Terrifier 3 opens in theaters October 11. This review is based on a screening at Fantastic Fest 2024.
A Christmas-themed slasher in October? Why not? With Terrifier 3, director Damien Leone pays homage to ’80s and ’90s horror icons and the rapidly multiplying, increasingly “ridiculous” sequels that kept their franchises alive. (Like how Hellraiser, Leprechaun, and even Friday the 13th eventually launched their supernatural killing machines into space.) Leone takes every opportunity to weaponize festive staples and bastardize sainted Christmas imagery, adding biblical and batty layers to Terrifier’s signature, practical-effects bloodshed. By dressing like Santa Claus, silent psycho killer Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) adds a new flavor to his immaculate brand of slasher mutilation – and with Leone overcomplicating his mythology with each new Terrifier, it’s much needed.
Terrifier 3 mirrors Terrifier 2 in both positive and negative ways. It stages jaw-droppingly brutal death scenes (hell yeah) but indulges a story that’s spiraling out of control (hell meh). Lauren LaVera lives to fight another day as beloved Final Girl Sienna Shaw, the “Chosen One” destined to defeat Art. She’s haunted by the unspeakable events of the previous film and obsessed with her quest to kill her grease-painted nemesis, which Leone addresses with a “just roll with it” jumpiness. Sienna repays her generous Uncle Greg (Bryce Johnson), Aunt Jessica (Margaret Anne Florence), and adoring cousin Gaby (Antonella Rose) by bringing Art to their doorstep – because what’s a massacre without innocents to sacrifice?
Then there’s Terrifier survivor Victoria “Vicky” Heyes (Samantha Scaffidi), who birthed Art’s disembodied head during the Terrifier 2 credits. Terrifier 3 treats Art and Vicky like Chuck and Tiffany in Bride of Chucky – this is as much their sequel as Sienna’s. Leone bounces between Art and Vicky’s knotty possessor-possessed relationship and Sienna’s fractured sanity, allowing Art to shine in all his vaudevillian, Charlie Chaplin-meets-Jack the Ripper glory. But, just as in Terrifer 2, he’s done no favors by the scattershot storytelling and a drawn-out, two-hour runtime. This time, Leone pads out his film by exploring the religious symbolism of the Virgin Mary and stigmata, flashbacks to Sienna’s comic-illustrator father, Art’s obsession with Christmas, the sleazy hosts of a true-crime podcast, Vicky’s thrall to the clown who ate her face in the first Terrifier – on and on and on.
The special-effects wizardry in Terrifier 3 cannot be denied. Drunk on the Christmas spirit, Art smashes through human icicles created with liquid nitrogen and trims a tree with intestines. Leone revisits some dependable favorites – Art’s chainsaw hack jobs, flayed skin, dislodged jaws, and mangled genitalia – but his crowning achievement is how it all continues to push boundaries and feel fresh. Art’s arsenal expands to produce a yuletide feast of grossness that doesn’t waste one ounce of flesh. There’s no regression here: Art’s still a top-tier murderer.
Thornton playing Art pretending to be Santa Claus is my favorite of the actor’s Terrifier performances, which adds to Terrifier 3’s morbid hilarity. He’s wildly emphatic when Art meets a mall Santa (Daniel Roebuck) in a dive bar, and Thornton conveys oodles of charm – enough to where the lush invites Art for drinks. Thornton’s range of facial expressions wins over surly drunkards as his eyes pop bigger than saucers, or when he giddily points at Santa decorations, then back at Roebuck. He’s having an absolute blast imagining how Art would interpret Kris Kringle’s overwhelming jolliness and how Art would hide his cruel intentions under a rosy-cheeked facade. Art’s menacing scowl, his muted laughter, his loony movements – Thornton is pure entertainment in the role.
But how much goodwill does Terrifier 3 earn as Art separates himself from other horror icons of the day – and how much does it lose because of its story? There’s nothing coherent about the way Leone thrusts his characters into a battle of ultimate-good-versus-ultimate-evil. The continuity is choppy, whether Art takes primary characters hostage or blazes past entire off-screen deaths. And even with 120 minutes to play with, Leone still feels constricted as he tries to evolve Art, Vicky, Sienna, and Sienna’s dorky brother, Jonathan (Elliot Fullam) Wires are crossed, big swings are taken, but we’re once again left with a highlight reel of exceptional bodily mutilation squeezed between stabs at thoughtful storytelling that largely miss their intended targets.
