Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again host a fundraiser for Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.
Today’s theme: Sequel
Seven years after the events of Slaughterhouse, the notorious Bacon family enterprise is back in business. Cleavon Bacon (Bryan Butler) and his mute, baby-faced son, Remdog (Remington Tully), run a flame-grilled Wonder Jerky operation out of a dusty border-town junkyard in Campo, California. Business is slow, a slick Texas developer named Mel Webber (Jim Lairmore) wants the local land for a 36-hole golf course, and hikers from the Pacific Crest Trail keep wandering onto the property. Naturally, the Bacons solve their meat shortage and real estate problems the old-fashioned way. Meanwhile, survivor-turned-law-enforcement Liz Borden (Sherry Leigh) is pulled right back into her worst nightmare.
Leigh reprising her role and transitioning into a law enforcement officer gives the sequel a genuine anchor. Her dramatic beats—especially a well-shot scene visiting her father’s gravestone—actually elevate the material. And Jim Lairmore injects a surprising amount of witty, happy-go-lucky energy into his role as the swaggering Texas businessman, even managing to pull off a bizarrely functional romantic subplot with Liz.
However, prepare yourself for some of the most laughably unconvincing CGI and dummy gore ever put to film. Throat slashes, decapitations and obvious mannequins being butchered into jerky look utterly phony, courtesy of a clearly threadbare micro-budget. That would be fine if it weren’t for the middle stretch, which drags like a zombie thudding along with endless, dull conversations from teenage hikers and meandering interludes that make you scream at the screen to get on with things.
That said, the final confrontation between Cleavon and Liz, along with a flurry of franchise callbacks (including a climactic shouting match over family grudges), hits just enough nostalgic notes to satisfy die-hard fans of the original. I mean, I’m one of them, but I don’t know who else was clamoring for this sequel. Then again, they made another The Mutilator.
Personally, I’m shocked this didn’t go Rattlers 2 and just play most of the first movie.
But hey — Rick Roessler waited 37 years to make this, and this was what he made.
So yeah.
You can watch this on Tubi.
