Insidious: Chapter 2

Insidious, which I wrote a brief note about after seeing it saying that it started well but made the mistake of showing its ghosts and demons too often and too clearly and thus lost all of its tension, was a decent but ultimately disappointing film. However, it did well enough to spawn that staple of relatively low-budget horror: a sequel. And I must say, while similarly flawed, Insidious 2 was probably more consistently enjoyable and had some excellent moments, including a Back-to-the-Future-Part-II sequence tying into the first film that genuinely put a smile on my face, wrapped up by a similar treatment for this film’s prologue. Add in that pretty awesome old lady from the first film – sadly used for some dodgy Sixth Sense scene as a cliffhanger for a third ‘chapter’ already in the works – and you have something quite satisfying.

Which isn’t to say it’s good. The jumps are still very artificial, the ghosts’ powers vague and the lack of adequate lighting anywhere is somewhat tedious. It’s certainly nothing new, and most of the evil ghosts we’ve seen in horror since the 80s have had a tragic backstory about an abusive parent forcing a child into murder or some such – here with added ‘trap’…though this isn’t anime, of course. As horror sequels go, though, this is certainly one of the better ones, and I’d rather rewatch this than the original.