A Sequel Nobody Asked For to a Movie Nobody Quite Remembered
There are many ways to make a horror sequel: you can expand the mythology (Aliens), reinvent the formula (Evil Dead II), or — if you’re The Pact 2 — you can awkwardly reheat the leftovers of the first film and hope no one notices the smell.
Directed by Dallas Richard Hallam and Patrick Horvath, this 2014 direct-to-video “sequel” to Nicolas McCarthy’s The Pact is less a continuation and more a crime scene itself — a grim, lifeless mess with all the energy of a half-deflated Halloween balloon. The first film was a surprise hit — a minimalist ghost story with some genuine creepiness. The sequel, on the other hand, is like that same ghost got bored and decided to haunt a laundromat instead.
Plot: The Judas Killer Strikes Again (And Again, and Again…)
We open with June Abbott (Camilla Luddington), a crime scene cleaner — which is a fancy way of saying she mops up what the screenwriters leave behind. She’s called to scrub the aftermath of a new murder that resembles the M.O. of the “Judas Killer” from the first movie. You remember the Judas Killer, right? Don’t worry — the movie will remind you a lot.
June has a boyfriend, Officer Daniel Meyer (Scott Michael Foster), who’s so suspiciously bland that he might as well wear a sign reading, “Hi, I’m the murderer.” She also has mommy issues — her mom Maggie (Amy Pietz) is a chain-smoking, whisky-gargling exposition dispenser who exists mostly to be murdered so June can have motivation.
FBI Agent Terrence Ballard (Patrick Fischler), meanwhile, shows up to question June in the least professional manner imaginable. He delivers exposition like a man reading cue cards written on a moving treadmill: “June, you’re adopted! Your real mother was the first victim of the Judas Killer! Your uncle may have been a murderer! I’m deeply suspicious of you, but not enough to actually do anything useful!”
When June starts seeing ghostly shadows, the movie wants us to think it’s supernatural horror, but the scares are about as haunting as a malfunctioning Roomba. She has a vision of her mother’s death (shocking, no one saw that coming) and finds out that her family tree is basically a Christmas ornament of serial killers.
To solve the mystery, she contacts Annie Barlow (Caity Lotz), the heroine of the first Pact, who arrives halfway through the movie looking as if she’s still wondering why she agreed to this. The two conduct a séance (because when in doubt, add a séance), and Annie immediately gets herself murdered, which feels less like a plot twist and more like Caity Lotz’s agent successfully negotiating an early exit.
June then discovers the “Pink Room,” an erotic photo studio that sounds sleazy enough to be interesting — but don’t worry, the movie sucks all the intrigue right out of it. Turns out her boyfriend Daniel is a creepy photographer who moonlights as a serial killer, because of course he does. His big justification? The ghost of the original Judas Killer told him to.
Cue the most awkward domestic showdown since War of the Roses, featuring June and Daniel chasing each other around their house in a finale so predictable you could choreograph it in your sleep. June finally bludgeons Daniel to death, rescues the FBI agent (who’s been useless since act one), and walks away free. But just as she starts to relax — boo! — a mirror reflection reveals the ghost of Judas lurking behind her. Sequel hook, achieved. Audience interest, not so much.
Characters: Who Are You People and Why Are You Talking Like That?
Camilla Luddington (of Grey’s Anatomy fame) plays June with the enthusiasm of someone trying to remember if she left the stove on. Her character arc is essentially: confused → traumatized → confused again. She’s supposed to be a smart, independent woman uncovering her dark lineage, but she spends most of the movie staring at things off-camera and whispering, “What’s happening?”
Scott Michael Foster’s Daniel starts out as a loving boyfriend and ends up as a serial-killing, ghost-whispering nutcase. His transformation from “charming cop” to “murderous lunatic” happens so abruptly that I half-expected him to blame it on low blood sugar.
Patrick Fischler’s FBI agent Ballard feels like he wandered in from a completely different movie — possibly a parody of Mindhunter. His interrogation scenes are unintentionally hilarious: imagine a man who’s both overacting and undercaffeinated.
Amy Pietz as Maggie gets the thankless role of “mom who knows too much and smokes dramatically.” She’s killed off early, presumably because even she couldn’t keep track of who’s related to whom.
And then there’s Caity Lotz. Poor Caity. She reprises her role from the first film, gets a few lines about “the spirits,” performs a séance that goes nowhere, and dies in a hallway. The movie treats her character less like a returning heroine and more like an inconvenient cameo that needed to be wrapped up before lunch.
Tone: Psychological Horror by Way of Cable Drama
The Pact 2 tries to be psychological horror — you know, a deep dive into trauma and inherited evil — but what it delivers is a Lifetime movie that occasionally remembers it’s supposed to be scary. The pacing is glacial, the atmosphere nonexistent, and the scares are so telegraphed they might as well come with subtitles reading, “LOUD NOISE INCOMING.”
Every scare follows the same rhythm:
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June stares into a mirror.
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Music builds.
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A shadow moves.
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June gasps.
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Cut to black.
Rinse and repeat until credits.
Even the ghostly Judas himself, meant to be this terrifying presence, looks like a rejected extra from The Walking Dead. He pops up occasionally, hisses like a malfunctioning espresso machine, and vanishes again.
Visuals: Fifty Shades of Beige
The film is shot in that trendy “muted gray” aesthetic that screams, “We’re serious about our horror.” Unfortunately, the only thing it achieves is making every room look like a crime scene from HGTV: Haunted Edition.
Every set looks like it was built out of drywall and regret. The Pink Room, which should have been the film’s creepy showstopper, is instead a poorly lit studio with some dusty mannequins and a fog machine working overtime.
There’s no style, no tension, and no visual storytelling — just dim corridors, jump scares, and the occasional Bible page because apparently nothing says “evil legacy” like torn scripture.
Editing: A Masterclass in Confusion
The editing in The Pact 2 is so choppy it could be mistaken for a deleted TikTok montage. Scenes cut off mid-dialogue, transitions make no sense, and the narrative jumps around like a haunted PowerPoint presentation.
At times, you’ll wonder if entire scenes were accidentally deleted. At others, you’ll wish they had been.
The séance sequence, for instance, feels like it was edited by someone who had never seen a séance before — or possibly a movie. The continuity is so bad that you start questioning whether the ghost or the editor is the real villain.
Ending: The Pact to Never Watch This Again
By the time the credits roll, it’s hard to tell what The Pact 2 wanted to accomplish. The mystery is solved, the killer is dead, and the ghost still lingers, but you’re left feeling nothing but exhaustion and pity for everyone involved.
The final mirror jump-scare is meant to set up The Pact 3, but thankfully that pact was never fulfilled.
Final Thoughts: Sequel, Schmequel
In the end, The Pact 2 is the cinematic equivalent of reheating yesterday’s horror leftovers — all the flavor’s gone, and now it just tastes like fridge. It’s not scary, it’s not suspenseful, and it’s barely coherent.
The first film was a minimalist ghost mystery that surprised people with its tension and atmosphere. The sequel takes that foundation, buries it under subplots, and sets it on fire.
Final Verdict:
⭐️ out of 5.
A sequel so pointless it makes you nostalgic for death by dumbwaiter. Watching it isn’t terrifying — it’s just sad. The real horror is realizing you could’ve spent those 90 minutes reorganizing your spice rack and felt more suspense.
