Disclaimer: This was originally posted December 21, 2021 and updated July 2025. When it comes to Better Watch Out , the 2016 Christmas film directed by Chris Peckover, I didn’t plan on being fully engaged when we put this movie on. It was more of a random choice from a list of holiday movies but I was pleasantly suprised how engaging the seemingly obvious plot becomes. I went in assuming Better Watch Out would be a typical babysitter horror film of being confronted by evil and must defend the child against that evil. Sooner than I anticipated this anticipation was met with an outcome I didn't quite predict. I expected a burglar or group of burglars break in and then attempt to murder them but instead the danger lurked in a more unexpected origin. If you're interested in watching Better Watch Out (2016) it's available on Amazon Prime by clicking here and Peacock Premium by clicking here . Better Watch Out spoilers past this point The main protagonist doesn't change however, the babysitter, Ashley, played by Olivia DeJonge, gets more than she bargained for. While she’s babysitting, Luke, played by Levi Miller, has set up a fake intruder with the intention of saving her and then using that knighthood try and seduce her. He believes there's a mutual like between the pair and gives off massive budding-incel energy, which comes to fruition when he literally feels it is his right to date his babysitter. Enlisting the help of his friend, Garret, played by Ed Oxenbould, helps him accomplish this feat which she does believe initially. The 2 young boys go as far to convince Ashley that the murderer kills Garret, really instilling just how dangerous they want Ashley to believe the circumstances to be. Despite the audience becoming aware the revelation that Luke is behind the night she is alarmed and angered. She rightfully tells this demon child to get therapy and attempts to leave. Unfortunately Luke’s obsession knows no bounds and upon this attempt Luke slaps Ashley who falls down the stairs. An unconscious Ashley is then duct taped to a chair and Luke proceeds to torment her with a twisted game of ‘Truth or Dare’. Ashley’s boyfriend Ricky, played by Aleks Mikic, arrives on scene and after an unsuccessful attempt to knock him out he’s coaxed into being duct taped to a chair alongside Ashley with the threat of being shot. I have to say, as much as Luke is doing awful and terrible things, the actor’s portrayal of this character is what truly makes the movie. From voice cracks to the well acted juxtaposition between sociopathic actions and middle school boy thoughts Miller’s performance is what kept my interest. In a horrifying scene which I am glad they did not fully show, Luke decides that he wants to know what would actually happen if you smashed someone’s head with a swinging paint can like in the movie Home Alone. I have to give it to the actors because despite them not showing it, the reactions of the actors told me everything I needed to know about the gruesome outcome of this wretched experiment. After this murder the twelve year old mastermind even gets Ashley’s ex-boyfriend, played by Dacre Montgomery (shout out Stranger Things ), to come over who he then convinces to write an apology letter to Ashely outside before coming in. Seeing Billy from Stranger Things in 2010’s ‘swag’ fashion had me shook to the core in the best and most hilarious way. Nonetheless, while this is happening Garrett is finally being of some use and coming to his senses as Ashley convinces him that he’s expendable to Luke and the best thing to do is to let Ashley, now tied up in Christmas lights, go. He agrees and begins to untie her. Luke however is outside killing the boyfriend by stringing him up over a branch, armed with what looks like a suicide letter he is confident this murder will just look like the ex-boyfriend, now framed as a guilty killer, taking himself out. After this Luke goes inside to find Garrett trying to free Ashley and after some dialogue Luke shoots Garrett in the chest, killing him. I didn’t feel as bad as I should have about this because he should’ve stopped Luke far before anyone got killed but then again he did agree to participate in the original fake murderer plan so how innocent was he to begin with. Now defeated and resigned to her fate, Ashley shares a moment with Luke just before Luke stabs her in the neck, killing her. This next part had me triggered. I have been led to believe through the actions of this character that Luke is a criminal prodigy of sorts, willing to go the distance and conscious of evidence that will point his way. He’s even aware of the story of the crime and making it make at least some sense. Do I think he’s created a hard to believe mess? Absolutely. But, I do believe that not many would have assumed he had anything to do with it. However, his grand plan is to pretend that he slept through the whole massacre happening downstairs?!! Not only that but that the killer had zero interest in harming him or even making sure that he couldn’t identify them. It makes absolutely zero sense to me that police would believe this shit. There are four….. four dead bodies downstairs all killed in gruesome and very loud ways, how the fuck would he have not woken up, even drugged. Also, why would the killer drug him? I understand that the police believe that the ex-boyfriend commit these murders but what a weird way to go about it. If the ex really wanted to kill Ashley why would her babysitting be the time to strike and not when she’s walking outside alone, or home alone, etc. Whatever, this just pissed me off because it made a lot of sense up until he got into bed completely untouched to complete his story and didn’t stage that he’d been tortured and traumatized too. Now, I really liked this next part. After whining to his parents that he has no idea what’s going on and they confirm he’s safe blah blah blah they look out of the upstairs window to see Ashley, my girl, being rolled out of the house on a stretcher into an ambulance. They’re informed that she miraculously survived by placing duct tape over her neck wound, slowing the bleed. Ashley then flips off Luke who is still watching from the upstairs window, and Luke mentions he wants to visit Ashley in the hospital. I would hope that Ashley spills as much as possible in the ambulance ride and at the very least casts suspicion on Luke. Regardless, we hit the credits at this point. Better Watch Out (2016) ended up being a nice accidental find. A Christmas themed horror movie that doesn’t follow many of the clichés and even nods at being a darker version of Home Alone (1990) . If you’re looking for something a little more bloody than your average Christmas movie that isn’t littered with Christmas tropes I would recommend Better Watch Out.

Try as I might, despite my best efforts to watch a holiday themed horror movie this week I just couldn’t do it. It doesn’t really feel like Christmas this year and frankly after watching all three Black Christmas movies I needed a break. So, instead of a holiday movie this week I watched Hypnotic 2021 , a Netflix original starring Kate Siegel as the protagonist and Jason O’Mara as the antagonist respectively. From the opening scene I assumed the therapist, Dr. Collin Meade (O’mara) bared resemblance to a Criminal Minds episode where the serial killer uses his patients' phobias to kill them. A woman is crushed in an elevator and I have to assume that he doesn’t have Saw level abilities to make her wander into a mechanically altered elevator that crushes her without the news getting a hold of the story. I did however find it interesting to see what someone might experience inside of their head when having a phobia, like claustrophobia, come into play. We are introduced to the main character Jenn Tompson (Siegel) as she arrives at a friend’s get-together. We are informed through dialogue that she is struggling, hints like her bringing a dead plant because she drank the bottle of wine she meant to bring are made apparent. My problem with this throughout the movie is that she is a really put together appearing woman for someone struggling, unemployed, and in need of a life changing therapist. Her hair is done, her clothes are cute despite the costume designers best efforts to make Kate Siegel look frumpy in a knit sweater. Also in this scenario we meet the therapist himself, Meade, who shouldn’t even be at this party considering he is treating Jenn’s close friend, Gina Kellmen, played by Lucie Guest. Already I know he is no good based on this fact alone and his general lack of boundaries having the audacity to give Jenn a card in the first place knowing the association between his patient Gina and Jenn. We also learn that Jenn has an ex-boyfriend Brian Rawley, played by Jaime M. Callica, whom she has a sorted past with but clearly still cares about. Of course Jenn ends up going to see Meade for therapy and goes under hypnosis. We as the viewer are not privy to what happens in this session, as neither Jenn is, she goes under and then wakes up and that’s it. We do however learn that within three months of that session she has secured a good job and per her therapist's urging is going to have dinner with Brian to discuss their issues surrounding the death of their newborn son years before. As she is leaving to get groceries for said dinner she gets a call from an unknown number, she answers and then blacks out only to come to with Brian choking in her bathroom. Despite me thinking he would for sure be the first murder victim of Meade in Jenn’s life he is alive on a ventilator. Jenn blames herself only to piece together with memories and clues that she in fact bought sesame oil, Brian’s allergy, and put it in the salad for him during the blackout. In a surprising twist Jenn doesn’t just ignore this but instead starts to investigate hypnosis and crimes committed under hypnosis. The discovery that you can in fact be hypnotized and then be made to carry out crimes she compiles evidence and takes it to an officer who previously investigated Meade for this very crime, Detective Wade Rollins, played by Dulé Hill. She’s also roped her friend Gina, the one who introduced her to and recommended Meade, into this investigation despite Gina not believing her at first. Rollings is sympathetic but can’t do much at the moment as he has tried in the past and the police bureau uses hypnosis in crime investigations and doesn’t believe him about Meade. This is annoying but ACAB so it makes sense. As they leave Gina decides to mention that despite his protests before Meade has also used hypnosis on her, and at this moment I know that she will either be killed or try to kill Jenn. Before that happens however Jenn tries to catch Meade by recording him during one of their sessions. She’s not great at deceiving him and he has been stalking her anyways and is aware that she went to talk to the police with Gina. He lets her record it anyways and just uses the time to interrogate her about her mistrust around him. He creepily calls her “my love” which will become important later and I will bitch about that. As predicted he calls Gina and puts her under hypnosis to kill her, my problem with this is why the hell would she continue talking to him when she heard it’s him on the phone knowing damn well he uses death mind control on people? Also, she starts seeing a spider on her while driving with her husband but like she doesn’t have to crash or accelerate into traffic, she could’ve just pulled over and gotten out. Either way, she and her husband die in the crash. There’s some cat and mouse between Rollins and Meade, with Rollins being far too trusting in his presence even drinking his alcohol. It’s apparent that Meade only uses hypnosis on certain patients but we still aren’t privy to why that is at this point in time. I can’t believe that he’s letting Meade not only know he’s onto him but also calling him out on his turf, is this a man thing? Anyways, Rollins goes and tells Jenn his findings and warns her and then leaves only for Meade to show up moments later and use force like power to stop her dead in her tracks. Rollins gets attacked in his apartment by another one of Meade’s patients under hypnotic mind control, she’s somehow good at fighting and practically kicks Detective Rollins’ ass. He ends up in the hospital which I appreciated because I like his character and it annoys the hell out of me when they kill a character too soon and make the villain seem invincible only for him to be easily thwarted later. Jenn ends up going to see another therapist to talk about the hypnosis and maybe be hypnotized again and fuck that. I would never be able to trust another therapist again after this bullshit. Alas, this sweet lady puts her into a hypnotic state where she starts choking in the real world but in her subconscious she has visions of a house and a bracelet with the date of March 6th on it being given to her by Meade himself. Once she breaks out of this state to a horrified therapist they determine that that darn Meade has placed stop gaps in her subconscious so she can’t be hypnotized and released from his bullshit by anyone else. They do decide however to place their own suggestions in her subconscious as a defense against Meade. Now right here I thought, damn that’s genius, I wonder how this will play out. Well, not as intelligently as I assumed. Like every gung-ho horror movie idiot, Jenn goes to the place from her dreams alone, despite learning that it’s Meade’s dead mentor’s home, in the middle of nowhere. Before she leaves she updates the recovering Rollins, cause he can’t catch some peace. This freaks him out but he stays his ass in the hospital bed where it belongs. Unfortunately, he gets a call shortly after that Meade is actually the son of the “mentor” who had ties to MKUltra and implanting false memories into patients. Xavier Sullivan, the mentor, refused to retire like most white men with ideas of grandeur. When Jenn gets there we are shown that uh-oh, Meade is actually Jamie Sullivan, the creepy son of creepy Xavier. I’ll admit some of these events might of occurred out of the order I’ve described them but it’s all the same in this scenario. In the face off between Jenn and Meade/Jamie we learn that he has been trying to recreate his wife and their happy moments with lookalikes and that Jenn has made it the furthest up in here. He has her hypnotized to sit still as he describes his creepy agenda. In a cliché he gets angry when he’s called insane. This bothers me because I think we can all agree that you can be insane and still be aware of being insane especially if you’re a trained therapist who has knowledge of what is psychologically “normal” and “abnormal”. Some more stuff happens and then we get to the point where Rollins is there trying to find and shoot Meade and Jenn is able to break out of the hypnosis kind of. Side note, during the altercation between Meade and Rollins Meade uses a tire iron to hit Rollins and I want to know why everyone in horror movies just has tire irons laying around, I don’t think I’ve owned one in my life. Jenn gets the gun and shoots a fighting Rollins and Meade and thinks she has shot Meade and killed him waking up in the arms of Rollins on the couch. He calls her “my love” though and she instantly knows based on the stop gap placed by the good therapist that she’s under hypnosis. This pissed me off. Why the hell weren’t there far more stop gaps in place, was it a time issue, was it a fear it wouldn’t work? My thinking is that Jenn and the viewer both know he’s used words such as ‘stop’ and ‘sleep’ so couldn’t they have just added those to the counter measures to stop some of this extra shit from happening? It seems like a pretty base level insurance policy to stay protected in face of an odd situation that is just missed. Regardless, she gets free, kills Meade, and Rollins survives. Like every disgruntled woman she cuts bangs in the flash forward. She has a great job and waits dutifully by the side of Brian for him to wake up from whatever is up with him. Was it a great movie, no, was it a nice break from Christmas horror, yes. I didn’t have to think much, the plot, while predictable, also had satisfying elements. Not particularly scary other than the notion that someone could fuck up your whole life because they put you under hypnosis. I assume that the level to which he’s able to control her isn’t possible but I honestly don’t want to know if it is because the idea of people walking around being mind controlled in real life is actually terrifying. I left this viewing never wanting to be put under hypnosis.

Disclaimer: This article was initially posted December 9, 2021 and updated on July 8, 2025. These days Christmas, a commercially motivated holiday, is focused on giving, joy, and often miracles thread through those more profit driven goals like gift giving and holiday event attending. From that commercial aspect grew the modern Santa Clause, a man in a sleigh who watches your children all year long then determines who is deserving and undeserving of material gifts, specifically toys. As with most things this too can have a horror spin on it however. Though the horror genre isn’t typically associated with Christmas I feel there are inherently sinister elements of the Christmas season that fit perfectly with horror. I'm a huge fan of both horror and Christmas and right after Halloween passes I look forward the holiday season with a mixture of Christmas-themed horror mixed in. Watch Black Christmas now by clicking links below As of updating this post Black Christmas (1974) is available to watch free with ads on Roku by clicking here , Black Christmas (2006), Black Christmas (2019) is also available for free with ads by clicking here , and Black Christmas (2019) is available on Hulu by clicking here . Though the 3 Black Christmas movies aren't considered a series or franchise at least one of the 3 renditions typically makes any Christmas horror list. As is customary with many remakes changes to the plot and circumstances are made to modernize it for the new time period. Additionally this is a great set of movies to show trends in the horror genre throughout different eras of horror. The 1974 original is quintesential in that it innovates on the genre similarly to the other horror movies of the 70's that sought to push bounds and try new filiming techniques, methods, and technology. The 2006 remake of the original is a Rob Zombie film and is very bare bones in the plot department but over the top in distasteful subject matter, gore, and color. The most recent rendition that released in 2019 incorporates social issues surrounding gender, particularly in the college setting, and opts for a twist ending that differs from anything in the other 2 Black Christmas films. Black Christmas movie spoilers past this point All 3 films have the same base plot: a group of sorority girls living in a Greek house on a college campus are still there after most everyone has left for Christmas break when they start to die one by one. Each group becomes aware they are under threat in different ways but the big shock of the film that pushed the original 1974 film to it's place in horror history that the killer after them is in the house with them from the start. All take place on a snow filled and festively decorated campus with the addition of a few male characters who are either parents, boyfriends, or police. In addition to those through threads there is a closet kill or fake out scare, prank phone calls of a creepy nature, a ski trip is mentioned, and a decorative glass unicorn figurine becmoes a weapon. The first 2 films, the first coming out in 1974 and the second in 2006, have very similar stories with the second one going more into backstory for the killer and explaining some of the vaguer plot points that the 1974 Black Christmas left that way. The 2019 remake however has a very different plot and only shares basic similarities like the setting and basic framing of the story. Black Christmas 1974 The original movie, Black Christmas (1974), considered by some to be the first slasher POV popularly used in a horror movie. Written by A. Roy Moore and directed by Bob Clark the plot is based on an urban legend about a babysitter and the 1943 case of a 14-year-old murdering his family. On opening a group of sorority sisters and frat guys are having a holiday kick back. Nothing of note happens here except the men getting kicked out followed by a phone call. This phone call switches the tone from jovial to fear, and it's revelaed that a person who the women have named “the moaner” has been calling and saying crude and unusual things. They explain that when they answer the moaner says things that make little to no sense and are usually sexual in nature. These statements from the moaner were added in post production to be more vile for the time without the actors knowing. One particularly iconic kill scene is filmed with a handheld camera as the killer hides in a closet and then attacks Clare. After killing her the killer places her body in the attic window like an ominous watch over to the murders of her friends. Her body, sat in a rocker, is the actress with a plastic bag over her head which seems potentially dangerous from our more safety focused perspective of today. Throughout the movie we revisit the attic and the killer at some points even interacts with Clare’s body, further driving home the psychologically disturbed nature of the murderer. The first half of the movie is following Clare’s dad trying to find out what the hell happened to Clare; it's odd to follow a male character despite the film being about a sorority house. The other iconic scene that is usually noted is the killer, Billy, using a unicorn glass figurine to stab to death a rather interesting character, Barb, while she drunkenly sleeps. Ultimately one of the sorority boyfriends, Peter, who is a rude but not murderous guy, gets blamed for all the killings. Peter is thus taken away while the actual killer and obscene amount of bodies are still in the house, and just then the phone rings. This alludes that the killer is calling, not in the back of the police car but still on the loose, which the audience is privvy to. The ending of the first Black Christmas is intentionally vague, leaving many plot points unfinished and open to the imagination of the viewer to what will happen next. This was more common in earlier horror films, particularly in the seventies, a story could end with little resolution but just as a standalone snapshot in time. Now, audiences anticipate endings that make sense and feel easy to continue into the future and imagine what sort of life the characters could come to live. Upon initial release Black Christmas , actually released under an alternate title to avoid accusations of Blaxploitation, something popular at the time. Initially the film received mixed reviews from audiences, some finding it to be too obscene and grotesque to be enjoyable. I can see why it would be called obscene and myself felt squeamish and uncomfortable during certain scenes filmed under the harsh lighting that really felt like you saw through the POV of a disturbed, mouth breathing individual. Despite this mixed reaction Black Christmas became the 3rd highest grossing film in Canada at the time at $2 million. Costing about $620K to make the film earned $4.1 million from the international box office by the end of the release. A few years after the initial release in 1978 the film faced unexpected controversy around the TV premiere date about 2 weeks prior to it. The man we now know to be Ted Bundy broke into the Chi Omega sorority house in Tallahassee, Florida and murdered several women, understandably ringing a bit too close to the Black Christmas premise. In response the Florida governor requested the film not air in Florida and the network allowed Georgia, Florida, and Alabama to air an alternate movie during the time slot they planned to air Black Christmas . This makes a lot of sense and mirrors what the film industry has done in recent eras in light of unexpected disasters and horror plots that might be too similar for comfort (the first Final Destination and the 9/11 terror attacks occurring the same year). Black Christmas 2006 The story gets weirder in the 2006 rendition however, intentionally casting many attractive young starlets to not be able to distinguish who the final girl is, eliminating that as a spoiler to who lives. Still following Billy this 2006 version makes significant changes and additions to his backstory, filling in missing plot holes from the original. These plot fills are interesting to say the least and I don’t even know how to describe how bizarre things become in this movie. From obscenely grotesque scenes to jarring acts of incest over music and tone that don't match that intense of a topic to shown assault this movie genuinely made me uncomfortable. To clarify this discomfort was more in a triggered manner than a fearful one. Things are fairly basic A+B=C in regard to the horror elements in the story and the "Agnes" mentioned in the original movie’s phone calls is revealed to be Billy’s younger sister. This doesn't really clear things up unfortunately, as it is also revealed that Billy's sister is also his daughter whom was conceived via his mother assaulting him. He is contained to the attic for his entire life alongside Agnes, kept captive there by their mother. Billy is also yellow , like bright highlighter SpongeBob yellow but a deeper shade. He’s meant to be jaundiced but instead he looks like a Sin City character or Ralph Finneas in 28 Years Later. Aside from being essentially glow in the dark bright Billy alongside Agnes are a killing duo in this version rather than a solo Billy. A multitude of wild murders occur, a varying level of play on the female aspects of the characters, playing into stereotypes or misconceptions. Despite believing they've defeated the killers after a battle sequence the killer duo somehow survive a fire and once at the hospital attempt to take out the final girl. The alternate ending was actually Billy being impaled by a Christmas tree, pushed while battling the final girl, and his entrails becoming stuck to the top on the star and threading the tree like additional decor as the very yellow Billy slides down. This monstrosity of a visual creation is that of the Weinstein’s and the studio that made this film, ultimately becoming the final version. I'm less than a fan of this version, it dials up all of the qualities that I disliked about the first film and dialed back on the hidden gems. It is odd that Agnes stayed in the attic for so long without detection despite the sorority house and the activities within it commencing down below. While they explain Billy being absent from the property leading up to the events of the film, I don't recall this being explored in the detail it warranted. Regardless I found this movie relied too heavily on tropes while also seeming to believe itself above them. Black Christmas 2019 The 3rd and most recent Black Christmas released in 2019 and takes a completely different turn than its predecessors. I often think of movies like this when I imagine what direction horror would've headed in had the pandemic and resulting strain on the film industry not occured. I wonder what projects might've come to fruition and if another Black Christmas following this story's setup would come out. The only out of the 3 directed by a woman, Sophia Takal's perspective is felt throughout the on screen action from story to costume to portrayals. It's clear that Takal took advantage of top of mind issues that college aged women were facing during the first TACO presidency and incorporated them into the horror which paid off well. I find the 2019 remake interesting to watch from start to finish, enjoying the characters, the group of women's friendships, and the supernatural frat cult turn of the story. Feeling drawn from headlines the main antagonist is a fraternal order of men who have been taken over by the misogynistic founder’s evil spell. Their goals are to have men rule the world attack and during the Christmas break resolve to attack the house of sisters still on campus. Ultimately they hope to indoctrinate all men on campus and then the world with the aid of dark magical forces. Fortuneately this is stopped in an epic fight scene by the pissed off surviving sorority sisters. The evil is ultimately ended when the founder's supernatural bust is smashed to pieces and the frat house burns down while the sisters and the one woke guy who survives look on. While it doesn’t have much in common with the other two movies aside from the intial circumstance of sorority sisters at their house as Christmas Break begins it treats its female plot subjects completely differently which pays off in a better film. Woman aren’t objects in the third one and not plot devices like in the first one but rather have complex and deep relationships while having one another's backs. Rather than making fun of sorority girls or enjoying evil things happening to them they are actually the subjects to root for and empathize with. While this feels normal in modern horror it is important not to forget that not long ago this was new. All the characters are multidimensional and have motivations outside of a horror movie plot, another aspect not as common in earlier horror or films. Also, not a huge fan of the Billy killer so I did not miss him in the slightest but found this to be a far more interesting antagonist for the women to battle. This was my first time watching any Black Christmas movies and I was definitely intrigued due to the 2019 remake becoming available to watch. While I'm not a huge fan of the first 2 versions I am thankful to have them as a reference point for what I really do like and appreciate about the 3rd and most recent film. I have major respect for some of the horror techniques pioneered with the first film like the killer POV camera shots and the killer contacting the victims from inside of the house the whole time. I imagine in the seventies your home was even more of a safe space than it is now so to think to check that space seemed like an unneeded overreaction. Despite the more lax approach to the sorority sisters in the 1st movie I do think that Clark accomplished the goal of portraying young adults as more capable rather than partiers in comparison to other media at the time.

Disclaimer: Originally posted November 25, 2021 and updated July 2025. For the Thanksgiving holiday I decided to rewatch a movie that takes place over Thanksgiving break at a college, Kristy (2014), rather than a Thanksgiving themed movie. Directed by Oliver Blackburn and starring Haley Bennet as the main character and Ashely Greene as the main antagonist, this movie is definitely worth the watch. Kristy focuses on a college girl who stays on campus over Thanksgiving break and then is hunted down by a group of cult members targeting what they consider “Kristy” like women. Currently the movie is available to watch free with ads on Amazon Prime and Tubi The movie opens to a beaten up car in the forest with a hooded figure sitting inside of it. We flash to someone in a clearing taking photos with their phone of something on the ground. Quickly it is revealed that the dead body of a woman is on the ground with the letter ‘K’ carved into her cheek. Following this there is a montage of what looks like a forum with videos and postings about killing women that are considered to be Kristys which we learn from a voiceover. First and foremost we need to address what a “Kristy” is and why it pisses this group so much. A Kristy is a well liked, privileged, and pretty girl who believes in God and this group believes that by killing Kristy that you are killing God. The first portion of the movie after we establish that there is a murderous group and who they intend to murder is establishing who our main character, Justine, is and what makes her fit the criteria for being Kristy. Justine has a boyfriend, Aaron, who loves her, has friends, is athletic, and studious. She also seems to know just about every worker she encounters on campus. Not only that but she works part time for work study because she is on an academic scholarship and seems close with her family based on a phone conversation we see between her and her mom about her not coming home for Thanksgiving. It’s established that she’ll be staying on campus due to the outrageous cost of airfare. She won’t be alone though because her roommate, Nicole, is also staying behind. There’s a sweet scene of her saying goodbye to her boyfriend where he makes some last ditch attempts to convince her to come home with him over the break. After repeatedly declining he makes a recording of him telling her he loves her and he’s off. Flash forward to Nicole bailing because her family is going to Aspen and she doesn’t want to miss out on it. Nicole also tries to get Justine to come with her for the break but again Justine declines. With Nicole gone she’s on her own with the nice dorm security guard for the break. After spending the day in a well filmed montage swimming, dancing, and making the best of her time alone on campus she decides to take her friend's car and go to the store for some snacks. She is kind enough to ask the security guard if he wants anything and this alone makes me like her and also know that the security guard will unfortunately be killed before the film is over. At the store she sees a hooded girl acting really strange who she has an odd interaction with. It’s really odd to think but our girl Alice from the Twilight movie series is this hooded girl with piercings, crusty lips, washed out skin, dark sunglasses, greasy hair, and a hood. This strange woman tells Justine she likes her car and then attempts to touch her hair while saying that she’s pretty. Obviously, as most of us would, Justine backs up and swerves that girl hard. This offends the weirdo and Justine is off to checkout. The girl comes and wants to buy the glasses and gets into a tiff with the cashier about a discount. Justine, uncomfortable like any of us would be, offers to pay to end this interaction which further offends the woman who slams a twenty down on the counter and leaves. Justine exits the mini mart and is faced head on with the headlights of the rundown car from the beginning of the movie, yikes. The car peels out of there and Justine gets in her friend’s car to leave. She ends up in a road incident with said broken down car but manages to make it back to her campus and then dorm. She lets the security guard know this and he says he’ll check it out. It is important to note that this campus is fairly secure for a college campus and you must have a reason for being on said campus if you want to make it past the gate. My own college campus is in a city and this notion is so bizarre to me but it is a major plot device. Being that this campus is seemingly in the middle of nowhere the electricity, that is being upgraded over break, starts to go on the fritz along with the WiFi. This freaks Justine out when the movie she’s streaming cuts to a failed internet screen. For some reason Justine’s reaction is to bang on the window during the storm to try to get the attention of the security guard making the rounds outside. For what reason I have no clue. Behind her the door opens and the hooded woman is there in her dorm room. They exchange some words and Justine manages to get out and get downstairs hiding from the group behind the security desk after finding none of the phones work. She hears the security guard by the door trying to get in and she tries to warn him about the killers only for him to be killed. The group convenes and lets Justine know that the hunt for her has begun. The next big chunk of the movie is Justine either hiding from them, or running away from them. Notable moments include Justine finding the dead front gate security guard, getting to the groundskeeper house, getting him and his dog killed, and even jumping off of the library roof. Regarding Justine as a character I think she’s extremely smart and resourceful but to further the plot and keep the final battle from happening too quickly they have her character do some dumb things. This woman never locks a door behind her, sits down rather than tries to find any weapons in the first half, lets the dog run right out the door, and when she makes it to the road after jumping off the roof she goes back onto campus to try and save her boyfriend rather than get help. She also shouldn’t have survived enough to be able to run around after jumping off of the roof but that’s neither here nor there. In a rather lackluster scene the group kills Aaron in front of Justine which is partially his fault for not listening to her and running to her while she screamed at him. This causes Justine to strangely say ‘no’ to them a couple times and then run to Aaron’s car which he’s left running. She’s not quick enough however and one of the group members jumps on the hood of the car. He tries smashing into the windshield to stop her but she rams him into a wall, killing him. This clearly intensifies things and Justine manages to get away to the athletic center. She hides and empties Aaron’s backpack she’s taken from his crashed vehicle and finds the recorder. In a clever move she uses the pool as a hiding place, holding her breath underwater while one of the group members searches this area. When he has almost given up he discovers the contents of the backpack and knows she’s near so begins searching again. Justine has been army crawling through the bleachers and has placed a hose into the water. This draws the killer’s attention and she then bum rushes him into the pool. They face off underwater and she ends up cracking his neck with his bat. Justine then goes Home Alone on these assholes, killing the next one in the showers by luring him into a stall with a recording of her whimpering. She unmasks him and takes his phone, becoming shocked that she finds the website from the beginning of the movie. This website reveals that this isn’t the only group of killers but just one of many targeting Kristys across the country. She pretends to be one of the group members and responds that Kristy has been killed and is on the way to meet up with the other group members. She ends up confronting the girl from the gas station who seems to be the ringleader and sets this bitch on fire. The movie ends with Justine’s voiceover saying she’s no longer Justine but is now Kristy. Granted I know it’s not Thanksgiving themed or focused but it does fit the criteria for being around Thanksgiving. This movie has great camera work, good acting, and is well paced. I am still sad the dog died and didn’t even want to go into that part of the movie. All of the plot holes about how she got away or how they found her made sense to continue the plot of the movie so they’re rather easy to look past. If Thanksgiving isn’t your thing but you still want some holiday-ish focused horror then I highly recommend Kristy (2014).

Original Shudder Post - November 24, 2021 If there is one thing that drives my opinion on applications, it is user experience. It always feels like a lot of the problems like minor annoyances to the consumer can be easily fixed with a little tweaking. Yet, a lot of streaming platforms don’t seem to notice or care to fix those little annoyances. That is one thing I will always say positively about Netflix, their user experience and how it is ever evolving in the right direction. Most of my Shudder opinion is going to focus on user experience for these reasons. Aside from being horror focused, which I am appreciative of, it is at the end of the day another streaming platform. With so many options for streaming platforms out their user experience is what I typically use to determine what platforms I will be subscribed to and which ones won’t make it past the free trial period. To start, Shudder is a streaming platform dedicated to horror content. It has recently been revamped and creates platform specific content as well as streaming horror content in general. Now that alone is a tick in the box of reasons to stay subscribed, that there is a possibility for horror content that is new but unavailable on other platforms. However, I haven’t had the chance to watch anything other than V/H/S 94 (which is a good watch) so it is still open for debate whether that platform specific horror content is worth the watch. So far, I have only been able to access Shudder on the internet, Apple phone/tablet, and Samsung Smart TV. It isn’t available through Xfinity boxes or PlayStation. I don’t have access to other modes so if or if not they are available is a non-issue to me. In the accessibility area that isn’t bad, could be better but could also be worse. Now to using the app, which is where my minor grievances come in. The search function leaves room for improvement. I specifically went onto Shudder to watch V/H/S 94, the newest installment of a series I am a fan of. Unfortunately, finding the movie became more difficult than anticipated. It wasn’t featured on the homepage for me, which I found weird since I assumed it would be something used to draw people into using Shudder. When I tried to find it through search not only is there not predictive text, but I also couldn’t find the movie using “VHS” or “V/H/S” or even just “V”. It’s truly bizarre that search terms that should pull up at least an associated movie pulled up zero search results. Not everyone can have an algorithm like Netflix where even movies they don’t have are predicted and similar ones recommended, but I don’t think it’s too much to ask that at the very least the first letter of the title pulls up the movie as a result. Eventually, I found the movie in the new section after scrolling through a few rows of titles. Now for the biggest gripe I could find, subtitles/closed captioning isn’t working for me. I personally am not hard of hearing, but I prefer the subtitles always being on. However, there are a lot of people who genuinely need closed captioning to be able to watch media and not having that function working is just not something a big platform should be doing. The world is already not accessible enough for people who are differently abled, the least we can do all that’s in our power to limit that inaccessibility and closed captioning is the bare minimum. Even TikTok has closed captioning functions. All in all, I found the app to be usable (aside from the closed captioning malfunction which could just be an issue with my personal technology…hopefully) with a wide array of selections. To be clear though I am fully aware these are the most first world problems and at the end of the day it’s just an app, an app that I am thankful exists. Also, an app I highly recommend checking out for any fan of the horror genre. July 2025 Post Revisit The above post was originally posted November 24, 2021 and Shudder has changed a lot in new features and stayed pretty much the same for the preexisting features. The live TV channel-style feature has more than a couple of times introduced me to movies I wouldn't have watched otherwise but was glad to have seen, making it a worthwhile feature in my opinion. I think the inventory options ebb and flow, there will be bursts of new conent that seems really interesting but then I won't hear much chatter about Shudder for a few months.

Like many young Americans I'm not a fan of Thanksgiving and rather look forward to a Federal Holiday guaranteeing a day off following earlier years of Black Friday shifts that began around 2 AM. Unlike more jovial holidays like Christmas and Halloween, also based around consumerism in America but still more festive than the history surrounding Thanksgiving. My first thought was shock that more than one Thanksgiving-specific horror movie existed but a horror movie about a horrifying holiday actually makes more sense than anything. The history of Thanksgiving is rooted in the same themes common throughout all United States history, whitewashing a rather crude and evil truth to favor the pilgrim settlers as heroes they were not. Rather than heroes pilgrims relied heavily upon indigenous populations knowledge and kindness throughout the harsh winter in a rugged land they were not prepared to survive in. The pilgrims and many generations of them to come in many different forms repaid these tribes by stealing from, lying to, cheating, and even murdering them. Instead of a day of rememberance for the lives lost to the imperial conquests of the fledging USA colonies it became a day to celebrate that very predating act of meeting with the natives prior to their hatred sweeping through the land like rot. On the contrary the central theme of Thanksgiving by the eighties centered around being thankful, or rather grateful , for the life that you have and what you have within that life. Similar to rags to riches stories this serves as a way to put negative feelings back on a society rather than addressing that those feelings could be possible side effects. It is more clear than ever that history is a more fragile concept than we'd previously felt it to be, that it takes one unchecked institution, person, or administration to threaten the sanctity of historical fact and record keeping. Nonetheless, it is a holiday mired in horror both real, cultural, political, and otherwise. Pilgrim 2019 spoilers past here Luckily, there is one character in this movie who not only is aware of the aforementioned facts but challenges the other characters during the celebratory events surrounding Thanksgiving. I was thankful throughout for this character, also wanting to question the Pilgrim’s religious teachings and gender roles from early on. We open on a scene of the back of a little girl’s head with two adults arguing in the background. The background is fuzzy, but we can gather that it is most likely a little girl and her two parents arguing. A flash forward takes us to the present day where we can gather that the little girl is now a teenager and the main character, Cody, played by Reign Edwards. Before going any further I need to address Cody’s wig. Cody is clearly a biracial woman (based on the knowledge that her father, Shane, played by Kerr Smith, is white) and I am going to infer that rather than show her natural hair they wanted her to wear a wig, which would be fine. Except that the wig is horrid. Not a lace front, shiny like they didn’t even attempt to make it look natural and with a curl that looks fresh out the box, not styled. This brings me to a mini rant about how black women and women of color with type 3 and especially type 4 hair are not treated with the respect and dignity they deserve to be when it comes to hair and makeup. You should not be a makeup or hairstylist on movie or fashion sets if you cannot do all types of hair. It makes zero sense that you would cast people of color and then have them on screen lookin a damn fool because you didn’t vet if anyone could lay a damn wig. They had the audacity to film this wig on Cody’s head underwater where you could see her natural hair line and the band on the inside as the wig lifted. As if the hair didn’t look bad enough outside of the water. Honestly now that I think about it the wig looked better and more realistic after she came out of the water. Anyways, during a character establishing dinner we learn that Cody’s mother isn’t in the picture, her workaholic dad, Shane, pays around $60,000 a year for her to attend boarding school, Cody skips class, and hates her try hard stepmother, Anna, played by Courtney Henggeler. We also learn that Cody has a half-brother, Tate, played by Antonio Raul Corbo, with whom she has a decent relationship. In a misguided attempt to bring the family together Anna has decided that they will be hosting Thanksgiving pilgrim re-enactors who will take them through a traditional, historic celebration. Which just off rip sounds horrifying. We then get this seemingly unimportant scene of Tate and Cody breaking a wishbone where we hear a voiceover of Cody wishing that her stepmother’s Thanksgiving plans blow up in her face as Cody breaks off the larger piece of the wishbone. So clearly this is a foreshadow that this holiday is about to go awry. For no reason at all we hear a distorted voice repeat what Tate says. This is an unimportant detail but extremely bizarre because it is the only time that this occurs in the whole movie. For the sake of not going over every detail the next few scenes entail an HOA meeting hosted by Anna where we learn that she isn’t well liked and seen as a fake social media brag. We also establish that Cody is dating a neighbor boy, Finn. Mid-party the pilgrim re-enactors, Ethan, and Patience, arrive early and don’t break character for one second. Cody is the only suspicious one and Anna passes Patience, played by Elyse Levesque, off to Finn’s mom, Katherine. Late at night Cody finds Ethan, played by Peter Giles, telling Tate a bedtime story, alone in Tate’s room which is red flag central. Cody can’t find any information about this reenactment group online, but Finn tells her to chill out. We learn Ethan is all about gratitude and has some sort of sordid history with his family. Katherine makes the mistake of being ungrateful about her life when she’s talking to Patience in her kitchen who then makes her some sketchy herbal tea. Back at Cody’s we discover that creepy Ethan has made an entire shed in their backyard overnight. Anna and Ethan are replacing the lights with candles and lanterns and are requesting that all electronics be given to them. How could this possibly go wrong. They inform Cody that Tate and Ethan have gone foraging and gotten berries for the feast but warn not to eat the green stemmed ones because they’re poisonous. To this I say why the hell would you bring the poisonous ones back to the house unless they’re a plot device to be revisited later. We flash to Finn in his house where he puts his phone on a table by the front door to charge, the weirdest action by a teenage character ever. He looks for his mom, Katherine, only to find Patience churning butter so aggressively that her hands are bleeding while she stares out the window. Terrified by this creepy pilgrim lady Finn backs out of the room to find his mother dead on the floor. He runs downstairs to his table phone but when he picks it up to call for help, he’s attacked from behind. Should’ve just went out the front door but whatever. Cody finds Ethan trying to indoctrinate Tate into their weirdo religion in the shed and confronts him. More pilgrims are now around with no explanation from Ethan other than what their roles are like “builder” when asked. Disturbed by this Cody goes to find Finn only to find his body in the front closet. While this is happening Shane and Anna are captured, dressed in pilgrim era garb, and put into (HEAD SHACKLE THINGY). They’re lectured about not appreciating their lives and being so focused on technology rather than one another. Ethan proceeds to brand both Anna and Shane which he follows up by maniacal laughter. Cody goes home rather than going to find help after discovering a crime scene and frees her parents. In a bonding moment, all three take down a pilgrim together. The family’s plan is then for Cody to go get help and for Anna and Shane to sneak into the house to rescue Tate from inside without alarming the pilgrims inside. This clearly doesn’t go well because not nearly enough has happened for the movie to be over, so Cody is captured in the driveway and Shane is stabbed, falls, and then gets the axe from Patience. Cut to Cody and Anna tied to chairs in the backyard, Anna gagged and being slapped. Random but Anna sounds like a turkey gobbling during this scene which is very on brand for the movie. Then in truly annoying fashion the pilgrims, directed by Ethan, lift Cody over the pool and dunk her in and out. This is the scene where we get shots of that horrid wig underwater. Cody is almost drowned as Ethan yells and asks if she is grateful. Once Ethan is satisfied that she has faced death and is grateful she gets to come out of the torture contraption. The pilgrims and their captives then go inside to have Anna shuck corn and Cody smash berries for the Thanksgiving feast. Realizing they are screwed Cody plays along and declares all the things she’s been ungrateful for and that it’s true they didn’t appreciate their lives. Anna decides bump that and even though she’s the reason they’re in this mess she doesn’t repent. Cody with the quick thinking picks up a sharp tool and stabs patience in the hand and head and Anna realizing this is their moment throws flour into the candles, causing a mini blaze? Not sure why this is even a thing but it’s a thing. They capture them of course and Cody’s wish comes up. Back in captivity Anna and Cody are about to be forced to enjoy the feast. The main dish is none other than Shane himself, revealed to them when a cover is taken off a dish and his head with an apple in it is the centerpiece. Uh-oh these pilgrims are cannibals. They proceed to enjoy their feast of Shane and force Anna and Cody to eat parts of Shane that they proceed to spit out. At this point I’m thinking do they even want to survive this event. Suddenly, the pilgrims start to choke and cough up blood. This leads to a truly disgusting scene of Ethan forcing himself to vomit and a shower of said vomit raining down on another dying pilgrim. This scene is truly gross, but we have managed to get one over on the pilgrims. We learn that Cody, when mashing the berries earlier, put the poisonous ones in and all of the pilgrims proceeded to eat that poison. Patience is looking for Tate upstairs but succumbs to the poison. Tate then frees Anna and Cody. But wait, Patience wasn’t dead. We then have two battles, one between Anna and Patience and another between Ethan and Cody. Highlights from these battles is Anna using Shane’s head as a weapon to hit Patience with who she then stabs in the neck. Anna and Cody then confront Ethan, beating him together. Cody asks Ethan why the hell they’d do all of this, and he says it’s to make them grateful and aren’t they grateful. He also asks Cody isn’t this what she wished for. Upon hearing this Cody takes an axe and says, “Happy Thanksgiving” and then off camera kills Ethan. We see his feet go lax and then his hand open to reveal none other than that damn wishbone from the beginning of the movie. All things considered this Thanksgiving themed romp could’ve been a lot worse. I appreciated that Cody called out how odd and potentially dangerous this whole ordeal was from the beginning however I am far brattier and would’ve said, “I leave or the pilgrims leave” because no way that this was ending any way but horribly. Not particularly scary in any sense with minimal jump scenes and the gore mostly confined to the final act, it’s still a decent watch. It’s not too long that you’re sitting there wondering how certain scenes made the cut but not too short that you’re left wondering why nothing had an explanation. I like the fact that there isn’t really confirmation if this is a group of crazies or rather some supernatural manifestation tied entirely to Cody’s wish. Considering that Ethan has knowledge that only he could have and that the pilgrims don’t break character I’m leaning towards supernatural. That also begs the question however, do these pilgrims have a history of rolling into town on Thanksgiving to terrorize family’s they perceive as ungrateful? There is a newspaper clipping in the beginning credits that showed a missing family, so I assume that this family is not the first. I also wonder why the pilgrims are not at all shocked by modern technology, clothing, or trends. With a movie like this though I will give it a pass on answering all the questions simply because that would take a lot of the mystery and intrigue out of the viewing experience. If you’re looking for a Thanksgiving themed horror movie during the holiday season, I would recommend Pilgrim (2019) even if it’s only to yell at your screen asking characters why they would make those choices.

Technically found footage made its debut in the 1980 movie, Cannibal Holocaust which utilizes a found footage concept that is more-so "this is based on a true story" but cinema style rather than what we'd expect from a found footage made today. Though the concept was used in this controversial film the horror subgenre we recognize today is modeled after The Blair Witch Project 1999 that used a solely "found" footage format, even if story elements like a true ending couldn't be achieved through this method. Taking the concept very seriously the creators had the actors remain lowkey leading up to the release and utilized "Missing Persons" posters that were actually advertisements for the movie as a guerrilla marketing concept. Since it's success found footage has become an entire subgenre with its own styles, methods, and cliches that have developed through trial and error since 1999. This medium of storytelling challenges the creators to find realistic reasons for characters to be filming and for that filming to continue when they are facing imminent danger and possible death which presents an opportunity for innovation in the genre. Known in part for the cliffhanger endings many found footage films end in screen cards with a few sentences of some off screen outcome after the dust of the movie settled. Although the subgenre has grown exponentially some stand out amongst the rest for most horror fans, myself included. The rest of this post is my top 5 found footage movies that I gravitate towards and find myself rewatching often. Note: this post is orginally from 11/12/2021 and the list has since changed. The original list in order is The Blair Witch Project 1999, Unfriended 2014, V/H/S/2 2013, Creep 2014, and The Taking of Deborah Logan 2014). Movie spoilers past this point Number 1 - As Above, So Below 2014 Originally As Above, So Below 2014 was just an honorable mention in my ranking of found footage horror but after making the original 2021 post I remembered how much I liked it. Between 2021 and now I don't even want to know how many times I've watched it at this point, but it is safe to say it is now an all time favorite. A found footage that incorporates the more traditional style of a professionally filmed movie being found after a group has disappeared. They use nice equiptment and have a professional camera man who follows them throughout the Paris catacomb tunnels as they search for the Philosopher's Stone. Incorporating alchemy and the hunt for the stone in the film is really cool and it stuck with tying the plot to larger and grander ideas. I love the mix of realistic and supernatural scares held together by a building backstory. Number 2 - The Blair Witch Project 1999 There's not a single watch of The Blair Witch Project 1999 that hasn't left me looking over my shoulder and freaked out by the end. The lack of evidence until the building end in either direction of real or unreal turns the suspense dial up to 11 and the interspersed cuts to other, quieter footage following heightened moments created a false sense of security going into the final act. What seemed to be only in their heads starts playing out on the fictional footage captured by the group of 3 after getting lost in the woods turns far more serious and scary. This is the original found-footage movie that captivated audiences into the faux reality that found footage films are now known for. Trail blazing this subgenre to a wider audience than predecessors had managed with a rather simple plot the found footage genre, known for the simplistic filming style and lower budget actors sought for their lack of name recognition it it a studio's wet dream of a project on paper. Number 3 - The Taking of Deborah Logan 2014 Verdict is out if I have a bias for 2014 or rather that it was just a good year of horror, possibly a genesis of what I'd call modern horror now but The Taking of Deborah Logan 2014 is too good of a found footage to not include it. The style of the movie follows similar other found footage films, particularly of the time; put together as a raw or rough cut of a documentary, possibly the inclusion of scenes the creators would have ommitted due to the light it paints them in. Deborah Logan, the subject of the documentary, is experieicing straneg symptoms that mimic rapidly onset dementia and her adult daughter who's now returned home to care for her despite their differences. Fairly quickly after the film crew arrives at the Logan household things go downhill, most if not all of the incidences being attrbuted to Deborah's medical condition rather than thinking it could be attributed to spiritual disturbances in Deborah. Basically-she is possessed and this becomes pretty obvious to a viewer watching despite the usual hesistance of the characters to believe they are facing something supernatural. I can't watch this alone or in the dark which is the highest ranking of scary that I categorize movies in, particularly the imagery and blend of real and CGI effects are haunting. Number 4 - Paranormal Activity 2007 Paranormal Activity 2007 really revived the subgenre after the 2nd Blair Witch Project film didn't live up to the expectations audiences had following the first movie. Being unable to recapture that breakout sucess created an uphill battle for future found footage projects, like this movie. Before viral was a known and understood phrase the audience reaction-that of pure terror-went mega viral and attracted audiences to the movies. With a similar schtick to it's predecessors the question, "is this real?," was floated as part of the marketing campaign, and it stuck The haunting of the main couple’s home is the backdrop for the film and the reasoning used for having a camera system set up throughout their home, something considered normal today. The haunting starts small, not even hidden from early on but rather the extent is hidden from the viewer and it picks up as the couple continues to engage with it and observe it through the filming setup. The final scenes (from both endings, of which there are at least 2) shocked moviegoing audiences and left people screaming at their screen for answers. Video footage of audience members watching and reacting to the film were even used in the aforementioned promo to hook audiences. Number 5 - Unfriended 2014 This movie got some hate when it came out and I'm not sure if it's controversial but nonetheless, Unfriended 2014, is one of my all time favorites and I can argue why it deserves a place on found footage rankings. Prior to this film the idea of having a full movie take place only from the POV of looking at a laptop screen was perposterous, an afront to the long standing beliefs about how films ought to be made. It isn't the best plot ever but the feat it accomplishes with the style and fluidity that it does is true craftsmanship and is the very type of innovation that the genre benefits from. With on screen typing and silent moments of panic coupled with tech malfunctions while the story is told from end to beginning throughout the group's game that drives the plot forward and forces the teen characters to stay in the evil videochat despite it seeming obvious that they should close their laptops and run far away. Conclusion & Other Subgenres Horror subgenres are common, developing and evolving over time, and one of arguably the best additions is found footage. I love how the medium pushes creativity and forces creators to take chances on endings that aren't as predictable as the genre continued to develop over the coming years. Although it took some years for the steam to pick up following the 1999 release of The Blair Witch Project and then the not-so-great sequel one year later, Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 2000, considerably less liked than the original. Despite the twist that the original spun on the genre the lack of success for the sequel likely caused trepidation from studios, possibly seeing it as a flash in the pan rather than something that could evolve into a subgenre. Now a full-fledged subgenre with parameters and guidelines evolving in particular around the technology available now and how we use that tech. Back in 1999 it didn't make sense for people to have a recording device out unless they were a filmmaker, professional camera person or a niche hobby, placing large constraints out of the gate for the plots of these movies. As tech evolved to be intertwined with our everyday lives, to the extent that in Unfriended 2 it is believable that dark web hackers are able to tap into the vast network of surveillance cameras throughout a city. This advancement in real world tech allowed for a more complete story to be believably told in more than ending title cards. Examples get more advanced and sometimes more dystopian to further plots and leaning into the possible horrors of tech while using a creative storytelling format. Of all the subgenres I would say that found footage is my 2nd favorite, I'm not sure what my absolute favorite would be but irregardless this takes spot 2 in my lineup. While not my favorite of all time I rarely dislike a found footage movie, often finding that even B-horror style found footage flics are entertaining and sometimes repeat watched, something I can't say about other subgenres. If you're interested in more subgenres, in particular deep dives into genres I have a cannibalism post and a feminine coming-of-rage post up now and the underlined phrases can be clicked to re-direct to that page now.

The most recent Paranormal Activity installment released October 29, 2021, titled Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin , sticking with the format of the other recent franchise releases that opted for stand-alone names and stories. Directed by William Eubank ( Underwater 2020) and written by Christopher Landon (several other of the Paranormal Activity ) it is just a good horror movie flat out. Coming in at one hour and thirty-eight minutes Next of Kin gives quite a lot of good substance to break down like what elements are used to build the horror, the departure from a franchise staple, and the plot itself which is not reliant on the original plots. To watch the movie now it can be digitally rented or purchased by clicking here . The story basics: a woman, Margot, played by Emily Bader, was abandoned by her mother at birth, and she finds out who her biological relatives are through a 23andme DNA test and is traveling to visit a cousin she's met through this website who is Amish. She rallies and hires a film maker, Chris, played by Roland Buck III, and a sound guy, Dale, played by Dan Lippert, to travel to her bio-family's Amish community and create a documentary about her meeting her family. For no apparent reason other than kindness Margot has been granted permission to film the family on their farm and interview them about her mother and themselves. Next of Kin 2021 spoilers past here Right off the bat I did not like the main character Margot. Though Margot is understandably excited about finding out about her origins and this way of life, she comes across extremely entitled and downright disrespectful towards her hosts. When we go into this movie as far as the characters are concerned there is not a single reason to assume these people are ill-intentioned or that they are doing anything bad, just living Amish and following that way of life. Knowing this, they still act like they are shocked about their way of life and almost mocking at times like they are at a zoo exhibit rather than guests in a home. Margot in particular doesn't respect boundaries and typically directs the conversation to her mother even when speaking to teenagers and literal children who have never met her mother despite being asked not to. Margot proceeds to break every single rule that they have laid out for her visit upon her arrival. As a guest in these people’s homes she goes into a locked attic to investigate, finding things from her mother and even being shaken by a jump scare. The jump scare is implied to be the ghost of her mother or some other family member in the reflection of a window like a warning. As a viewer I know that they are probably up to no good or have bad intentions but from Margot’s perspective she’s continually crossing boundaries towards people she claims to want to get to know and continually judges not only her mother but them for things she didn’t even take the time to research before showing up. The crew even goes as far to attempt to break into a church that is not only locked but barred shut. Once caught, the head of the house, Jacob, played by Tom Nowicki, explains that the church is sacred ground and that entering or filming is not allowed and you would think that would be enough to deter the group but alas they seem determined to get into some bullshit no matter what harbingers come. Fast forward and they start to see some seriously spooky stuff that is granted scary but also it's hard to feel bad for them because if they had minded their own business they might've been fine. The one character to rally behind, Dale, who has been the most respectful and even had an Amish makeover, ends up looking like the Little Lad. Black but not-acting-Black-currently Chris (there’s very few Black people who would’ve been down with even half the shenanigans that Chris was not even bothered by) and dumbass-self-centered Margot decide to break into the church regardless of warnings. They come across cultish drawings, blood from apparent sacrifice and an altar. Not only do they move the altar to reveal a hole into hell but they decide to drop down said hole to investigate. In the hole to hell there are crosses everywhere and what looks like protection wards which Margot stupidly touches. Down at the bottom of the hole there is what appears to be a room of some sort where terrifying noises are traveling from. This of course finally scares Margot. Margot and Chris show Dale the footage back at their room in the house and examine whether it’s evidence of some sinister happenings going on there. This leads to more investigation which reveals that Jacob has a locked closet where there is a laptop, a router, and other electronics that Amish typically do not own or use at their homes. Margot finds out that they had been searching for her and upon finding her had begun stalking her...over a year prior. It had always been a plan of theirs for Sam, the cousin who she found with 23andme at the beginning of the film, to lure her back to the farm. So of course now this woman finally wants to go home. Chris decides that they should stay for another night, which is obviously a terrible idea. During that very night something comes and attacks Margot in her room, leaving her with what Amish doctors claim is an unusual and intense period. Chris and Little Lad don’t buy it and finally take some action. Unfortunately the action is more of a quest of steps it's something: they decide to walk into town to try to get a battery for their broken down van, then come back and fix the van and then run away screaming. Luckily, they manage to run into a mailman in the middle of nowhere who gives them a ride. On this ride we learn that Margot’s family, the Bailers, aren’t even Amish. At the store while the worker is getting the right battery they use his computer to look up “Asmodeus”, a word that they’d come across while breaking into the Bailer’s belongings. Lo and behold Asmodeus is the demonic prince of lust, suffering, and wrath, so definitely not good. They learn that Asmodeus infected, or attacked, some Norwegian village and they turned against one another and bad stuff started happening. They turned to “the White Witch” who made it so the demon would pass from daughter to daughter in a particular family line in order to contain it or it would be unleashed. Little Lad, the sensible king that he is, puts two and two together and identifies that they believe Margot is the daughter with which this demon needs to be passed to. Chris tries to point out that this stuff can’t possibly be real and in one of my favorite rationalizations in a horror movie to date Little Lad explains that regardless of it being real or not the Bailers believe it is real so Margot is obviously still in mad danger-facts. They both make it back to the farm to find Margot missing and a possessed Sam being funky in the hallway and he explains to them that if they stay inside until the bell stops ringing they’ll be solid. So of course what do they not do? Stay inside the damn house until the bell stops. Fast forward a but and obviously after some tension, drama, and Jacob falling down the hole to hell we end up back at the bottom of the hole where a woman we can assume is the White Witch is performing a ritual on Margot that Chris interrupts. The White Witch gets really stressed that the salt protection barrier has been disturbed, which any horror fan knows is not great. We then get to see the demon creature, which manages to live up to all of the horrifying expectations set. Suprisingly they manage to get out of the hole to hell and a battle ensues. We lose Dale as they run to the barn (RIP Little Lad) and after some tense moments Margot confronts the creature demon who she addresses as Sarah and mom. Next is an interesting and really important franchise moment; for the first time I know of we leave found-footage and go to regular footage. It makes sense in this scene and I think makes it possible for the story to continue because we don’t need to worry about a camera falling and catching drama and then it not making sense for a camera to still be in use by the creature. In this real footage ending Margot defeats the creature by throwing it down the same bale hole that she almost fell down in the beginning of the movie in the family's barn, fulfilling that foreshadow. At this point we need a reason to stick around to see the terror unfold so Margot and Chris go to find the keys to the van on Little Lad’s body. Things have gone crazy while they fought off the creature and the whole community is attacking one another, someone with their eyes gouged out running past, multiple fires, and other signs of chaos. Surprisingly Chris and Margot make it out of there in the van after some jump scares and things cut away from them, presumably both making it out alive. Wrong-we cut to cop car dash cam footage at the farm. The sounds of a crying baby lures the officer into the barn only to find that Sam is the one making the baby crying noises and when he turns around he makes a look at the cop that possesses the cop to shoot himself in the head. Sam gets in the car after possessing another officer to do the same and he just drives off the farm. So clearly the demon prince has jumped into Sam and is now unleashed on the world, thanks Chris for freeing Margot which led to Sam being possessed and then free. In the end the whole state if not the country and world is could have a demon unleashed on it because some dude went down into a hole to save a really entitled and annoying woman from having a demon passed into her with no contingency plan for the demon. While Next of Kin is a departure from the other Paranormal Activity movies it exceeds expectations with an interesting story and good found footage is to be expected going in. While it is frustrating to watch the characters break every horror rule I am interested in the aftermath of the Sam-escaped demon creature and if he goes after Margot and Chris.

If you're interested in a more recent review of Jennifer's Body (2009) that dives into the toxic friendship between the 2 lead characters, Needy and Jennifer, then please click here . The below post is an older review of the movie that is less in depth and focused on my own viewing experience and love for the film. You can watch Jennifer's Body now by clicking here or renting by clicking here . If you're interested in adding a DVD copy of Jennifer's Body (I definitely have) to your collection they go for pretty cheap on Amazon . Long, long ago in a time before we realized we all knew what late stage capitalism was Jennifer’s Body (2009) premiered following a typical horror press tour that focused on the lead, Megan Fox's attractiveness. To the dismay of teenage boys across the world the film catered to an audience not sitting through over an hour of content just to see a naked Fox swimming in a lake. I recall trying to sneak into the R rated feature, not necessarily a horror fan at the time but a fan of Megan Fox, who was definitely my favorite part of Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004). Unfortunately for the version of me that couldn't get into R rated films wihtout parental supervision I had to wait for the movie to hit a Comcast channel. The first time I caught it on I set a DVR recording and waited. That recording lasted on our DVR for years and played almost nightly through various moves and school changes. From my first viewing I became entranced which further confused me when I recalled people hated it so much, women and men critics alike. Adults and teens mocked it in passing if they even took it seriously enough to know about to begin with. Like many Tumblr girlies of the time period that followed I wanted to be Jennifer and was in awe of her like Needy even though I naturally related more to Needy, played by Amanda Seyfried. The humor matched and exceeded my own creativity which further helped me see myself in the characters, watching over and over like the outcome might be different on the 100th watch. Be it the teenage angst or the female rage I felt this movie spoke to me in a language I understood and needed at the time. Frankly, I didn’t mind if Jennifer ate all of the boys in the movie as long as I got to watch her and Needy hide the bodies. When I watch it as an adult I feel like I'm stepping into a time capsule to only a handful of years ago that feel an entire galaxy away, like a weird dream that I can barely recall. In that place jokes trended on the side of not so PC without being intentionally offensive or a troll and the entanglements of toxic female friendship aired on the side of romantic partnerships without the language or knowledge to describe any of it. Before we knew the language of mental health diagnosis or understood the pathology behind behavior lots of things felt supernatural or happening on an island of your very own hellish nightmare. Don’t get me wrong, I am thankful for the progress we have made in respecting ourselves and one another as human beings but returning to one's adolescence can be a reflective space worth venturing into. Jennifer's Body is one of my favorite movies and I've admitted that and then had to defend it within the same sentence based on a crazy look or wild reaction.

The Netflix miniseries, Brand New Cherry Flavor , premiered August 14, 2021 to buzz around the avant style and deadpan delivery of the lead. Similarly to other horror titles Brand New Cherry Flavor is based on the novel of the same title by Todd Grimson. Straight from the trailer it’s clear that a mysterious, albeit naive wannabe artist is on her way to LA and gives an air of desperation that would be easy to take advantage of in a city with LA's reputation. Although a lot is given away in the trailer Rosa Salazar’s performance as the lead, Lisa Nova, makes up for these spoilers and is engaging enough to hold interest. Lisa is revealed to be an aspiring filmmaker making the sacred pilgrimmage to LA with tapes of her short film but the leg up of a meeting set up with a producer named Lou Burke, played by Eric Lange. Lou is clearly semi washed up with all the markings of a sleazy Hollywood user that warning tales are shared about. After their meeting Lou decides to invest in Lisa’s movie and the pair become a team in the endeavor to get the movie made. They get ready to pitch the movie with her as the director but things take a predictably dark turn. In preparation to pitch the movie we get scenes of Lou teaching Lisa how to pitch herself but he persistently interjects with stories about his own inspirations and aspirations. Lou's ultimate goal is making a movie for his child self and in return it's revealed that Lisa’s own driving force is making a movie her mother, who left her as a baby, would see. Following this while at a party they plan to pitch to some rich big wig who is a mysterious woman, Boro, played by Catherine Keener. The second they start to speak, the world around them silences and the air fills with intensity; during this moment of stillness between the 2 she warns Lisa that an important conversation is taking place without her. It's clear that she is warning Lisa about the movie being made without her. Fast forward to what is seemingly a revenge plot gone awry what is a slow burn transitions into hyper drive when Lou violently attacks Lisa in his driveway after she confronts him about stealing her movie. Tears streaming down her face and in total shock Lisa gets in her car and drives to Boro, the address still on her arm from the earlier party. After some dialogue and back and forth they agree to the small price of puked up kittens from deep within Lisa for Boro to exact revenge on Lou for her. Once this is complete and set in stone it becomes clear that the fallout and upcoming action resulting from this rash decision will be the driving force of the season. The first episode is somewhat what is to be expected based on the trailer with much of the trailer scenes occurring within that limited space. I always feel like this is a good omen that there was so much good stuff to choose from that they just chose from the 1st episode and there's still so much more to see. Granted that could also mean the exact opposite that all the good shit is out of the way by the end of the first hour. With all of the set up out of the way and the main characters mostly accounted for the season can move forward to the unpredictability that lies ahead at neck breaking speed. It is a housekeeping episode worth the energy to take the roller coaster ride of the season that follows. There are enough unanswered questions at the end of episode one to pique the audiences interest to keep watching like, "Why is she puking kittens?," or, " Why does Boro want the puked-up kittens?," in addition to, "What the hell happens in her film's short that no on can who's screened it can figure out that gets them so fascinated by her?" Although the audience is led to believe that things are set in Boro and Lisa's arrangement nothing is over until it is over and the characters each seem less than trustworthy on the surface. Each of the main characters seems willing to sacrafice anything or anyone to fulfill their dreams no matter the collateral damage which sets up a scenario where anything can happen and is believable. In particular it seems Boro has Ursula intentions for Lisa, taking advantage of her blind ambition and rage coupled with her old wounds reopened by the fresh betrayal. Boro's intentions are likely more sinister but the kittens throw things into a stratopshere of "what the fuck" untraveled territory. If this is only episode one what do the rest of the 7 episodes in the mini series contain?!

The beef is more of a general issue with modern media but nonetheless still a problem and that problem, to put it simply is: the endings don’t make sense anymore. We all remember the final season of Game of Thrones . Eight seasons of beautiful character and world building culminated in a final battle viewers couldn't see and bizarre endings for the most beloved characters. The predictions, hopes, and insights went unanswered and a desire to rewrite history. Personally, Daenerys' fate still doesn't make sense and felt like a u-turn from the original direction for her. Granted, the knowledge that she is meant to be the villain from early on makes their decisions less offensive. Despite doing unquestionably harsh and evil things Emilia Clark still had us feeling like Daenerys had the right and we related to her struggle against what we'd call "The Man" for our society. Regardless, it's like all logic will suggest the show is dropping hints and reasonable setups for future plot points, that you're an investigator collecting clues to solve the mystery. When you finally feel comfortable in your prediction you are caught completely off guard by the reality of the ending. This would be fine if the ending made sense, but unfortunately it's more The Open House (2018) , at the time one of the new scary movies on Netflix, than it is M. Night Shyamalan masterpiece. All of a sudden like a circa 2007 GPS inaccurately changing directions on short notice, the story is almost unrecognizable. What you thought to be aliens is really a sentient television creature that wants to harvest human bodies for some unknown reason like the ending of Await Further Instructions . It doesn't matter if it's a pick from the scary movies on Netflix or one of the new horror movies to hit theaters, the risk of experiencing a bad ending has increased considerably. The person who had been obviously cleared of being the killer is suddenly holding the weapon. Or worse yet, an ending like A Classic Horror Story , the whole plot of atrocities interwoven with mystique is actually just one man's attempt to create a real life horror movie. The let down is swift and once the big, nonsensical reveal occurs the story doesn’t take nearly enough time to explain what the hell just happened. The events fold out how they would after any climax and then just like that screens fade to credits and you’re left underwhelmed at best and most likely utterly annoyed. It would be preferable for a predictable and satisfying ending to play out like the cherry on top of the finale sundae. What could've been a great movie is now relegated to it's bizarre ending and misfire of a climax. Whenever the idea of rewatching comes up you have to consider if you can handle the let down again. Attempts to create the most unpredictable endings and reveals are extremely present in the horror, and horror adjacent pieces. Despite best efforts this sometimes backfires and ruins the entire story. When the option presents itself it seems that picking the best ending regardless of how generic or predictable it is turns out better. With better endings movies in the horror genre have a better chance at transcending past just the horror audience and becoming award worthy installations in media.

The movie Candyman  2021 delivers on the promises that the trailer makes, particularly if you're going in not expecting the previous movies to be entirely intertwined in this installment. In the original Candyman  that came out in 1992 Tony Todd portrays a fictional but vengeful spirit that kills people who speak his name 5 times into a mirror. Much of the first movie doesn’t pertain to the modern remake and instead takes the legend and develops it into a narrative fit for the time and style of 2020’s horror films. Taking place around the real Cabrini-Green Homes public housing project in Chicago, Illinois that has since been demolished, murders in the area sometimes being attributed to Candyman and the victim inviting him to take them by saying his name. To digitally rent or buy Candyman 2021 now click here and to purchase the DVD version to add to your physical collection click here . Todd's portrayal in the original brought the supernatural horror to life on the big screen, a performance that is still famous to this day. His performance stands apart in part because of the scenes he filmed covered in real, live bees. In addition to being covered in bees he filmed the bees coming out of his mouth, which is a truly horrifying and haunting scene that lives as an image in horror fame. The idea of bees coming from inside of your body and out through your mouth is insane and a drastic way to show the internal decay of Candyman. Although Todd is included in the 2021 remake he isn't actually seen on screen until the very end which is a good device to build suspense for fans while also lightly incorporating the lore from the first film. Showing scenes from even earlier than the first film Candyman  2021 opens in 1977 with the murder of a Black homeless man with a hook for a hand. His name is Sherman Fields and he’s accused of giving candy to a white child that had a razor blade in it due to being known to give out candy to children. He’s beaten to death by police but he’s silently absolved after his death when the razor blade incidences continue occurring. This already shifts the tone of the movie to directly include police violence which hadn’t been the case in the 1992 version. Fields’ murder is seen by a young boy in Cabrini-Green which sets forth events revealed later in the movie. Spoiler and Content Warning Prior to watching the newest Candyman  I hadn’t been big into the series, finding the movies difficult to watch but wanting to support Todd as a Black lead horror villain. The Black community in America has had a tempestuous relationship with horror that has culminated in somewhat of a Black horror renaissance in recent years. If you’re interested in a full post about the Black horror subgenre click here to redirect to that post. The remainder of this post will include spoilers about Candyman 2021 through a plot summary and overview. If you’re not interested in reading that and want to skip to the spoiler-included conclusion then click here or click here to go to all posts . Candyman  2021 Plot Summary Following the flashback to 1977 the opening shots that include the credits are disorienting with the use of backwards studio logos, upside down shots of downtown Chicago, and unsettling higher pitched string music. The elements effectively set the atmosphere on edge, like a fragile balance destined to be broken. Following the police murder of Sherman Fields (portrayed by Michael Hargrove ), mentioned earlier in this post, and the unsettling upside down shots of Chicago as the sun sets, Troy Cartwright (portrayed by Nathan Stewart-Jarrett ) is shown walking down the street with his boyfriend Grady Greenberg (portrayed by Kyle Kaminsky ). The couple have flowers and wine in the year 2019 and they’re on the way for Grady to meet Troy’s sister, Brianna “Bri” Cartwright (portrayed by Teyonah Parris ) at her place. Once inside we also meet Anthony McCoy (portrayed by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ) who is Bri’s boyfriend she lives with. She disses Grady’s wine and Troy then disses Anthony, claiming he hasn’t made a new piece in 2 years to which Bri ends up commenting Troy is salty they didn’t use him as their realtor for the apartment they’re in. Bri argues she paid more for her place because she liked the location is close to her gallery but Troy retorts that he warned her the place was haunted. Anthony adds the backstory of the place to their conversation: it used to be Cabrini-Greene projects that were torn down. He comments that the place has been gentrified after it was demolished, a very modern issue many lower income communities are facing or were facing in America. Bri informs Troy and Grady that the developers and city lied to the Cabrini-Green residents that they would make the housing project better and moved the residents around frequently. She says it was a bid to develop the areas around Cabrini-Green to further drive up the value of the eventual residences. Grady calls the group out about their disdain for this situation that they too are technically those people because they purchased one of those residences where Cabrini-Green used to stand. Everyone is silent and to break up that silence Troy offers to tell a ghost story and although Bri declines he proceeds, first setting the atmosphere by turning off the lights and lighting candles in the middle of the group. He begins with, “This is a story about Helen Lyle,” which is the name of the main character from the 1992 original. This monologue feels like informing the audience what former movies will or won’t be included, focusing and honing in on the 1992 base story as a jump-off point. Troy makes note of Helen being a white grad student and explains that she set out to do her thesis on Cabrini-Green’s urban legends. The flashback style for this movie is giving Tim Burton and I don’t hate, backlit cutouts and puppet like people figures emulate the spoken action on screen as Troy tells the story of the first film. He specifically mentions Helen’s pictures of graffiti and asking questions of the residents and says that she just snapped one day, the shadow figure grabbing a meat hook. He explains that she beheaded a dog and did snow angels in blood when the police arrived, taking her into custody that she immediately escaped. Troy insists that what he’s saying is true but his source is “look it up” as he continues  his ghost story. Troy says that Helen went on a killing spree and then took a Cabrini-Green mother’s baby then on the night of the annual bonfire Helen arrived and presented the baby as an offering to place in the fire but the residents jumped on her, fighting her and claiming she was in a phuge state. They saved the baby but Helen walked into the fire and died there in the middle of the projects. Rather than even talking about Candyman legend that rolled into the legend of Helen Lyle she’s now the most prevalent urban legend of the area which has somewhat transformed how it’s spreading. Bri and Anthony seem spooked by the story but Troy is still generally light hearted and just encourages Anthony to paint on his way out. This sets Anthony up for failure in the sense that once he hears the legend of Candyman from his girlfriend’s brother he experiences no hesitation to dive in and learn more. Not only does Anthony feel drawn to the legend but he feels compelled to research the area and use the legend as inspiration in his work for an upcoming art show he is meant to be featured in. His art piece invites viewers to look into a mirror and summon Candyman by saying “Candyman” five times. Before that however we cut to the following day from the dinner and Anthony presents work to an art dealer, Clive Privler (portrayed by Brian King), who tells him his work is the same stuff he did 2 years prior. Clive threatens to replace Anthony in the upcoming summer show, revealing he took a risk by giving Anthony a solo show since he just got out of graduate school, presumably for painting. Clive wants him to dig into his history and fulfill a niche of a Black backstory of Chicago for the art show. Anthony explains he’s thinking about a piece on white supremacy and how it creates spaces that neglect communities of color’s needs aka gentrifying an area. Anthony claims he’s from Bronzeville or the South Side of Chicago but Clive calls that background “kind of played” in response. Anthony offers up Cabrini-Green as an alternative focus and Clive seemingly takes this as Anthony is then shown searching the area on Google. During his research he finds the story of Helen Lyle that Bri’s brother told and is inspired by the before and after the area. Anthony then goes to the projects to capture photos of what the projects look like now and he’s stung by a bee that is immediately eaten by a swarm of ants, leaving a bump on his hand. He breaks into one of the Cabrini-Green buildings and sees graffiti covered walls that include a chilling image of a monstrous figure resembling Candyman and he takes a flash photo of this, closely mirroring what Helen did in the first film. Anthony ducks behind a building when he hears incoming sirens and a man, William Burke (portrayed by Colman Domingo ), starts telling him that the cops used to leave the area alone but now frequent it. They end up at William’s laundromat that is also where he lives and he tells Anthony that things have stayed the same after Anthony asks about Helen. William means that despite many Black girls dying in the hood no one, particularly the white gentrifiers, know those victim’s names but they know the one white woman that died in the hood. Anthony not so slyly floats what would make someone snap like Helen did to dig more details from William. William very matter-of-fact tells Anthony that Helen was looking for Candyman in the area. This is another mirror moment where Anthony is doing exactly what Helen did, asking questions of the Cabrini-Green residents about lore obvious to them and clearly brushed aside to the onlookers. William believes that Helen found Candyman out in Cabrini and says his Candyman was Fields, explaining Fields used to stare but also he’d hand out sweets to children. He explains the tale of the razor blade miscarriage of justice that I covered earlier in this post. He tells Anthony that the day he saw Fields killed wasn’t the last day he ever saw him and in the flashbacks Fields is wearing the iconic yellow coat, which feels like another addition of lore that differentiates this remake from the original. The retelling is paused while Anthony crafts his newest work, his passion ignited for using the Cabrini-Green story in his work. When Bri gets home he excitedly shows her the new painting, and he explains that Fields started appearing around the area as a ghost and eventually the legend becomes Candyman instead of Sherman Fields. Anthony tells Bri that this story and work is calling to him and that he feels like what he’s supposed to be doing. Now he tells her the legend at the core of everything: say Candyman five times in the mirror and he’ll appear and kill you. Like a goof he suggests that they do it and Bri wisely declines but Anthony proceeds to say it despite her protests and does so into the reflection in the window behind her. Following this initial piece and pitch to Bri going alright Anthony creates his entire show piece around the concept of the Candyman legend. It ends up being an interactive piece that includes a mirror to say Candyman into 5 times that opens into an alternate scene in another space of his abstract painting. Anthony explains the meanings are pretty literal in his work and it’s shown that one of the critics he’s trying to impress rolls her eyes at it behind his back. She calls him out for being an artist because she believes they are some of the worst gentrifiers, making the piece hypocritical in her view. Anthony proceeds to get drunk and then doesn’t take the criticisms disguised as compliments well and calls Bri’s group of associates out, being guided out by Bri while he continues shouting back and forth with Clive. Later on, back at the studio Clive closes up after everyone has left with his employee’s assistance as he rants that Bri is finished due to backing Anthony. The employee goes to examine the Say My Name piece and Clive warns her not to do it as a cool camera movement uses the reflection behind her to show Clive talking and the red-lit background in the studio from another piece while also showing her. The 2 start to hook up intercut with Anthony staring into a mirror in his workspace as a bee buzzes near his ear. During the hookup the employee starts saying Candyman as part of their foreplay and the bee begins tapping against the mirror’s glass. A creative angle is used to show Candyman in the reflection, exposing he’s in the background of the studio right before he kills the couple. He’s invisible to Clive and is only visible in reflective surfaces despite impacting the environment around him like cutting the projection screen with his meat hook. Clive is hooked to the employee as part of a kink he’s delayed from running out of the studio and is drug back from the glass doors, the invisible form lifting his legs as he’s drug next to the girl’s body then hooked under the chin and lifted off the ground. Both Clive and his employee’s bodies are discovered by Bri the next day when she arrives at the studio and Anthony is even more inspired to paint than previously. The area that he received the bee sting is starting to fester looking increasingly infected and grotesque, spreading from the initial bite over half of his hand and down towards his wrist. A cut away shows him watching news coverage of the murders and he’s visibly happy when he realizes the coverage includes the mention of his art piece, Say My Name. He is proud and in awe and says, “they said my name,” which is a foreshadow for events to come. Bri and Troy are disturbed by Anthony’s reaction to the gruesome murder that she found of her associates. Later on that night we are from Bri’s POV and she dreams of her dad sitting in a window sill. He looks back at her to say he can fly before jumping out of the window intercut with her finding Clive and his intern, drawing a connection of the 2 events in her mind. She awakes in a panic to find Anthony missing from the bed and in the bathroom, stuck in a trance like state. The next day Anthony is at the university library of the school Helen attended and an archivist is able to find a tape recorder and a file. The tape starts playing as a voice over and Helen is talking about Cabrini-Green and the violent occurrences that took place in the first movie. She hypothesizes that violence is a ritual in the area and that the “summoning game” is actually just a cover for that violence and a scapegoat. She believes them not wanting police involved is connected to the prevalence of Candyman being blamed for murders in the area, residents saying Candyman did it rather than the truth. Helen believes that the mere suggestion of being followed after doing the summoning game explains the feeling of it happening for real rather than the victims telling the truth about things. While she talks about something lurking in a reflection the elevator Anthony is in that is entirely made of mirrored walls on the interior starts to malfunction. His disgusting hand is shown in more light and clarity when he takes his headphones out. Suddenly a piece of candy falls to the floor with a pink and for some reason he decides to open it, cutting his finger on the wrapper in the process. He then looks up to see a bloodied and beaten Fields reflected back at him with a wild grin, startling Anthony but disappearing when the elevator doors open. After leaving the university he paints in a crazed trance state holed up in his work space while listening to Helen’s tapes. These tapes include interviews with residents that describe the Candyman murders from her 1992 research into the legend. Anthony decides to visit the critic from his show, Finley Stephens portrayed by Rebecca Spence, at her apartment to discuss the piece she’s writing. She wants to get quotes from him about his work in light of the events, now interested instead of scoffing at his work. She calls his work eternal now that the murders happened and Anthony says he’s expanding the work into a series and plans to do a solo-show all about Candyman even saying, “spread the word,” like it’s some kind of charitable cause and she tells him she loves that, now clinging to his words rather than tuning him out. He calls out her switch up and she says it grew on her. While she’s away in the bathroom Anthony starts picking at his nasty hand and steals a fabric napkin of hers to cover his rotting flesh, going to look for her. In her hallway is a  mirror however that Anthony believes he sees Candyman reflected in but suddenly instead of Candyman it’s his reflection as Candyman—seeing that his movements mirror the terrifying hook-handed figure in the mirror. Anthony also sees that Fields has a hook for a hand that mirrors his own rotting hand. Startled and disturbed Anthony runs out of the apartment but after he does the camera pans out to the outside apartment through the wall length windows and Finley is shown being violently lifted off the floor by an invisible force, likely Candyman, and thrown against the window and then back into the apartment. Presumably Candyman has killed her after Anthony has left her apartment, another victim in his wake. Meanwhile at the important dinner with Bri and her colleagues that they’ve discussed multiple times his hand continues rotting and he’s distracted. In the midst of poaching Bri for their own abruptly everyone’s phones alert that Finley has been found dead and her husband is a suspect. In light of this news Anthony rushes out of the restaurant, causing a scene and alerting everyone to his weird behavior. He then goes to the laundromat to speak with William and he’s more than ready to yap about the urban legend. William explains that Candyman isn’t a “he” but rather the hive, trying to more closely incorporate the bee elements in this retelling. He lists 2 cases in addition to the Fields one that’s already been discussed; one is William Bell, who was lynched in the 20’s and Samuel Evans, who was killed during the white housing riots in the 50’s. William states that there was an original however before all the rest, and while explaining this the scene is intercut with the images Anthony has been furiously painting, which appear to be the men from these legends. He says that Helen found the OG story also, taking place in the 1890’s about Daniel Robitaille. The story is shown through the cutout puppets from earlier in the film with audio additions like crying and an angry mob. Daniel painted portraits for the wealthy all around the country and was loved by his clients. Things went wrong after he was commissioned to paint a wealthy Chicago man’s daughter who he started an affair with. She got pregnant and went to her father to confess the affair which causes him to hire men who he tells to “be creative” to hunt down Daniel and kill him in revenge. After being chased Daniel ended up at the tower in the Cabrini-Green area, collapsing from exhaustion and the mob proceeded to beat him. William explains they tortured him and cut his hand off and that they even shoved a meat hook where his hand once was. The hook is lore from the original movie and I’ve always wondered why they did that when the hook would be a weapon and figure it just needed to be explained but it was a wanted addition to the Candyman character. The mob then smeared his chest in honey from the hives in the area which then made bees sting him relentlessly, explaining the rib cage bee hive that Todd reveals when he opens his trench coat in earlier films. A crowd watches Daniel as he is set on fire, which ultimately kills him right there in Cabrini-Green. William says a pain and subsequent story of pain like Daniel’s aka Candyman’s lasts forever and that that is what Candyman is—the stories of grievous harm that will always tinge an area even if it is unspoken. Still confused Anthony asks again if Daniel is who Candyman is and William proclaims that all of the men who’s stories comprise the Candyman legends are real. He says that Candyman is how the community deals with the atrocities that have happened and still happen to them. Back at their place Bri has broken into Anthony’s studio and found his paintings, disturbed by them and his behavior. When he gets back he tells her he thinks he made a mistake and shows her his hand as evidence of how dire things have gotten. He tells her about William and that he knows about Candyman but she insists it isn’t real. Anthony lashes out after more back and forth and she leaves, insisting Anthony not follow her. The POV then switches back to Bri’s instead of Anthony’s to show her being consoled by Tony and Grady who express having trepidations about Anthony all along. Switching again the POV is then across town and focused on the teen from the gallery opening, Finley’s daughter, who is in a high school bathroom with 4 other friends. She asks if they know about Candyman and suggests they do it. They agree and recite it in the mirror in unison. When they go to leave the door won’t open and one that is using a compact mirror hears buzzing and sees something behind her. One girl goes back for her vape and is brutally killed, a curtain of blood falling down as some of them look beneath the stall before the one of them approaches that area. Cut to screaming and a student hiding in the stall who is listening to music but hears the screams and violence over her music and believes she’s being pranked. Meanwhile Anthony’s hand is rank, fingernails falling off and everything so he finally decides to go to the hospital. Across town speaking with a colleague from their dinner who’d previously been interested in her talents reveals that her interests are more due to her connection to the tragedies and her own father’s tragedy. She’s interested in Anthony’s work, hoping to use Bri as a connection to get to him. Back at the hospital a doctor approaches Anthony and tells him, “Welcome back,” to which he’s confused, not remembering visiting the hospital ever before. She tells him that his chart indicates he was born at the hospital but he protests he believes he was born in South Side. Regardless she wants to admit him immediately for testing and monitoring after bandaging his hand up but he leaves in his painter scrubs. He ends up visiting his mom, Anne-Marie McCoy portrayed by Vanessa Williams who also played the character in the first film. This reveal is more confirmation that Anthony is the baby from the first movie who was also named Anthony. Anne-Marie asks about his hand and he explains the hospital near Cabrini fixed him up but a side shot shows the infection has spread up his neck and coming along his jaw on the side of his face. He tries to talk about the fire in Cabrini, Helen and the baby but after he says the name she shushes him quickly and claps over her mouth, telling him to not say it. She admits that he was born in Cabrini and lived there 2 years but that she lied to protect him and give him the chance to grow up normal. She also admits that he’s the baby that Helen took, removing any doubt if it remained about his past. She claims that she thought Helen committed the murders at first which cuts to more cutout figure puppets portraying the action she describes as she tells the story. She tells him that Candyman had a purpose for Anthony and chose him to be one of his victims in the fire and that Helen saved him. She says that she thought Helen killed Candyman in the fire, and the people in the area vowed to never say it again. She figures since he knows and used it in his art show that people yapped about Candyman despite the pact. Now, despite her efforts Candyman has found Anthony again and is taking him to be his victim. Anthony is angry, enraged by the confirmation and leaves in silence despite her begging him to stay. He is then in Cabrini as the sun is setting, drawn to a particular building when the lights flash and in a trance. Cut to Bri at their apartment with Troy and Grady, getting her belongings and leaving Anthony a note. Worried however by him not being around she visits the laundromat that Anthony mentioned looking for him, making her way into the back office and opening a door that looks like it leads to a basement before saying “nope” and closing it. Unknowingly she locked herself in the back office however and is snatched by William before she gets the attention of a patron to help her. Without warning a flashback takes over of William, but he’s Billy—the child version of him, begging to hang out with his older sister and her friend. They are going into the bathroom and after shutting the door do the summoning game in the mirror, which he overhears. After saying the name 5 times he hears thuds and opens the door to see blood covered walls and his sister and her friend’s bodies on the floor. He also sees Fields in the reflection, smiling from the shower as bees buzz around the room with his hook raised to his face. Back in the present William states that they have a witness and drags Bri’s body out of frame. Another cut takes the scene to the inside of an abandoned church with a phone call in the background overheard. It seems like a 911 call and the caller claims they saw the “Say My Name” killer, who he describes as a Black man in his 30s with a hook, over in Cabrini-Green recently. The voice sounds like the white man version of a Karen but it is revealed to actually be William once he ends the call. William then tells Bri he was baptized in the church they’re in. Anthony is behind him, facing a wall while whispering in a trance. He says that Cabrini-Green got caught in a loop of occurrences that stained the area repeatedly, thinning the fabric between that place and another. William believes that it rotted the neighborhood from the inside out before it was torn down to be replaced for white people to move back in. Next William reveals a rotting away Anthony that looks like a hive of holes is over his body now spread over his eye, turning it white. He then cuts off Anthony’s rotting hand and replaces it with the hook, Anthony clearly in pain in his trance, a tear running down his frozen face and whimpers escaping his mouth. William starts reciting the new legend: Anthony McCoy was an artist who lost his mind and then the cops came and shot him in cold blood. He intends for people to tell the story so that Candyman can live forever as the police sirens begin in the background, William saying it’s the swarm coming. He pulls out candy that he says is the sacrament and he had me until he did that, that drives home he’s crazy. Bri manages to escape however while he’s wrapped up in his monologue and he yells after her asking if she wants a sweet. Off screen we hear flesh noises and yelling in pain as William concludes shouting and Bri keeps running through the ruined neighborhood away from him. Her and William get into a scuffle after some cat and mouse in the ruined area and she stabs him to death in one of the abandoned homes. Anthony then approaches and says her name, collapsing into her arms as she begs him to get up. He tells her it’s okay as the approaching sirens get louder and police come in; off screen but lit with police lights Anthony is shot after screaming to put his hands up without a further question. I think it’s powerful to not show the cop but rather Bri to keep the focus on her and the emotional impact rather than the imagery of Anthony’s death or the perpetrators. A shocked Brianna is arrested aggressively by the officers who are already crafting a story in the background for shooting Anthony on sight. They place her in a car and have muffled conversations amongst themselves, before one officer gets in. He starts talking to her in a condescending and accusatory tone. He claims cooperation will help and says that the officer who shot Anthony had to shoot because he was charged at. The officer tells Bri in not so many words that she needs to corroborate their story in order to make the shooting of Anthony justified self defense, making eye contact with her in the rearview mirror. He says that the other option is she’s an accomplice of Anthony’s and will go to prison for the crimes he committed and demands she pick from the 2 options. She asks if she can see herself in the mirror, agreeing to talk if he lets her. The officer reluctantly moves the mirror for Bri to see herself and she says Candyman, once quietly at first then another time with slight hesitation. The cop hears between the second and third times and she’s saying it more confidently by the third. She starts smiling as she says it a fourth and fifth time, the officer in the car getting scared because it’s weird behavior out of context. Just as she finishes the 5th recitation string music picks up and the car doors automatically lock. While this happens outside the car an officers throat is slashed and this causes the other officers to begin shooting into that direction towards what looks like Anthony in Field’s bloody trench coat, surrounded by a swarm of bees and using his hook hand to slash them. We are able to see him through the car window past Bri with her still in frame, avoiding any glances towards the screams and sounds of carnage. Another officer tries to get in the car, banging on windows to be let in but he’s brutally killed by Anthony from behind, Bri crying and shaking but not looking. Anthony then stops and looks into the car at Bri who still won’t look, bees buzzing around him. The cop still locked inside the car whispers in stunned fear, “who are you?,” which leads into a voice over monologue. Anthony’s monologue response to the question is as follows: “I am the writing on the walls. I am the sweet smell of blood on the street. The buzz that echoes in the alleyways. They will say I shed innocent blood. You are far from innocent but they will say you were. That’s all that matters.” I wanted that to be just a little bit more impactful to really tie together Candyman’s new motivations that incorporated the original lore. I felt like this kinda bridged the gap for me but ultimately left me wanting just a little more pizazz and depth in presentation, drawing out the scene more since it is seemingly a culmination of buildup. That’s another thing: there’s a lot of stories and side stories going on due to the nature of the hive concept and it’s hard to keep track of all the significances each detail means to each story or what stories. The car just unlocks at the end of the monologue, which is kinda lame and anticlimactic, and the officer just runs down the street terrified. Bri cautiously gets out of the now unlocked car and makes her way down the street towards where the cop ran. She happens upon Candyman, his head replaced with a swarm of angry bees and levitating off the ground, lifting the cop that ran up against a wall through a metal gate. Bri watches on in horror as the cop is killed and the figure floats towards her, the bees clearing little by little as he gets closer. Tony Todd is then revealed as the face within the swarm and he tells Bri to tell everyone, the final words of the film before it cuts to the title. In this scene the use of CGI is apparent to age revert Todd back to what he looked like in previous Candyman films which takes some of the bite out of the scene’s intensity. I almost wish more real effects could’ve been used to regress his appearance to make the scare possibly stick better. Again, I get it but I have to do a bit more legwork than I’d like to make the puzzle pieces fit on behalf of the movie. Some of the aspects were over-explained, like gentrification, while other aspects like exploitation, inter-community violence, and police brutality are mentioned but not expanded on enough to be pieces of said puzzle upon only watching Candyman 2021. Topics like gender roles in the Black community, the phoniness of some modern art spaces, childhood trauma, and relationship violence are brought up but only in cursory fashion. While I do like the movie and the way it crafts an entirely new narrative from a story while still maintaining much of the same material and bones of the original story is beautifully done I still wanted a little more focus in the narrative. I felt a little all over the place and then stumbling into the end rather than a gradual build that really packed the full potential punch of the ending. Spoiler Filled Conclusion At the time this film came out I found it to be revolutionary in the willingness to sort of display vengeance against the police and somewhat advocate for a push back towards police brutality. I was a bit confused because the limited knowledge I had of Candyman informed me that he seemed to target a lot of Black folk for a spirit that aimed to protect the Black community. Perhaps they mean he’s developed over time alongside the neighborhood to match the needs but that’s the sort of extra thinking I wish the movie did on behalf of the viewer. I did like explaining the first movie with the outlines to include the plot as through thread that played a central role in Anthony’s own story. For example here’s a snippet of what I wrote at the time and the original content of this post: “I absolutely loved this movie and left feeling unsettled, angry, betrayed, upset, and thoroughly pleased. Not only is the movie amazing but the social commentary throughout connects it to modern day racial struggles that the original touched on but didn’t explicitly focus on. Overall, I highly recommend any horror fan go out and see this movie while it is still in theaters, I know I’ll be purchasing a digital copy as soon as it’s released.” I ended up not buying a digital copy (though I had rented it more than once before it became available to stream on Peacock ). Since the release of this movie much in the political landscape and racial issues have changed, particularly after the 2024 presidential general election. While I did feel that it expanded on the legend and still do I no longer think that the social commentary is anything crazy woke anymore. It seems like an obvious fact now in many circles that police target and kill Black people disproportionately and that many of these problems are deeply ingrained within the police communities serve Black constituencies. We’re also under agreement that racism is alive and well—something that not even a decade ago would’ve received major pushback and disbelief. With this newer perspective I view Candyman as a half baked idea that could’ve been spectacular with more focus. I wish it did one issue really, really well rather than trying to cover a bajillion issues slightly. In stark contrast the original story focused heavily on the character Helen Lyle (portrayed by Virginia Madsen), a white masters student researching incidences she believed to be part of an urban legend myth at Cabrini-Green for her thesis. The distance between the subject matter and the character allowed the racial elements to be parallel to the story happening to Helen rather than the story happening to her that is ingrained in her. She had a choice whereas Anthony is predestined. In the new 2021 version however the origin of Candyman is more closely intertwined with the brutal killing rather than the interracial relationship or Daniel’s desire. The brutality and unjustified nature of this and the subsequent murders on the same land is said to leave a stain on that place, and in Cabrini-Green’s instance this is Candyman, a vengeful spirit that has ever evolving motivations.