It's official: John Carpenter is a twit. We're not talking mildly retarded or marginally incompitent, we're talking winner of the Uper Class Twit of the Year Award! Carpenter actually went along with this sequel to his fan favorite HALLOWEEN and critically raped HALLOWEEN II, producing the monstrocity known in subtitle as SEASON OF THE WITCH, or know in most horror circles as HALLOWEEN III: TOM ATKINS RUINS HIS CARREER AND JOHN CARPENTER BLOWS THE LAST OF HIS MONEY HE MADE FROM THE ORIGINAL HALLOWEEN. Why even bother to put the HALLOWEEN name on the title John? Sure, there's another movie called SEASON OF THE WITCH from George Romero, but you probably could've billed this as ANOTHER SEASON OF THE WITCH or something. But, since I'm not a huge fan of the HALLOWEEN series anyway, I guess I don't mind. By the way, the only thing this movie has to do with the other HALLOWEEN flicks, is a TV ad for a showing of HALLOWEEN and that's it. No cameo by Donald Pleasance, no one even dressed as Mike Myers, simply a TV ad. Right now you're wondering, "how can I get my boyfriend/girlfriend to stop hitting me constantly and using me for my money", but that I cannot help you with. If you're instead wondering, "why is it titled HALLOWEEN III if it doesn't have Michael Myers in it?", well, I can't help you there either...

H3:SoW opens on October 23rd. A shabbily dressed dude attempts to elude some guys in business suits driving a car who are apparently chasing him down. He takes refuge in a salvage yard, where he seeks out the night watchman, mumbling about something before passing out at the guard's feet, clutching a "Silver Shamrock" Halloween mask. The fugitive man is hauled off to the hospital, where he babbles incesantly about how somebody is going to kill everybody. If he was refering to Myers, he's a little late, as the masked killer, as I mentioned, is not in this movie. Brought in to take care of the kooky man is the divorced Dr. Dan Challis, our hero who is played by b-horror icon Tom Atkins, known best for his role in NIGHT OF THE CREEPS. At least in my book anyway. Sure enough though, as soon as the patient is left alone one of those guys in the suits comes along, *yoink*s the dude's skull apart with his bare hands, then goes back to his car where he douses himself in gasoline and blows himself up real good! Boy, those Jahovah Witnesses don't take "no" for an answer!

The now dead man's daughter, Eliie, comes along looking for her father, finding instead Dr. Dan (who likes to play the field like he's in a baseball game). The two trade notes on the old man's situation prior to his demise, and find themselves involved in one hummer of a Scooby-Doo mystery! Curious about the mask the man was clenching, as well as the guy's apparent grudge against the company, the duo set off in search of the Silver Shamrock factory, all the while falling prey to those nightmarish Silver Shamrock commercials... "2 more days till Halloween, Halloween, Halloween. 2 more days till Halloween, Silver Shamrock"... It would drive a priest to suicide! MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT CEASE! MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY... is preffered to this. Anyway, Italian cannibal flicks aside, this long winded "Diagnosis Murder" episode marches on.

Upon arrival to the only-rural-town-in-California town of Santa Mira where Silver Shamrock has set up HQ, Dan and Ellie shack up at the local motel, posing as potential buyers of Shamrock masks for the upcoming holiday. Obviously, staying in the same room and posing as a married couple, Tom Atkins gets laid. Hey, Tom can bang all the chicks he wants, I have no problem with this, but what I do have a problem with is him baring his pale white ass at the camera! Get that thing out of my face old man, or I'm gonna paint it with my lunch! As for Silver Shamrock, we learn that the place is owned by Irish immigrant Conal Cochran, who also brought in some of his own workers, putting local employees out of work. As for these other workers of Conal's, my money says the fuckers are robots, since they can twist off locals' heads with ease! Well, robots or demons or something inhuman. Conal soon takes note of Ellie and Dan's "Cagney and Lacey" hijinx, setting his automated minions to capture them and bring them to the factory.

At the factory, Conal does the classic "James Bond villain unveils his secret plan so the good guy(s) will know how to stop him after his/her/their escape" as he does just that, showing Dan and Ellie his diabolical plot. In an attempt to bring a little of the old Paganistic horror to the holidaze, Cochran and his motorized lackeys use fragments from a stolen piece of Stonehenge and wire all their Halloween masks with little magical recievers in the name tags. A special television broadcast of a chessy strobing pumpkin graphic sets off the recievers, causing them to energize the stonehenge chips in the tags, which then fire a beam into the head of the person wearing it. Soon after, the person's head cracks open, and an assortment of creepy crawlies squirm out, varrying from poisonous snakes to cockroaches to spiders to all different forms of nightmare candy. With any luck, the deadlier of these nesting vermin will lash out and kill any nearby people. Also, if Conal's lucky, his brainwashing commercials will have the kids sitting around their TVs when the special broadcast is shown. Dan witnesses a test drive of this vile plot, as Conal has a family locked into a room. The kid winds up with a serious headache and the parents both wind up fat and dead. So, now only Tom Atkins stands between the children of America and death by Creepy Crawlers... looks like the Ahmish will rule the world. Well, the Ahmish and all those kids whose parents make them wear homemade costumes, like the classic "soiled sheet ghost" or "dad's old frat clothes hobo".

Well, somehow or another, our horny heroic couple (seriously, they're all over each other like every 15 minutes) manages to escape their bonds, blow up the evil factory, the evil Conal, his evil lackeys, and the evil Stonehenge rock (which I feel was more "misunderstodd" than evil), and make their getaway. But, you know it's not over yet, as the Ellie that Dr. Dan saved turns out to be one of Conal's evil machinations, which he discovers almost too late, when she attempts to kill him as he drives their escape vehicle. What follows is one of the slowest, worst choreographed, and most painful to view "fight scenes" in horror history. I knew their hastily thrown together romance would never make it to the "2nd Month Anniversary" stage. Dan hands her a serious beatdown with his handy dandy tire iron (along with 3 not-so-climactic "the killer's not dead yet!" moments) and that takes care of little miss lead panties. Our intrepid M.D. now makes his way to the salvage yard from the beginning, where, for some odd reason, he discovers several trick-or-treaters there with the night watchman guy (yeah, I bet he was planning on giving them a "treat"), preparing to view the scheduled Silver Shamrock special presentation. Making a drastic phone call to the local police, he has all the local TV stations shut down... all except one. So close, yet so far there Danny Boy! Oh well, I doubt saving the children of Southern California would've made much difference anyway, since Cochran's plan included zapping the brains of children all over the US, if not the world, so don't feel bad there Doc, I'd be more worried about the snakes and deadly species of insect that should be swarming about you very soon...

To be perfectly honest, I give Carpenter credit for picking up a fairly original story, even if it does seem to lack logic of any kind. Some pretty cool FX on the violent gore scenes and nice arrangement of the writhing masses of sliy creatures. The soundtrack was weak, mainly because it lacked Carpenter's trademark "Halloween Theme", and the acting was, well, a little too 'B' for a mainstream horror flick, though ya gotta love Tom Atkins! Come to think of it, this may have actually been a decent flick without the HALLOWEEN III tag... nah, I'm just kidding, I STILL would've been annoyed, disturbed, and bored senseless by it! Who the Hell takes over the world with Halloween masks?! Diabolic genius my hairy ebon asshole! Screw you John Carpenter, I hope you lost more money with this than you did with MEMOIRS OF AN INVISIBLE MAN! Chevy Chase?! What were you thinking you fool!

Sequels: HALLOWEEN 4: THE RETURN OF MICHAEL MYERS; HALLOWEEN 5: THE REVENGE OF MICHAEL MYERS; HALLOWEEN: THE CURSE OF MICHAEL MYERS; HALLOWEEN: H20

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