Scare Package II: Rad Chad's Revenge

First, I am a huge fan of the original Scare Package, and the clever way it had fun with a myriad of horror tropes. This sequel goes very far astray of what made the original so great, so to say I was disappointed is an understatement, though I could find a few redeeming qualities.

From the very beginning, writer/director Aaron B. Koontz makes it abundantly clear that this is a comedy... and a goofy, borderline-slapstick one at that. This is an anthology series, so you've got a variety of writers and directors. This aspect was slightly different from the original, in the fact that there were only four short stories, and the Koontz/Burns framework story is the bulk focus. Which is not exactly a mistake, as exactly half the shorts (the latter two) completely suck.

I thought the first two shorts were very good. As a matter of fact, the first, Welcome to the 90's, I felt was the one thing clever enough to fit into what the first movie accomplished. It is a fun take on a role reversal of final girls, though it does get preachy by the end. But a great idea, nonetheless. The second short is good, too, The Night He Came Back Again! Part VI: The Night She Came Back, as I always like to see characters return from the original (more can be found in the wraparound story). It is a (further down the line) sequel to a short from the original, and is left open-ended enough for more. I just hope Koontz goes back to his original winning concept, if this actually continues as a franchise.

Here's the problem: This sequel is (primarily) not a clever comment on horror tropes, it is a parody and reference-generator of horror films (plus other films in general). The framework story focuses mostly on the Saw movies. This sort of thing has not only been done already (in the "Movie" movies, Meet the Spartans, etc.), but I'm fairly certain one of the Scary Movies has done Saw already!! So, add redundant on top of all that's wrong. Now, I'm all for movie references, but when that's your movie's sole focus, it gets real tiresome. Case in point: The fourth short, We're So Dead, is nothing but a very obvious succession of movie references, seemingly designed for a Saw "game" in the ensuing frame. The references and quotes in the latter/concluding part of this movie fly at you rather mercilously, and made me wish the movie was over already.

There is a modicum of fun to be had here, but ultimately the movie is bogged down in dumb parody and cramming in as many references as possible. There is even an extra on the Blu-ray, done in a Pop-up Video style, TELLING you what and where all the references lie/refer to. Which is actually a pretty good idea, if I had the patience for it. Ya gotta sit through the movie again in its entirety to get them all.

C'mon, get back to the drawing board!

The first "Scare Package" was a fun riff on horror films (most of them being good) for the horror nerds by horror nerds. "Part II" is ... somehow ... a cash grab (can't imagine much) pandering to how women are strong, independent, don't-need-a-man, ball kickers and men are alpha males who make the wrong decision every time or are fat goofy slobs.

Much like putting the "F" word in titles of movies, "Part II" sets you up for what to expect from it. It's slow, boring, lazy and badly written by people who either don't care about the genre or just were told to write a story in 30 pages or less without being proofread.

There's nothing wrong with a female lead (there's millions of films dedicated to this, there's entire sections of streaming apps to prove this), but it's becoming a negative trend when literally every movie is doing this and when a movie that is a series of vignettes does this.

There are some great gross out gags and some funny one liners, though.

Scare Package II (2022) is a movie that I recently watched on Shudder. The storyline follows a horror guru who dies and sets up a series of horror games for his guests to observe and/or survive, Saw style. Will any of his guests survive the games or are they all destined for a demise similar to his own?

This movie is made up of several segments codirected by Alexandra Barreto (Mayans MC), Aaron B. Koontz (The Pale Door) among others. This picture stars Jeremy King (As Night Falls), Shakira Ja'nai Paye (House Party), Byron Brown (Blood Fest), Dustin Rhodes (WWE), Barbara Bingham (Friday the 13th VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan) and Diana Prince (Halloween Ends).

It's too bad this is a parody because the special effects and gore in this are out of this world. I really enjoyed the kills scenes. Like every film made up of several segments, some are better than others and some take themselves more seriously than others. The killers are consistently pretty cool with good makeup, masks and overall design. The comedic content was inconsistent with some scenes more clever than others. The acting will remind you of the Scary Movie franchise, essentially "good enough." The sets are absolutely incredible, like a horror movie play land, very well done. The dialogue can be annoying, but the concepts are consistently worthwhile.

Overall, this is a fun parody that's worth watching once. It isn't Scary Movie, but it's good in its own way. I would score this a 5.5-6/10 and recommend seeing it once.

Back in 2019, Aaron B. Koontz and Cameron Burns' Scare Package was a sly prank on the horror genre. It was a refreshing anthology series that riffed on all of the genre's tropes in clever and fun ways. The sequel, Rad Chad's Revenge, offers much of the same fun but much of the enjoyment is ruined by the filmmakers' constant need to push their repeatitive personal agendas over entertainment or blood-curdling good laughs.

The framing narrative this time is a spoof of the Saw series with a deceased horror guru and video store owner Rad Chad turning his funeral into a series of daunting, deadly escape rooms for the mourners in attendance.

Of the stories presented only two are fairly well done. The first, Welcome to the 90s, has several famous horror final girls and 'Buffy' (Steph Barkley) fending off Jason, Freddy, Xenomorph, Michael Myers, Leatherface stand-in: Tony the Killer (Joshua Miller). Although it is dragged down with a lot of ham-fisted, patronizing editorial commentary which it could have and should have done without, Welcome to the 90s is the best of the four stories. The second featurette, The Night He Came Back Again! Part VI: The Night She Came Back, is a sequel to The Night He Came Back Again! Part IV: The Final Kill in the original film with final girl Daisy (Chelsey Grant) making her return.

If you shut off Scare Package 2 after that one, you won't have missed anything much. If do you venture further put on that football helmet or hard hat you have sitting around as the filmmakers continue to hammer home their agenda over and over again like Thor bludgeoning the ice giants with Mjölnir. That's ultimately why what could have been a good follow-up just becomes as irritating as Love and Thunder. Okay, nothing in filmdom could be THAT annoying but Scare Package 2 gives it a run for its money.

After the funeral of their friend, a group of random strangers are forced to partake in a series of Horror Movie-inspired traps to leave the event alive while a series of stories about the life lessons he imparted to others plays out.

The Good Stor(ies): Welcome to the 90s-After inadvertently helping a serial killer start a murder spree, a group of sorority sisters must band together to stop his deadly rampage using the rules of the genre to do so. Overall, this was an entertaining starting point for what's going on. The amount of meta-humor present, from the names to the character archetypes and play-on-words involving the type of action here with the interactions they have with those around the campus, provides a highly enjoyable framework for what's going on here. The stalking isn't bad and generates some solid confrontations and cheesy scares that go along nicely with the rule-breaking that goes on which is hammered on so thick it becomes somewhat eye-rolling at points. It's the only issue here but it does stick out somewhat due to the fun involved in the rest of the segment.

The Night He Came Back Again! Part VI: The Night She Came Back-Returning to her childhood home, a woman and her boyfriend arrive at the cursed cabin where her murderous brother will return to exact his revenge on her and her family. This was a rather fun slasher outing and had plenty to like about it, starting with the back-and-forth war that takes place as the reveal of their supernatural powers enables a heavy-hitting and exciting confrontation that allows for a constant stream of wholly effective practical effects. It also leads to a fun finale that's undone by the brevity of it all and a lack of explanation for what's going on due to that brief setup which is a bit of a flaw but not enough to truly hold this down.

The Bad Stor(ies): Special Edition-After gathering her friends together, a woman's efforts to have them pack up her dead brother's belongings at the lighthouse where he worked finds the efforts impeded by a malicious supernatural being. This was a generally bland piece that only has one aspect going for it. This segment only really works due to the wholly effective gore and make-up work throughout here which features a cool-looking mutation and a slew of effective deaths which aren't enough to hold out over the other features here. The sluggish pace that spends far too much time on a group of friends debating an urban legend rather than explaining everything is a major source for this one making it hard to care or understand what's happening, leaving this a disappointing feature.

We're So Dead-After encountering a dead body in the woods, a group of friends decide to use it to test their reanimation serum on a human being for once which causes problems when the. This one could've been a lot more fun than what it already is had it been given more time to do anything. The lack of explanation for anything as the flashback structure of the whole thing makes for a rather difficult immersion into what's going on with the friend group and how the exact nature of the serum works. This is even more troublesome with the introduction of the matter transference device that comes into play that has very little information on anything which makes for a wholly troublesome piece. The whole idea of melting together the various stories into one whole makes for a fine concept initially and the exploits of the experiments manage to generate some solid special effects for the kills do make it entertaining but it's not enough.

Scare Package II: Rad Chad's Revenge-After the funeral of their friend, a group of random strangers are forced to partake in a series of Horror Movie-inspired traps to leave the event alive. This wasn't too bad for the most part but does have a bit of an issue here with the series of traps that they're forced to partake in during the interstitial moments here feeling more like what would come about from genuine parodies than anything else. While that ends up making these scenes somewhat hard to get through, it also causes a somewhat uneasy transition into the next story with very little throughline into the next segment. The finale in the video store connecting the dots with everything and turning it into a short slasher with a solid game behind it with some decent effects, but it's too little too late.

Rated Unrated/R: Extreme Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.