When The Conjuring arrived in theaters during the summer of 2013, James Wan signaled that this was a shift in the horror landscape. The Saw and Insidious director showcased the reality-inspired haunted house tropes in a manner distinct from the pitfalls of 2000s horror trends, with the MPA giving it an R rating not for blood and gore but for disturbing violence and terror. As time went on, however, the expansion of the Conjuring series drifted farther from its allegedly true origins, and the recent The Nun entries prove that the franchise is quickly losing its value.
The Nun and The Nun II Storylines
When someone discovers a nun in a secluded Romanian abbey having committed suicide, a priest and novitiate go to exorcise the powerful demon known as Valak from the once holy place. Years later, the sequel finds the evil in France, continuing its reign of terror on the Catholic people in the area. Both films star Taissa Farmiga as Sister Irene, Bonnie Aarons as the creepy nun villain, and Jonas Bloquet as a Frenchman who helps Irene in her quest.
Critical Reception of The Nun Spinoffs
As the second spinoff in the Conjuring series, following Annabelle from years earlier, The Nun already had trouble justifying its existence. Despite winning record box office numbers for the instantly popular horror franchise at the time, The Nun found Annabelle screenwriter Gary Dauberman spinning his wheels by further introducing more characters without giving the audience a reason to care for them. Both films received generally negative reviews, but the second still had markedly improved critical reception.
Which The Nun Is Worth Watching?
As Annabelle and The Nun threw us fodder for peripheral The Conjuring haunts to battle against, the cracks in the original appeal quickly displayed themselves. While some argued this brand-new The Nun II gave us a scarier experience, we are here to tell you it might be even worse than its fatally flawed predecessor. Where The Nun is economical in its simple yet twisty origin story, The Nun II is as or more scattered, jumpscare-obsessed, and blandly directed as any other The Conjuring spinoff. The film returns with the young Farmiga and Bloquet yet continues not to invest any time in these characters. Like the Annabelle movies, The Nun II is another meaningless accessory to the franchise that does not even have the atmosphere of Corin Hardy’s The Nun direction.
Replacements for Max Viewing Options
The first two Conjuring films, not coincidentally the only two directed by Wan, stick to the intended approach that The Nun and its sequel abandoned, while outlier entry Annabelle: Creation barely makes the grade thanks to David F. Sandberg’s withholding direction. With nothing but disappointment from the last five years of this franchise, audiences will hopefully start looking towards new avenues for a horror fix, and we can bid farewell to these spinoff sequels once and for all.
The Nun II is streaming now on Max.