Annabelle: Creation Review

Warning: I'm not a big fan of the Conjuring universe. No, that does not mean I can't watch horror. I love good different horror movie, and this universe just does not give that.

Okay, though the whole shifting into new haunted house gimmick is now stereotypical, Conjuring is one of the movies that made it stereotypical, the original, so it gets a pass. However, all the other movies that follow are way too predictable, including this one.

This movie gives you the background story of the creepy Annabelle doll that appears in the movies - about how the already evil-looking doll came to be possessed. Years after the young daughter of the Mullins passes away in a car accident, they open their house and allow an orphanage of a few girls and a nun to shift in. And of course, a small anti-social handicapped girl wanted to go wandering around the house late at night into a usually locked door and out of bounds area... because all little girls do that, right?

And that's when the spirit inside Annabelle is set lose. The first half of the movie is literally just all this that I just mentioned, nothing happening, one just waiting for Annabelle to predictably unleash herself, and nothing else.

The second half is where the actual horror, in my opinion, starts, and you actually get to see the creepy doll exercise its powers. However, then too, you know when they're going to try to frighten you, and you find yourself prepared for what's about to ponce at you, reducing the scare.

Also, though I know most movies use this tactic, it's always very dark when the scaring is happening, because of which half the visual details are missed and you go by sound.

All in all, it's not a bad movie, and certainly a good movie to start off with horror for people who are not horror movie buffs like me. Or even a good movie for a sleepover. Yet, for those who watch a horror flick now and then, you'll be found forcing yourself to sit through this movie because you've gotten so far in the series anyway, but will have an absolute absence of excitement.