Jack O'Lantern was almost universally panned by critics. DVD Talk wrote Jack O'Lantern is one of the goofiest, silliest, and most obviously inept "do-it-yourself" horror flicks I've seen in quite some time", offering that one might expect "a no-budget stinker like this populating the 99-cent VHS bin", but that it was "a bit bizarre to see a company like Lions Gate releasing this malformed mass on DVD." Of plot and cast they wrote, "The acting is hilariously bad, the story is muddled, familiar and boring, the kills are juicy yet infrequent, and the titular beastie? He looks like a goofy, runny, smelly pumpkin. Not too scary, obviously." They summarized by writing "[the film] is just a boring, derivative, and amateurish mess from beginning to end. When it's not ripping off better movies, it's meandering around in a barn and grinding to an endless halt."
