- Directed by David R. Ellis
- Written by J. Mackie Gruber, Eric Bress, Jeffery Reddick
- Stars A.J. Cook, Ali Larter, Tony Todd
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 30 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rvajfn-S3EI
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
The chains of events that lead to deaths are complicated and don’t always go the way you’re expecting. Clear, survivor from the first movie, is back, and there’s a new batch of doomed people hoping to survive. It’s not a spoiler to say most of them don’t. But the fun is seeing who gets it and how and when. It was decently made. If you like the first one, you’ll probably like this one too.
Spoilery Synopsis
A news report tells us that it’s the one-year anniversary since the airplane crashed in the previous film. Forty students died on that plane, but all the students who didn’t board the plane also died. The guest on the show basically explains how Death itself came for those students as the credits roll. “No one can escape Death. Today may be your day to die.”
Kimberly and her friends are going on a trip. As they drive away, we see the car has been leaking something. The kids stop at a light as a homeless woman comes to the window and scares them. They get moving and drive past a school bus full of chanting students. We see various other cars, motorcycles, and other dangerous-looking things going on. Kimberly’s dad calls about the leak. A giant log truck passes them on the right as the young people panic about a cop following them. It’s quite involved in the setup for what we know is going to happen.
Suddenly, everything goes haywire all at once. The log truck loses a log which kills the cop and the motorcyclist. Another truck kills the stoner; a couple of families crash into logs and explode. One guy gets beheaded explosively. Kimberly’s car rolls over, and then another truck kills them all.
Kimberly looks at the homeless woman. All that was a vision. Kimberly knows what’s going to happen and blocks traffic instead. All the cars behind them are stopped as well, so everyone waits for the traffic to clear. Then the log truck drives by, and Kimberly tells the cop what’s going to happen. And then it does, killing lots of other people, including everyone in Kimberley’s car except for her.
Kimberley tells the cop that this might be just like that airplane crash thing last year. The police bring in all the people who survived the accident. Maybe Death will be coming for all of them now. Maybe it’s not over.
Evan, one of the survivors, only just won the lottery yesterday, so he goes home with his shopping and fixes dinner. The microwave shorts, which causes him to drop a ring in the sink. He gets his hand stuck in the drain because of his Rolex, and then the dinner on the stove catches on fire, setting off the smoke alarm. The whole kitchen catches on fire. He finally gets his hand out of the drain but can’t get out of the burning apartment. He breaks a window and goes down the fire escape as the apartment explodes about him. He almost dies a hundred different ways, but then the fire escape ladder falls on his head.
Thomas, the cop, researches freak accidents, especially the ones from the first film. Everyone from the accident watches the news, and they all recognize Evan, who was with them earlier.
Only Clear Rivers survived the events of the first film, but she’s been institutionalized. Kimberley goes to visit her. She’s been hiding away from Death for the past year; she’s in the asylum voluntarily with crazy safety measures. Kimberley tells her about her experience and is told that now she’ll be the last to die. Kimberley explains that’s not the way it’s been happening. Clear tells her to watch out for the signs of Death.
Thomas comes to Kimberley; the survivors all want to meet. Nora and Tim Carpenter, mother and son survivors, are next up, and Kimberly thinks they’ll be killed by… pigeons.
Tim goes to the dentist. We watch the fish in an aquarium in the waiting room as well as construction going on outside the office. A pigeon crashes into the window as the dentist gets to work. The doctor turns on the oxygen with the laughing gas, but an electrical short takes out the oxygen. With a hundred things going on at once, Tim chokes on a rubber fish– almost. As they leave in complete safety, Tim is squashed flat by the construction equipment.
Clear leaves the asylum and meets up with Kimberly and Thomas. They go to see Mr. Bludworth, the cemetery groundskeeper from the first film. He’s about to cremate Evan. Clear is certain they can beat Death, but Bludworth says no, you can’t. “Only new life can defeat Death. There’s a balance to everything.”
On the out, they stop for gas at the most deathtrappy gas station ever. They discuss what Bludworth said; they have to find the pregnant lady from the accident. Her new life can reset the death chain. Thomas works his police contacts to track her down.
Rory, one of the other survivors, almost gets his foot stuck in an elevator door. He shows up at a group meeting for the accident survivors, most of whom don’t believe any of this. Eugene tempts fate and nearly gets impaled by a kayak. Kat the businesswoman, is also skeptical, but Nora is a believer after what happened to her son.
On the way out, Eugene and Nora get on the elevator with a man with a basket of prosthetic arms. Rory gets a vision about “a man with hooks.” Things go badly for Nora. Eugene tries to kill himself, but it isn’t his time, so Death won’t allow it.
Isabella, the pregnant woman, is taken into protective custody. Suddenly, her water breaks, and the baby is on the way. Deputy Steve doesn’t have a squad car, so he takes her to the hospital in her van.
The survivors talk about previous near-death experiences, and many of them tied in with deaths from the previous film. All these people who died to save them were people from Flight 180. All those events caused ripples in Death’s design, and none of these people should be alive right now anyway.
The survivors’ car and the deputy’s car almost crash, but amazingly, none of the survivors dies. Eugene gets impaled, but he’s still alive. As the emergency crews arrive, we see things setting up for more carnage. Gasoline from a news truck leaks through a pipe which drips into the car where Cat is trapped. That doesn’t mean much, because she’s killed by an airbag deployment. She drops her lit cigarette, which causes the news van to explode, which causes a barbed wire fence to fly through the air and slice Rory into chunks.
Kimberly, Thomans, and Clear rush toward the hospital where Isabella is giving birth. At the same hospital, bad things happen to Eugene.
The baby is born, and the curse seems to be broken. Maybe Eugene’s not going to die from a ventilator failure after all. “It’s OK, it’s over!” Then Kimberly has another vision; now she thinks Isabella wasn’t meant to die in the accident after all.
Clear goes into Eugene’s room and the oxygen explodes, killing them both. Thomas and Kimberly look at her bloody hands, just like in her premonition. She’s seen herself in a white van drive into the lake next to the hospital and drown. “I have to die.”
Kimberly steals an ambulance and drives into the lake on purpose. Thomas dives in after her, but the doors are locked, and he can’t get her out in time. She dies.
One of the doctors from the hospital wakes Kimberly up with her crash cart. She did die, but not permanently. This is the new life that was needed to stop Death.
Some time later, Thomas and Kimberly have a picnic with her family. We find out that the chain continues as a grill explodes…
Brian’s Commentary
It’s “One Damned Thing After Another: The Movie.”
The original “Final Destination” (2000) can be found here. The whole film has a really weak story; the only reason to watch this is for the crazy, Rube-Goldberg deathtraps. They are really elaborate here, and sometimes, they’re just red herrings, but sometimes they aren’t.
Kevin’s Commentary
It troubles me that Clear was able to hide from Death by taking safety precautions and voluntarily isolating herself in a padded cell in a mental institution. As crazy as the chains of events that caused the fatalities were, Death could have found a way to get her. Everything else in the movie makes perfect sense though. It’s kind of crazy, but entertaining. A worthy sequel to the first one.