Spider Baby (2024) by Dustin Ferguson

Director: Dustin Ferguson

Year: 2024

Country: USA

Alternate Titles: N/A

Genre: Psycho Family

Plot:

After being reunited at their family home, a psychotic family learns they’re supposed to meet with normal relatives to undergo an inheritance, but when they arrive and see how unhinged and psychotic the kids are, they try to disrupt everything, setting loose their dark nature on the family.

Review:

Overall, this was an exceptionally fun and generally likable remake. Among the best attributes here is the way it manages to provide quite a fun, solid grounding of the traditional setup, just with some slight tweaks and changes. The central setup of the film is nicely the same, with the family being forced to entertain relatives who’ve never met them before and have to try putting on a brave face even though their psychotic tendencies are quite likely to burst out at any moment, and it manages to set up a fine sense of immersion with the story. That allows for the group to carry on their traditional behavior of acting unhinged and crazy with the unnatural antics they partake in that come off as playing like children, making obscure remarks about their family, or so clearly being forced into civilized constructs that they’re not comfortable being so that when it finally comes time for them to go back to their unhinged nature at the end with the vicious slaughter that takes place.

That comes off even better with the blistering pace on display, keeping this one running along at a fun clip as it hits a lot of the same energy and tone throughout. With the focus on so many familiar plot beats and behavioral tactics that follow on from the original in a condensed form so that it’s slightly shorter than the already brief original, it brings those to the forefront even further to the point of being able to run through the familiar parts to look for the twist at the end where it tries to incorporate the new rampage at the end. The one lone factor that might be present with this one is the rushed finale where it tries to focus on the suddenness of their outbursts as a strong setup to something interesting only to then suddenly get wrapped up so quickly it’s hard to make sense of what the point was, especially with the formulaic excruciatingly long credits scroll that could’ve been used for more efficiently to help expand that ending. Otherwise, this was a solid enough entry.

Overview: ****/5

An immensely fun and effective remake, there’s a lot to like here that comes together quite nicely and keeps itself as a solid remake, even with some minor drawbacks that do crop up. Give it a shot if you’re curious about it or are a fan of the creative crew, while those turned off by those factors might want to heed caution.