Film Review: Final Destination - Bloodlines
Death Runs In The Family
INTRODUCTION
This is a quick review of the newly released film Final Destination: Bloodlines. Please note that this is just one of the many movies I will have watched each year, and my initial grade for this film may change over time, for better or worse. To stay up to date on my thoughts about other movies and any potential changes in my opinion on this one, follow me on Letterboxd.
If you enjoy these reviews, I’d greatly appreciate it if you could share this newsletter with family and friends who might love receiving film reviews, classic movie lists, and Oscars projections straight to their inbox.
PLOT
Via Letterboxd: Plagued by a violent recurring nightmare, college student Stefanie heads home to track down the one person who might be able to break the cycle and save her family from the grisly demise that inevitably awaits them all.
REVIEW
WARNING: Light spoilers ahead.
Up until just this past week, I had never actually sat down and watched any of the Final Destination films.
Sure, I was aware of them. I vividly remember being in fifth grade and 11 year old me being glued to the TV during the trailers for the first movie, intrigued, as one of those kids who saw horror films that they shouldn't had yet, by the hype surrounding its premise - the idea that the “slasher” wasn’t some masked killer, but death itself, coming back for revenge after someone had the audacity to cheat him out of multiple souls. Over the years, bits and pieces of the movies would flicker across my TV screen, but I never gave the series a proper, start-to-finish watch. Even non-professional cinephiles who watch more movies than the average person have their blind spots, franchises that, for whatever reason, just never grabbed them.
But times have changed. I’m now a film critic with a newsletter and a podcast mic right next to my laptop. And with the first new entry in the series in 15 years, Final Destination: Bloodlines, about to drop, it felt like the right time to finally dive in and binge the entire franchise. So that’s exactly what I did. And, well, I definitely have some thoughts, about the series as a whole, and about this new chapter in particular.
The core premise of this franchise, that a group of young people, usually fresh out of high school or college, are trying to outwit and outrun death itself, is, at least on paper, a riveting concept with loads of potential. There’s so much room to explore. These films flirt with some genuinely heavy themes - the inevitability of death, the randomness of when and how it comes, and the quiet (or not-so-quiet) panic that settles in when you realize that God doesn’t give get a warning, a reason, or a reprieve. It’s rich ground for existential questions; the kind of stuff that, if handled right, could leave a moviegoer walking out of the theater a little shaken, maybe even a little more aware of their own fragile place in the world.
And then there are the questions the premise naturally raises. What does it really mean to cheat death? Is there a loophole in the cosmic system, some hidden pattern our heroes have accidentally stumbled into? How long can someone actually delay the inevitable? And what about those premonitions? Are they simply random flashes of fate, or is there another force at work? Maybe something or someone actively trying to counterbalance death. A god of life, perhaps? A guardian force? These are the kinds of ideas that practically beg for deeper exploration, the sort of lore-building that could give a horror franchise a mythology to rival any of the genre’s heavy hitters.
Unfortunately, now having seen them all, the Final Destination franchise has tended to leave me wanting when it comes to all of those bigger, more intriguing ideas I just opined about. To its credit, it does make an effort to build some lore; there are patterns to how death operates, hints at flaws in such a pattern, and theories about how to cheat the system. But when it comes to the why behind any of it, especially the recurring premonitions that kick off each film, the series largely shrugs. These psychic visions just happen. No explanation, no deeper mythos, just characters repeatedly telling each other to “read the signs!” like that’s supposed to cover it.
What we get, instead, is a strict adherence to a formula. Someone has a premonition and saves a group of people who were supposed to die in some massive catastrophe. Then death comes after them one by one, in increasingly elaborate and outlandish fashion, following the original order they were meant to die in. Somewhere along the way, the survivors think they’ve figured out a new loophole or a way to reset the rules. And then, twist!, they die anyway. Unable to escape death’s cold grip. The end. Rinse, repeat.
Call it a spoiler if you want, but that’s the basic shape of nearly every single film in the franchise, save for one (and even that one still ticks most of the same boxes). There are occasional attempts to shake things up; a new wrinkle in death’s design, a finale twist clever enough to spark some post-credits buzz; but for the most part, if you’ve seen one of these movies, I feel like you’ve basically seen them all.
So, what about Final Destination: Bloodlines? Does it shake things up enough to stand apart from its predecessors? To some extent, it does. I’ll give the film credit for at least trying to bring something new to the table. This time around, the group of unlucky souls trying to outrun death isn’t just a bunch of random classmates or coworkers, it’s a family. That alone adds a slightly different dynamic, and with it comes a new rule that even the offspring of those who were saved by a premonition aren’t safe; because technically, they were never supposed to be born in the first place. It’s a smart expansion of the franchise’s internal logic, one of the few times where it felt like the mythology was actually evolving.
The film also justifies its status as the longest entry in the series by padding things out with a bit of familial drama. Unfortunately, while the idea is promising, the execution is incredibly surface-level. To be fair, that’s been a consistent issue across the franchise, supporting characters rarely get arcs deeper than a puddle, and Bloodlines doesn’t buck that trend.
That said, there are moments worth praising. Tony Todd’s traditional cameo is handled with real care this time, and knowing now that it marks his final role, it hits especially hard. It’s a fitting, well-executed farewell for a horror icon who’s been one of the most consistent, and, for me, few compelling elements of the series.
And of course, if you're here for the kills; which, let’s be honest, is why most people show up, you won’t be disappointed. The film delivers on the franchise's signature promise of outlandishly elaborate, mean-spirited deaths. The buildup to each one is filled with that delicious tension the series nails, where every object in the room becomes a potential murder weapon. There are plenty of “cringe in your seat and look away” moments that will leave even seasoned horror fans squirming.
But at the end of the day, this is still a Final Destination movie, and like the rest, it clings to the same tired formula. You know the drill by now - there’s a premonition, the characters start dropping one by one in gruesome fashion, a possible loophole is discovered, and then you know the rest. Rinse, repeat. Aside from the familial angle, which admittedly adds a fresh wrinkle, nothing here really felt like a meaningful departure from what we’ve already seen time and time again.
That’s what makes the wave of glowing praise for Bloodlines feel a bit disorienting for me. It’s left me in the odd position of being the outlier, the one person at the party not quite feeling the vibe. And that’s not typically where I land, especially when it comes to these big studio genre flicks. But with this one? I just kept thinking, I’ve already seen this movie. five times before.
It pains me to be the party pooper here, but I’ve got to give Final Destination: Bloodlines a mediocre grade of C+. As much as I can respect the effort to shake things (a little bit) up with a fresh plot beat, and while this is easily a step up from the weaker sequels, it’s still, at its core, the same movie we’ve seen before. The beats are all too familiar, the surprises feel prepackaged, and the franchise’s refusal to fully evolve is wearing thin with me.
Plenty of folks seem to be genuinely thrilled with this installment, and I wish I were on that train. But I can’t help feeling underwhelmed, like I’m watching a franchise stuck in a loop, just like its doomed characters. I’m really hoping that if the series continues, it finds the courage to break free from its template storytelling and finally explore the bigger, weirder, more ambitious ideas it’s been flirting with for over two decades now.
GRADING
