HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH: The One Without Myers

The third installment of the Halloween series is definitely the most hated. Even the duel between Michael Myers and Busta Rhymes in Resurrection, which I often cite as the moment of jumping the shark for the entire genre, did not meet with as much dislike as the idea of debuting director and screenwriter Tommy Lee Wallace (the author of the first adaptation of It). The reason is one – the lack of the beloved villain.

Maybe if Halloween III: Season of the Witch had appeared as the second part of the series, the wave of criticism would not have been so monstrous. It would have changed the character of Halloween to one closer to the formula adopted by the authors of eighteen+ (this is not a joke) parts of Amityville, where the only link between almost all of them is the location of the action (though not always even that).

Such was, moreover, the original intention of the producers (including John Carpenter) – to create an anthology with each finale occurring on the last day of October. The popularity of the first film, however, caused this concept to be shelved, with a correct supposition of success lying in continuing the story of Michael Myers. It turned out to be a one-way ticket.

In 1982, an additional problem was the lack of tradition regarding the absurd returns of defeated murderers from what were just beginning to emerge as long-lived slasher series. Halloween III: Season of the Witch appeared two months after the third Friday the 13th, and thus long before the resurrection of the decomposing, lightning-struck corpse of Jason Voorhees. Myers would be brought back to life only in the insane times when the murderer from Crystal Lake freed himself from underwater captivity thanks to the telekinetic abilities of the daughter of a brutal alcoholic.

It is enough, however, to rid oneself of fan devotion, to let oneself be carried away by the autumn atmosphere and the interesting, though predictable story of fighting a powerful, power-hungry corporation, to discover enormous pleasure in watching Wallace’s vision, a man who was involved with Halloween from the very beginning – in 1978 he worked on editing and it was he who was offered the position of director of the first sequel, yet refused due to the, in his opinion, absurd idea of making Michael Myers and Laurie Strode siblings.

As a main template, Invasion of the Body Snatchers from 1956 was used, filming was even done in exactly the same town, and the endings of both films are strikingly similar. The most interesting change in the third film is the abandonment of the spectral shape, as Myers was originally described in the script, in favor of an open enemy, and one present in every household – the television.

A great idea, but one that also gave rise to the greatest problem of the story – the unclear motivations of the antagonist. Why does Silver Shamrock want to kill all American children? What will it achieve this way? And by the way – how can one amass a fortune selling only three mask designs sold exclusively in October?

The businessman behind this whole commotion might want to just watch the world burn, but approaches this definitely less convincingly than the Joker in The Dark Knight. Let us, however, turn a blind eye to this enormous hole in the script – after all, we have seen stranger things in horror films – and there is decent compensation on offer.

A pumpkin generated on a retro computer and synthesizer noises that could be attributed to Brad Fiedel already introduce a specific mood during the opening credits. This time we do not feel fear of a single-person force of evil that might in a moment jump out from around a corner; instead there appears a tension accompanying the conviction that perhaps the whole world has gone mad and only the main character can perceive it. In John Carpenter’s oeuvre there exists another film with a very similar, suffocating atmosphere – They Live.

The unease is also intensified by the counting down of successive days – from the very beginning we know that on October 31 something significant must occur. I have a particular weakness for small-town, claustrophobic horror movies, and the one created by Wallace is one of my favorites.

I am convinced that if not for Myers breathing down its neck, Halloween III: Season of the Witch would not have turned out to be a total financial disaster, and would actually have found a group of devoted fans and probably become one of the many beloved horror films of the golden era of VHS tapes. Now, as autumn is in a full swing, it is a perfect opportunity to watch it once more, this time without prejudice.