Director: Brandon Espy
Year: 2024
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural Slasher; Horror/Comedy
Plot:
After her husband dies, a woman becomes frustrated trying to keep her son in line and is forced to rely on a tape of a children’s show host who begins casting a strange spell over him to the point of abducting him into a parallel world of his forcing her and other survivors to try to stop him.
Review:
This was a pretty enjoyable effort with a lot to like about it. One of the biggest aspects of the film is the central starting point involving how the series of events unfold that lead to everything going on. The first half setting up the folklore of the killer who uses his tapes from the show’s past to target kids in abusive situations at their home which sets up the new family being targeted based on what happened with her husband to start things off. The escalating problems trying to rein in their son and how nothing is working providing the need for finding the tapes and bringing him into their lives keep this moving along with the son’s continued outbursts eventually signaling his eventual encounter and abduction with the demented figure as there’s little about the behavior that clues him in as anything other than the next target in the killing spree as the twisted logic in targeting the parents based on misguided qualifications to judge them as bad parents make it start strongly.
Once this happens, the series of interactions that occur involving the search for him offers up a lot to like. Not only is the investigation quite strong filling in the lore about what happened to him in the past, why he needs to target children, and how he goes about it which also helps with the folklore of the killer, but there’s a series of fun setpieces showing that happen with the incidents involving him targeting other families in graphic fashion. Turning up the wackiness quite heavily to showcase some intriguing and enjoyable sequences involving some fun supernatural-tinged sequences with his powers forcing creatures to come to life or influence unnatural events to happen allowing for a slew of over-the-top kills to come about leading nicely into the strong finale set in the world of the killer as he uses his powers to control the world around him. Using some impressive effects and visuals to accomplish this, it creates a lot to like here.
There are some issues here bringing this one down. Among its main drawbacks is the lack of urgency in the finale where it takes forever to get a point across and sapping a lot of the urgency out of the situation. What happened beforehand was a ruthless and vindictive psychopathic killer willing to dole out judgemental punishment to others who were deemed bad parents yet when confronted with the person who’s been continually foiling his plans against his will or warnings decides to keep her alive past the point of holding her captive makes little to no sense. There’s such a deviation from his plan that he even sets up the idea of stopping himself through the idea of toying with her rather than outright killing her just for the sake of preventing her from interrupting his plans which get screwed up anyway so there’s little about it that works here. It’s also somewhat hard to get behind the killer as the film intends. The whole thing is presented as if his acts of violence against the violating parents are justified based on how the child reacts to everything, yet the parents are truthfully more justified in disciplining their bratty children making it hard to feel the sense of vindication that emerges in the death scenes the way it wants us to think. These all manage to hold this one down somewhat.
Overview: ****/5
A generally fun and somewhat likable genre effort, there’s quite a lot to like here which manages to overcome some issues that crop up to the point that it remains quite decent overall. Those who are fans of this particular style or are curious about it will have a lot to like here while those turned off by this type of entry should heed caution.
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