PLOT: In the “Strangers” finale, survivors face new threats from masked strangers. Secrets emerge, jeopardizing their lives as the line between reality and peril blurs in their battle for survival.
REVIEW: After nearly two years, we’re finally seeing the conclusion to The Strangers trilogy. It’s been a rough road as the first film was criticized for being a remake of the original, and the second was more lambasted for how little the story advanced. Now, we’re getting the final entry with The Strangers: Chapter 3 and getting a look at how Maya’s story ends. And I’m pleased to say that it’s definitely better than the last outing. But is it too little, too late for audiences?
Chapter 3 follows a much more subdued Maya (Madelaine Petsch) as she’s still on the run from the killers who terrorized her and killed her boyfriend. Story-wise, this entry is easily the most interesting of the three, with the main killer trying to make Maya join him and become a Stranger herself. But the journey is filled with so many downright stupid decisions that I can’t believe they made it past the first draft. Characters that have been set up for three movies are treated as fodder, and many of their deaths lack impact, just sort of happening unceremoniously.
The opening is a classic slasher intro, with a woman going to a hotel and getting terrorized by a Stranger. But it still feels fairly out of place and one of many scenes that feel like detours from the main story. I’m still not sure what this series’ aversion to actual violence is. This would be so much more impactful if it weren’t treated like a CW show. There’s one moment where the film goes further than expected, but otherwise, it all feels very reserved. Give us the red stuff!
I guess one thing that is always going to be inherent in a trilogy that’s filmed back-to-back like this and not really switching locations is the repeat nature of it all. I mean, how many times can we watch Maya get knocked out, crash a car, or just barely escape her would-be killers? It just gets stale after a while. I don’t really know why they decided to make the “Is Tamara home?” dialogue, said in every movie like it’s some tagline. It’s to the point where it elicits more of a chuckle than anything terror-related. It’s beaten into the ground. At a certain point, these Strangers need to come up with some new lines.
Madelaine Petsch is still the best part of these movies but her screentime feels cut down here. We’re following ancillary characters a lot more, though they’re mostly just introduced to give us a higher body count. But anything is better than more Maya just being scared and running for her life again. At least this gave us an intriguing different side to her. Unlike the last film, which gave us unnecessary backstory, this actually adds some layers to the villains that are a bit more interesting. One thing I’ll give Chapter 3 credit for is that it finally makes sense of so many elements introduced in the trilogy, including why the town acts how it does. Their behavior was always a bit suspicious yet they do a good job of explaining what’s going on here.
But despite all the red herrings and different elements at play, they decide to make one of The Strangers someone who isn’t even in the other two chapters. What is even the point of having so many characters behaving a certain way, if you’re not even going to use one of them as a killer? Instead, it’s just a random person and they don’t really even really participate in the story. It genuinely feels like an absolute waste of a character and I don’t understand why they went that route.
I found myself enjoying the high body count and the story finally wrapping up. It avoids just going in circles like the last entry, and feels different enough from the original film that it finally has a unique identity. It even ends on an intriguing note (though I doubt that will ever be explored further given the reaction to the trilogy). Even still, I would consider this to be the most rewatchable of the trilogy. It’s dumb but much more entertaining this time around. Unfortunately it just can’t really get over its sloppy execution.
