Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) is resurrected and returns to Miles County in terrier 2, this time focusing on a teenage girl and her younger brother during Halloween. Along the way, he happily kills many strangers and is obsessed with the evil of it all. It’s gore from start to finish with a little storyline sprinkled in, expanding on the first one Terrier film where we see art chasing Tara Heyes (Jenna Kanell) around an abandoned building, more just for the thrill of the chase.
“I love that people see the character from Sienna because I’ve had that character in my head for about 10 years,” said the director. Damien Leone. “People have been clinging to my villain. I wanted to see if I could maybe make a lead character that they like too. So I’m excited. I’m really happy with what Lauren LaVera has brought to the character. I think she’s so likeable and vulnerable and charismatic and heroic. She’s made such a layered representation of it.”
Terrifier 2 wastes no time
terrier 2 begins with Art covered in blood after a man’s murder. He goes to a laundromat to clean himself up and there he meets Demon Girl (Georgia MacPhail), another evil entity who almost seems like family to him. Some characters can see Demon Girl, some can’t. He’s making funny faces with her while a man sleeps in the corner of the laundromat like a sitting duck. Before he leaves, of course, Art kills him.
Then we meet Sienna (Lauren LaVera) who has nightmares about art. Her little brother Eric (Griffin Santopietro) wants to dress up as him for Halloween, which angers Sienna because she suspects her nightmares are more than just dreams. This is confirmed when they serve as a conduit to start a fire in her room and burn everything on her nightstand except a dagger her father left her before he died. It seems that this dagger is magic and that is why she and her brother become the target of Art.
“I knew the supernatural element would be huge, and I didn’t want to directly explain why he was coming back, but just let the public know that there is a supernatural force leading him on this mission to lead him to Sienna,” Leone said.
Sienna and Eric are targeted because of a magical dagger, and the power that directs it “takes the form of this little girl,” Leone explained, referring to Demon Girl, “be it a demon or the devil himself.”
Terrifier 2 is full of Gore
Art has its guiding force and goals, but it must also have fun. It seems that’s why he chases Sienna for a while before taking her on completely, with horrific scenes where he chops off her friends, Halloween store clerks, or really anyone with a heartbeat. These scenes can be uncomfortable to watch, but that’s probably what fans of the first one have Terrier movie expected, and terrier 2 takes it to another level.
“There’s one scene in particular that I knew we’d cover the whole room with in blood. We actually built that set because I knew I couldn’t shoot it in someone’s house. We would have simply destroyed their property. That set is still in a shed, and it still looks exactly like we left it. I think there are still only bottles of blood on the floor. I mean, we just ran out of there. We never wanted to look back… we shot it for two days and we knew it was going to be one of the big scenes, if not the biggest scene to rival the hacksaw scene in part one. That was what everyone expected of us,’ Leone said.
Art takes obvious pleasure in these scenes, almost cartoonish elements mixed with his murders, but at times, depending on the circumstances, it’s dead serious, which makes him all the more terrifying.
“There are a lot of little Art the Clown things that we know we want to do, like little looks he does or moments like that. But what I like to do is maybe one or two will come my way, and with someone like Dave, I like to just let him play and improvise and do all kinds of crazy stuff. What’s great is I think sometimes he goes way too far in a very cartoonish piece, but I can always bring him back in, maybe meet somewhere in the middle or something like that. And he is very brave, he has no problem going anywhere,” explains Leone. He continued: “Then there are times when I tell him to drop the whole clown shtick, I want you to be dead serious like you’re not even dressed up as a clown right now, so it makes it even scarier, and you don’t have to.” “I don’t really know what’s going on in his head.”
Ability for Terriifier 3
terrier 2 is a strong successor to the first that will undoubtedly please its fans. There is everything the first had and more. The kill scenes are more gruesome, there’s more of a story to follow, and the overall filmmaking is stronger. We also get a longer run time, coming in at just over two hours.
“Right now, as an artist, I’d like to tell a solid trilogy,” Leone commented about the possibility of making another one. “That way you can look and feel fulfilled with a beginning, a middle and an end and feel satisfied. Something you can walk away from and say, ‘I know what this was about. I know these characters, and there was a solid arc.’”
There is currently no confirmation for terrier 3though to echo Leone’s feelings, there’s certainly plenty of story to tell, and we’re interested to see how he and his team would rise to the challenge of taking the blood to an even greater extreme once again.
terrier 2 will be in cinemas from October 6, 2022 from cinedigm in collaboration with Icon Events.