Remember all of those warnings from your parents on Halloween? How psychos are sticking razor-blades, pins, and heroin in candy and giving it out, or abducting kids straight off of their doorsteps?
Halloween 3 takes these urban legends to a whole new level, to Stonehenge and beyond.
Movie: Halloween 3: Season of the Witch (1982)
Plot: Eight days before Halloween, a shop owner clutching a pumpkin mask is chased by a group of suited men. He arrives at a hospital, but is found and killed by the roughest eye-gouging ever attempted.
Luckily, this is the hospital of Dr. Dan Challis (played by Tom god-damn Atkins) who, along with the shop owner’s daughter, travels to Santa Mira, home of the Silver Shamrock Corporation to discover plans for Halloween that will forever change the world.
Don’t believe me? Then you will have no problem watching this clip.
(WARNING: VIDEO CAN INDUCE SEIZURES!)
Killer: Conal Cochran, a successful businessman who has complete control over the town of Santa Mira due to his CCTV video cameras, phone taps, and android hitmen. Think of him as Big Brother with a thing for witchcraft and human sacrifices. Okay, Big Brother with just a thing for witchcraft.
Critique: Halloween 3 is still one of the most maligned films in the Halloween horror franchise. It barely received a better grade than the horrible attempt to continue the original Michael Myers story, Halloween: Resurrection. Resurrection had fucking Busta Rhymes in it. But we’re not here to talk about Halloween: Resurrection yet. We’re here for Halloween 3.
Halloween 3 was meant to be a continuation of the Halloween franchise in a way that could make it almost never-ending. The sequel just happened to be a real sequel to the original, extending the story of Michael Myers, but when Michael burned up in that hospital, that was to be the end of it. Or, at least a break from the silent slasher.
The third installment focused on witchcraft, the Druids, and Samhain. Instead of being afraid of the ghouls that stalked our streets on Halloween night, we were made aware of how naively trusting we are of large corporations without even a thought of what sort of hidden agenda they may have. In this instance, it’s sacrificing all of humanity for continued good fortune, which is probably an exaggeration of big business, but, hey, who knows? I’ve heard of plenty of jokes where celebrities and businessmen eat children to prolong their well-being, so why not a whole movie about it? I’m looking at you, Queen Elizabeth II. That royal baby doesn’t fool me.
Unfortunately, most critics wanted to see more Michael Myers. He was the embodiment of the preceding sequels, and some critics felt cheated that he wasn’t returning and decided to protest with horrible reviews of Halloween 3. It was called out as a basic 80’s horror movie with the Halloween theme plastered on it. This is a fair assessment, but wasn’t Michael Myers a basic slasher who just happened to kill on Halloween? I’m not trying to demean how great those first two movies were, but I think that, if you enjoy what John Carpenter and Debra Hill did for slasher movies with those two installments, then you should respect what they did in regards to the horrors of Big Brother, Big Business, and Big Black Magic.
Scene of Awesomeness: Tom Atkins beats the crap out of an android, making it well-known that even a simple doctor can be an absolute badass.
Scene of Ridiculousness: As Dr. Dan Challis attempts to make the broadcast company cut the Silver Shamrock special from every channel, he forgets to yank the kids with the masks away from the TV. You know, so they all don’t die from pestilence. Just a thought.
Body Count: 30 (plus alleged infinity)
1 body crush between cars
1 car crash, complete with total body incineration
1 skull-splitting eye gouge
1 self-immolation
1 head ripped off by hand
1 face explosion by laser
1 innards ripped out of the chest
3 deaths by mask pestilence
1 power drill to the head
17 by microchip zapping
1 by Stonehenge ritual zapping
1 tire-iron beating
Countless alleged Samhain sacrifices via mask pestilence
1/2 pair of breasts (just missed seeing a nipple, therefore it’s only a half)
Actors/Actresses of Note: Tom Fucking Atkins. You may remember him in such badass roles as Rehme in Escape from New York, the dad in Creepshow, Ray Cameron in Night of the Creeps, and Frank McCrae in Maniac Cop, to name a few. This times he plays a doctor. A badass doctor, but still just a doctor.
Quote: “Amazing Grace, come sit on my face. Don’t make cry, I need your pie…” -Budd
Grade: B+