The Strangers horror film series has become a unique one. The original movie was meant to be a standalone story, but is currently being remade into a trilogy of movies, with the first two of the trilogy already being released at the time of writing this. Both versions follow the events of a couple being stalked, tortured, and preyed upon by three masked strangers. The idea behind them, that you could be watched, hunted down, and hurt by anyone at any time, is a great one for a horror film. It’s genuinely scary and feels real. That being said, unfortunately, these movies can be extremely frustrating.

For starters, there’s a lack of plot. This is especially the case with the 2008 original and with The Strangers: Chapter 1. It’s more or less one big chase scene for 90 minutes every movie. The Strangers: Chapter 2 does add a bit more, but it’s not much. It’s still mostly chases. Sure, there’s definitely some suspense here and there because of it, but the lack of actual story around that leads to a lack of caring about those characters being hunted.

This remake trilogy was their chance to improve upon the original movie and use its premise to tell a new story. The Strangers: Chapter 1, however, is basically the same exact movie, except it was made with a somehow worse quality and one of the victims lives at the very end. Everything is the same, but it looks and feels cheaper. It’s a bonkers choice to go that route with it.

Also, these movies are meant to be grounded in reality. There’s no magic or powers of any sort like in a lot of other horror movies. There is nothing paranormal about them. That’s how it should be with this premise to maximize the fear felt from potential real life scenarios. However, the Strangers do some things that are impossible without superspeed or teleportation. They must be sprinting faster than any human alive in order to knock on the door and then stand ominously down the street, or appear behind any closed door the victims open. It kind of takes one out of it every time something like this happens.

Something else that contradicts the purpose of the movies is that Chapter 2 starts to reveal who the Strangers are and explore who they are as people. The whole point is that these Strangers could be anyone. That’s what makes it so scary. Maybe they’re someone you know. Maybe they’re not. Anyone could be watching you and you might not know it, and you might not know who they are. That’s a terrifying concept that the original attempted to capture, but now they’re throwing that out the window. It takes the primary fear factor out of the horror movie, which is a problem.

These movies are chock full of things that are annoying or just plain silly. In The Strangers: Chapter 2, the movie gets interrupted by a wild boar that chases the protagonist around the woods for almost ten minutes, which has nothing to do with the rest of the film. The characters make every dumb decision possible, like refusing to run when they’re completely in the clear and constantly discarding their weapons. The movies also feature just about every horror movie cliche possible, like phones losing signal at the most inconvenient moments and people not believing the protagonist when they said they saw something. 

It’s worth noting that there are still great moments with suspense and scary shots. The protagonist hiding in the morgue freezer was enough for the audience to hold their breath. One of the Strangers lurking in the reflection of a mirror is genuinely creepy. That being said, they’re still very frustrating. They could all be combined into one single better movie instead of being bogged down by endless chases and cliches for 90 minutes each.

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