“The Strangers: Chapter 3” will be the latest in a franchise that is currently on bumpy terrain. The first two films in this Renny-Harlin-directed reboot trilogy have both been negatively received (albeit commercially successful), derided as ho-hum slasher flicks that lack the most effective elements of the 2008 original film. Nonetheless, the teaser trailer for the final installment struggles valiantly to create a hook that will draw back dissatisfied viewers – even at the expense of a major potential spoiler.
Maya Lucas – Beaten, Traumatized, Desperate… Driven to Evil Herself?
If you’ve seen the first two films, you know that the protagonist, Maya Lucas (Madelaine Petsch), will start “The Strangers: Chapter 3” under extremely rough circumstances. Already, she has been stabbed near-fatally, hunted, attacked by a wild boar, forced to witness her fiancé and numerous other innocent people murdered, and obliged to kill one Stranger in self-defense. The 56-second teaser, which dropped on November 26, opens with her walking into a church, her face smeared with blood. “You look like you’ve been through Hell,” remarks Sheriff Rotter (Richard Brake).
Will this head of local law enforcement be of any help to Maya in her struggle for survival? Between the fact that he and his deputy ignored her testimony about the Strangers in the previous film and the sinister smile that mantles his face in this teaser as he inquires, “Where are they?”, the prospect of his assistance is dubious at best. So, what will be Maya’s fate in “The Strangers: Chapter 3”?
A shocking and appalling (in a good way?) potential answer to that question comes in a series of subsequent shots that show the three masked Strangers standing over a new couple of victims who are sitting bloodstained and terrified on a bed. One of the Strangers, wearing the “Pin-Up Girl” mask of the Stranger whom she killed in the previous film, is Maya. The final shot in the teaser shows Scarecrow, the sack-headed Stranger, caressing Maya’s mask-covered face with what might be described as a creepy tenderness.
Powerful Twist or Megalodon-Sized Shark Jump?
If nothing else, the teaser for “The Strangers: Chapter 3” gives away a plot point that is truly astonishing. But will this singlehandedly redeem the final stretch of a much-maligned trilogy? Obviously, the teaser offers no context as to Maya’s apparent shift to the dark side. However, the closest thing it has to a throughline is its insinuation of Maya’s shattered mental state whenever she is onscreen.
After all she’s undergone, Maya can be forgiven a lot of deranged thoughts and actions, but can we buy a sudden crossover to Team Stranger? Done right, it could work as a chilling depiction of the cycle of violence. But if “The Strangers: Chapter 3” fumbles the execution, it may well wind up in the same conversation as Thomas Harris’s “Hannibal,” – a franchise sequel with a twist so unhinged as to raise questions about the mental soundness of the artist, and not merely the main character.
In any case, the placement of such a jaw-dropper in the teaser for a sequel that few are eager to see feels, in and of itself, like a jumping of the shark, wielding pure shock value in a bid to entice those who were too bored and/or frustrated with the previous two installments to put this one on their watch lists. But who knows? If you find that this teaser has done its job by arousing your curiosity (however trepidatious), then the only way to satisfy your intrigue is to see “The Strangers: Chapter 2,” which is slated for release on February 6.
