[Mother of Fears] Three Generations of Trauma in Halloween (2018)

Welcome to Mother of Fears – a monthly column that will explore the various roles that mothers play within the horror genre. Mothers are a staple feature in horror movies, and yet, their stories, motivations, representations, and relationships with their children are so varied and complex that we never feel like we’re watching the same story twice. Every month I will take a look at a different mother from the world of horror, explore their story, and look at how they fit into the broader representation of women in horror.

One thing that is interesting about the constant reworking of the Halloween (1978) timelines is that we get to see a different side to the characters involved depending on who is at the creative helm for each particular movie. And this is quite clear in David Gordon Green’s Halloween (2018) which brings Laurie Strode's character back from the dead, and gives us a glimpse of what her life has been like for the past 40 years since that night Michael murdered all of her friends. 

I’ve touched on Laurie Strode’s mothering before in Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998), which saw Laurie faking her death and moving across the country with her son John to start a new life as the headmistress of a private boarding school. The Laurie in 2018’s Halloween, however, has stayed much closer to Haddonfield. And while both versions of the character have deep trauma and an over-reliance on downing glasses of wine, the latest version of Laurie has had a much harder life than her name-swapping predecessor. 

Living on the outskirts of town, Laurie has chosen to batten down the hatches and fortify her house on the off chance she ever has to deal with Michael again. She proved herself a worthy opponent against Michael in 1978, but in the end, it was Loomis and his gun which stopped the killer, if only momentarily. Laurie has therefore spent the last 40 years filling in the gaps of her self-defence knowledge, as the firing range littered with half-destroyed mannequins attests to. With Michael locked up, she knows the chances of encountering him again are slim, but with him having escaped once before, she doesn’t want to risk it. 

With her many locks, bolts, and security cameras, Laurie seems reasonably secure in her life, but with Michael about to be transferred between facilities (which always goes well and always seems to happen directly before Halloween), Laurie’s paranoia has reached its peak. She even drives to the hospital with a gun in her car to watch Michael leave, catch a glimpse of him, and maybe even think about removing him from her life for good. 

However, Laurie is not the only person to be affected by the events of 1978. It is revealed that she has a daughter, Karen, and a granddaughter, Allyson, both of whom she has a strained relationship with. Allyson tries her best to connect with Laurie and wants to include her in the family as much as possible, but it’s Karen in the middle of it all which makes everything quite difficult. 

Karen’s childhood is portrayed as extremely difficult, as she tried to cope with her mother’s paranoia and desperation to protect her daughter in the way she was unable to protect her friends when Michael first attacked. While Laurie trained and prepared for another Halloween night where Michael might darken her door again, she also insisted that Karen participate so that she could feel confident in her safety. And while Laurie pushed her safety knowledge onto Karen she also pushed her fear, anxieties, and isolating lifestyle onto her. 

In the end, Karen was taken away from her mother when she was 12, and Laurie never regained custody. The two still speak, and Laurie has clearly been a constant figure in her granddaughter's life, but what happened before Karen was taken away has always tainted what bond the two could have had. 

It makes sense that Karen is wary of her mother’s behaviour when it comes to Michael. There’s no denying the trauma that Laurie went through 40 years ago, but when all this time has passed and there’s not even been a hint of Michael escaping or even doing anything remotely dangerous, it’s easy to see how Karen could become bitter and twisted about the whole affair. The more Halloweens which pass without incident, the more Karen will come to regret those wasted years of her childhood, and all the time she missed with her mother in the years that passed later. 

So while Allyson wants to welcome her grandmother into her life more, Karen does what she can to put a wedge between them. And none of this is done out of hatred for her mother, but rather as a protective measure for Allyson. Karen doesn’t want Laurie to have the same effect on Allyson as she did on her own childhood. She wants to shelter Allyson, and ensure that she grows up in a more stable environment than she did.

It’s clear from an outside perspective that Laurie desperately needs someone to talk to. After seeing Michael’s hospital bus drive off, Laurie turns up at a family dinner shaken and distressed. She needs to talk about what has triggered her, to try and explain why Michael is still a constant thought in her life. But she struggles to get her words out, and Karen has been in this position so many times before she has very little time and patience for her mother. To her, Laurie is paranoid, and 40 years of being Michael-free should be enough to cancel out that one night when he did actually show up.

Allyson tries her best to fight through all the family trauma that has come before her, but without full knowledge of that night in 1978 or first-hand experience of Karen’s upbringing, it’s hard for her to fully understand either woman’s point of view. All she knows is she wants all the women in her family to be closer, and she doesn’t want to create drama with her mother every time she mentions her grandmother or tries to involve her in things. 

Even after Michael escapes, Karen is still quick to label her mother delusional, pushing Laurie out of her home when all she’s trying to do is ensure that her daughter is safe and well-protected. For Laurie, she sees this as all the years she spent training Karen going to waste. For Karen, this is about avoiding ever being stuck in her traumatic childhood years again. She can see her mother spiralling, and she doesn’t know how to stop it, just like she didn’t know when she was younger. It’s easier for her to push Laurie away from her entirely than it is for her to risk feeling trapped all over again.

Once Laurie and the police have encountered Michael face to face, Karen has no choice but to finally believe her mother. And while it was the site of her very unhappy childhood, she also recognises that Laurie’s house is the best place for them to hide just in case Michael does decide to hunt Laurie down. 

The night Karen thought would never come has finally arrived, and while she clearly resents her mother for all the time they spent preparing when she was a child, Karen is still able to carry out the plan Laurie instilled in her all those years ago. She works with her mother to lure Michael into a trap, before shooting him and trapping him in the basement to burn to death. 

It's obviously not the ideal way to bring a family together, but the three generations of Laurie’s family have never looked closer as they make their way from the burning wreckage of Laurie’s home. Huddled together, each woman has had her own encounter with Michael that night, and Karen and Allyson have finally gotten a glimpse into the event which changed the trajectory of Laurie’s entire life. 

Ultimately, Laurie tried her best for her family. She never wanted them to go through what she did as a teenager, but she wanted to make sure that if they did, they would be prepared. And while Karen lost her husband and Allyson lost her father, Laurie succeeded in keeping those she loved safe. I hope that in the end, Karen was able to recognise the reasons why her mother did what she did. Surely the fear of meeting Michael face-to-face and seeing the life of her own daughter at risk should be enough for her to see how easily Laurie was pushed to these extremes. And hopefully, the fact that Karen’s plan to lure Michael to the mouth of the basement worked perfectly displays just how good a teacher Laurie was in those early days. 

Trauma was what tore Laurie’s family apart in the first place, but this time around the trauma the three women share brings them closer together. In burning down Laurie’s home, the hope is not only that they will kill Michael off for good, but also that they can cleanse their family of everything which has gone before, and start a new life together. Of course, it’s a horror movie, and there are sequels that sort of ruin this idealism, but coming out of the cinema in 2018, I had high hopes for a brighter future for Laurie and her family. 

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