Gee…I wonder who the main villain of this film is. Even if you haven’t seen the trailer, there are only so many actresses on the poster who look like the character in the center right? You can guess between the two actresses listed and it should be easy to guess correctly. This is a modern horror film that I actually saw the trailer a while back. I knew that it would be terrible, but I saw it to see if I could at least drag some good feats out of this. I wasn’t disappointed!

A group of scientists decide that they will bring things back to life against the school’s orders. They succeed in bringing a dog back to life, but then some corporate white collars decide to shut down the project. The “heroes” laugh this off and try to make another experiment, but someone forgot to pay General Electric so a spark is sent off and destroys one of the characters. They bring her back to life, but…she seems different. She seems…evil!!!!!? (Shocker!)

My hunches are typically right when it comes to a film being good or bad. I can usually tell if I will like it or not based on a single trailer. Not a teaser, but the full thing. That being said, you still have to be careful to go in with an open mind, but this film makes it easy for you since there’s animal violence within seconds of minutes of the film starting so I was able to confirm my theory. It may sound strange to watch a film that you know will be terrible, but it’s actually not uncommon.

See, the best reason to watch a film is to enjoy it. After that, another very legitimate reason is to just watch the film for feats. This way, I can add the fighters to this site someday in the battle section. A final reason that I watch films for at times is just to appreciate the dialogue as well as the banter between characters. If a film’s script is really good, I can at least have a few chuckles as I get ready to write my negative review. I do the same thing for video games. (minus the third option since there is almost never any banter in video games) Based on the poster/dvd cover, I knew that the villain would have some good super powers. After all, villains in horror films are always overpowered and typically have a range of attacks like reality warping and teleportation.

One of the ways that this film went wrong was the fact that it has way too many jump scares. Seriously, when you show us a vague object in the background and start speeding up the music as the scene gets darker and darker, everyone and their pet bird knows that a jump scare is about to happen. You’re taking the scare out of the jump. Every jump scene here is utterly predictable and you’ll just be laughing. Actually, this is a Great film to watch in a group as you try to poke fun at it the whole time. Seeing the Mystery Theater 3000 tackle this would likely be very entertaining. There’s just so much material to work with here.

An obvious negative here is the animal violence issue. It feels like I have to mention this in every single horror movie and it must be a trope of some kind. Naturally, the dog dies. It’s so unnecessary and disturbing. The fact that the heroes are bringing things back to life also ensures that you see quite a few dead animals throughout the film and this movie was doomed from early on. However, it brings me to a nice topic of discussion that many philosophers and scientists still debate. As far as I’m concerned there is no debate, but I’ve seen this question asked several times in real life and the answers that other people give are always sad. They always seem to believe that the end justifies the means.

The characters are all fine with experimenting on animals. When the main character decides to finally try a human everyone immediately starts to back up. “Experimenting on animals is okay, but a human..humans are real!” is essentially what the characters try to say. For many people, animals don’t have rights and anything is fair game. If killing 10 animals means that you will save 100 humans, a lot of people would jump on board in an instant. If you were to rephrase the question so it’s 10 lives against 100, people would still go for it, but there would be many more who would simply find it preposterous. It’s a very sad train of logic that I’ve always disagreed with right from the start. The fact that all the characters believe this just makes it all the more sad.

The other topic to tackle relates to one of the final sane lines by the main villain. Zoe asks why she was sent to Hell over one mistake when she tried to make up for it by doing good things for her whole life. That’s an incredibly easy one to answer, good works are not enough to send you into Heaven. You can lead the nicest life imaginable. You can fight in wars and save hundreds of people or always put others first and help out whenever possible, but you still won’t go to Heaven if you haven’t accepted Jesus Christ into your life. It’s a concept that many people cannot wrap their heads around and the outcome is quite sad, but unavoidable. It’s tough to think that you could be a great person and it will not make a difference, but we are all sinners and don’t have the power to save ourselves. Zoe found this out the hard way and now she’s working on bringing as many people down as possible. Considering how all of the other main characters act, it shouldn’t be difficult.

To Zoe, Hell is essentially reliving her worst moment in life over and over again. I don’t see this being very far fetched as that could certainly be what Hell is like. Hell is simply unbearably bad. So, whatever hurts you the most emotionally and physically will be what happens there. It’s why Hell is a truly scary place and it’s never ending. Another difficult concept to grasp, but one that you must as it will really affect how you live each and every day. You will certainly treasure each day on Earth as you realize what a privilege it is to live in such a pleasant world even if it’s far from perfect.

It almost goes without saying that I couldn’t stand any of the characters by the way. We have the average teenager who smokes a lot and is constantly making crude and inappropriate comments. He was terrible. The main character believes that experimenting on animals is okay and he doesn’t seem to think too highly of the dog’s intelligence. His final scenes are also terrible and he’s unlikable. Zoe essentially cracks and we find out that Hell broke her and turned her evil. While that may not be her fault as she is insane for the final part of the film, it doesn’t help her become a good character although she is a threatening villain. The intern seemed out of her depth the whole time as she tried to fit in and the final member of the group didn’t really have any character.

The script is one of the things that prevented any of the characters from being likable as they were constantly swearing. It’s to be expected as horror films in general have some of the worst reputations when it comes to the script. The characters will swear whenever they are surprised, upset, or excited, which is constantly. While it’s not the worst writing that I’ve seen, it’s certainly down there and hurts the film once again.

At the very least, Zoe is a strong villain. She seems to have some reality warping skills as she can literally send you to Hell. She has high speed regeneration, possibly some kind of body snatching ability, super speed, telekinesis, super strength, and much more. As with most horror villains, she can essentially do whatever she wants including turning off the lights with her mind. How spooky right? For films like this, you’re essentially watching to see how she destroys everyone in whatever gruesome ways she can imagine. No worries though, all of the bodies are somehow kept intact for the twist ending.

You do know that there is a twist ending right? All horror films are basically required to have one and this is no exception. How one guy’s body survived being in a metal container that was crumpled up is beyond our wildest imagination, but I’m sure that Zoe has a power to help with that. She also has a large blood supply so that she can give some to everyone that wants to have powers without wearing herself out. Must come back to that high speed regeneration eh? As with most twist endings, we can assume that humanity was ultimately destroyed.

Overall, This was a pretty terrible movie, but at least it was predictable. It followed the horror stereotyped and formula to a T. You can probably guess just about everything ahead of time. “Will ____ die DReager?” “I’ll do you one better Bill, they’re all going to die and at least one of them will be in a Man of Steel way” “Right on Reager!” Now, just copy and paste that answer to every single horror film where there’s one villain up against a group of teenagers and you’ve got yourself the correct answer. If horror films where you get to see really unlikable characters destroyed by a villain that they cannot even begin to fight against are your thing, then you’ll love this film. Just try to get past the animal violence and the poor script. Meanwhile, I’d recommend watching Scooby Doo Zombie Island if you want a movie that has more heart. On the bright side, I did like the corporate agents who came in and owned the main characters without breaking a sweat.

Overall 1/10