2 out of 5

Director: Robert Hall

The curse of the sequel. I loved the original Laid to Rest – it seemed like an amazing balance between fulfilling what we want and expect in horror and also sidestepping, cleverly, some stereotypes. Bloody-Disgusting compared this to Hatchet 2 and it’s an apt comparison: instead of the cohesive feel of a movie, we have what feels like just a required followup ’cause the fans demanded it. Which means those cleverly sidestepped tropes – nudity, dumb cops, pointless kills (yes, the first film had awesome over-the-top kills, but they felt tied to the killer’s style instead of just splatter) – all of those tropes appear here in spades. And look at that title – “Chromeskull” is our forefront now, so he’s certainly the star of the show, regardless of who’s wearing the mask. But two stars isn’t fair, really, because it’s still a fun movie. Director / co-writer Rob Hall takes some steps to expand on the story of the first by showing us that Chromeskull is not alone and, in fact, he has a whole bunch of fledglings working for him to help set up his “games”. Brian Austin Green is the leader of this, helping his healing boss (he got a boo-boo in film 1) to tie up lose ends… but maybe he oversteps his responsibilities, and suddenly there’s a fight for the Chromeskull throne. So yes, characters take a back seat here to our killer, and Hall drops the semi-believability of the first one for a Jason type slasher who never stops coming no matter how much he’s shot and stabbed. The kills are fun – perhaps not as directly jaw-dropping as film one, but there are some technically amazing setups that nonetheless show off some amazing skill. Also notable is the shakycam. Film one was patient, this one goes in for the wild edits and bouncing camera. It’s consistent, at least, and fits the change in scope of the films, but is a much different feel. So Laid to Rest 2 – not a bad lil’ horror film. But the true definition of a shoulder-shrug sequel.