Campy, poorly acted, and wickedly gory!!! Still a must see!!

Rating: 7/10 (22 July 2006)

I'm kind of seeing this series again in reverse. I saw the terrific third installment and happened to catch the second recently. I remember always being impressed with this series but found this time around a little campy. Has it always been this campy?? I don't know but Final Destination still has a way of scaring the living daylights out of you and imagining EVERY worse case scenario. Whereas the first one made you scared to death to ever set foot on a place, this one makes you never want to see another car for the rest of your life. Within the first half hour you are treated to one of the goriest, horrendous, shocking death scene car crashes I have ever seen. Brilliantly directed, shockingly real and brutal...it's just horrifying. Following that we are given the usual Final Destination track down as Death systematically begins to murder each survivor in the most obscure, original, and horrifying ways imaginable. If anything Final Destination has breathed new life into original death scenes which is a must for the Horror/Slasher genre and Final Destination has it nailed. I don't know how the writers continue to come up with it. It's always a surprise and you never know what's going be the death of them.
A.J. Cook picks up the lead as Kimberly Corman, the psychic girl who envisions the car crash the saves a group from dying but sets them up in Death's path. Cook is a little bland and over acts in several scenes adding to the campy feel of the film. Campy is not bad, especially in the horror genre but Final Destination feels like it should be more intelligent than campy. Cook does an okay job but her emotions don't really match the situations. Within hours of three of her best friends dying in the most horrific way she appears to be fine. When discovering Death is stalking them, despite a few tense moments, she doesn't seem overly moved by it. They could have cast better but she is alright. Michael Landes (Jimmy Olsen from one of my favorite TV classic Series Lois and Clark) is Officer Thomas Burke, the male lead. He always looks like a deer caught in the headlights which I suppose is the proper look given the situation. He doesn't quite have the acting strength to carry off the lead role and all in all he doesn't get subjected to the same amount of torture as the rest of them. Still him and Cook have decent chemistry although no romance is ever implied and he does a decent job much as Cook does. Ali Larter returns as the only returning character from the original film as Clear Rivers. Disturbed and having herself locked away to protect herself she finally comes out to help the new batch of survivors beat Death (because she did so well the first time everyone but her being dead now.) She is good as the veteran of the team but she does come across as a bit of a raving mad woman at times. But I won't complain because I love cross overs from previous horror installments into new ones. I'm glad they brought her back especially since I usually can't stand Devon Sawa (who was the lead in the original.) The rest of the cast in their small roles as eventual victims all do a decent job of blatantly establishing their characters and thus becoming victims of circumstance to their personalities.
The problem with Final Destination 2 over the previous one and the latter one is the cast. It's not nearly as strong as it has been or is now and the cast over acts and comes across as cheesy which is never good given the horrifying original death scenes. But because of a strong script of horror and the establishment of a connection between this film and the previous one it's a must see. The Death scenes are infamous and classic and original and just shocking it's almost funny but you feel scared to death as you chuckle at them. The story line is a little difficult and it feels a little forced especially the connection to the original and the way they end things up in how they "conquer" Death. They try to be fresh and original but overall doesn't exactly work as far as the story line goes. It's more complex than it should be. Stunt man David R. Ellis who has a huge film coming out this summer "Snakes On A Plane" is obviously well versed in stunts and choreographing harrowing scenes but his direction of cast might need something to be desired. Still #2 in the series you must see just because as a whole the trilogy to date is one of the most unique horror thrillers to be made in recent years. Horror fans will love it!! 7/10