Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988)

Originally I had planned on watching a different movie today, but after yesterday's success with Hellraiser, and a night filled with dreams, nightmares, and images from the movie, I knew I had to watch Hellbound: Hellraiser II today! None of the movies I've seen his month had the effect on me like Hellraiser did. I wasn't sure what to expect with the sequel, but I had heard some people actually liked it more. This did, however, mean my expectations were raised (no pun intended), while they were possibly lowered before yesterday's viewing. Can the sequel that came out only 1 year later really be better than the original? Jump into Hell with me and we'll find out!


The story picks up moments after the ending of the first film, even recapping the final few moments of the previous film's ending. It does a better job of this than the Rocky films did, cutting out the pointless and showing only the quick clips of what you need to know. Kirsty (Ashley Laurence) finds herself in a mental institution with police questioning her on the killings of her family. She tells them the truth, but stories about demons and zombies don't tend to do much for your rep as a sane person. When the head doctor of the facility, Dr. Philip Channard (Kenneth Cranham), overhears her descriptions of the events, he comes up with an excuse to leave, but he clearly seems to know more about exactly what she's talking about than he lets on. Kirsty opened the demonic puzzle box once before, and has seen Hell with her own eyes. Will she be safe from the evil Pinhead (Doug Bradley), or for that matter, will she even be able to hold onto what little sanity she has left?

The puzzle box will open gates to Hell

I once again enjoyed the effects of this film. However, being the second time delving into this universe, the shocks of what I'm seeing don't have the same impact as the first time. Also, the non-practical effects are improved as well. In the first film they were generally pretty good, but at the end they took a sudden dive in quality, apparently due to running out of budget. In the sequel, they all seem much more even in quality.

I think the acting was a little bit better this time around, and it's nice that they were able to get nearly all the actors to come back to reprise their roles. The only one I noticed was different was the female Cenobite, who unfortunately doesn't have a nickname, was cast differently this time which is also too bad. Another odd bit for me was that Pinhead shows more emotion this time around. It's not much, but enough that he didn't have that calm eerie nature from the first movie. I just didn't like him quite as much all the time.

Kirsty believes by entering the Cenobite's Hell, she can save her father

In the first film, most of the movie is about Frank trying to come back to life by killing people. Here, Dr. Channard not only manages to resurrect someone, but the full process which took the whole first movie, is completed very quickly, skipping the time it would probably take to gather potential victims. While this felt rushed, it was obvious that they wanted to do more interesting things with the idea of a fully healed Hell Dweller. It's too bad though, because it was the effects, and the process of bringing Frank back to life, that was one of the big things I liked about the first movie so much. Skipping over all that does allow for other things though, because soon all our characters are running around in the Cenobite's world. This film's main focus is knowledge of their world and the origins of the Cenobites.


This was another problem I had with the movie though. Explaining their origins and where they come from just took away from who scary they were for me. I actually really liked how mysterious they were in the first movie. I even thought maybe they were aliens or something in that they said they were "explorers". No such luck. What they do show more of though that is interesting is the Cenobite's Hell. It's a giant endless labyrinth with a strange god looking over it all. Sadly there are no monsters roaming the endless corridors like in the first movie.

The Cenobites version of "Home Sweet Home"

While there were plenty of aspects that were improved over the first film, and it was cool how directly it connected story-wise, Hellbound: Hellraiser II just didn't have the same charm for me that the first had. I attribute this entirely to the revelations about the Cenobites, and how unmysterious, and frankly, weak, it made them look. Looking at the trailers for the next 6 movies also didn't look promising as the series definitely takes a sharp turn into the shitter. I wouldn't say the sequel is bad, it just reveals too much back-story for my liking and removes certain parts I liked about the first movie, like fast forwarding over the resurrection. I can see why some people would like it though, because it does expand on the lore of the universe more. Unfortunately for me, that only removed the mystery that I enjoyed so much.