After 14 years, the Final Destination franchise is back in cinemas with the newest installment, “Final Destination: Bloodlines.” However, this film is an example that some franchises should be left in the past. The film has some interesting moments in between and with great and clever kills that might be some of the best in the franchise, but the constant use of computer generated imagery (CGI) ruins them. This does ruin the film experience because the main point of these films is to see characters die in the most random and yet interesting ways to get the audience to laugh and or have a reaction of disgust.
The film opens in the 1960s, set to a disaster at a high-rise restaurant, a scene that offers many gory kills that work as a dark comedy, but are quickly ruined by the usage of CGI. After this scene is over, it is revealed that it was a dream experienced by modern-day college student Stefani Reyes, and it causes her to try and figure out why death has targeted her family and how she can stop it. This serves as the narrative device for a plot that deals with curses and unfinished business with death.
The plot in this film is different compared to other Final Destination films, because it involves a broken family that has come together to try and find a way to stop the deaths in their family. The films also mostly revolve around random people — high school students in particular — who have cheated death before and must cheat it again.
This change to the story is interesting and one that could work with better writers because the execution is a mixed result. There are many scenes in this film with conflicted emotions. One scene can have a very serious tone with a heartwarming moment with certain family members, and immediately get cut with an over-the-top death scene.
The film tries to get the audience to care about the characters in the film, and it only works to some degree. It’s hard to get invested in the characters because they can randomly die at any moment in the film. While it can be entertaining, it still leaves the audience to just move on to the next character and wait for the next death to happen. Compared to other Final Destination films, this installment is one of the better ones, but that isn’t saying much.
The other problem that this film has is the pacing. After each death, the audience is left wanting more, but it takes a long time between kills to focus on the characters. While this would be good to focus on the characters and give them more time to develop, the problem is that the characters aren’t interesting, and this causes the audience to lose interest in the story and in what is being shown on screen.
Verdict: “Final Destination: Bloodlines” isn’t a bad film, but it isn’t a good one either. The film has some moments of creativity and interest with the gory deaths, but besides that, there isn’t much that this film offers. It’s more worthwhile to just watch one of the old films on streaming services.
