Leave it to 90s horror to make a 4-film franchise out of an already unimpressive movie from 1990 (my blog here) and drag it through the decade, even after Scream reinvigorated the genre. Here’s what you can expect from the three sequels.
MIRROR MIRROR 2: RAVEN DANCE (1994)
If you remember Tracy Wells of the awful Mr. Belvedere sitcom of the late 80s, here she is as the lead girl, who comes to live at a Catholic orphanage. She becomes enamored with a mirror in her room because it is the only thing she can see following a punk rock band being zapped into oblivion after they tease her and she wishes them gone.
And that is the last we ever hear of the boys.
Veronica Cartwright is a nun who was also blinded by the killer mirror, but she’s still around and for whatever reason has not put a stop to the mirror. Sally Kellerman is Tracy’s evil stepsister (say what???), who teams up with Roddy McDowall to make this as cheesy and campy as possible.
Tracy is now a blind dancer, and every time she twirls around to a song that sounds like it came from 1989, bad things happen. At all other times, she’s roaming the orphanage to a whimsical horror score that sounds like it was stolen from a Full Moon feature.
Mark Ruffalo appears and befriends Tracy, plus we get a spider scene, a killer crow scene, a bloody mirror scene, and laser-shooting toys coming to life. At the very end, a cool demon climbs out of the mirror for a moment and almost makes this worth a watch.
Of note is that character actor William Sanderson, who appeared in the first film, is in this sequel as a different character.
MIRROR MIRROR 3: THE VOYEUR (1995)
Thing start out okay. A witchy woman does some sort of ritual, and a Rico Suave/Richard Grieco fusion (anyone post-Gen X…look them up) dressed like John Travolta in Pulp Fiction comes face to reflection with the bleeding mirror.
Next, character actor Billy Drago is thrust into the first of many sex dream sequences, for this installment is more about erotica than horror.
Drago plays an artist moving into a new home…where he finds the mirror.
Turns out the house is where the witchy woman lived, and she’s still around, banging Drago and dragging him into the flashback story with her Rico Grieco man.
It’s bad. It’s really bad. The mirror feels like it’s lost its importance as the star of the franchise. Don’t expect a demon to appear in the last few minutes, but do expect to see Mark Ruffalo return…as a different character. I’m noticing a trend here.
Also, David Naughton appears in a minor role as a detective, clinging to the hope that An American Werewolf London will get a reboot someday and make him a star once again.
MIRROR MIRROR 4: REFLECTIONS (2000)
Brace yourself, because this is going to blow your mind. Billy Drago stars in this sequel…playing a different character than in the last film. That means that every single movie in the Mirror Mirror franchise is somewhat of a reflection of the film before it.
On the bright side, the fourth film takes its cue from the post-Scream “teen” horror craze, focusing strictly on five kids trapped in a haunted attraction at a masquerade party. The dull side is everything else.
It is dumbfounding that a script this bad could be green-lighted, but here we are. A girl and her guy sneak into some sort of shop(?) to try on costumes. In another part of the place, a worker finds a mirror and playfully does the “mirror, mirror, on the wall” shtick from Snow White. She gets torched by the mirror, the couple finds her remains, an angry force shaky cams after them as they run, and…
…the girl wakes up a year later. She is still not over the death of her boyfriend, sooooo…she goes to the same masquerade party at the same place from the year before. Is it Halloween? Why this location for the party? Why the haunted tour thrown in? Why do all the other guests just suddenly disappear for the rest of the film?
Anyway, the five leads get lost in the attraction, the main girl has a nightmare that reveals her boyfriend was killed by some sort of zombie guy the year before, and Billy Drago shows up as a homeless guy who becomes the devil on her shoulder.
I have no idea what was going on. There are lots of flashbacks to her in bed with her boyfriend, the kids split up, a “countess” suddenly makes an entrance for reasons that are beyond me, and 54 minutes in one of the kids is finally attacked by a demon.
At least there are visual elements of horror in the final 30 minutes. As far as plot…I have no idea.
