Christina Reviews The *Final Destination* Series

There are four entries in the Final Destination saga.  In the first movie, a boy (Devon Sawa) has a premonition that the plane he is boarding is going to blow up with all of his classmates inside.  He starts screaming something along the lines of, “The plane’s going to explode!  We’re all going to die!”  and is kicked off of the aircraft.  A handful of his classmates follow him.  They think he’s crazy, particularly this one pompous brat played by the always charming Kerr Smith.  But sure enough, the plane blows up shortly after lift off.  The survivors have been spared an untimely death thanks to the psychic abilities of this unlikely hero.

But it’s not over.

Over the next several days, the survivors slowly begin to die horrible deaths, one by one.  It’s as if Death itself is after them, determined to come back for those who were tricky enough to slip past its deadly grasp the first time around.

The second movie is the same basic premise, only now it’s a girl who has a premonition of a fatal highway pile up.  She survives, along with several others, thanks to her quick interference. 

And then, like in the first movie, the survivors get picked off one by one in the days that follow. 

The third movie is more of the same, only now the survivors have cheated death by roller coaster.  The special features on the DVD allow you to “Choose Your Own Fate,” but unlike those Choose Your Own Adventure stories you may or may not be familiar with from your youth, your choice really doesn’t have all that much of an impact either way.  It’s really only subtle changes to the plot if you have a character choose one course of action over another.

The fourth movie is in 3D.  Several people die at a race track after a boy has a premonition.  He and his friends are spared, but not for long.

I liked this series.  It was an interesting premise and it lent itself to some awesomely bloody death scenes.  The fourth movie was particularly good in 3D. 

The only problem is that the whole series had this gaping plot hole so big you could drive a bus through it.  Think about this for a second.  If even just one person were to survive a deadly accident that they were never meant to survive, it would have ramifications that would extend to the far reaches of the world.  It’s called the ripple effect.  Final Destination 2 actually drives this point home quite nicely without even realizing it. 

With that in mind, it really doesn’t matter if death comes back for the survivors or not.  Death’s plan is already completely $!%##&.  Might as well clean the slate and start over from scratch.

I give the first movie three and a half stars and the rest of the series three stars.