Things what I hated about H2 : Spoiler-y edition

Yeah, I know I said I'd wait a few days, but I've changed my mind. Deal with it. There are some mad spoilers in this, so fair warning and all that.

Okay I've already detailed how looong the opening sequence was. So let's get to the other stuff.

Like New Laurie. This chick is ir-ri-ta-ting! I couldn't relate or sympathize with her at all. I get that the trauma of the incident is suppose to have caused this big personality change, but her so-called rebel came off as a freakin' BRAT. Apparently, one concept for the original Halloween II was for Michael to come after Laurie 3 years later as she's started to move on and put her life back together. I always thought that would have been interesting (and sorta ended up happening with H20), but I liked the continuation of events through the night. I feel Zombie's story might have benefited from a wider time span between the previous movies events and this movies (and in reality the movies are 2 years apart, so why not).

Here, Zombie tries to remedy some of what he screwed up in part one by giving more depth to his characters. Unfortunately, he clearly doesn't know any real people. Laurie and her new friends are just obnoxious. They say 'fuck' a lot and make sexy comments because that's what wild women do. Annie is about the only character I really felt was broadened in this film. You did get a sense that she just wasn't over nearly being killed a year ago. The credit for that might just go to Danielle Harris more than Zombie. Once again, he fails to really flesh out his characters, at least the ones you're supposed to be scared for.

I also didn't like the random kills just thrown in. What was the point of him stopping at the Rabbit in Red except for the reference to the first movie? Yeah, okay. He comes across the trash guy during his travels (another WTF thing about this movie...I kept thinking of Metallica's "Wherever I May Roam" when those scenes came up), but why bother going into the bar to kill people? I'll allow the people in the truck, but it still seemed thrown in to up the kill count. While I get that Michael stalks and kills Laurie's friends, the killing of the girl in the van was so random (and perhaps to a similar kill in Prom Night, hmm?), especially since he freakin' teleported to the house moments later. (Another sign of the Jasonifying of Michael Myers by Mr. Zombie.) A lot of the kills in this movie seemed to be there as an attempt to keep people from falling asleep.

I know some people find Giant Michael more frightening than Carpenter's Michael, but his massive size takes a lot of the suspense out of the movie for me. Michael's "normalcy" in the original film is one of the things that makes him so terrifying. Yeah, big guys are scary, but it's that quiet guy you THINK can't harm you that you really need to look out for most of the time. Frankly, I was amazed at the number of people who thought screaming obscenities and threatening a guy who's 7 feet tall was a good idea. Not so surprising when he stomps your face in, dude.

And then there was the Loomis stuff. On the one hand, that was really interesting. I'm into true crime books & shows, so I know that there are a few opportunists out there. (If you ask me, Vincent Bugliosi is one of them. Yeah, I said it! Seriously, read his egomaniacal book Outrage about the O.J. case. THAT should have been called If I Did It as in If I Had Been the One Who Prosecuted the Case). I can get behind Zombie's portrayal of him as someone who would attempt to turn Michael's rampage into a money-making ego stroke. However, it didn't seem to fit with the rest of the movie. I know it was important to Laurie's finding out about her parentage, but a lot of it seemed wasted in this film.

I will give him this: he managed to sneak in a lot of nods to films in the original series which was actually enjoyable. I remember specifically the referral to Michael as a shark. (You may recall Busta's character in Resurrection saying Michael is a "killer shark", that is if you haven't blocked that abomination from your memory.) And the ending definitely harkens back to the ending of Pt. 4 when Jamie has "become" Michael. Also, Laurie sharing visions with Michael is a callback to Pt. 5. And of course, there's the hospital stuff. Here, Zombie managed to "remake" the original Halloween II without it feeling like a rushed obligation the way his "remake" portion of Halloween felt in the first film. Those subtle cues worked way better than stuff like the Rabbit in Red thing.

And one other thing, while I wasn't feeling the love for the new Michael (poor Daeg), that kid and Taylor Scout whatshername look a LOT alike, especially that end scene. Nice casting in that one area.

Lastly for the good stuff, the scene when Laurie walks out with that mask on was genuinely freakin' creepy.

Hey, I can give credit where credit is due.

Simply put, I thought it was a poor follow-up even to his own film. Somewhere in there was some potential, but it got lost in translation somehow. Disappointing.