Halloween Ends director says Haddonfield has 'decomposed' in time since last movie

After the mental and physical injuries inflicted upon Jamie Lee Curtis' Laurie Strode by Michael Myers in Halloween (1978), Halloween (2018), and last year's Halloween Kills, the character has finally found some peace at the start of the just-released Halloween Ends, which is set four years after the events of the 2018 and 2021 films.

"Laurie has done her work to heal herself from the devastation of the loss of her daughter and the loss of many, many friends," says filmmaker David Gordon Green, who also directed the two previous movies in the Halloween franchise. "She's in a good place, and writing her memoir, and reflecting on things that she's done, could have done differently."

Ryan Green/Universal Pictures Jamie Lee Curtis in 'Halloween Ends'

While Laurie is in a good place, the place she is in has fallen apart. Turns out, having a masked maniac periodically slaughter members of the populace has done little to help the disposition of the other people who call Haddonfield their home.

"If we were stepping away from Haddonfield for four years, I wanted to see that the town had kind of decomposed, to a large degree due to the violence that Michael Myers had brought," says Green. The director calls the film "a study of the contagiousness of these negative entities that are in our lives. If they go unchecked then they spread and if we can wrap our head around them and be our own hero then maybe we've got a fighting chance."

Green's words echo those of Curtis, who, during a Q&A conducted by Drew Barrymore at this year's New York Comic Con, described the film as concerning "how we treat each other. And it's a movie about how the entire town of Haddonfield has turned against Laurie Strode, the innocent victim whose life was brutalized by Michael Myers, and it just shows... what violence does to people... These movies are about way more than just Michael Myers and Laurie Strode, they're about who we are."

Halloween Ends will be the last time we see Laurie Strode fighting Michael Myers, or anyone else, as Curtis has decided to walk away from the Halloween franchise after 44 years. As Jamie Lee Curtis recently told EW, "I need to now cut her loose and let her live in the minds and hearts of the fans that have supported her. I now get to go off and do my own thing."

Halloween Ends is now available to watch in theaters and on Peacock.

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