Reviews

Way better than expected from a Hellraiser "reboot" made in 2022. But not nearly as good as those two first movies. Where those had grotesque love stories between psychopaths and skinless creatures escaping hell, this has more attractive young people running, screaming and being picked off one by one.

It's definitely not as bad/cliché as your average American teen horror, but still. It was Frank, Julia, Dr. Channard and their twisted love/lust/desires that made those movies classics. Not Pinhead chasing Kirsty.

Voight was by far the most interesting character and should've been the center of the story. He should've lured the brother in as a sacrifice, making the sister and/or boyfriend try to find him. His "wish" from leviathan should've been to bring back some old lover, now disfigured and skinless like frank and Julia (but worse), forever needing more blood to stay alive. Explicit sex scene with this broken lump of meat could've been this movies "mattress scene".

Because it badly needed that "cherry on top" to truly make it "Hellraiser". Skinned people making out and the razor blade scene on the mattress was what made people talk about those movies. It wasn't Pinhead. It was those scenes and relationships that was so f'd up that you just HAD to talk about them. Disturbing, fascinating and beautiful all at the same time.

Pinhead is fantastic though. Love new Pinhead. Love new cenobites design. It's less 80's bdsm/metal vibe, and more outer worldly "explorers in the further regions of experience". Love it. Perfect.

Also loved all the effort put into the box. Best box.

Anyway, everyone involved is clearly capable and fans of the source material, so if you get to make another one; go way, way darker.

So, the sales pitch is basically; what if we combine 1930s Disney shorts like Steamboat Willie, with 1990s Cartoon Network craziness like Cow and Chicken - Short and sweet 14 minute episodes with silly and fun adventures.

Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, yes and no.

The show is based on a video game aimed at adults - being one of the most brutally difficult games of recent years. But the show seems to be made for very young kids.. or older dudes with a nostalgic affection for specifically old school American cartoons.

I can't help but feeling that this awesome world and all these absolutely amazing animations, are being somewhat wasted on something too niche for its own good.

In a world where Japan and anime has conquered 2D animation, I'm not sure how successful a decades old American format like this can really be.

In my opinion, this should've been one big movie based on the story from the game. Or at lest a continuous adventure based on the game, instead of stand alone "wacky" shorts.

Anyway, I'm happy Netflix continues to take chances and that passion projects like this gets funded and exists.

Season 1 is actually good. Probably rate it 7.5-8. Season 2 on the other hand.. what happened?

How on earth did they manage to take a pre existing violent, dark and gritty fantasy story about a monster hunter, and turn it into a boring soap opera?

This is just terrible! Awkward acting. Cringey dialogue. Uninteresting characters. Plot holes. Overacting.

Reminded me of Xena warrior princess but with embarrassing Game of Thrones wannabe politics shoehorned in every other scene. Seriously. What happened to the writers!?

Me and a friend often talk about how we're probably never going to experience another "wow, I've never seen anything like this before" moment, like we had all the time growing up. You know, watching CGI in Terminator 2 or Jurassic Park for the first time in cinema. Or going from a 2D to a 3D game console. Or even from the NES to the SNES.

Well, watching this was pretty close to having that feeling again. I watch a lot of animation - Preferably 2D and Anime. But I've never seen anything quite like this. It must have cost a small fortune to produce with all the insane talent involved.

And it's not only the jaw dropping art style. Camera angles, editing, character designs, background designs, pacing, script, dialogue.. every single piece of the puzzle is off the same insanely high quality and all come together perfectly to create something truly mind blowing.

I have zero interest in the game, but absolutely loved this show. Good job everyone involved.

Watched the movie first time knowing nothing about the books. Verdict = amazing looking and sounding Sci-fi epic with slow and somewhat confusing story. Especially since it abruptly ends in the middle of the first book. Probably a 7.

Watched it again after going down a YouTube rabbit hole of dune lore and.. wow.. like watching a completely different movie.

I mean this book series have clearly helped inspire ideas in everything from Warhammer 40k, Star Wars and Game of Thrones to The Matrix and sooo much more. And I had no idea.

The similarities to Warhammer are the most obvious and what made me appreciate it 100 times more on the second viewing.

It is a shame though that much of this is not explained very well in this movie, and that I had to rely on external info to realize how insanely cool this universe is. I mean book 4 is titled God Emperor, with all female space marine legions killing heretics.. come on! This movie making money and becoming a series might be the closest we ever get to see 40k on the big screen.

And since I have seen several people complaining this is a white savior story.. trust me.. you are meant to believe so on purpose... 61 billion surprised pikachu faces.

Watched the movie first time knowing nothing about the books. Verdict = amazing looking and sounding Sci-fi epic with slow and somewhat confusing story. Especially since it abruptly ends in the middle of the first book. Probably a 7.

Watched it again after going down a YouTube rabbit hole of dune lore and.. wow.. like watching a completely different movie.

I mean this book series have clearly helped inspire ideas in everything from Warhammer 40k, Star Wars and Game of Thrones to The Matrix and sooo much more. And I had no idea.

The similarities to Warhammer are the most obvious and what made me appreciate it 100 times more on the second viewing.

It's a shame though that much of this isn't explained very well in this movie, and that I had to rely on external info to realize how insanely cool this universe is. I mean book 4 is titled "God Emperor" with all female "space marine" legions killing heretics.. come on! This movie making money and becoming a series might be the closest we ever get to see 40k on the big screen.

And since I've seen several people complaining this is a "white savior story".. trust me.. you're meant to believe so on purpose... 61 billion surprised pikachu faces.

The original Swedish tv series was made by Ingmar Bergman; one of the greatest writers and directors of all time.

This American remake is made by.. well, it kind of feels like it was made by the algorithm that currently spits out mass produced cannon fodder for the streaming service wars.

I'm not going to pretend like it's a complete failure. It's not. It's clearly made by people who respect and admire the source material. The difference is that with the original you can "feel" that it was made by one of the greatest artists of our time. While with this you "feel" that it was made by rich Hollywood kids that didn't really "get it". I don't really know how to explain it. It just feels shallow in comparison.

Anyway.. It takes both arrogance and bravery to even entertain the idea of remaking someone like Bergman, so I guess I both scoff at and applaud the artists involved at the same time.

If nothing else, hopefully this show inspires someone to go down the Bergman rabbit hole and come out a little bit different on the other side.

Edit; Bumping this up from 5 to 7 after last 2 episodes. Especially the finale. Good job. Thumbs up.

If Pan's Labyrinth and Dark Souls had a baby who was dropped on its head and grew up to be a poet.

It's a slow, atmospheric and beautiful story about courage, honor, nature and the five virtues of knighthood; friendship, generosity, chastity, courtesy, and piety

People who say they walked out of the theater probably pay money to watch Vin Diesel movies.

9/10 chopped off heads. Favorite movie of the year.

Was expecting something like a mix of the 95 movie and MK9. You know, an exciting adventure with a violent and epic tournament to decide the faith of the world.

Well, this was nothing like that. There's not even a tournament. Seriously.

And who in their right mind looked at the absolutely amazing scorpion and sub zero character/costume designs from the latest games and thought; "hm, not good enough, we can do it better"??

.. but who loves fantasy, elves, dragons, magic and 2D animated action sequences of the highest possible caliber, I applaud this show. I knew absolutely nothing about this world or characters going in, but binged the entire season and can't wait for more. Of course it's a glorified commercial for the game, but when commercials are this good I couldn't care less. To produce this kind of anime with this amount of hand drawn animations isn't cheap though. So I really hope Valve/Netflix, or who ever is paying the bill, keeps doing it for many more seasons. Cause this is really good television. And to whoever designed the dragons: hat off to you.

Episode 1) Wow, this is dark and actually pretty good. 2) Mmm.. a bit less dark and mature than I first thought, but still kind of cool I guess. 3) Not sure if I like where this is going. 4) Ok, this is getting really stupid really fast. 5) aaand now we're off on a road trip.. *turns off*