by Hudson Moura
Ready or Not 2: Here I Come (dir. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett) begins exactly where the first film ends, returning immediately to the survivor-bride who escaped the Lomas family’s lethal “honeymoon night.” If the original’s premise was a single family’s ritualized hunt, the sequel expands the game into a broader, quasi-global contest: multiple families—linked by a secret society with explicitly infernal, Satanic overtones—now dispute the prey as both trophy and prize. The chase remains the engine, but the film’s escalation is organizational: what was once domestic becomes networked, suggesting a tradition that is less eccentric than systemic.
Samara Weaving returns as the bride, still the film’s emotional and tonal anchor. Her performance continues to operate in the register that made the first film distinctive: panic pushed into dark comedy, survival as improvisational intelligence, fear constantly edging into disgust and disbelief. Yet Ready or Not 2 complicates the formula by attaching her to a second “prey”—her sister, played by another well-known horror performer. On paper, the shift from one hunted woman to two should broaden the film’s rhythms and relational stakes. In practice, the pairing is uneven: the two have sharply distinct acting styles and tonal energies that do not always mesh, producing a mismatch that blunts what could have been the sequel’s most interesting new dynamic.
The casting elsewhere is, by contrast, a consistent pleasure. David Cronenberg is priceless as the patriarch—an inspired choice whose mere presence feels like a meta-blessing for a contemporary horror franchise. He brings a gravitas and perversely measured authority that suits the film’s ritualistic mythology. Elijah Wood and Sarah Michelle Gellar add further texture, lending the ensemble an amused competence that fits the film’s tone: horror performed with a wink, violence delivered with theatrical precision.
Importantly, the film is less interested in being genuinely scary than in sustaining a particular genre cocktail: gore plus dark humour plus chase mechanics. Its pleasures are visceral and comedic rather than suspenseful. For fans of the first installment, that continuity will likely be reassuring: the sequel retains the same taste for excess and the same willingness to puncture terror with punchlines. And if the film’s expanded mythology sometimes feels like escalation for escalation’s sake—more families, more rules, more elaborate secrecy—the final joke confirms that the filmmakers still understand the franchise’s core: survival is not only physical, but tonal. The film may not terrify, but it reliably delivers the gory, deadpan fun that made Ready or Not a cult-friendly hit in the first place.
Rating: 3.2/5