I really didn’t like The Nun back in 2018… it had good production values but was otherwise a very generic horror flick. But in the grand tradition of throwing good money after bad, I went to see The Nun II with very low expectations. And in the rare tradition of Annabelle: Creation, it turns out to be a sequel that thumps the original.

The Nun II continues the story of the young sister (played by Taissa Farmiga) who survived the first film. It also follows the children and staff at a nearby boarding school…. which has an evil nun problem.

This sequel maintains the quality production values of the first flick but adds a lot of character work. These two sets of characters get a decent amount of screen-time and depth. Enough to make me care which is rare in horror flicks like this.

Farmiga is joined by the wisely cast Storm Reid as a fellow sister in the convent. While not the most critical character to the plot, she brings a lot of charisma to the movie. Her mere presence raised my expectations.

Unfortunately, the film lacks confidence in the audience. It has an over-abundance of cheap, poorly established jump scares that lack depth and importance. They play out on such a predictable schedule… as though the writer and director worried that we’d forget we were watching a scary movie. They could have cut a solid twenty minutes out the movie if they respected our intelligence and attention span.

I rather liked this movie. The final act is almost strong enough to earn it a better rating… if it hadn’t been proceeded by so much routine filler. As it stands, the film is just a little too uneven. But Farmiga and Reid have such charisma together that I hope there’s a Nun III where we continue to follow these bad ass sister soldiers.

Score: 78