The Strangers: Chapter Two serves as a follow up to The Strangers: Chapter One, a hard reboot of the franchise. Admittedly this sequel is slightly better than Chapter One. However, that is admittedly a low bar as part one was a disappointing and boring beat sheet replica of the 2008 original but without any of the brilliant tension building or eerie direction that Bryan Bertino and chapter two only slightly changes that. The Strangers: Chapter Two is directed by Renny Harlin (Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, Deep Blue Sea, Die Hard 2) and written by Alan R. Cohen (The Strangers: Chapter One), Alan Freedland (The Strangers: Chapter One) and Amber Loutfi. The film stars Madelaine Petsch (Polaroid, Sightless), who is returning from Chapter One as Maya, as well as Rachel Shenton (The Colour Room), Brooke Lena Johnson (The Strangers: Chapter One), Froy Guitierrez (The Strangers: Chapter One, Hocus Pocus 2) and Richard Brake (Barbarian, 31, Bingo Hell) who is criminally underutilized in both films.
The film picks up near where Chapter One left off, and actually leads with a pretty fun chase sequence through a hospital with Maya being chased down by the Strangers with a neat moment of her having to hide inside of a morgue to evade being spotted by the masked psychos. As cool as this scene was it would be quite awhile into the film before I'd feel any more excitement. The closest thing to match it before the third act being a bafflingly abrupt scene involving a boar, one that left my shelf and other audience members scratching our heads.
While there isn't a lot of gore the burlap masked stranger is by far the most intimidating in the film, swinging his axe through anyone that gets in his way multiple times in a brutal manner. I also can't stand how many bad decisions the writers have Maya make, especially when Petsch is so well suited for the role and is giving her all to bring any sort of depth to the character. All for her to be stuck in chase sequences that lose their wind after the first few moments and again, some agonizingly questionable decisions her character is forced to do in service of the script. Knowing that the foundation of The Strangers as a franchise was always to be realistic cut above other slasher/home invasion horrors and seeing fall into such low effort slasher antics is disappointing to say the least.
The biggest sin I feel this film commits is its insistence to answer the questions nobody was asking. The script takes priority in giving a fleshed out childhood trauma backstory to the strangers, well, at least to two of them (I guess the third one is just there for fun?). There's also a lackluster motive behind the iconic "Is Tamara home?" line, when I feel the bigger question is simply… was anyone wondering? It all feels like a total overcompensation and ironically makes the titular villains less scary as a result. The inherit creepiness of The Strangers has always been their anonymity, the random and horrific acts of violence they would inflict on innocents just because they happened to be home when they were in town, and the fact that after a job is done they drive away, only to be seen again in the nightmares of their victims unfortunate enough to be left alive. This reboot replaces that with killers who utterly lack personality and are thinly veiled behind a cliché and rushed backstory.
The implication the film makes with the strangers also opens up a weird plot hole, with all of the murders, including the villains backstory happening in the same town, how are they still running around without any suspicion? I'm not one for poking plot holes in things, but that was one of my immediate thoughts after leaving the screening. Another unnecessary change from the core elements of the original and its sequel. This trilogy in its completion has been explained as a "long three part movie" which makes The Strangers: Chapter Two the "second act of a film" according to the director. However, I can't help but question the reasoning to approach it from this angle. There was some talk of a master-cut being put together, stitching chapters one, two and three into one film. Personally I feel like this should've been done from the beginning, yet I feel like my inherit issues with this reboot would remain.
Overall, The Strangers: Chapter Two further overcomplicates what should and could be a simple and creepy story. It's underwhelming, mentally grating and even at it's most exciting points it still falls short of previous franchise entries.
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