If you’re even slightly squeamish about insects, They Nest might push you into full-blown entomophobia. This made-for-TV creature feature from director Ellory Elkayem (Eight Legged Freaks) creeps along with familiar B-movie beats but manages to burrow under your skin with some genuinely unsettling bug-based horror. Think Arachnophobia meets The Thing, but with cockroaches—and far less prestige.
Thomas Calabro plays Dr. Cahill, a stressed-out surgeon escaping city burnout by retreating to a quaint island in Maine, only to be greeted by hostility from the locals and the rising threat of flesh-eating, mind-controlling cockroaches. The infestation is discovered via a waterlogged corpse, and as you’d expect, nobody believes Cahill until it’s far too late. Add Dean Stockwell to the mix as a cranky islander, and you’ve got a reliable genre face to anchor the mayhem when it hits.
Despite some low-rent production values and a fairly predictable plot, They Nest offers a few effective chills, especially when the critters start crawling into the more intimate spaces of the human body. The practical effects are modest but used cleverly, and Elkayem leans into the paranoia of small-town denial with just enough flair to keep it from feeling entirely by-the-numbers.
The Prognosis:
Where the film stumbles is in its uneven tone and forgettable characters, who mostly serve as bug fodder. But for fans of creature features who enjoy a slow buildup and a grotesque payoff, They Nest has enough squirmy moments to satisfy. It never reaches cult classic status, but it’s an enjoyable slice of early 2000s horror that earns its place in the insect invasion subgenre—just don’t watch it during dinner.
Directed by: Mike Wiluan | Starring Dean Fujioka, Callum Woodhouse | Premieres on Shudder & AMC+ July 25
In Monster Island, Shudder’s latest exclusive creature feature, wartime survival collides with Southeast Asian myth in a film that smartly blends old-school monster thrills with an unexpected emotional core. Inspired by Creature from the Black Lagoon and rooted in Malay folklore, the story drops a Japanese soldier and a British POW onto a seemingly deserted island following a submarine attack. But peace is short-lived, as the island is home to the Orang Ikan — a fearsome aquatic predator who’s as territorial as it is terrifying.
What sets Monster Island apart from many of its creature feature contemporaries is its willingness to slow down and explore the human side of horror. Rather than lean solely on blood and beasts, the film builds tension from cultural divides and post-traumatic wounds, forcing its two leads into a fragile alliance. Dean Fujioka and Callum Woodhouse bring depth and vulnerability to roles that could have been flat archetypes. Their chemistry makes the film’s central theme — that survival often means facing not just monsters, but your own past — all the more resonant.
Admittedly, the film’s ambition sometimes outpaces its resources. Pyrotechnic effects and digital enhancements can look rough around the edges, and the pacing dips during some mid-island soul-searching. But the film’s practical effects — particularly the creature design — are strong, evoking a rubber-suited charm without feeling dated. There’s enough gore to keep horror hounds engaged, but it never overpowers the human drama, and that balance is key to its charm.
The Prognosis:
While it might not revolutionise the genre, Monster Island shows there’s still plenty of room for creature features with a conscience. By grounding its mythological terror in real-world history and emotional stakes, the film claws its way out of B-movie cliché and into something far more sincere. For fans of wartime horror, international folklore, or just old-school monster mayhem with a pulse, this island trip is worth the ferry.
The sequel we all knew was coming. And yes, we will be referring to our checklist of what makes a good sequel, but that aside, is this outing any good, and was it necessary?
From memory the last movie (reviewed and podcasted by me and Chris Dawes) was definitely ripe for franchising. So straight away we’re not in Matrix territory where the question “Why!? Just why!??” isn’t screaming in your head every few minutes.
In 2.0 we pick up two years after the last movie, where Megan’s creator – Gemma (Allison Williams) and her niece Cady (her name is Cady!?? The whole time you swear they’re calling her “Katie!) played by Violet McGraw – are continuing their lives as the only family each one of them has. Except now Gemma is a staunch and vocal advocate for AI regulation due to her knee-jerk reaction to being almost killed by a robot AI (of her own making, it should be said) and Cady (in turn) is following in her aunts’ footsteps (of sorts) by being a computer science nerd.
In an overcompensating effort by Gemma, she ensures Cady takes Akido lessons so she can defend herself. Unfortunately Cady takes those lessons to an unwanted extreme by regarding Steven Segal as a martial arts poster boy, and one beaten up school bully later, Cady gets in trouble; Gemma is at her wits end, and we soon realise life between them is full of tension. For Gemma still punishes herself for putting Cady in harm’s (Megan’s) way, and Cady hates on Gemma for… reasons. She’s a teenager now, so it’s Hollywood lore she be a little bitch to any authority figure in her life. To be honest, you kinda zone out when you go through their motivations ‘cause you’re keen for the Megan goodness to begin.
And that gets kick started by the presence of another killer robot named Ameila (played by NOT Olsen sister, Ivanna Sakhno). However, unlike Megan, Ameila is very lifelike in face and body, as she is constructed NOT to be a faux babysitter for kids, but as a turbo charged infiltration assassin for the CIA.
How she came into existence is the McGuffin that drives the Main Plot of this film, as we simultaneously find out that (shock surprise) Megan is still “alive”, in an online only sort of way. So when Amelia goes rogue (because of course she does) and comes after Gemma and Cady (for reasons you’ll have to watch to understand) Megan’s primary directive to protect Cady at all costs comes to the surface as she demands Gemma build her a new body to literally kung fu fight Amelia (robato robato).
So with our pieces on the board, let’s get into the nuts ‘n’ bolts of M3gan 2.0.
And for a more detailed description of that, as with our last analysis of the first movie, here’s Chris
Dawes with his half of this review.
Dude – I didn’t see it! You went to the premiere without me!
Chris Dawes
Thanks Chris!
Anyway – some highlights worth mentioning is the existence of another Chekov’s Gun in the form of a cybernetic exo-skeleton that makes people super strong (although its application is at least a little funnier/cooler than you’d think).
We also have a new Megan dance number. For those of you who don’t remember, the main (and some would argue, only) reason the first movie did so well, was because of Megan’s hip-hop/ballet moves she pulls before killing Ronnie Cheng. It was a perfectly bite sized Tik Tok moment which gave the film it’s viral boost as countless people imitated it along the lines of Deadpools *Nsync number.
However, Megan’s effort this round – whilst certainly cool – is less memorable due to the fact it doesn’t have any unique & easy-to-copy dance move(s). In the first instalment it was a simple twist of the hips and a rubbery swing of the arms mixed with a sideways head-duck. But for 2.0 she does the Robot (very generic and a bit on the nose) with a 360-degree head spin (which is impossible to replicate). Although in its defence, it’s still entertaining to watch…
Kiwi legend Jermaine Clement guest stars as Alton Appleton, a tech billionaire who serves as both plot device and comedy device.
Another nice (re)addition is the return of Gemma’s two co-workers from the last film Cole (Brian Jordan Alvarez) and Tess (Jen Vann Epps) giving us some nice continuity for 2 characters (and actors) who really don’t need to be there.
And speaking of returning cast – the 2 most important also come back, despite the fact that, had they not, a lot of people wouldn’t have noticed. And they are Amie Donald and Jenna Davis. For they are Megan. More specifically her body and voice respectively.
As Megan was meant to be a pre-teen to match Cady in the first film, the immediate problem they were always facing was, IF they were going to recreate her as before, they would have to recast. But the film-makers clearly appreciate one of the reasons Megan works, is because Donald and Davis clearly work.
And so – with Donald going through the typical growth spurt that comes with puberty – Megan finds herself a foot taller when given her new body, and leaning into this means that the franchise is trying to give the impression each instalment will be a continuation of Megan’s evolution; both in body and in sentience.
And that alone implies this film series will be less Chucky and more Terminator. In more ways than one, as tonally there is a clear shift in Megan’s role from being the Big Bad, to the thing that fights the Big Bad (just like Arnie did in T2)
The Prognosis:
The film-makers have put careful thought into this sequel by analysing the first film’s success, identifying what worked, and leaning into those markers.
So checklist time:
1. Is it a clone of the original? NO
2. Is it a clone of the original but simply more and just bigger? NO
3. Does it expand the universe/lore of the original? YES
4. Is it a good standalone film without relying too heavily on the original? YES
5. (Optional) Does it have a cool new gimmick or element that’s not in the original film, but sits well within the universe of the first film? (Eg: Think Yoda and his ground breaking puppetry in The Empire Strikes Back. Or the CGI T-1000 in T2). NO
6. Does it identify the SPIRIT of the original, and duplicate it? YES definitely.
Because the biggest thing the film-makers have wisely clocked is that Megan ISN’T a horror film, but a fun film. Camp fun. And that’s what makes this movie an upgrade from the original.
Heretics, directed by José Prendes, is yet another entry in the ever-bloated found footage genre—a tired rehash of tropes that aspires to be The Blair Witch Project in a haunted house but crashes and burns before it even gets the camera rolling.
The premise is painfully familiar: a group of thrill-seeking teens break into the abandoned Simmons House, armed with shaky camcorders, bad attitudes, and even worse dialogue. They’re swiftly confronted with the presence of a shadowy cult that begins picking them off one by one. It’s a setup we’ve seen dozens of times, and Heretics brings nothing new to the table—only louder screams, cheaper scares, and a cast that feels more irritating than imperilled.
Any potential tension is suffocated by the unbearable ensemble of characters, each more grating than the last. Instead of building atmosphere or dread, the film relies on aimless yelling, predictable jump scares, and faux-ritual mumbo jumbo. It’s hard to care about who lives or dies when you’re actively hoping the cult hurries things along.
The only flicker of professionalism comes in the form of Eric Roberts, whose 20-second cameo is little more than a contractual obligation. His presence is both jarring and ironic—proof that the film knows how to attract a name, but not how to use it.
From its dull aesthetic to its lazy execution, Heretics feels like it was made with one eye on viral success and the other closed entirely. It mistakes noise for tension, clichés for plot, and shaky cam for style. What could have been a creepy little cult horror flick turns out to be an uninspired slog with no purpose and zero payoff.
The Prognosis:
Some heresies are unforgivable. This is one of them.
Push, the latest Shudder Original, arrives with a high-stakes premise that promises maternal terror and psychological tension—but despite its visceral setup, this horror-thriller quickly loses steam and ultimately fails to push past cliché.
Natalie Flores (Alicia Sanz), eight months pregnant and haunted by the tragic loss of her fiancé, seeks a fresh start in America. But her attempt to rebuild takes a dark turn when she’s targeted by a sadistic killer (Raúl Castillo) during what should have been a routine open house. Trapped and alone, her situation becomes increasingly desperate when she goes into premature labor, setting up a race-against-the-clock scenario that sadly never reaches its full potential.
There’s no denying the narrative ambition behind Push—it touches on trauma, female autonomy, and the vulnerability of pregnancy under threat. But these weighty themes are handled with a frustratingly superficial touch. In its best moments, the film flirts with intensity, but more often, it feels like a pale imitation of Inside (2007), the ferocious French horror film that tackled similar themes with unflinching brutality and far greater psychological depth.
Alicia Sanz gives a committed performance, doing what she can with a role that leans heavily on panic and pain, while Raúl Castillo brings unsettling energy to his villain, though the character lacks dimension. The script, unfortunately, relies too much on convenience and thinly sketched motivations, leaving tension deflated and plot turns predictable.
The house itself—a key location in the film—offers some atmospheric framing, but it’s not enough to compensate for the story’s undercooked emotional arcs and rushed pacing. The stakes are clear, but the suspense rarely lands, and what should feel like a suffocating countdown instead plays out like a laboured shuffle toward an inevitable climax.
The Prognosis:
Push is watchable enough for fans seeking a late-night thrill, but it never comes close to the visceral punch or thematic weight of its cinematic predecessor. It’s a film about survival that, ironically, never quite finds a pulse.
How dark are you willing to go? For David Cronenberg, The Shrouds marks another step into the abyss—one not of body horror, but of soul-rattling grief. This is arguably his most intimate and meditative work in decades, stitched together from threads of personal mourning, speculative technology, and the philosophical weight of death’s final curtain.
At the centre is Karsh (played with measured intensity by Vincent Cassel), a widower and tech entrepreneur who creates a radical new device: one that allows the living to peer into the graves of their deceased loved ones via digitally monitored “shrouds.” This deeply invasive (yet oddly spiritual) concept is classic Cronenberg—scientific progress colliding with deeply human frailty. But when a series of graves, including that of Karsh’s wife, are mysteriously desecrated, the film pivots into a sombre, noir-like mystery driven more by obsession than resolution.
From the turn of the century, Cronenberg’s work—Spider, A History of Violence, Cosmopolis, and Crimes of the Future—has leaned away from his earlier grotesque sensibilities and toward psychological excavation. The Shrouds is a continuation of that journey, and perhaps his most self-reflective piece since The Fly. With the recent passing of his wife, the film becomes a stark act of cinematic mourning—less a story than a eulogy.
The concept of the shroud here operates on multiple levels: biblically, as the linen of death and resurrection; metaphorically, as the veil between life and death; and narratively, as the enigma that cloaks Karsh’s unraveling. There’s also the ever-present shroud of mystery that clouds the truth—not only of the graveyard desecrations, but of Karsh himself. As the film progresses, Karsh becomes more opaque, his motives murkier, and his grief increasingly pathological. These twists are fascinating but also frustrating, leading the narrative into a fog of unanswered questions that might leave some viewers cold.
Yet Cronenberg surrounds Cassel with a stellar cast that brings warmth and depth. Diane Kruger and Guy Pearce, both enigmatic and grounded, help anchor the film in emotional reality even as it drifts into cerebral territory. Their performances are subtle yet compelling, with Pearce offering a particularly nuanced turn.
The Prognosis:
The Shrouds isn’t easy to love—but then again, grief rarely is. What it offers is a look into one man’s private hell, filtered through the lens of a director who has never shied away from uncomfortable truths. If its philosophical weight sometimes outweighs its dramatic clarity, it remains a compelling, mournful meditation from one of cinema’s most fearless auteurs.
Saul Muerte
The Shrouds will be screening in cinemas nationwide from Thu 3rd July.
Directed by Jeff Wolfe, Outbreak promises psychological dread and emotional turmoil against the backdrop of a creeping viral catastrophe—but ends up delivering little more than a tepid, trauma-soaked shuffle through familiar terrain.
The film follows a State Park Ranger (Billy Burke) and his wife (Alyshia Ochse) as they navigate the emotional wreckage of their teenage son’s disappearance, only to be confronted by a mysterious outbreak that further destabilises their world. As the infection spreads, so too does the sense of despair—but unfortunately, not much tension.
Billy Burke anchors the film with an earnest and committed performance, his weathered presence lending weight to otherwise limp material. Wolfe allows plenty of room for grief to dominate the narrative, but the pacing is sluggish, and the dramatic beats soon feel repetitive. Rather than building momentum, Outbreak spirals into melodrama, with a script that too often leans on genre clichés and a plot that telegraphs its twists from miles away.
There are a few flashes of atmosphere—some moody cinematography and eerie silences—but the film’s tonal heaviness overshadows its horror ambitions. The virus metaphor is serviceable, and by the time the film reaches its climax, the emotional payoff feels muted and overly familiar.
Despite its promising premise and a solid cast including Raoul Max Trujillo, Taylor Handley, and Jessica Frances Dukes, Outbreak plays it safe when it desperately needed to take risks. Watchable, sure—but only for the curious or the committed fans of the cast. For most, this is a slow trudge through thematic terrain that’s already been better navigated by others.
Outbreak will be available to rent or buy on DVD & Digital across Apple TV, Prime Video, Google TV, YouTube, and Fetch (AU) from July 2nd.
In 28 Days Later (2002), Danny Boyle and Alex Garland didn’t just kick the zombie genre into overdrive—they reanimated it. With rage-fueled infected, urgent digital grit, and a raw emotional core, it felt like the end of the world captured in real time. The sequel, 28 Weeks Later, traded intimacy for scale and kept the horror grounded in family trauma and moral collapse. Now, 28 Years Later arrives with all the right ingredients—Boyle and Garland reunited, a new angle on the infected, and a haunting performance from Jodie Comer—yet somehow the dish feels tepid, left too long to simmer in its own legacy.
Set nearly three decades after the initial outbreak, the film offers an evolved world, where quarantine zones remain ruthlessly enforced and life persists in liminal spaces. Comer plays Isla, a survivor embedded in a tight-knit community on a remote island connected to the mainland by a single, heavily guarded causeway. It’s a solid setting, rife with dread and potential—one that echoes the tension and bleak solitude of the original. But where 28 Days Later propelled itself with primal urgency, this entry often feels subdued, wandering through plot points instead of sprinting toward them.
The heart of the story follows a lone expedition back into the mainland’s infected heartland, where the infected have not only continued to mutate, but so too have the remnants of human society. The central theme once again revolves around family dynamics, something that has served as a connective tissue across all three films: Brendan Gleeson’s tragic turn in Days, the fractured Carlyle-McCormack family in Weeks, and now a newly-formed surrogate bond at the centre of Years. But here, it feels overemphasised to the point of distraction—particularly in scenes involving Ralph Fiennes, whose ponderous monologues often stall the film’s pulse when it should be quickening.
Comer, however, is the standout. Her portrayal of Isla brings grit, empathy, and conviction to a role that could’ve easily fallen into genre archetypes. She’s the emotional engine of the film, grounding it in human stakes even as the narrative wobbles into philosophical excess. The supporting cast handles their parts well, but none leave quite the same mark.
Visually, Boyle still knows how to stage devastation. His direction remains bold, capturing dereliction and dread with poetic framing. Garland’s script toys with paranoia, substance use, and psychological collapse—recurring themes for the duo—but here they feel more like recycled motifs than fresh meditations. There’s also an odd tonal shift in the final act, when the film suddenly veers into kung fu-style combat and hallucinatory spectacle, abandoning its grounded realism for a jarring dose of genre whiplash. The effect is disorienting and not entirely earned.
Fans looking for the visceral shock and bleak urgency of 28 Days Later may be disappointed. This is not that film. The infected still rage, the world still crumbles, but the pulse has slowed. The film’s strongest moments are its quietest – glimpses of survival, the cost of trust, the strange rituals that have replaced society. But in its desire to evolve, 28 Years Later sometimes forgets what made the original bite so hard in the first place.
The Prognosis:
28 Years Later is a fascinating, if flawed, return to a world that reshaped horror cinema. It’s packed with emotional resonance and striking visuals but often stumbles under the weight of its own ambitions. The virus has changed. Maybe the filmmakers have too.
There’s weird, and then there’s Lifeforce. Tobe Hooper’s 1985 sci-fi horror fever dream didn’t just step outside the box—it set it on fire, turned it into a naked vampire, and launched it into orbit. Forty years on, this glorious trainwreck of a film still pulses with an unholy energy: part alien invasion thriller, part erotic vampire myth, part end-of-days apocalypse, and all unleashed Hooper. It’s a mess—but it’s a beautiful, ambitious, and absolutely unhinged mess.
Based loosely (and we stress loosely) on Colin Wilson’s novel The Space Vampires, Lifeforce begins like Alien and ends like The Omega Man, with an interstellar expedition to Halley’s Comet bringing home something ancient and devastating: a trio of seductive, humanoid vampires who drain the life—literally the force—from their victims. What follows is a strange cocktail of sci-fi espionage, metaphysical dread, zombie contagion, and enough full-frontal nudity to make the MPAA sweat through its polyester.
At the centre of it all is Hooper, hot off the back of Poltergeist (and still shaking off the questions about Spielberg’s creative control). With Lifeforce, he grabs the wheel, hits the gas, and swerves into chaos with wild-eyed conviction. This is Hooper unfiltered, blending gothic horror and pulp science fiction with operatic flair. The film is massive in scale—shot like a prestige epic, scored with bombastic orchestration, and featuring enough laser-beam FX to fry a satellite. It’s hard not to admire the sheer guts of it all.
There’s espionage too—cold war paranoia baked into the script like secret messages in a sandwich. The British government scrambles to contain the outbreak, while American astronauts (including a stiff but determined Steve Railsback) struggle to explain what the hell they brought back. At times, the film plays like The Day of the Jackal with energy-sucking space demons. Other times, it’s Dracula on a spaceship, as Mathilda May’s otherworldly alien lures victims with silence and skin, drawing a hypnotic trail of destruction through the ruins of London.
And it’s in May’s performance—ethereal, deadly, utterly magnetic—that Lifeforce finds its strange gravitational pull. She doesn’t speak a word, but commands the screen like a vampire goddess. She is both object and agent of desire, representing Hooper’s recurring obsession with sexuality as a monstrous, irresistible force.
Yes, it’s convoluted. Yes, it spirals into nonsense. But there’s a manic joy in how it barrels forward, ideas colliding midair like doomed satellites. Life-force theft, reanimation, psychic connections, body horror, possession—it’s all here, stitched together like a mad scientist’s pet project. The tone shifts from serious sci-fi to gothic melodrama to gonzo action, often within a single scene.
And yet, for all its excesses and flaws, Lifeforce endures. It’s campy and chaotic, but also strangely profound. Beneath the spectacle is a film about identity, human weakness, and the eternal hunger for connection—even if that connection destroys you.
The Prognosis:
In an era of sanitised blockbusters and streamlined storytelling, Lifeforce stands out as a relic of fearless filmmaking. It’s a film that swings for the stars and occasionally misses, but when it hits… it leaves a mark.
Director Christopher Smith (Triangle, Severance, Creep) has long walked the fine line between genre smarts and psychological thrills. With Consecration, he returns to familiar territory: isolation, trauma, and the gnawing sense that reality is unspooling by divine design—or perhaps something darker. Unfortunately, despite a stellar cast and evocative visuals, this theological thriller never quite delivers the clarity or momentum it promises.
At the centre of the story is Grace, played with icy restraint and wounded conviction by Jena Malone, who travels to a remote convent in the Scottish Highlands after the supposed suicide of her priest brother. It’s no spoiler to say she doesn’t buy the Church’s official line. What follows is a grim unpicking of spiritual rot, ancient rites, and personal demons—literal and otherwise.
Malone is a reliably magnetic presence, giving Grace a cold, coiled intensity. She’s in nearly every frame and carries the film with a quiet sense of fury, even when the script leaves her wandering in narrative fog. Danny Huston, meanwhile, brings a slippery, unsettling charm to his role as Father Romero—a man whose calm demeanour suggests he’s either a holy man or something far more manipulative. Their scenes together crackle with tension, even if the broader story never quite catches fire.
Visually, Consecration is arresting. Robert Adams’ cinematography makes the windswept cliffs and ancient stone interiors of the convent feel appropriately ominous and otherworldly. There’s a chilling stillness to the imagery, as though the land itself has been cursed. Smith knows how to set a mood, and he does so beautifully here, evoking The Ninth Configuration by way of The Nun.
But for all its atmosphere, Consecration stumbles under the weight of its convoluted plot. Flashbacks, hallucinations, religious visions, and a not-so-linear structure make for an increasingly confusing experience. Smith is no stranger to twisty storytelling—Triangle remains a standout in that regard—but here the puzzle-box elements feel murky rather than mind-bending. The story moves slowly, and its pacing often saps the tension that the setting and premise so deftly establish.
By the time the “revelations” arrive, they’re less shocking than they are baffling, tipping the film into a kind of Doctor Who-style timey-wimey terrain that doesn’t mesh with the grounded horror of its opening acts. It’s a tonal mismatch, and one that ultimately dulls the emotional impact of the finale.
Still, there’s something admirable about the ambition on display. Consecration isn’t content to offer up surface-level scares. It aims for spiritual unease and existential horror, and when it clicks, it’s genuinely unsettling. But in the end, the execution can’t match the ambition.
The Prognosis:
A gorgeous, well-acted descent into faith and madness—but one that loses its way somewhere along the sacred path.
Saul Muerte
Consecration will be available on UK Digital Platforms from 16th June.
Surgeons of Horror 