DEATHGASM 2: GOREMAGEDDON Review: The Band Is Back For A Bloody Encore
Deathgasm 2: Goremegaddon is now in theaters from Raven Banner Entertainment. Beware of spoilers in case you haven’t seen Deathgasm (2015).
Deathgasm 2: Goremegaddon, the sequel to the 2015 New Zealand horror comedy, is set in the present day after the events of the first movie where the band unknowingly unleashed an ancient evil by playing cursed sheet music. We find lovable loser, metal head and lead guitarist Brodie (Milo Cawthorne) and his friend and drummer Giles (Daniel Cresswell) living in squalor and a state of arrested development.
Brodie still struggles to deal with the loss of former front man Zakk (James Joshua Blake) whom he was forced to kill in the first film. His guilt has made it hard for him to hold down a job and put his welfare checks at risk of being canceled by the hilariously sadistic bible thumping welfare worker Jonno (Harrison keefe). To make things worse, his girlfriend Medina (Kimberley Crossman) left him because of his inability to move on and joined Rewind Her Funeral Tape, a cheesy “Heartcore” band featuring the insufferable Jesse Dead (Kieran Charnock).
In a moment of desperation Brodie decides to once again use the cursed pages of sheet music to resurrect Zakk and key board player Dion (Sam Berkley) from the dead, re-form Deathgasm, and win the battle of the bands to get Medina back. As expected things don’t exactly go as planned.
It is clear that writer and director Jason Lei Howden is an avid fan of the horror genre. The Deathgasm movies are blood-soaked love letters to Sam Raimi and the original Evil Dead films.
In addition to the deadite-like undead, over-the-top gore and wild POV camera shots, there is a shared DIY spirit to the filmmaking. In some ways, they have more in common with the slapstick gallows humor of Evil Dead II, Army Of Darkness and Ash Vs. The Evil Dead than the recent entries in the Evil Dead franchise from the past few years. They even borrow a few gags that will be familiar to fans of the iconic franchise. However, the influences aren’t limited to Sam Raimi. There is also a funny Little Shop Of Horrors style bit where Brodie & Giles have to either look the other way or assist the zombie version of Zakk & Dion in eating people to sustain themselves so they can keep rocking.
While it’s fun to see the band back together again, the often juvenile humor in Deathgasm 2 (it features more penis mutilation than a Jackass movie) feels more heavy-handed than in the original, and at times wears out it’s welcome. In addition, the first film was more of an underdog story about a bunch of outsiders forming a band that didn’t know the evil they were unleashing when they played those cursed chords, whereas in this installment, Brodie knows what he is doing when he chooses to once again use the demonic sheet music, making him a selfish and much less sympathetic character. Yet despite not quite hitting all the notes of the original movie, fans of the first film will most likely enjoy this encore.
Passionate genre film enthusiast
I don't believe in guilty pleasures
