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The Babysitter: Killer Queen (2020)

The Babysitter: Killer Queen desperately tries to emulate what worked in the first and fails just about every single time. Even those who hated 2017's The Babysitter would classify it as a masterpiece after this.

Two years after the events of the first film, Cole (Judah Lewis) is unable to convince anyone that his babysitter, Bee (Samara Weaving), was the leader of a murderous satanic cult. His parents (Leslie Bibb and Ken Marino) think he’s nuts and he’s been friend-zoned by his childhood sweetheart, Melanie (Emily Alyn Lind). When she invites him to a party, he’s shocked to discover she and her friends are planning to use his blood for the same kind of ritual he narrowly escaped. Worse, Bee’s apostles (played by Andrew Bachelor, Hana Mae Lee, Bella Thorne, and Robbie Amell) have returned from the dead.

It’s the same movie we saw before but with twice the killers. Not even new killers either. Melanie (now unconvincingly turned into a villain) is the new Bee. The misfit girl who happens to be at the party, Phoebe (Jenna Ortega), is the new Melanie. The other partygoers are carbon copies of the cultists who tried to kill Cole the first time. Because when we see a sequel, what we really want is a remake, right? The deaths are slightly different but none are surprising, which takes away any punch (comedic or otherwise) they might’ve had. You sit there, as quiet as a corpse while the plot move along in obvious ways. There isn’t a scare to be found.

But maybe you weren’t expecting to wet your pants in terror. You came for the blood-soaked laughs. Tough luck. Written by Dan Lagana, Brad Morris, Jimmy Warden and McG (who directs again), Killer Queen tries hard to duplicate Brian Duffield’s humour. Their attempts are embarrassing to watch, like a couple of kids trying to act out The Babysitter to convince you that it was soooo good. You think it can’t get any worse than the same gags copied and pasted? Just wait until you get to the end. This whole time, you’ve been wondering where Samara Weaving is hiding. There’s no way they’d make the movie without her. She was integral to the original’s success! Killer Queen found a convoluted way to bring everyone else back. Her too. It requires hackneyed, contradicting and nonsensical retcons, but McG assumes you'll be so happy to see her again you won't care. Did the people who made this movie not think we’d seen the first one? Did they even see it?

A scene during the end credits hints at yet be more to come, which is a scary thought. The Babysitter: Killer Queen is the Men in Black II of this series. The premise is a flower pot smashed onto the head of fans. Each joke it a shard of glass you have to pick out of your bloodied scalp. Best to avoid the whole thing and pretend like it doesn’t exist. (September 15, 2020)