It's never a good thing when a sequel opts out for gratuitous carnage in order to overcompensate for the lack of surprises that the first movie gave away. In addition, it escalates the supernatural and the ghostly to a whole other level. Its most unforgivable sin, of course, is to resurrect the murdered psycho, Grabber, into a ghost who can actually harm the living. Here, he plays like a poor man's Freddy Krueger, a demonic entity not aware that his aura is so 1980s - and not in a good way.
The original "The Black Phone" was a well conceived thriller. Despite the somewhat familiar trope of children being abducted and murdered, Scott Derrickson's film (based on a short story by Joe Hill), was original in more ways than one. The violence, for the most part, was kept off-screen. The protagonist, a boy named Finney (Mason Thames), struggled to free himself from the basement of the madman called the Grabber, himself concealed behind a devilish mask. It filled the audience with dread, terror, and an insatiable desire to see Finney get away.
I have said nearly nothing the plot of "Black Phone 2," because it is laughably ridiculous. The movie's nothing more than a gimmick, an unnecessary project forced into existence by studio execs looking to further cash in on the Black Phone trademark. Derivative in all the wrong ways, it is a stain on the legacy of the original.
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