Jeepers Creepers 3 Is A Major Letdown For Fans Of The Series

      

      It took 14 years after the release of the second Jeepers Creepers for a third film to finally get made and now audiences get the long-awaited third installment of the franchise, that first began in August 2001 with the release of Jeepers Creepers. Made for a budget of only $10 million dollars, the first Jeepers Creepers not only became a box office hit but developed a cult following, that led to the greenlighting of a sequel, which was released on the same Labor Day weekend release as its predecessor two years later in 2003. Carrying with it an even larger budget of $17 million in comparison to the first film, Jeepers Creepers 2 ended up being slightly less successful than its predecessor along with garnering the same style of mixed reviews, but ultimately ended up doing well enough to generate talks of a third film. The road to Jeepers Creepers 3's production was not a smooth one as the film struggled to find proper financing, and almost went straight to DVD under MGM studios. Add to that a total of nine straight years of numerous false attempts to begin production as well as setbacks. Upon finally securing financing and beginning production in early 2016, the film came under fire due to director Victor Salva's involvement given his criminal past regarding a child molestation case in the late 1980's, which led to him being convicted and later rehabilitated. Undergoing numerous rewrites, the script was polished with its story now taking place between the events of the first Jeepers Creepers and Jeepers Creepers 2, rather than the story taking place 23 years after the events of the second film with Gina Philips returning in a much larger role as Trish from the first Jeepers Creepers, 
rather than being reduced to a cameo role in the finished product. Unlike the first two films which received full theatrical runs, the third Jeepers Creepers received a one night run in theaters in October 2017 before landing on DVD, mainly due to the controversy behind its directors past. One suspects that the finished product ended up being a result of the resistance Salva received in terms of securing funding for the film for obvious reasons as the third Jeepers Creepers is easily the worst of the three films in regards to storytelling, production qualities, and lacking both the sense of fun and creepiness the first two films carried in terms of terrifying audiences.

The plot for Jeepers Creepers 3 takes place in between the events of the first and second film (Confusing right?) with Sheriff Dan Tashtego and a team of creeper hunters enlisting the help of officer Davis Tubbs to help stop the monster's eating spree. Watching the newest Creepers film, one doesn't understand why the films plot didn't continue from where the second movie left off with audiences, as that movie's ending experienced a time jump of 23 years into the future showing that the creature from the first two films was only a few days away from getting the opportunity to escape and eat again. Instead of continuing that films story and focusing on the farmer Jack Taggard played by Ray Wise, who caught the Creeper and was guarding him, Salva chose to take the franchise a step back by going backwards in the series timeline. The new story makes little to no sense in the overall timeline of the series, and only serves to frustrate and largely disappoint fans, who went into the new film with great anticipation that the story would find new ground after the terrorizing of a school bus of kids. The film abruptly ignores the storyline of both films before it, which was a fatal mistake for the movies chances to be a decent sequel. If Salva wasn't going to add to any of the previous storylines from the first two movies instead of doing a standalone one in between, then what was the point of establishing and making the audience care for the siblings in the first movie or the angry and vengeful farmer in the second. At least with those films, the audience had characters that were fairly well-established, and made you care about their safety when the creature appeared on the screen. Sadly that's not the case here as the audience doesn't connect with any of the characters in this film with most being throwaway ones, that only serve to be appetites for the creature with no real depth to them. The creature himself is not as scary this time around as he's way overexposed compared to the previous two films. Jeepers Creepers 3 feels like it doesn't have any of the creativity, the cleverness, nor the passion that went into telling its story, that the first film had nor the campy fun of its sequel.

      In terms of the films acting performances. the actors try for the most part but feel as if they lack the energy and enthusiasm, that actors such as Justin Long and Gina Philips carried in the first film. Stan Shaw is introduced as a new character in the series playing Sheriff Dan Tashtego, whose brought in to help track the Creeper. Generally a strong character actor, Shaw does the best job possible job with playing his role despite how badly written his character comes across. Brandon Smith returns as Sgt. Davis Tubbs from the first Jeepers Creepers with more screentime delivered to his character (One still doesn't understand why such a minor characters in the first one got a larger role in this story when Trish's arc is left unresolved). He plays the part the same way he delivered his performance in the first, which was cheesy though effective despite his character feeling pointless in this film other than helping to bridge the story in between the first and third movie. Meg Foster is third in line for strongest bystander character with her doing the best she can with the character written for her as being a dementia-stricken old lady. The rest of the cast is made up of young teens who deliver serviceable performances with Gabrielle Haugh as Foster's daughter Addison, Jordan Salloum as her brother Kenny, and Chester Rushing as Buddy Hooks, the young country boy crushing on Haugh's character, fulfilling the movies quota of having a generic teen romance thrown in the mix of the story. As for the Creeper himself, Jonathan Breck returns to the iconic role and once again provides a creepy yet effective performance despite his character not being as impactful this time around (That's more of an issue with the films direction and writing rather than his performance). The performances as a whole are passable with everyone trying their best to make something out of the story, but don't have a strong script to work off.

      The films directing and writing by Victor Salva is well deserving of the criticism it receives as both works lack the creative feel that the previous films had. While neither Jeepers Creepers film was perfect and had their share of issues with each story, they always carried with them a sense of campiness, which made their stories thrilling regardless of how silly they came across. That sense of dedication and passion towards telling their story is absent here as everything from the writing to the films production values feels like a downgrade in quality. The CGI in the film is cheap and unrealistic compared to the work done in the previous films, both of which carried with them larger budgets. It doesn't help that the effects are plastered all over the film either and involve weird new surprise twists involving the Creepers van that was never revealed before in the previous films. Examples are a giant chain that shoots out of the van and can go straight into another car, or rolling explosive balls that fly out of the Creepers vehicle and can blow up vehicles during highway chases. The films pacing is uneven and all over the place with the story both lacking focus and feeling off compared to the first two films. The way that Jeepers Creepers 3 ends with it's final scene is how the movie should've began with the tying of the first two movies stories together. The previous films also had stronger characters, that made the audience give a damn such as Darry and Trish from the first movie. Their plot was simple and easy to follow while providing enough time for the audience to grow connected with them and care when Darry is taken by the creature and ultimately murdered. The first movie was essentially a simply story about a pair of siblings trying to survive against something mysterious and sinister, that's out of their control. The second film took what worked about the first movie and built upon it with the main focus being the high school football team with an effective side-by-side subplot involving an angry farmer father, who became hell-bent on killing the creature after taking his son. The difference between the plots of the first two movies and the one for the third film is the first two were well-balanced, fairly developed, and easy to follow. Regardless of how silly the second film came across as being in comparison to the first, the audience was still drawn to the story and having fun with the concept of a bunch of high school kids in a school bus being terrorized by the Creeper. The plots for the first two movies worked because they took each other's concepts and built off them to create what could've been a bizarre yet solid horror movie trilogy if Jeepers Creepers 3 had stuck to it's original script of taking place after the events of Jeepers Creepers 2. Wouldn't it have been a more exciting storyline to see Ray Wise's character from the second team up with Trish from the first film to take down the Creeper once and for all when he awoke at the end of the second movie? That would've been a much more satisfying film for fans than what they ultimately got here.

      The most eye-opening revelation about the third film being so poor in quality in comparison to the first two is not how bad the CGI is for the film, it's how poor the scriptwriting comes across along with how the story feels like a bunch of unfinished ideas thrown together without a straight-forward narrative. This is easily the most confusing and frustrating Jeepers Creepers film to follow in regards to its plot as the film feels like it jumps all over the place with numerous characters the audience doesn't give an ounce about because they aren't properly developed. Some of the movies subplots have moments of potential where it could've worked if more elaboration was placed upon it, while others prompt unintentional laughter due to how silly they come across. Examples of the story feeling like it's bouncing off the walls is Meg Fosters character getting visions from her dead son along with the audience being treated to Sargeant Tubbs pointless bickering with Sheriff Dan Tashtego. The films jumps from their subplots to that of the anti-Creeper gang, then to the ones involving the teenagers such as Buddy crushing on Addison with her character having her own subplot. The script tries so hard to juggle all of these stories while introducing all of these characters in an attempt to make them relevant to the plot when in actuality they feel unimportant, unnecessary, and distract from the true narrative of the series which is that the creature gets to eat every 23 years and 23 days. The first two movies brilliantly and effectively conveyed that concept in the most brutal fashion, yet here the Creeper doesn't feel like the same creature from the first two films. The Creeper is also not as scary in this one due to the amount of times he's shown in daylight, making his costume come across as looking cheesy (Anyone wonders why he's wearing a red shirt in this film in comparison to the others?) For whatever reason he chose to eliminate some of the key traits that made the Creeper such an intimidating and frightening figure in the first two films, Salva fundamentally changes his own horror movie monster and gets his characteristics wrong. Whereas the Creeper singled people out by smelling their fear and eating their body parts, he does nothing similar here besides just walk around and grunt. The CGI work on him is so terrible that when he flies away at night, it looks like painfully fake rather than being visually striking. The only good scene in the film involving The Creeper is a scene in the woods where a group of young teenagers bikers find the Creepers truck in the woods prompting his character to attack. Beyond that one of the most innovative and interesting characters in modern horror is completely betrayed by his own filmmaker and completely wasted.

       To put it blatantly, Jeepers Creepers 3 is an all around terrible film, that serves as being a massive letdown for fans of the first two who waited 14 years for a stronger story to continue the series from where the second film left off. Here, the audience still doesn't know the origins of the series main antagonist, though it's hinted that the main characters in the film do because of a hand, that allows people to see visions of where the creature came from and what he truly is. The audience never gets to see what the characters in the film saw, which makes such a subplot completely pointless, frustrating, and stupid. Looking at this film in comparison to the previous two Jeepers Creepers, one doesn't understand why Salva decided to go in between his previous films with a story that absolutely no one was interested in watching, and didn't choose to continue from where he left off with the end of Jeepers Creepers 2. He missed out on a really good opportunity to tie both of those films together by uniting all the survivors in what could've been a strong finish to a fun series of horror movies. Not only could the Creepers origins story been explored here, but audiences could've gotten the proper finish to the trilogy they waited 14-years for while giving Trish's character as well as Ray Wise's character from the second the justice they seek for the Creepers actions. The third Jeepers Creepers film is a bad movie any way that one cuts it, but its greatest tragedy is not that it's terrible, it's the lost potential the third movie had to wrap up it's series in a more satisfying fashion for fans of the series. The end of this film implies that the door is left open for a 4th film, which after watching this almost nobody will want unless a different writer-director helm it or the series gets completely rebooted. What could've been a sequel that gave fans what they wanted after waiting in anticipation for 14 years, ends up being a complete disappointment, that deserves to be forgotten about immediately after seeing it and erased from memory. You'll be better off for it once you see what has been done to the story.

Final Verdict: If you enjoyed Jeepers Creepers 1 and 2, skip and avoid this film at all costs and just rewatch the first two, it's way more satisfying than this.