Evelyn Rose is a junior and a reporter for the Fishers Tiger Times. Her views do not necessarily reflect those of the newspaper.
The film “Ready or Not” was released in 2019, and at the time I was doing a 31-day, 31-horror-film challenge for October. It was a breath of fresh air because it mixed the ideas of eat-the-rich films through rich people doing satanic rituals and annoying in-laws
The movie follows Faith (Samara Weaving) on the night of her wedding, drawing cards to choose a game to play with her new family. The bad card is hide-and-seek, in which her family must hunt her as a sacrifice to the devil before dawn.
The sequel, “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” begins with Faith one minute after the events of the first film. Her victory causes a second hide-and-seek game to unfold, where the winner of this game gets to control the world. Mr. Labelle, the original deal maker with the devil, gives new rules for this second game to all the families.
Since this is a sequel, there are a lot of new faces added to this film, such as Faith’s sister, Grace (Kathryn Newton), who gives this film the emotional weight it needs to be taken seriously. Four new families are introduced this time around, but this time a lawyer (Elijah Wood) oversees all the rules with a book to make sure everyone signs their contracts with Satan.
These new families are much more diverse, coming from different parts of the world, showing how far-reaching the hand of the rich is. After the first 15 minutes of introducing all the new characters, the second game of hide-and-seek starts.
The film shines during the game because of the first rule: You must only use weapons in the century that your family made the deal with Satan. This rule leads to a lot of creative weapons on screen, such as snipers from the 20th century to ancient Egyptian swords from the B.C era.
The rule sets the stage for world-building to this film, showing how long certain families have been in power, and it gives subtle hints on who belongs to the most powerful families.
If you end up breaking any of the rules, your whole body explodes into a puddle of blood. Every time this occurred, it felt like a jump scare but still led the film to have lots of fun when the body-popping horror happened.
In between all the action and horror elements is a semi-interesting sister conflict, but as soon as the conflict between the two gets going, the movie starts dragging its feet. The last 30 minutes drag and was only saved because I was still interested in Grace (Samara Weaving), who I have loved since the project “The Babysitter.”
Once the final set piece gets started, it becomes a bloodbath that any horror fan would find worthy of a Golden Chainsaw award (best kill in a movie award). I was a bit shocked with how the director ended up bringing my attention back into the film with the final set piece because I kept zoning out during the slow part, but I ended up satisfied as a fan of the first picture. The film is also heavily reliant on Samara Weaving, who really kept my attention with her ability to act with just her eyes and ended up carrying the film even in the slow parts.
Overall, “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” is a solid entry into the long legacy of horror films. It is a film that plays it relatively safe, getting the job done of making a movie that fans of the first one would be happy with. It helps we get a cameo from legendary director David Cronenberg, who made iconic films such as “The Fly,” “A History of Violence” and “Eastern Promises.”
So, I give this a 4 out of 5 skulls on the hope that I do not see a third “Ready or Not.” If you enjoy “The Menu” by Mark Mylod, another eat-the-rich film, then you can find a lot to enjoy these two entries.
