After I had watched the first film that was made in 2017, I wasn't really interested in seeing the sequel. Once I found out that the sequel had a higher budget than the first one and had read what the sequel was about, I decided to give it a try. Wicked Ones follows the two main characters, Alex and her boyfriend, now her husband in the sequel, as parents of their three children, and they must confront Collin Miller, (The Wicked One) who is still on the loose, and two unstable serial killer psychopaths who escape during a prison bus transfer (which reminds me of Halloween {2018} . Once their two teenagers fall victim to them and are held captive. This sequel is quite an improvement from the first one. The first film Wicked One was made with very little creativity as I noticed that there are lots of similarities between that movie and the Halloween films. I felt like Tory Jones who wrote and directed both the first one and this sequel, had in copied off of the first Halloween film back in 1978. This sequel is without any doubts a lot more original with way more creativity and this is what the first film should've been. If you were to put Michael Myers in a farm setting instead of Haddon-field then that's what you would have with the first Wicked One movie. You will notice in the first film that Collin Miller rides a horse, which is his source of transportation. In Halloween (1978) Michael Myers's transportation is an old station wagon car. Instead of a car for the first Wicked One we had the serial killer ride a horse. I'm not sure if Tory Jones didn't think that most most film buffs and horror fans wouldn't notice a difference, but yeah, we did notice a big difference in transportation. Wicked Ones is more original in a lot of ways, but there is a problem with this sequel, like the 1981 sequel Halloween II, Michael Myers doesn't drive a car in that movie, he's just travelling on foot to get around. Collin Miller doesn't ride his horse in Wicked Ones, so I do see a similar pattern here. That being said, the cinematography is way better, the acting is also much better, and the special effects are done wonderfully. The music for this sequel is also better than the first movie. Everything is a lot better this second time around. I really do hope that going forward Tory Jones does uses inspiration but he doesn't try to completely get an idea by practically copy another horror movie, but just change the setting and try to pass it off on his own. I'm letting the fact that Collin Miller was on foot in this sequel slide, because there are lots of other parts of this movie that I really enjoyed and had made up for that small similarity. I do want to point out that this is a good example of a crowdfunded horror film in which that when you raise more money and have a longer financing campaign going to get the funds to make the movie, it will for the majority of the time pay off. I do recommend Wicked Ones, you'll have to see the first movie in order to know what's going on and to get introduced to the characters, but just be aware that it's not at all as well done as the sequel. The only aspect in filmmaking that I give the first movie credit for, is having really good special effects and visual effects, but nothing beyond that. All horror fans and horror buffs should watch this sequel.
Written by
Bailey Giannini
(Film Buff, Cinephile & online film critic)
