KaZenPhi

The production values reach industry standards and it doesn't get boring much, but this kind of documentary format has become incredibly formulaic and calculated by now.

There really isn't a whole lot of nuance and depth to the cause of this tragedy that couldn't have been told just as well in a ten minute youtube video instead. The proverbial villains are obvious. Additionally, pushing grieving distraught family members in front of the camera comes off as exploitive, cruel and cynical.

Netflix's documentaries were the select few in-house productions still worth watching but it looks like the bottom is about to drop out. Let's see if people will still pay the subscription price to watch old episodes of Friends a few years down the line.

I was a big fan of the first movie. An irreverent, creative and very funny comedy about a bunch of metalheads from a dead end town in Finland looking for their big break, encountering ever more ridiculous situations. Clearly made by people who know and love metal culture but also enjoy poking fun at its more openly ridiculous aspects.

The only moment where it started to lose me was the relatively uncreative and much too conventional finale which felt more like how an American remake of the same material would handle it.

After seeing the trailer I began to fear part two would just going to be exactly that, but stretched to 90 minutes.

And yup, that's basically what happened....

The plot couldn't be more cliched if they tried, you can see every beat coming from a mile away and the last half hour especially becomes a total slog.

It's not a complete failure, the chemistry between the cast is great as ever, there are some good tunes throughout and the constant stabs at Finland's friendly neighbor Norway did make me chuckle at least, but the bog-standard plot and lack of ideas drag this movie way down. The seemingly endless barrage of cameos from the metal scene just smells of desperation and all the music references felt way too obvious this time around.

Heavy trip was the little movie that could. This feels strangely corporate by comparison.

It brings me no joy to say it, but what a disappointment.

I admittedly didn't have high hopes for the return of this franchise. After two spectacular entries the quality (and the budget as well...) started to go down drastically with a brief uptick in entertainment value when the movies became downright comedies, albeit intentionally. Just when it seemed like the law of diminishing returns would keep striking, fittingly with the same inevitability of Death in the final destination movies, the series seemingly stopped for more than a decade, leaving an uneven legacy of creative, thoroughly enjoyable but progressively flawed slasher flicks.

However in a surprising turn of events Final Destination came back from the dead in spectacular fashion given us the best entry since the initial two.

There are plenty of surprises in the plot, the deaths are gruesome and creative, the actors and makers are actually taking this movie seriously, there's a clear visual style to the production and it's not as predictable as horror movies usually are.

The dark comedy is still there but a bit more subdued and deaths are given a bit more gravitas than in more recent entries of the series.

Shockingly enough in the year 2025 a horror movie is like an actual movie.

If they keep up the same quality displayed here I'm gladly looking forward to potential sequels. If this remains the final part it's a great swan song.

Rip Tony Todd, it was great seeing you on screen once more.