Director: Charlie Steeds
Year: 2025
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: Snake Infestation
Genre: Snake
Plot:
Heading out into the country, a family looks to renovate a run-down property they own, only for a squatter at the house to make life difficult for them as they try to carry out their plans, which are then further complicated by a massive snake in the woods killing anyone who comes across it.
Review:
This was a slightly disappointing and underwhelming follow-up. The majority of the positives here are based on the final half, where all the snake action is brought into play. The revelations involving the real culprits of the voodoo spell that’s at the center of the action, featuring what they’re looking to do with the family, is a solid touch as it puts forth a fine amount of interactions here that offer up both supernatural voodoo ceremonies to set everything in motion, with the more deliberate cheesy creature action. This is used to provide a fine series of chases and confrontations around the house, from the snakes taking out the repairmen in the shack to the family being chased into the woods, where the revelation about everything takes place, involving the ritualistic ceremonies to bring the snakes to life. That provides a slew of cheesy encounters involving the obviously cheesy snake puppet being used to coil around victims or bringing about some fun, gory attacks, giving this a rousing, engaging section that helps to overcome the few negatives here.
There are some big issues here keeping this down. One of the biggest drawbacks n here is the immensely unlikable setup that brings everything together at the house in a way that makes it hard to get invested in what’s going on. The family is really hard to get involved with, with the son being an arrogant, self-centered tech-obsessed teen that’s more concerned with getting online than spending time with his family, constantly snaps at his step-mother who’s only trying to help, and half-jokes about leaving everyone to fend for themselves in the woods as his only interest is getting back to his old home where there’s an internet connection. The dad is a well-meaning but clueless city bumpkin who doesn’t know what he’s doing and is in over his head regarding the house, and lets the moronic repairmen walk all over him without fighting back. The mom doesn’t do much beyond yell at the son for his behavior and disappears for much of the film, leaving her with something, but without being a prominent presence, she tends to disappear for long stretches of the running time.
That’s hard enough, but the fact that this one tends to be so out of focus on what it should’ve been that it feels like something else entirely than a cheesy creature feature. The majority of this one is spent on the lame family drama that’s not all that interesting anyway, the entirely problematic need to get the squatter off the property, or trying to deal with the lazy repairmen, which are nowhere near that interesting to be involved with over time. These all drag the pacing down to the point of barely getting any kind of killer snake action at all during the first hour, as the few instances present here are just not enough to keep this one going with the lack of snake action, especially when there are so many instances of keeping this from happening if they had just thrown him off the property at the very beginning. As well, with the cheesy special effects being dominated by the goofy puppet and its unnatural reactions, trying to play everything off, there are some problems to be had with the film.
Overview: **/5
A downgrade from the original but still enjoyable enough, this one is watchable enough for what it is, even with some problematic factors on display here that end up holding this one down. Those with an appreciation for this kind of genre fare or who are fans of the creative crew will want to give it a shot, while those who are turned off by these factors will want to heed caution.
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