Review of Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones (2014) by Roszie B — 09 Apr 2014

If you thought that you could get away from the nonsensical bullshit of the main Paranormal Activity movies with this "spin-off", you were dead wrong. Don't misunderstand me, until the bullshit at the end, this was actually on its way to being the second best 'sequel' in the series.

I realize that's not saying much when the best sequel in the series is only good at best, but still. But the filmmakers/writers, like fucking idiots, had to go and get cute with the film and find a way to tie this spin-off with the main film series.

Even if you're a fan of the series, you have to be straight up about the fact that rarely anything in the series makes sense. The series, with each sequel, finds a way to needlessly, and stupidly, complicate its own story to where it's an absolutely pointless trying to figure it out.

This film, with its "cute" nod to the first film, opens up a whole new can of worms that probably won't ever be solved and I'm just sick and tired of it. I really am, I'm sick and tired of this series grasping at straws trying to look for anything that would give the series a little more mileage.

I wonder how many hardcore drugs would I have to take in order to make sense of this series. Because that's the only way I'd care enough to figure out the films, I simply just don't give a shit and the people writing these films make it really hard to care with the nonsensical stories they're telling.

These films are all a blur to be perfectly honest, they're all just starting to blend together and I can't tell the difference between each individual film. This is the only that's really "different" with its all latino cast.

I realize this series, with its minuscule budgets, makes a ton of money for Paramount. But creatively, these films have been dead in the water starting with the third film. I'd say starting from the second because that's really where the nonsensical shit started happening.

Each sequel is just putting a band-aid over a gaping wound. The only reason I wanted to give this film a shot was because I thought it would be completely removed from the main series, which I'm absolutely sick to my stomach of.

I wanted to watch a one and done horror film. But, and seeing what happened, it wouldn't surprise me if Paranormal Activity 5, set to be released this year, yes...TWO Paranormal Activity films in ONE calendar year, finds a way to incorporate what happened in this film into it.

If it does happen, I'm literally gonna lose my fucking mind. And the cute stuff hearkening back to the main series took up like maybe one or two minutes of the whole film and it drove me nuts. So you can imagine how PA5 will kill me if they continue down this road of grasping at straws to keep the series going.

To be honest, if it wasn't for that ridiculous ending, I'd have given this film a 2.5 star rating. It's certainly not good, but the change in perspective and characters really did freshen up an old and tired franchise.

It was only a little bit, but it did freshen it up some. The problem is that the scares just aren't there like they were in the first 2 films. It's the law of diminishing returns. You tell the same joke over and over and over again.

It got a great reaction the first time, but more you repeat the same joke the less laughs you get. Same thing applies here with the scares. It gets to the point where the climax of this film is, almost exactly, THE SAME CLIMAX AS THE THIRD FILM.

That's absolutely ridiculous and unacceptable to me. There are some decent scares, but a lot of it is just trying to repeat what the first film did so well without nearly the same success. And the sad thing is that the film was really successful given its budget.

Maybe a whole new cast of characters, with a different ethnicity, was really enough for people to think that the series is fresh and new again, when it really isn't. I've absolutely grown to hate this series and the horrible thing is that there's just no end in sight for this insufferable, interminable nonsense.

Christopher Landon, director of this film, did say that there was an endgame but that it will take them a couple more films before they get to that point. This is unacceptable, this fifth film should be the last one, period.

There's just no way they can keep grasping at straws to justify putting out sequel after needless sequel. The point is, this film isn't particularly good...it has its moments. But if you've grown disappointed in the series in the last couple of years, this won't change anything at all.