The Correct Order To Watch The Halo Movies
The first "Halo" video game, "Halo: Combat Evolved," was released in 2001 and its lore was so involved and complicated, it was accompanied by the publication of Eric Nylud's novel "Halo: The Fall of Reach." The plot reaches back into ancient times where it involves wars between long-forgotten alien species, then reaches into the year 2525 where elite supersoldiers, part of the SPARTAN II project, keep the peace. The game's action surrounds the invasion of a new alien species called the Covenant, a race waging a galaxy-wide holy war. The main character is Master Chief John-177, a masked SPARTAN equipped with high-tech guns and a holographic helper/girlfriend named Cortana.
"Halo" has been a mainstay in the medium ever since, having spawned multiple sequels in 2004, 2007, 2012, and most recently in 2021. There are also 10 additional spin-off games, many novelizations, comics, an animated series, and a high-profile Paramount+ TV series. Neill Blomkamp once announced his interest in making a live-action "Halo" feature, but that fell apart way back in 2009.
It's immediately worth noting that there has yet to be a proper, full-length "Halo" feature film. The "films" in the series are mostly all shorts or cutscenes that have been edited together into features. One of them was shot as a feature, but released in 15-minute episodes. It was then re-cut back into a feature for individual purchase. The films are often available on Blu-ray or for download.
The films also tie directly into the mythos of the "Halo" games, so a working knowledge of "Halo" is required to understand the films on the below list. It also helps to understand the "Halo" chronology, as the stories are told out of order.
The following list is compiled of five features as they were ultimately presented.
The release order
Here are the films in order of their release:
- "Halo: Landfall – Prequel to Halo 3" (2007)
- "Halo Legends" (2010)
- "Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn – Start of the Human-Covenant War" (2012)
- "Halo: Nightfall" (2014)
- "Halo: The Fall of Reach – The Spartan II Program" (2015)
"Landfall" was released as three shorts that were edited together into a single seven-minute video that one can watch on the Bungee YouTube channel. The shorts were filmed by Blomkamp, as he had already made some contributions to a scattered "Halo" feature.
"Halo Legends" is a compilation of seven animated shorts released in 2009. They were compiled onto a DVD released by Warner Bros in 2010. The shorts all serve as backstory for the Halo universe, and feature characters intimately known to players of the "Halo" games. The seven shorts were distributed among six animation studios, and they were given wide latitude for the project, making for wildly different looks and tones.
"Forward Unto Dawn," a live-action film, was released as five 15-minute episodes prior to the release of the "Halo 4" game, and was later edited into a 75-minute feature that was released on home video and on Netflix. It's a tale set 31 years before the game in question. Unlike the "Landfall" short, this was more of a film than marketing material.
"Nightfall" is a remnant of an unmade Ridley Scott "Halo" feature, and it was the origin of a character named Locke, an important figure in the "Halo" games.
One might note that the most recent film is an adaptation of the 2001 "Halo" novel that accompanied the release of the first game. It is an animated prequel and was originally presented in three chapters and runs about 64 minutes in total.