John’s Horror Corner: Fright Night 2 (2013), a non-sequel filled with bloody boobs paying no proper homage to the 1985 original or the 2011 remake.

MY CALL:  Not at all a sequel, rather this reimagining relies on our love of the original Fright Night (1985) while offering a new perspective to our vamp’s origins.  Not very good, but moderately entertaining.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Fright Night 2:  Well, you should really see Fright Night (1985) and Fright Night II (1988). Maybe even the Fright Night (2011) remake, which offers a lot in the way of cast performance but little in the way of satisfying effects.

Director Eduardo Rodriguez (Stash House, El Gringo) does not get off to a promising start.  After a very “direct-to-video” opening vampire sequence, we meet a class of college students studying abroad in Romania.  Among them are Charley Brewster (Will Payne), his ex-girlfriend Amy (Sacha Parkinson), and his rude friend Evil Ed (Chris Waller; The Sleeping Room, Inbred).

If, at this point, you feel a glimmer of hope that this will continue the story of 2011’s Fright Night, you’d be wrong.  This is not Charley’s continued story after surviving 2011’s undead events in Las Vegas.  These are totally unrelated characters of the same names or, in alternate perspective, they are the same characters in a different universe reliving a “similar” chain of events as our much better casts did in 1985, 1988 and 2011.  In other words, this is really in no way a sequel.  More a reimagining.  And, as such, a most unwowing Peter Vincent (Sean Power) now hosts a reality Monster Hunters TV show and Gerri Dandridge (Jaime Murray; Dexter, Spartacus: Gods of the Arena) is a female Romanian professor of European Art History who engages in lesbian vampire sex scenes that feel more gratuitous than in the sexual spirit of vampirism.

This movie echoes some of the iconic scenes of the original Fright Night (1985)—e.g., Charley’s neighborly voyeurism and Ed’s encounters with the main characters. Our Gerri, much as 1985’s Chris Sarandon, also takes every opportunity to let Charley live…although I can’t surmise why until it is blatantly explained to Amy (and the audience) in the form of some needlessly elaborate “vampire blood prophecy malarkey” shoehorned through the characters’ mouths.  And speaking of malarkey, blood and boobs is the name of the game here. There are silly over-dramatizations, drippy baths of blood, a heavy dose of gratuitous nudity, some messy blood spurts, nonsensically long strip club scenes, a montage of Charley freaking out, and a vampire battle royale as our “prophecy” unfolds before our lobotomized eyes.

We learn that Bram Stoker’s Dracula was a mix of Elizabeth Bathory and Vlad the Impaler.  Gerri’s play on Bathory was obviously nothing to the historic The Countess (2009)—which was much classier than the blood-soaked boobs of this non-sequel—but Gerri (and Jaime Murray’s performance) remains the best aspect of this movie.  The coolest parts involved her abilities to shadow walk (as in Subspecies and Bram Stoker’s Dracula) and using her bat affinity for sonar (which I don’t even think I’ve seen in a vampire movie before).  She looked sleek and sexy and, not that it’s a bad thing, but her vamp style reminded of 30 Days of Night (2007) or Blade (1998). The most redeeming scene (in its entirety) of the film was actually its comic-style animation flashback explaining her origins.

Most other critical elements failed.  All dialogue in Evil Ed’s scenes were bad, the action largely sucked (and I don’t know why there were so many “fight scenes”), the CGI was obvious (an intestinal explosion and a gooey melting scene), Ed’s fake fangs were so bulky it muffled his speech, and the gore make-up (an eye gauge and Evil Ed’s melted pizza face) was really just so-so most of the time.  I guess they tried…it just wasn’t really enough for me.

Although Gerri’s final transformation was moderately entertaining…and, for some reason, the latex monster had demon boobs!  Like an alien demon beast (that could have been from any random movie)… with no clothes…and boobs!  What’s with this movie and boobs?  LOL.

Yes…like it or not, you see this thing’s boobs.

This movie had so much nudity (for a sequel to a mainstream movie, anyway), it’s trailer should have just been blood-speckled boobs and Gerri being a sleek badass.  This “non-sequel” is dumb. The premise was wasted on this reimagining and should have been used for a more serious standalone vampire film rather than a direct-to-video sequel (that really isn’t a sequel) of a remake.  And while a few scenes and depictions actually had some heart, they were surrounded by so much drivel they were easily forgotten in the wake of eye-rolling stupidity.

But, hey. Loads of boobs, blood and badness mean that you could make a solid Bad Movie Tuesday evening with your friends. To be fair, knowing this movie is awful is the best way to enjoy it.