The premise of “Final Destination” is delightfully easy: If you happen to one way or the other handle to cheat loss of life, the grim reaper will declare your soul via a collection of deadly, Rube Goldberg-esque traps. However like so many different long-running horror franchises, the principles that information the “Final Destination” universe have develop into more and more sophisticated over time.
In 2003, “Final Destination 2” launched the idea of “new life,” as an antidote to loss of life (extra on that later), whereas “Final Destination 5” revealed that its doomed protagonists may kill harmless individuals to steal their remaining lifespans.
To be honest, not each film within the collection is as preoccupied with these guidelines, however “Final Destination Bloodlines,” which hits theaters Friday, is weirdly obsessive about them. Within the course of, it’s damaged an important one.
What’s The Plot Of ‘Final Destination Bloodlines’?
Like each nice “Final Destination” film, “Bloodlines” begins with an enormous, lethal set piece. On this case, it’s the 1968 grand opening of the fictional Skyview Restaurant, a hovering tower of metal, concrete and glass. We observe Iris (Brec Bassinger) as she and her boyfriend attend the opening-night occasion and die in a tragic accident that kills a whole lot and brings the tower crashing down.
Besides, as is often the case in these films, that preliminary scene was only a premonition. Iris sees your entire lethal occasion play out forward of time and manages to save lots of everyone. After all, Dying has different plans.
Over the next many years, Dying meticulously kills every one that ought to have perished that night time. And since the method takes so lengthy, Dying has to take out their youngsters and grandchildren, too. For Iris, which means her two middle-aged youngsters and a brood of young-adult grandkids. This brings us to the current day, the place the film takes place.
It’s a compelling premise, and a intelligent new twist on the franchise, which usually focuses on a gaggle of high-school college students reasonably than a household. However there’s only one little drawback, and it boils down to 2 phrases: New life.
The Guidelines Of ‘Final Destination’
Most “Final Destination” films embrace a pivotal scene the place a spooky mortician named William Bludworth (Tony Todd) exhibits up and explains what’s occurring. In “Final Destination 2,” that features the revelation that if one of many survivors provides start to a toddler, it’s going to cease loss of life in his tracks.
“Solus novus anima licet evinco mortis; only new life can defeat death,” Bludworth explains within the second “Final Destination” installment. “The introduction of life that was not meant to be, a soul forbidden to roam the earth, that could invalidate death’s list, shatter its very existence.”
A lot of “Final Destination 2” revolves round this idea, although it in the end fails to save lots of them. As an alternative, it’s when one of many protagonists drowns after which is resuscitated that “invalidates death’s list” on the finish of that film. (In “Final Destination 5,” Todd returns to clarify the entire lifespan-stealing factor, which is truthfully too disturbing to take severely, even throughout the “Final Destination” universe.)
So it’s notable that, when Todd seems in “Final Destination Bloodlines,” in a posthumous function he filmed earlier than dying of most cancers in November 2024, his character by no means mentions “new life.” As an alternative, he reveals all the opposite established methods to cheat loss of life, both completely or quickly.
Why the omission? Properly, the apparent cause is that your entire film hinges on “new life” not stopping loss of life. Since “Final Destination Bloodlines” is all in regards to the grim reaper chasing after the youngsters and grandchildren of the survivors of the Skyview Restaurant, it wouldn’t make sense for the existence of these youngsters to shatter loss of life’s checklist within the first place.
It’s a irritating plot gap in an in any other case well-constructed scary film. However right here’s the factor in regards to the “Final Destination” films: no person ever actually escapes loss of life.
On the finish of every installment, a small group of survivors might imagine they’ve made it out alive, however like several good thriller, the story all the time ends with one final scare — a reminder that loss of life by no means provides up.
