This year marks the 30th anniversary of Halloween 5, the second film in the Thorn Trilogy. Though arguably not the greatest sequel in the series, Halloween 5 does have some redeeming qualities that make it a fun watch and a must-see this October.
One year after the events of Halloween 4, Michael Myers returns to Haddonfield once more to finish what he started: the murder of his niece Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris).
At the end of Halloween 4, we witness Jamie raise a pair of scissors and attack her foster mother, an event that lands her in a psychiatric hospital. Jamie is now mute, but shares a telepathic link with Michael, who is very much alive.
But Michael was shot and fell down a mine shaft, so how did he survive? Conveniently, there is a tunnel in the shaft that leads to a river, which Michael floats down until he reaches a dock attached to a shanty with a pirate-ooking man inside. He collapses–presumably from exhaustion–and then we suddenly flash forward to a year later where he wakes up from a coma, still at the pirate guy’s house. He kills the man and escapes with a different mask than he had in part 4—which is supposed to be the same mask. Don’t look at me, I didn’t write the script.
Rachel (Ellie Cornell) returns for a brief appearance, bringing into the fold some new characters, Tina (Wendy Foxworth) and Samatha (Tamara Glynn). Tina takes over the “big sister” role that Rachel’s void leaves open and helps Dr Loomis (Donald Pleasence) protect Jamie from Michael once again.
The storyline is horrible. Though Halloween 4 is technically the start of the Thorn Trilogy, part 5 is where we first see Michael’s thorn wrist tattoo that you’ll learn all about in part 6. Now there is a psychic connection between Michael and Jamie that never existed before, bringing an element of the supernatural into the series that was never really needed.
The mask in part 5 is honestly the worst of all of the films’ masks. His hair is slicked back and his features are sharp, not at all like the varying Shatner masks we had grown to love over the past 3 films.
Tina has got to be the absolute worst character in any of the Halloween films. To call her annoying would be an understatement and she fills a void that never needed to be left open by *SPOILER ALERT* the death of Rachel. The only good thing Tina brings to the film is her friend Sam, who is the least annoying character in the entire hour and a half of the movie.
Dr. Loomis has been turned into a worthy candidate for an old folks home, yelling at poor mute Jamie to help him find Michael–whom everyone still believes is dead–all based on the fact that he believes Jamie has a psychic link to Michael. I’m not sure when a psychic link became plausible to the good doctor, but it’s a shame what they did to his character.
Then we have the Man in Black character that we have never seen before and really serves no purpose in the film until the very end. Maybe if they had explained Michael’s backstory, aka the plot of Halloween 6, before part 5, this character may have made a little more sense. But that was probably asking too much of the hot mess of a script.
The deaths are pretty lame, with the exception of Tina’s boyfriend, who gets a garden hoe to the forehead. Sam’s boyfriend gets it with a pitchfork in a very Jason Voorhees fashion and Sam is killed offscreen with a scythe. We are five films in and they are still killing people off screen? Lame. As for Tina, I still can’t figure out how being stabbed in the shoulder killed her. I know they claim she was stabbed in the chest, but it was clearly the shoulder. Either way, Tina was killed and I’d put that in a plus category.
So, what are the redeeming qualities that I mentioned before? Well, we have Danielle Harris, who is clearly the victim of a bad script. We know from watching part 4 and basically every other role she has done, that she isn’t a bad actress. The movies may not be the best sometimes, but she is always good in them.
We have absurd comical moments that really don’t belong in a Halloween film, but are just bad enough to keep you entertained. By that I, of course, mean the police officers who bumble around to their own idiotic theme music. How do these people become police officers? I suppose you would have to be pretty stupid to be a cop in Haddonfield, considering we all know that mortality rate.
Even most of the things I said were awful are worth watching for. If you are prepared for a bad movie, then it becomes so bad that it’s fun to watch. If you’re expecting a serious film like the original, then you’re in for a bad experience.
It’s 30 years later and we have suffered through some truly terrible and some truly excellent Halloween sequels and remakes since Halloween 5 was released. Despite being one of the worst in the series, Halloween 5 is still a fun watch and really fun to trash talk while watching. If you have never seen it before, don’t expect anything amazing. If you have, maybe think about turning it into a drinking game. If you drink every time Tina is annoying, you might just not make it all the way through.
