- Directed by Leigh Janiak
- Written by Phil Graziadei, Leigh Janiak, Kate Trefry
- Stars Kiana Madeira, Ashley Zukerman, Gillian Jacobs
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 54 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dj3CXY8rKuY
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
It suffers from what all three of the films do, a slow start. Using the same cast as ancestor characters in 1666 was an interesting choice that worked. Only the first part is set in the past, and the wrap up back in the modern time of the 1990s was more satisfying. There’s more to like than dislike about it. If you’ve watched the first two, you really need to see this one.
Spoilery Synopsis
We get a recap of the first two films, ending with Deena in the 1600s, in Sarah’s body. Sarah/Deena gets called in by Josh/Henry to help the pig give birth. Henry looks just like Josh from 1994. Credits roll.
As Sarah/Deena walks through town, we see that all the 1666 villagers look like actors from the previous two films. She stops to talk to Hannah, the pastor’s daughter, who looks like Samantha. Thomas is the town lunatic. Sarah takes a baby pig to Solomon, who looks like Nick from the future; they’re engaged.
Sarah, Hannah, and Lizzie go to see The Widow in the woods, and Sarah finds the old woman’s book of spells. They soon get thrown out, and instead, they eat berries by the fire before making out with each other.
In the morning, Hannah tells Sarah that her father’s lost his mind. Something may have possessed him. Hannah’s mother suspects that Sarah and Hannah have been wicked together, and they might get blamed for her father’s insanity. Sarah’s indiscretions get spread all over town.
Henry reports that the mother pig has eaten all her babies, so Sarah kills it with an axe. When the well gets contaminated, everyone starts looking for a witch. Sarah and Solomon talk about how she didn’t invite the devil to town.
Suddenly, there’s a scream. The pastor has gone crazy and locked all the children, including Henry, inside the church with him. Solomon breaks down the door and finds all the children dead. Thomas continues to scream that it’s all witchcraft. Hannah and Sarah’s fooling around comes up again; everyone saw them making out.
Sarah runs off into the woods as the villagers search. Hannah is caught and chained up in the barn. Everyone thinks they summoned the witch, so why not make it true? Sarah wants to make a deal with the devil to save them both. Sarah runs to the Widow’s house and finds her dead.
Sarah hides in the basement of Solomon’s house and finds a whole stone pentagram set up. Turns out, he’s the one who’s been doing the black magic all along. The two soon get into a physical fight, and she stabs him. He chases her toward that big throbbing thing in the tunnels, which was there already in 1666.
Solemn catches Sarah and cuts her hand off. He catches up and turns her over to the villagers, claiming she’s the witch. They’re taken out to the hanging tree and ordered to confess. Sarah confesses to being a witch, taking the blame off Hannah.
As Solomon chains her up for the hanging, she curses him and his whole family. They hang her and bury her there under the tree.
Later, her friends moved the body out to the woods in a secret grave. We see how the curse has affected the people in 1978, 1994, and other times.
Back in 1994, Deena wakes up, having buried Sarah’s hand with the body. Nick Goode, Solomon’s descendant, arrives on the scene. Deena tells Josh that Nick is the real bad guy here. “Goode is evil,” she explains; Sarah was never really a witch. We get flashes of the modern Nick Goode doing a ritual to add names to the Devil’s list. It keeps their family on top in the town of Sunnyvale.
We cut to the cellar-blob, which is now spawning bad things. Deena and Josh go back to Ziggy’s place, where Sam is still tied up. They tell her the whole story about evil Nick, who knew the truth all along. They can’t kill the devil, but they can kill Nick.
The group enlists Martin, the mall’s janitor, to help them. They plan to lure the possessed monsters into the mall and lock them behind the security gates. They use Deena’s blood to lure the monsters to the mall as they do a “preparing for battle” montage with a lot of black-light spray paint.
The deputies show up and arrest everyone, until the undead murder monsters show up and kill both cops. Skullface, the Halloween killer, The Milkman, and some others walk right into the stores and get trapped as planned.
Sheriff Goode arrives on the scene, and he knows that they know what’s been going on. He arrives and faces off with Ziggy, whom he saved all those years ago. They douse him with Deanna’s blood and then release the monsters.
Nick gets stabbed but runs away. Deena follows him down into the tunnels that seem to be under the whole town. Josh, Ziggy, and Martin shoot the monsters with Deena’s blood, and they kill each other, but they also know that’s not going to last. Sam escapes and follows Deena into the tunnels.
Nick and Deena come to the pulsing blob. Upstairs, Ruby and the masked child show up, and Josh uses the axe on them– the dead monsters start to reawaken.
Nick stabs Deena, but she makes him touch the blob, which is really distracting for him. Deena stabs him in the eye, and all the monsters upstairs vanish at the same time. The evil blob melts into a puddle.
Deena helps Sam up; she’s gonna be fine now. They walk out through Nick’s living room, past a poster of his many-branched family tree. As they go outside, a garbage truck rams a car on the street; Sunnyvale isn’t so perfect anymore…
We get a few minutes of the characters tying up loose ends.
Brian’s Commentary
Using the same actors to play characters in different time periods was stolen straight outta “Dark Shadows” (1966), but we don’t see that happen very often, so we’ll call it a good feature here.
All three of these films take entirely too long to get to the meat. They’re really slow for the first 45 minutes, and that’s true for all three. Each part feels like it’s been stretched out for maybe 30 minutes extra for some reason.
Still, it ended well, although the first half, from 1666, took way too long.
Kevin’s Commentary
I’m going to go with the second half of this one, back in 1994, as the best segment of all three movies. I thought the wrap-up, bringing it all together, was satisfying. My biggest complaint would be it is a bit too stretched out. I wouldn’t call the whole trilogy great, but I didn’t hate it, and there were many entertaining bits.