Another Red Wedding
Ready or Not was a modest hit in 2019 that succeeded in announcing directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett as filmmakers to watch within the horror community. A clever flip on the slasher thriller, Ready or Not centered on Samara Weaving’s Grace Le Domas, a bride-to-be who’s introduced to a family of wealthy in-laws that secretly belong to a Satanic cult. In a brutal game of “hide and seek” within the family’s mansion, Grace is hunted down by her husband Alex Le Domas (Mark O'Brien) and his sadistic relatives on the night of her wedding. Even if the film’s defining quality was the number of gruesome death scenes, there was a hint of satire in the vein of Meet the Parents about the awkwardness of meeting one’s new extended family. Not only was Grace a spunky “final girl” with a self-deprecating sense-of-humor, but her stalkers were haughty aristocrats, and many of them showed complete incompetence as killers.
Ready or Not’s boldest twist was in its final act, which expanded beyond the grounded “eat-the-rich” satire into full-on supernatural territory. A sequel wasn’t immediately announced because there was little more that Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett had to say; more importantly, they were hired by Spyglass to pick up the reigns to the Scream franchise for its first entry without original director Wes Craven. Scream became a hotbed of controversy due to the firing of actress Melissa Barrera from the most recent installment, but the derisive critical reaction to last month’s Scream 7 served as further proof that Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett had brought something unique to the series, and hadn’t simply delivered up a reheated reboot.
A premise as simple as Ready or Not simply required a sequel that could justify being largely derivative. Ready or Not 2: Here I Come may have taken seven years to hit theaters, but it's set moments after the first film’s conclusion; after her in-laws are eviscerated by a bloody curse, Grace is reunited with her estranged sister Faith (Kathryn Newton), who’s begrudgingly remained as her emergency contact. In an expansion similar to that of the John Wick series, it’s revealed that the events of the first film were orchestrated by a shadowy council that controls world events. The head of the enigmatic order is Chester Danforth, played by David Cronenberg, who’d gathered representatives from the world’s most powerful families to play another “hide and seek” game to kill the Le Domas sisters.
That the first film ended with head explosions similar to that in Cronenberg’s Scanners made it appropriate for the Canadian filmmaker to cameo in the sequel, which would suggest that Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett are aware of how overt their homages are. The biggest issue with the first Ready or Not is that their script wasn’t strong enough to develop an ensemble of memorable antagonists; most of the Le Domas family members were only distinct because of their weapons of choice. The villains in Ready or Not 2: Here I Come are more broadly written, but Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett had the advent of more recognizable stars at their disposal. The primary foes that the Le Domas siblings face off with are Danforth’s children, Ursula (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and Titus (Shawn Hatosy); when ignoring the fact that there’s no universe in which Gellar, Hatosy, and Cronenberg look remotely similar to one another, they’re all enjoyable as evil characters that lack any forced tragic backstories.
The casting is on point because Gellar is most recognizable for her titular role in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in which she portrayed the same type of sarcastic, highly-trained heroine that Weaving’s asked to emulate; using her as the antithesis to Grace was a way to signify the passing of the torch. Hatosy might be best known currently for his role as the confident, dedicated performance as Dr. Jack Abbot on The Pitt, but Ready or Not 2: Here I Come offered him the chance to be a ruthless psychopath steeped in misogyny. Hatosy’s brilliance is that he’s able to portray an imminently loathsome character who’s just cartoonish enough to prevent the film’s violence to feel legitimately disturbing; for all its gore, Ready or Not 2: Here I Come is seldom played straight. The only serious moments are a few fleeting moments of bonding between Grace and Faith, but the chemistry between Weaving and Newton is strong enough that the film doesn’t have to explicitly spell out its subtext.
The exploration of the secret history of the Danforth family is the type of worldbuilding that is useful because it's an explanation for the first film’s incongruities. Thanks to an explanation by the Satanic cult’s lawyer, played in a tongue-in-cheek performance by Elijah Wood, it’s clarified that the Danforths have seized control of a wedding venue in which they block all the exits, monitor Internet services, and control local law enforcement. The purpose is to stack the odds against Grace and Faith, and ensure that there’s not an open question as to why they didn’t alert the cops or call for outside help.
The specific backstory that Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett has allowed the Ready or Not series to feel resolute in purpose, even if its parallels to recent events are merely coincidental. That the film is about an all-powerful group of wealthy powerbrokers that secretly control the world’s political nucleus may not have been intended to be an Epstein metaphor, but there’s enough righteous fury for the sequel to channel the same effect.