Review of Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin (2021) by Jluis_001 — 06 Nov 2021

By quality merits, this is without a doubt the best looking movie of this franchise. By far.

Paranormal Activity: Next of Kin plays with some different rules, but the focus continues within the cults, witches, and demons. Only this time we're in the present, and both the tone and atmosphere of this story are clearly inspired by horror movies like The Witch, It Happens At Night, Apostle, and more like them.

But that's the only decent thing it tries to emulate, the rest of it, is the same, tedious, repetitive and generic search for answers, from the characters who got into the situation in which they are simply because the script arranged like that, and therefore now they must face the consequences of their ineptitude.

Even with its short duration, the paranoia the film tries to induce is not functional because six previous films have already prepared you for everything you could expect in this franchise, and this tale never tries to do something new.

There's something demonic at the end of the road, and in this case it looks too much like Tristana Medeiros from the REC series.

The last minutes are the only ones that could be considered as true horror because they are trying to escape while being chased by this entity.

And the ending that works more like an epilogue of sorts, feels exactly like the ending of Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension, with another demon loose in the world. Only this time, it feels like we're starting over.

I can only wish that's not the case.