parts 4, 5, & 6 and takes place 20 years after the end of part 2. Jamie Lee Curtis returns as Laurie Strode, who has faked her own death and changed her name to become the headmistress of a private school in California. Michael Myers has tracked her down and, while all but a select few are away from the school on a vacation, sets out to complete the job he started twenty years ago.

H20 was made in 1998, during the post-Scream slasher renaissance, and feels very much like a product of it's time. Characters in the film can be seen watching Scream on television, and Kevin Williamson (of Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer fame) was brought in to punch up some of the dialogue in the film. This isn't actually a bad thing if you enjoy those late 90's slashers, but H20 certainly doesn't brave any new territory. Learning from the mistakes of the last 3 films in the franchise, H20 is fairly straight-forward and explains very little. It's never revealed where exactly Michael came from, where he has been for the last twenty years, or why he has returned now. There are a few good kills, but not as many as you would expect from a Halloween film, especially one that is supposed to be Michael's big return. The film is littered with disposable characters, very few of which actually die.

Let me just say that H20 is one of the dumbest titles ever. Since the movie has absolutely nothing to do with water, it's just a really lazy and unfunny pun. Also it then insults us further, explaining the pun by adding "Twenty Years Later". I'm not stupid, I get why you're calling it H20. Maybe the third film in the series of Halloween remakes should be titled "Hallow33n: The Es Are Threes Because It's The Third Movie, Get It?". I remember really disliking Halloween H20 when it first came out, but upon re-watching it I didn't hate it nearly as much. Even though it's nothing out of the ordinary, it's certainly not as bad as some of the previous sequels (even though it does feature a Creed song). It's a standard, no-nonsense slasher that comes in at a merciful 86 minutes. I give Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later 3 1/2 out of 6 beers.