The Descent: Part 2

Plot: You know that cave full of cannibalistic creatures that killed all those women? Sarah, the sole survivor from the first film, decides it'd be a good idea to go back! And people say characters in horror movies are stupid.

Comments: Okay, that was a bit unfair. After all, it turns out that Sarah has amnesia. So when the authorities as her to help them find her friends, it's not like she has a good reason not to, I guess. But I wish she had refused, because it would have prevented a sequel that didn't need to be made, and probably shouldn't have.

It's not that The Descent: Part 2 is a bad film, per se, but it's an incredibly generic one. The best moments of the first film had nothing to do with flesh-eating monsters, and everything to do with the interaction between the all-female cast, and the claustrophobic shots inside the cave. All that is pretty much forgotten here, as a bunch of new characters travel into the cave with Sarah and are predictably picked off one by one by the Crawlers. And all that's fine. I mean, who doesn't like to see innocent, well-meaning people brutally butchered by subterranean cannibals? But it seems odd to follow up one of the best, most original horror films of the past decade with something so by-the-numbers.

More annoyingly, it does something that fans of the original should find unforgivable. The worst kind of sequels are the ones that go back and change or contradict or otherwise mess up a great moment from the first one. And The Descent: Part 2 does just that by bringing Juno back. (Technically, I guess that's a spoiler, but considering that Natalie Mendoza is listed in the opening credits, it's not that big of one.) Arguably the best moment of The Descent is when Sarah cripples Juno with a pick axe to the leg after realizing that A) Juno had slept wit her husband, and B) Juno had killed (accidentally, but Sarah didn't know that) one of their friends in the cave. That last shot of Juno in the cave as the Crawlers got closer, was really excellent. And while it was sort of nice to see an understandably pissed off Juno confront Sarah, I would have rather they left that ending alone.

On the plus side, there's some decent gore, a couple of nice twists, and I did like the ending, which seemed like a nice mea culpa to anyone who preferred the original, somewhat more hopeless ending of The Descent. But on the whole, The Descent: Part 2 is a perfect example of why, if you know you can't top the original film, you probably shouldn't attempt a sequel.

Script: C+
Acting: C
Gore: B+
Overall: B-