Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2022- Spoiler Free Review

by Ismael Bustelo

In an era of remakes, reboots and reviving old franchises, the new Texas Chainsaw Massacre serves as a sequel to the 1974 movie of the same name. Similar to the Halloween movies we’ve seen in recent years, the movie rehashes many surface level elements of the source material but money is the clear motivating factor for this film. The film follows a group of friends who take a trip deep into Texas to resell a plot of land. While it is supposed to be a sequel, the original movie doesn’t have much standing in the plot. In fact, you could probably watch this without seeing the original and still understand everything because they spell it out for the audience.

In the first ten minutes, a store clerk mutters “gentrification” under his breath to the protagonists moving to town, only for that theme to not be fleshed out later whatsoever. The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre had some clever progressive themes underneath the surface when picked apart, however, the new movie has nothing beneath the surface. Frankly, it’s quite lackluster in both themes and plot. The protagonist is a survivor of a school shooting and it’s hard to tell if the movie is for gun rights or against them. This factor has no semblance on the plot and if it was removed, not much would change about the movie. It seems like it was added for either shock value or to make it more relatable. However, the movie falls flat on almost every front.

At times the movie feels like a bunch of old men writing what they think social media is. Direct lines from the movie such as, “Check out our post! It’s blowing up,” make it feel like someone put two robots in a room to talk to each other. Or probably the corniest part of the movie (and my personal favorite) where the killer is standing right in front of someone as they go on Instagram live and exclaim, “try anything and you’ll get canceled bro.” Oscar winning dialogue really now that I think about it. The acting isn’t even that bad, but the actors certainly suffered from a bad script. It’s clear this movie was made for one purpose only; money.

Whoever edited the credits did an amazing job given the low quality of the film all round. It’s comparable to getting a free dessert after the rest of your order in a restaurant was messed up. It’s like all the budget went to paying whoever made that credit montage. If only so much work was put into the actual movie. A good bad horror movie can be enjoyable, but this was just forgettable. Unfortunately, you can skip the movie and take away the same small amount of substance that I did.