Building off of what came before, Regan, the daughter, is now empowered and her and the movie at large are reconnecting humanity. If the first movie was about grief, sacrifice, and survival, then this one is about hope and resilience.
I’m just going to make a list here because I don’t have it in my to explain properly why I like this movie and yet have a lot of issues with it at the same time.
• Multiple times adult characters just up and leave children when everything tells us they would let them know first, if at least so that they do not follow.
• There is also a blatant misunderstanding of how a basic amplifier works and I looked really close for a battery compartment. You cannot just cut the cord off and immediately use it.
• Then there is the use of a record player as a two parter issue, one being that it is convoluted way to get attention and two being records do not just keep playing nonstop like an mp3 would. The second I can let go and assume the station had some automatic arm that was able to repeat the record.
• Oxygen tanks do not explode. Oxygen cannot make a fire, only contribute to it.
• There is a bit where a young character suddenly explores, but the characters motivation doesn’t really exist for this, and I would argue it exists in the opposite direction. I think there is a reason this scene is cut alongside another: one is good and one is not.
• The first movie showed that the creatures seemed like good swimmers. It seems retroactive to now make them die in water. It is around the hour and four minute mark in the original, the basement scene. I went back to check and the thing lowers its head in the water and slithers into it. Shallow? Sure, but that thing clearly was comfortable with water. It was submerged for almost 30 seconds of screen time. Also, Signs did it first.
That all having been said, I still enjoyed the movie and a lot of the touching sentiment was not missed on me. The list makes it seem as though I am going super hard on the movie, but I only say something because I got invested. The only truly awful thing was the amplifier, that hurt my soul. My mind says it is a 3 1/2, but my heart says to give it a 4.