Michael Myers is back once again. But not like he has been back before. He is back for the first time… again. Confused yet? This installment of Halloween is the 11th movie in the Halloween franchise. However, you are supposed to forget all of those other movies except for the original when watching this 2018 version.

This is not the first time this franchise has pulled the “forget all that other stuff” move. Halloween II is a direct sequel to the original and that is the first time you get Michael Myers’ return. Halloween III treats the first two as if they were only movies the actors were watching before their story about witchcraft began. Then Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers hit theaters and you get a sequel to the original two movies (now ignoring the 3rd). After two more installments we get the return of Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode in Halloween: H20. In H20, we are supposed to forget everything that happened in movies 3-6. And now only I, II and H20 were canon at this point. Halloween: Resurrection follows up H20.

In 2007, Rob Zombie reboots the entire series and starts over with the movie Halloween. He makes a sequel to that movie in 2009 called, get this, Halloween II. This finally brings us to the 2018 version. Which is called only Halloween for some reason. Jamie Lee Curtis is back again, but none of her backstory that we learned in Halloween II (the first Halloween II) that ties her bloodline to Michael Myers comes with her. So forget all that. The best part about all of this is that Nick Castle, who hasn’t played Michael Myers since the original movie, is back. So if you are only following Nick Castle’s Michael Myers’ career, then the chronology makes perfect sense.

Here is the good news. This is a Halloween movie and none of the above matters in the slightest. Michael Myers is a psychotic murderer who wears a mask and hunts teenagers. That is really all you need to know to enjoy this movie. There is nothing new here. Everything pretty much moves along exactly how you would expect. I will say though, that it is great to hear the revamped theme as Michael increases his body count.