And in many ways, my opinions are similar to so many other fans of the series. I still think V/H/S and V/H/S/2 are better than others in the series and consider “Amateur Night” and “Safe Haven” to be high points. Yeah, no hot take here.

Where my opinions start to differ is in which segments we should consider the worst. For example, I find the bland V/H/S/84 to be worse than V/H/S/Viral. I’d gladly put “Dante the Great” over Dickerson’s “Dreamkill.” Don’t get me wrong, both should be placed at the bottom of any V/H/S entry ranking simply because of the sheer number of found footage rules they willingly break.

But one statement I don’t think will end up being controversial is that the eighth instalment, V/H/S/Halloween, is the best entry since the franchise became a Shudder exclusive. So yeah, I consider it better than V/H/S/94, which I use as the bar to cross in order to make The Midnight Selections. (For the record, V/H/S/Beyond just barely missed out.)

It’s my opinion that all the entries in an anthology horror don’t have to be of the same quality for it to be considered a great film, but the weakest entry needs to at least be considered good. And this is where V/H/S/Halloween has an advantage over the lesser V/H/S franchise instalments. It’s extremely consistent. In fact, it is probably the closest the franchise has ever been to all the directors being on the same page.

In fact, if there is any kind of tonal shift, it has to do with the film’s treatment of children. In the first half of this film, kids aren’t the target of the violence and old-school horror rules apply. But near the middle of the film, it’s like a switch goes off and young people all of a sudden get added into the slaughter, with even the wraparound getting in on the act. Then “Kidprint” drops like a hammer. Honestly, I am still marveling at how the film seems intentionally structured around conditioning audiences into accepting so many horrible pre-adolescent (and adolescent) deaths.

Let’s start with the wraparound, “Diet Phantasma,” which is one of the simplest and strongest of the franchise, though I still give the nod to “Tape 56” and “Tape 49” as the best because they have moments that are scary in a way that few things in cinema actually match.

“Diet Phantasma,” directed by Bryan M. Ferguson (who?), shows a group of researchers testing a new Halloween-themed soda on unsuspecting subjects. Needless to say, it goes wrong in all kinds of predictably fun ways.

I generally don’t put a lot of stock in the wraparound, but this one I didn’t mind returning to between segments. The plot is almost non-existent and the whys aren’t answered, but who cares? Unlike some wraparounds that try to build towards a fragmented mystery, this one offers kill after kill with simplistic gleeful efficiency. I have no complaints.

The first actual segment is Anna Zlokovic’s (again who?) “Coochie Coochie Coo.” In hindsight, this is probably V/H/S/Halloween’s weakest segment, but at the time I was watching, I was wondering if I might end up considering it one of the best.

Two female high school seniors spend their last Halloween together trick-or-treating, or rather causing random mischief, one last time while masked in baby costumes. Then, out of nowhere, they see a mysterious house they wonder how they missed. What transpires in the house is a whole lot of infantilized creepiness that continuously ratchets up at an impressive pace.

“Coochie Coochie Coo” is a little rough around the edges, but I enjoyed it more than the happenings in the house in V/H/S/Beyond’s “Stork.” I can’t say why one kept my attention while the other just felt like stuff thrown at the screen, but I think it has something to do with immersion. It’s just far easier to get immersed in a Halloween-inspired world than one based in science fiction. Plus, it’s easier to get caught up in the plight of two girls chasing childhood nostalgia than it is a zombie-chasing task force.

Next up is “Ut Supra Sic Infra,” an instalment brought to us by Paco Plaza, one of the directors of [REC]. Big names don’t always deliver the best V/H/S entries (just ask Scott Dickerson or Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead), but Plaza’s is actually one of my favourites in this film. It doesn’t contain the same overt dark humour as the other entries, but in a film where multiple entries hit the accelerator and don’t look back, a slower build and more mature horror tone feels welcome.

A college-age man is in a police station being questioned about the mass murders of several Halloween partygoers who broke into an old mansion using an underground tunnel. The police, however, do not believe the man committed the crimes even though he has confessed because of the horrendous state of the victims’ bodies and logical inconsistencies in his story. Plus, he has considerable gaps in his memory.

To get to the bottom of the crime, the investigators take the man back to the crime scene to re-enact what happened, hoping to trigger his memory. Plaza uses the idea of resurfacing memory to structure his story, shifting the story between timelines. The buildup of the mystery is well-executed, but where “Ut Supra Sic Infra” shines is in the payoff.

NOW, LET’S REALLY START TO TALK ABOUT V/H/S/Halloween! The next two entries will probably determine how people really feel about this film. I expect both to be divisive entries for entirely different reasons. But these will also be the entries that most determine the film’s legacy.

So yeah, “Fun Size.” I loved this one. Directed by Casper Kelly, the man who brought us the Adult Swim Yule Log, a horror series full of wacky surprises. ”Fun Size” encapsulates the zaniness of Yule Log, but with a polish meant to satisfy V/H/S’s more hardcore horror fanbase. Like Flying Lotus’s “Ozzy’s Dungeon” in V/H/S/99, there is risk, but if received well by enough people, there is reward.

A group of four adults come from a party without candy and decide, since they are already dressed up, to go trick-or-treating. The second house they come to has a giant bowl of candy with a sign stating “take only one.” But, to their surprise, the candy has funny names that they have never heard of, and when they unwrap one, it’s shaped like a penis.

“Fun Size” blends the hyper-realism of found footage with the campy dark humour Kelly honed on Adult Swim. The supernatural villains are especially unsettling because their bodies seem to obey the physical logic of Looney Tunes characters. 

Now I’ll admit, I don’t think everything Kelly tries in “Fun Size” works, but most of it does, which makes this one of the most original and interesting entries in the entire franchise.

Now we’ve hit the point of the film where kids start to die in big numbers.

“Kidprint” is directed by Alex Ross Perry, known to horror fans for…nothing really. I have no idea how Perry got attached to this project, but I’m glad he did. As the director of numerous features, including Christopher Robin, he has film pedigree and a noted interest in reproducing the grainy feel of V/H/S film.

But damn, does he ever go dark. While everyone else is playing around with fun concepts, Perry decides to get all The Poughkeepsie Tapes on us. But here’s the thing, The Poughkeepsie Tapes is full of uncomfortably dark humour and so is “Kidprint,” so it still fits well into this anthology even if its presentation of child abduction and abuse hits hard. But if I wasn’t as familiar as I am with extreme cinema, I’d probably be taken more aback by this one.

“Kidprint” follows an electronics store owner who also runs a side business that takes pictures of children so they can be identified quickly by police if abducted. And with an actual child abductor on the loose and Halloween approaching, business is booming. But something feels a little off about this side hustle.

This is definitely my favourite entry of this film, but I can also see it being a controversial one. It goes to a darker place than any V/H/S entry has ever gone before. But damn, it is memorable.

The final entry is “Home Haunt” by Micheline Pitt-Norman & R.H. Norman. (Yeah, I don’t know who they are either.) And this is a fantastic entry to close on. It involves a father and son who transform their home into a haunted house every Halloween. But years later, the son, now a teenager, has soured on the tradition, feeling it is partially to blame for the teasing he faces in school. However, mum blackmails the son into helping out for one final Halloween.

Then the dad finds an old record in an antique store called “Halloween Horror” and steals it, hoping it will help make this year’s haunted house extra special.

“Home Haunt” is the third entry in V/H/S/Halloween that hits the accelerator and just keeps the foot on the pedal (“Coochie Coochie Coo” and “Fun Size” are the other two). In previous V/H/S installments, you’d be lucky to get more than one like that! And that’s the thing—being at the tail end of a two-hour film that just keeps pounding puts it at a disadvantage. But “Home Haunt” has more than enough going for it to keep us entertained. If it had been included in V/H/S/84 I’d consider it the standout entry, but in this film, I found it more middle of the pack and that’s okay.

And yeah, “Home Haunt” ends up being alright with killing kids too. The record’s cover art even humourously foreshadows this.

V/H/S/Halloween is a fast-paced horror extravaganza helmed by an odd mix of veteran filmmakers and newcomers that comes together surprisingly well. I got the feeling that each of these filmmakers wanted to do something special for the franchise and had an understanding of what worked best in the past. This is a film dripping in dark humour. And unlike the previous instalment, V/H/S/Beyond, V/H/S/Halloween allows practical effects to win over CGI, bringing the franchise closer to its roots. I would not be surprised if the V/H/S franchise returns to the Halloween theme again in the near future.

After eight installments, it’s hard to ignore the importance of the V/H/S franchise to the horror anthology film. Watching a new V/H/S film has become a welcome annual October tradition. There really is something special here.