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'Happy Death Day 2U' a sequel that wears its welcome
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Watch your back: A masked assassin lurks behind Tree Gelbman (Jessica Rothe). (Universal Pictures/-)
Happy Death Day 2U, the sequel to Happy Death Day (2017), seems doomed from the start.
The conceit of Happy Death Day, written and directed by Christopher Landon, wears out its novelty in the sequel.
Like the film Groundhog Day or new Netflix series Russian Doll, Happy Death Day features a time loop in which the main character wakes up and relives the same day over and over again.
In Happy Death Day, Tree Gelbman (Jessica Rothe), at first a heavy-drinking, rude university student, wakes up and gets murdered by a masked killer, which restarts her day, forcing her to face the same killer.
The first thing Landon does this time around is explain the loop, which occurs as a result of a machine that Ryan Phan (Phi Vu) built with his friends Samar (Suraj Sharma) and Dre (Sarah Yarkin).
The machine manipulates time — it either slows it down or does something else.
In Happy Death Day 2U, an accident with the machine forces Tree to return to her loop from the first film, which means she loses her relationship with Carter (Israel Broussard). This is where Happy Death Day 2U picks up steam, as it not only gets Tree killed again, which slowly eats away at her health, but it makes her confront what she has lost in going back.
Tree’s adversary is less murderous and much kinder this time; from a dean (Steve Zissis) that tries to shut the machine down, to the reality that she has now. Rothe as Tree, who is forced to examine herself, showcases brilliant dramatic acting skills. This is a high point for a film that feels like a retread of the original.
Happy Death Day is a college-centric comedy. This makes its slasher billing a little misleading — it has all the trappings of a slasher but is not fully fleshed out as one. In the sequel, the comedy aspect is heightened.
One of the funnier scenes in the film has to do with the fact that Tree needs to figure out a specific algorithm that necessitates a montage in which Tree is constantly getting herself killed – from jumping off a helicopter in a bikini to drinking poison in public.
Leaving the time loop as too much of a mystery for a second time would have been a mistake, so Happy Death Day 2U does the right thing by offering a bit of an explanation.
However, the main conceit itself gets tiring fast.
It also does not help that, save for Tree, who exhibits growth, and the loyal Carter, none of the characters really stand out as a fully fledged.
There are reports that this series will get a third film and judging only from Happy Death Day 2U, which makes its own convincing case that the series has not overstayed its welcome, this is not exactly encouraging news. (hdt)
