What has happened to the Creeper?
Both Jeepers Creepers were cheesy in their day but were interesting to say the least. Unfortunately, Jeepers Creepers 3 took over a decade to be released and after screening the film all I have to say is, “After all this time, this is the best you can come up with?” Victor Salva returns to write and direct the third in the franchise and we also see the return of Jonathan Breck as the Creeper. The result is a painful viewing experience which induced numerous laughs from a sold-out theater, and those laughs were directed at the film.
The Creeper is still out there killing whomever he likes. He eats the ones that he wants and no one can stop him. The police have found his truck with that clever license plate “BEATNGU” which translates to “be eating you”. His truck know displays various ways of protecting itself from outsiders equipped with traps and bullets that can simply ricochet when shot at. Bodies are found in the back of the truck and everyone is mortified and we see Sergeant Davis Tubbs (Brandon Smith) join a task force hell-bent on destroying the Creeper. “What happened here happened before!” screams Sheriff Tashtego (Stan Shaw) as he informs the Sergeant Tubbs of what is happening.
Now this sad. All the characters die in the oldest clichés such as running in a straight line, just standing there with a gun and not shooting and by standing around looking aimlessly until they are killed. The deaths scenes are so badly staged that the audience were laughing every time somebody got killed and even shouted at the screen!
A love story (if you can call it that) between Buddy and Addison (Chester Rushing and Gabrielle Haugh) is somewhat a nice touch until she’s taken by the Creeper but for some reason is kept alive. I will say that the actors do what they can, but the script is just so slow and boring, that I got to a point that I wished every character would be killed by the Creeper.
An interesting take on the film is that between Gaylen (Meg Foster) and her dead son Kenny (Jordan Salloum) who buried something on the farmland that he took from the Creeper. This thing will tell the origins of the Creeper and we’ll get a better understanding of what it is. That’s how the film was marketed, it would reveal the origins, well guess what? Nothing is revealed! We are robbed of our time in knowing who he is and where he came from. This is not only a disappointment, but it feels like a slap in the face that we’ve waited so long only to be given nothing in return.
It was nice to see Breck as the Creeper but his performance doesn’t scare or even creep. When the police and townsfolk do battle the Creeper the action is slow, boring and poorly executed. It was nice to see Gina Phillips again, but she only appears as a cameo in the final scene. What a way to build up the suspense!
The Creeper deserves a better movie and Victor Salva’s script is horrendous in creating stupid characters who have no common sense, weak action scenes combined with actors who look confused as the audience was. The audience’s reaction was the best part of this screening and Jeepers Creepers 3 is shockingly embarrassing to this franchise that we’ve waited so long to return. I want to see the Creeper again but Victor Salva needs to step down because this franchise is already looking dead, buried and long forgotten.
Leave a Comment