Horror flicks centered around killers have often struggled with maintaining consistency. Simple plotlines require closure, and the kind viewers would truly buy into involves the main antagonist ultimately meeting defeat. However, there’s also the financial aspect—box office earnings—and the desire to keep recycling violent scenes. Therefore, despite years of watching these movies, I remain puzzled about how Jason Voorhees came back at the start of each film.

Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday

. Jeffrey Reddick’s


Final Destination


The series is fundamentally a slasher genre piece, and this holds true even for the most recent addition.

Final Destination Bloodlines

Death has its own hockey mask. While you can’t outsmart death, after six films, perhaps it’s time to change that?

Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein’s


Final Destination Bloodlines


It’s fantastic; there’s no question about it. Coming 14 years after the previous installment, the requel (indeed, a requel) stands out as thrilling, humorous, touching, and innovative enough to indicate that this iconic series still holds significant potential. Ironically, despite everything, the outdated remains from 2003 could potentially hinder the franchise right at its reboot stage. However, someone must survive, making the narrative all the more subversive.

Bloodlines

is, death still yields a bit too much control over the franchise’s bible and attempts to earnestly try something new.

Let me explain. When the late David R. Ellis’


Final Destination 2


was released in 2003, protagonist Kimberly (A.J. Cook) tracks down Clear Rivers (Ali Larter), the sole survivor of the first film. That movie’s protagonist, Alex (Devon Sawa), is killed off-screen when a brick cracks his noggin. Cue the disasters and attempts to cheat death again. Rivers is killed in a hospital explosion, though Kimberly, having died and later resuscitated, is presumed alive.

James Wong’s


Final Destination 3


really commits to the ethos of death’s inevitability. Kimberly is confirmed dead in a bonus feature, and that film’s trio of survivors are trapped in an errant subway train as the credits roll. Franchise producer Craig Perry recently confirmed that, yes, those characters did die. Rinse and repeat. Both subsequent sequels end in the exact same way. Death is ostensibly cheated, the survivors breathe a sigh of relief, and then they’re quickly and humorously dispatched. Steven Quale’s

Final Destination 5

is owed some recognition for returning to the source material, yet the reasoning was straightforward. Nobody can outsmart mortality.


Final Destination Bloodlines

closes multiple plot holes regarding the franchise’s backstory, although its most intriguing detail is the disclosure, made by the late Tony Todd’s character William Bludworth, that

Final Destination 2’s

Kimberly remains alive, regardless of the bonus features. This decision is wise and enhances the suspense in this new installment. By confirming that survival across sequels is possible, it adds an interesting twist. Here come the spoilers.

Stefani Reyes (played by Kaitlyn Santa Juana) and her brother Charlie (portrayed by Teo Briones) supposedly evade mortality through what’s known as the Kimberly method. In this narrative, Stefani passes away but gets brought back to life subsequently. For those inclined towards scientific knowledge, it becomes apparent pretty quickly that this demise isn’t genuine; after all, there’s zero probability she truly expired. Eventually, plot twists converge when the duo meets their comical yet anticlimactic end—splashed with gigantic timbers from a crashed train. The scene manages to be humorous and playful despite lacking excitement.

For a franchise committed to the Rube Goldberg intricacies of cheating death, the series has rarely followed through. Cheap gotchas are used in lieu of an earnest commitment to shaking things up. Small as it might seem, there would have been mileage in either Stefani or her brother surviving. Think of the potential, the future implications. The tension, dammit. If death can be cheated, there’s an entirely new layer of suspense draped over every potential death scene.

And death’s inevitability might be the point… only, it isn’t. That’s just a baseline for gruesome kills and laugh-out-loud impalements. The series has always had something earnest to say about the juxtaposition between life and death, even when that message is sloppy or cloying. Tony Todd’s improvised monologue is perhaps the best those thematic undercurrents have ever been conveyed. Yes, I bought a ticket so I could see someone sucked into an MRI machine, but I’d also like it to
mean
That cannot occur if the series stays within the confines of 1980s slasher tropes, constantly eliminating characters and being forced to reinvent itself when it proves financially successful and requires another installment.

Kimberly managing to survive makes her an augur, and I would bet on her showing up in the expected sequel.


Final Destination 7


In the realm of horror, even death itself seems less inevitable than the endless stream of sequels. It’s almost as though I have foresight; perhaps I’m tapping into some sort of precognition. Were this true, I would advise exploring fresh ideas for once. Consider what Oz Perkins might propose instead.


The Monkey


It was darker but also more amusing.

Final Destination

The film also deeply affected me in a manner that other movies haven’t.

Final Destination

The series hasn’t had new content in over two decades.

We should accept movies for what they are and avoid getting overly involved in speculating about what a series needs to stay relevant. However, as someone who has been a fan from the start, I’m growing tired of seeing CGI blood splattered across the ending credits. The character Death has repeated this pattern since 2000, and I’ve witnessed it six times now. If he genuinely wishes to frighten me, then prepare yourself because we’re looking at many more installments down the line; he’ll have to make me invested again. Despite all this, I still thoroughly enjoyed my experience with

Final Destination Bloodlines

. I just wish


that meant something


.


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