My quick rating – 4.1/10. Well, folks, it finally happened. Someone out there watched Unspeakable from 2000 and thought, “You know what this story needs? A sequel. Twenty-four years later. With Edward Furlong. And magic coconuts.” And that someone was apparently Chad Ferrin. Bless his Troma-inspired heart.
Unspeakable: Beyond The Wall Of Sleep picks up immediately after James Fhelleps’ arrest—yes, that emotionally dead, incestuous murderer who spent the first movie shuffling from kill to kill like a depressed Roomba. Now he’s locked up in Arkham Asylum, because of course he is, and a renowned dream doctor named Ambrose London (played by a very paycheck-cashing Edward Furlong) is brought in to psychoanalyze his split personalities: Fhelleps and Joe Slater. Furlong might also want to investigate his career choices.
We’re already off the rails, and we haven’t even gotten to the magic rock.
The movie opens with irritating black censor bars over the gore and nudity, which made me think Prime was having a breakdown—but no, it’s just a strange artistic choice that thankfully disappears once the film jumps 25 years into the future, at which point we leave behind the vague attempt at Troma-style sleaze and fully embrace cosmic lunacy. I mean, sure, why wouldn’t the plot suddenly involve a mythical meteorite that zaps two brothers during a walk in the park and fuses them into a single bloodthirsty demon-personality-blob? That is after the enlarged penis duel, of course. Sounds medically accurate.
Ginger Lynn plays Furlong’s wife (yes, that Ginger Lynn), and Bai Ling wanders in for a scene like she got lost on her way to a Sharknado audition. You’ll get a possessed man chomping on intestines like spaghetti, although when the camera pans around—whoops!—his victim’s torso is in mint condition. Look, when the FX budget maxes out at four dollars and a wet napkin, sometimes continuity takes a backseat.
In what can only be described as drunk or high ramblings, Unspeakable 2 blends Lovecraftian horror, 90s late-night Cinemax vibes, psychological drama, and yes, the occasional poop joke. It’s unbalanced, chaotic, and about as grounded in reality as a Florida Man headline. The dialogue feels like it was written by someone translating therapy terms through Google Translate, and the performances range from “trying their best” to “what is acting?”
There are attempts at humor, usually shoved awkwardly into scenes like someone accidentally sat on a rubber chicken. But credit where it’s due, Ferrin really commits to the madness. The Slater/Fhelleps fusion gets its own little internal civil war, culminating in some sort of psychic cage match to determine which persona gets to drive the meat suit. It’s bizarre and kind of dumb, but still entertaining in an odd way.
The film also gives Alice (you remember, the grotesquely disfigured wife from the first movie who made Darth Vader look like a Nivea model) a surprise glow-up and questionable plot relevance. And the daughter that caught a case of death in the first flick, yeah, she is doing much better now. There’s also a garbage disposal scene that might be the single most inaccurate use of a household appliance in horror history. I laughed and cried. Ok, I didn’t, but I wondered if anyone on set was sober.
In the end, Unspeakable: Beyond The Wall Of Sleep is the kind of sequel that makes you question your own grip on reality. Is it “good”? Not in any traditional sense. But is it entertaining? Oh, slightly. Like watching a monkey operate a particle collider. Confusing, loud, and full of unexpected explosions.
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