It’s a smorgasbord of killers, but not all of them are up to the challenge of upping the body count. Let’s find out which ones disappointed.
AXES AND Os (2024)
While this is a fun slasher flick that takes place on Valentine’s Day weekend, everything is underdeveloped about the story, including the fact that it is Valentine’s Day weekend.
There’s a great hook for the killer—he was rejected on Valentine’s Day as a kid, so now when he kills, he rips out the heart of his victim and holds it up triumphantly. But that only occurs a few times instead of after every kill! Like, that should be his MO! It would have been even better if he’d left a facsimile of the card he handed to the girl that rejected him on every victim, but sadly, that doesn’t happen. And finally, this killer doesn’t wear a mask. He’s just a big, bearded backwoods dude.
But it’s not as simple as that. A group of girls heads to a rental house for a Galentine’s weekend at Valentine Lake after one of them is jilted by her boyfriend. Our two main girls are sisters, but only through adoption in one of the most crucial yet underdeveloped plot points of the film. The younger sister has nightmares of someone strapped to a hospital bed going crazy, and when she asks about her natural mother, her sister gives a half-assed answer. Nothing is ever clarified, yet it is absolutely essential to the final act of the film that this information be supplied. Since it’s not, the movie really makes no sense and leaves you trying to fill in the gaps.
See, this is one of those films that blends genres. I don’t know exactly why there’s a feral character…or experiment gone wrong…or vampire (?)…that comes to fight the killer at the end of the film, but that’s what we get.
We also get the usual. Cops on the case because there have been killings before. An obsessed character that is determined to take down the killer. A suspicious landlord the girls rent from who seems to be tied to the killer (another underdeveloped subplot). A bikini montage. An awkward attempt at simulating a hetero sex scene (the hubby and I both laughed, because there’s no way straight intercourse works that way).
And, of course the kills. The killer is named the Axeman, so it’s all axe, all the time. They’re not bad death scenes, and the few with heart extraction are even better, but CGI blood splashes that are used in every kill cheapen things a bit.
The highlight for me is indie horror queen Jamie Bernadette, who at one point takes a stance against the killer that’s almost like a meta moment in which she’s telegraphing that she’s an old pro at this. Her choice of fighting back makes for an unforgettable moment in an otherwise forgettable Valentine’s Day horror flick. Either way, it earns a spot on the holiday horror page.
EVIL NUN (2025)
How do you start a killer nun movie? A nun screaming her head off while giving birth by the altar in a church and then getting the axe.
Good start to a less than good movie.
Next, we meet a group of young people whose van breaks down in a Mexico desert.
Would you believe there’s no phone service out here?
As they set off on foot to look for help, they talk about a legend of a nun who had an immaculate conception in a church. Both she and the child disappeared, and now the nun haunts the church.
Sooooo…why not go take shelter in the first church they come across in a ghost town? Like…it’s a town. You could have chosen any other building.
Things get weird in the church, one good girl who is very religious starts seeing a demon nun, there’s one satisfying kill, the good girl gets possessed by the nun, and the nun demands they find her child if they want the girl back. Blah blah blah blah blah.
There’s really not a lot going on here, and that includes kills. The group finds and reads the nun’s diary and learns the truth about her delicate situation. The nun leads them to underground tunnels to find her body. No one else dies until a priest shows up and the nun is not happy about it. It’s just really bland.
THE KNOCK KNOCK MAN (2025)
A 75-minute movie from the director of Halloween at Aunt Ethel’s? I’m so in!
The Knock Knock Man is one cool and creepy killer, however he doesn’t have many victims at his disposal. I guess there are just enough to fill the short runtime, though. Dare I say I wish the movie had been perhaps fifteen minutes longer and delivered at least one more death scene?
A great little tale is told about the killer’s origins in some brief opening text. Some kind of visual narrative—perhaps eerie illustrations—would have been a fun alternative that could have enhanced the impact instead of making the backstory feel like an afterthought.
The opening kill does leave an impression though, introducing us to the creep when he appears in a girl’s peephole and then mangles her face.
Next, we meet our main group of five friends. No time is wasted in getting them to a lake house. There aren’t even any partying montages. After a quick dip in the water and a little dabbling in a game of Truth or Dare, it’s right on to someone suggesting they play the Knock Knock Man game.
This is like Bloody Mary meets Talk to Me, and it’s an effective concept. The group sits around a door on the floor and calls upon the Knock Knock Man. One person knocks on the door and momentarily goes into a brief trance. While in this other state of consciousness, they see a door. There’s a knock. They open the door. They stare into the face of the Knock Knock Man. They return to reality.
Problem is, one person is too scared to play by the rules, and before long, the Knock Knock Man has slipped into their world. Eek! He’s cool and calculated in his approach to victims, and he does some gruesome damage, which is why I wish there were more kills.
The idea of the Knock Knock Man showing up at your door gets a bit lost in the shuffle (not everyone falls victim to a knock on their door), but there are some good chases, no time is wasted in the kids coming up with a plan to conquer the killer, and the final battle isn’t drawn out or overblown. It’s neat, tidy, and left open for a sequel. Yay!
VHS SUMMER CAMP (2026)
How to make a cacophony of confusion out of a 72-minute, supposed love letter to 80s slashers. I can’t even comprehend what they were going for here. The slashing is the last thing on the mind of this sloppy script.
A group of kids comes to clean up an old campsite. One girl keeps seeing a ghost in the woods. Another dude keeps seeing prophetic clips on a videotape in his room.
The woman who owns the place is on the hunt for a witch. Supposedly, one of the girls in the group of friends is unknowingly the key to the owner becoming a powerful witch.
The owner performs a ritual in which she makes her hot daddy husband into a killer.
He does just that, and eventually he tries to make it all make sense in a piece of dialogue telling one girl in the group why she’s tied to both this place and the ghost girl in the woods.
And finally, there’s another creepy dude who appears once in a while carrying a machete without saying a word or killing anyone. He then simply pops up at the end to kill the killer.
We never do see any witches.
Here’s a note to scriptwriters. You have to choose wisely when deciding which plot elements of your story don’t need to be explained. It can’t be all of them.
