“Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers” (or “Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers” as it’s commonly referred to by fans) is generally viewed by fans and critics as the lowest of lows in the Halloween franchise. In terms of critics and reviews, the movie has a 4.8/10 on IMDb, a 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 10% on Metacritic, and 86% of Google Users have said they liked the movie.

A big reason that people don’t like “Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers” is because of the “Cult of Thorn” plot line. One of the main reasons why this plot line exists is because the trilogy of Halloween 4, 5, and Curse of Michael Myers, was not fully planned out before production of the movies. 

“Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers” didn’t have any references to the “Cult of Thorn” and was the only movie with a proper “structure”. “Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers” is where the “Cult of Thorn” stuff first came into play, however it only came up occasionally. In Halloween 5, we first see the thorn symbol on Michael’s wrist after he wakes up from a year-long coma. We see it again later in various scenes throughout the movie, usually in the background on a wall or some other object. 

We also see the mysterious “man in black” throughout the movie.

The factor that really brought the “Cult of Thorn” thing into existence was because of “Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers”. Production of the movie was super rushed, and had an entirely new crew working on it. There wasn’t even a completed script once production of the movie began. Therefore, the creators made things up as they went along, and left a bunch of opportunities for new plots for the crew who made the next movie. Unfortunately, the “Cult of Thorn” was one of them, and it’s what they decided to go with.

One thing that’s confusing about this movie is that there are actually two versions of the film. 

The first version of the movie, the “Producer’s Cut” (yes, not the director’s cut, the PRODUCER’S cut), was technically made first. It had different scenes and more explanation and plot line centered around the Cult of Thorn. It also leaves a completely different fate for Dr. Samuel Loomis, played by the late Donald Pleasence, who passed away just prior to the production of the movie’s theatrical re-shoots and release. 

After a test screening of the original cut (the producer’s cut) didn’t go well with the audience, the movie underwent a series of re-shoots which would give us the “Theatrical Version”. 

During the interim between Halloween 5 and Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers’s production, Dimension Films bought the rights to the Halloween franchise, and they were super involved with the movie’s production. They also put a lot of pressure on first time director Joe Chappelle to make the movie the way THEY wanted it.

Dimension Films and the production crew frequently butted heads over how they wanted the movie to go. Dimension Films basically wanted more gore and less cult (which is honestly fine by me, I thought the cult stuff was stupid). Even then, the production crew wasn’t entirely sure what they wanted to do with the movie, even though they were united against the Weinsteins.

So, with that out of the way, let’s move on to the actual review. Just a quick disclaimer, I’ve only seen the Theatrical Version, so that’s the version I’m going to be reviewing.

I think this movie is very overshadowed by the “Cult of Thorn” nonsense, and that’s why people think it’s so bad. I feel like this is actually a pretty solid movie, though. The theatrical version of the movie doesn’t give you as many unnecessary details about the Cult like the producer’s cut does, so if you’re like me and you don’t care about the Cult stuff, definitely watch this version.

The best part about this movie’s theatrical cut, however, is the gore. The theatrical version has A LOT more gore than the producer’s cut does. Part of that might be because the producer’s cut was never fully edited, but still, the gore is WAY better in the theatrical version. I mean, come on, A DUDE’S HEAD FREAKIN’ EXPLODES! That’s awesome!

I also think the ending to this movie is a lot better in the theatrical version than the producer’s cut. I don’t want to spoil it in case you haven’t seen it, but trust me, the producer’s cut ending is stupid.

So here’s the deal. I recommend the theatrical cut because it tries to ignore the cult stuff as much as it can, but if you want the story to make sense and want to see all of the stuff that was deleted, you might enjoy the producer’s cut.

All in all, “Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers” is a fantastic watch, and has some really tense scenes. I definitely recommend the movie, and I feel like it’s certainly one of a kind.