Search - Hellbound: Hellraiser II on DVD

Decent Opening, Confusing 2nd Half

The JuRK | Our Vast, Cultural Desert | 06/13/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"I watched HELLBOUND: HELLRAISER 2 last night and...it made about as much sense as the first time I saw it.

The opening was interesting and it was nice to see Ashley Laurence back, but the movie carries on with a conventional horror structure without thinking through the Hellraiser landscape.

Kirsty, Ashley's character, charges into the alternate universe to rescue her father. But armed with what? Everyone else is easily massacred but Kirsty is completely impervious to everything. Why? Does she have something special or has she tapped into some power to combat the evil? Not really. She's the lead character so she's never really threatened. And the reason she went charging in is pretty much discarded and never resolved.

There's a brief and disappointing "battle" between the Cenobites and the new Cenobite on the block, but it's over before you have any idea of what just happened. Looked cool.

Also good to see Clare Higgins back...but what exactly was she in this?

In the second half, I just went along for the ride since things happened that didn't make a lot of sense. These movies have a cool concept...but I don't think they've really thought things through. They think of cool images and scenes but they never really applied a lot of logic to them."