Final Destination Bloodlines review: Multi-generational horror revitalises this slasher franchise

May 13, 20253 Mins Read

Final Destination Bloodlines (R21)

110 minutes, opens on May 15
★★★★☆

The story: The sixth instalment in the slasher franchise follows college student Stefani (Kaitlyn Santa Juana), who is failing her classes because of recurring nightmares about a mass death event. She returns home to investigate the source of the dreams, which involve her grandmother Iris (Gabrielle Rose) and a catastrophe she may have averted in 1968, helping bring into existence generations which might not otherwise have existed. Death will find a way to wipe them out, unless Stefani and her brother Charlie (Teo Briones) thwart the process.

The Final Destination movies (2000 to present) are popular, but have not scaled the heights of horror fandom the way other series have, for a couple of reasons. Their tone is pessimistic, for one thing. And they do not have a villain with a face to use in jump scares or movie posters.

Because they revel in disaster set pieces, which presumably eat up much of their budget, they skimp on other areas, such as by using young unknowns in the cast and a utilitarian visual style.

These weaknesses are strengths, in the right hands. Final Destination Bloodlines plays to its main strength, that of the shock value of Death’s unexpected appearance, in ways that are as blackly funny as they are surprising.

As in previous films, Death is the faceless villain claiming the lives of those who have escaped a catastrophic event because, as the canon states, it hates the idea of being cheated.

The opening scenes traditionally contain a catastrophe that sets Death’s machinations in motion – in the past, bridges have collapsed, passenger jets have blown up and race cars have crashed, usually presaged by a deliciously drawn-out chain of tiny coincidences that result in mass carnage.

This time, Bloodlines’ creators have opted for a set-up that feels more elaborate and layered – the opening gorefest is pretty, instead of simply perfunctory.

Without giving too much away, the curtain-raising set piece is drenched in 1960s aesthetics, adding layers of fresh poignancy to the inevitable mayhem that follows.

The film’s title points to the death curse being passed down, another fresh development in the franchise. Instead of college-age characters biting the dust, three generations of an extended family are in Death’s crosshairs.

Co-directors Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein (science-fiction thriller Freaks, 2018), newcomers to the series, do a good job of maintaining the grisly tenor of the movies while nudging it out of its comfort zone, that of teens and young adults coming to grief in freak accidents.

Bloodlines, however, fails to fix the perennial problem of poor dialogue, a weakness that plagues scenes involving Stefani trying to convince family members that the death curse exists. A couple of high-fatality sequences are also compromised by the use of less-than-convincing computer-generated graphics that undermine their intensity.

But these are minor quibbles. In darkly humorous set pieces that are as nasty as they are clever about exploiting mechanophobia – think big machines with gaping maws – Lipovsky and Stein ratchet up the tension masterfully, showing their deep understanding of the franchise rule: What matters is not why people die, but how.

Hot take: Members of an average suburban family are stalked by Death as repayment for an ancestor’s sin, but over-the-top set pieces will see viewers laughing even as they cringe in horror.