Pet Sematary Two (1992)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s This About: More wacky Pet Sematary shenanigans!

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Had to do a Stephen King feature this year! Although he took his name off this sequel, so he basically has nothing ti do with it. Greeeeaaat.
• But it has Eddie Furlong in it, how bad can it be?
• All the marketing material has this movie titles like: Pet Sematary TWO, with the TWO spelt out. But the main title just now had the Roman numeral 2 (II). Wackiness!
• Mary Lambert is channeling her inner Tim Burton. The soundtrack even sounds like Elfman.
• I’d get off on seeing you suffer too.
• So there’s a movie being made in this movie, a gothic horror movie it seems. In between takes the lead actress calls her son, Jeff. Eddie Furlong strolls over and she asks him “How long have you been here?” As if she’s surprised he’s even there. So why did she call him if she’s surprised he was there?!
• So on the next take there’s a horrific accident when Renee, Jeff’s mom, kneels down in a set of a wet crypt while holding an iron gate and one of the gaffers knocks over an electrical box (quite the gaffe eh?) for the lights and it shorts out electrocuting her because he can’t let go of the gate. Jeff watches the whole thing. Helluva way to start this flick. 
• Anthony Edwards plays Jeff’s dad who’s a vet. Here starts the pet theme.

• I guess they’re gonna have to recast the lead in Castle of Terror now. I feel bad for the director.
• Clancy Brown plays the sheriff Gus. Awesome.
• I gotta know though…is this MAINE?! I mean it has to be the same town as the original. Unless there’s another magic Indian burial ground behind another pet cemetery. It’s Schlocktoberfest, anything is possible.
• “You look different than you sounded on the phone” means either you’re very pretty or you’re very ugly. In this case it’s the former.
• I’m quite surprised Goose is in this. I thought he was in ER around now (nope that’s 1994).
• That reminds me that I recently watched Gotcha! with him and Linda Fiorentino. Pretty decent flick but I always expected more paint gun shenanigans. But that’s a review for another day I suppose. Sorry I digress.
• Jeff finds some stray cats in the new vet’s office for his dad. He wants to keep one. $100 bucks he names it Renee after his mom.
• Zowie is the name of Clancy Brown’s kid’s dog. Pronounced ZOW-ee not ZO-ee. It’s well known around here that we love David Bowie but it always bugged me that he named himself after Jim Bowie (of the famous knife) and Jim Bowie pronounces his name BOO-wee not BO-ee. Personally I prefer BO-Ee but I guess you can also pronounce it Bow-EE like how they’re pronouncing the dog’s name. I’m sorry but I guess we should get back to this flick.
• Yeah, Gilbert just started moving things in to the abandoned vet’s office minutes ago but Gus and his dumb kid strolled in like it’s been up and running for a while. Did the original vet hightail it out of town in the middle of the night?!
• Zowie got his face cut up by a bunch of rabbits. Zowie is like a Malamute sized dog. I find this all hard to believe.
• Gus is now telling, bragging really, to Jeff that he used to date his mom back in high school. Goose is standing right there. Dick move Kurgan.
• Hey! It’s Billy from Big. He’s playing a bully named Clyde and has already targeted Jeff for being the son of a famous dead actress. With that dangle crucifix earring he shouldn’t be bullying anyone.

• Yeah, why did Jeff bring the cat to school?!
• I was wrong. He named the cat Tiger. Clyde said it was “pussy” name. I don’t think he meant it ironically.
• Also how much of a fucking prick do you have to be to bully someone you just met and said sorry that their mom just died.
• Clyde steals the cat (Jeff is a moron for giving Billy the cat in the first place) and makes Jeff chase him and his friends on their bikes a few miles.
• Nod to the Creed house. I’m pretty sure they would’ve sold that house since only the daughter survived the last film. So that house must be abandoned for a long time then.
• Clyde and his pals tell Jeff all about the Pet Sematary and the Indian burial ground. Then tease him that he should bury his dead mom in there. 
• Jeff then sucker-punches Clyde and they have a brief fight where Clyde wins. All-in-all a decent first day of school. All this would’ve been avoided if Jeff didn’t bring a fucking kitten to school.
• Drew, the chubby kid who owns Zowie, tells Jeff that he wishes his sheriff step-dad was dead. Typical boy bonding conversation.
• Gus is having too much fun watching bunnies fuck.
• He then sets up an electric fence for the bunny’s cage. I assume to protect them from Zowie. Or in Zowie’s case to protect Zowie from them.
• Gus is doing a pretty lousy Maine accent I must say.
• Just realized that Drew’s mom played Nora from Brighton Beach Memoirs.
• Always nice to see your step-dad sexually accost your mom in the kitchen.

• Gus stops mid-coitus to go outside to shoot Zowie because the dog attempted to get the rabbits again. I guess the electric fence didn’t do the trick.
• He actually killed the dog. I thought he was just going to scare Drew.
• I love how there’s a KEEP OUT sign at the end of the Pet Sematary that leads to the path to the Indian burial ground.
• What happens if you bury a goldfish in the Indian burial ground?
• And does it work on plants? What would happen if you buried a dead ficus?
• Drew’s mom hears Zowie and goes outside to look for the dog. Did she forget it died? She’s not acting like the now dead dog is suddenly back alive.
• OK let me get this straight. Drew’s folks are grounding him because they think he lied about burying Zowie but don’t seem to confused about the fact that Zowie is back to life? 
• And if Gus wanted Zowie dead a day ago why isn’t he more upset that it’s still alive?
• Vet’s take house calls in special vet ambulances? Vet’s have ambulances?
• Jeff has this weird dream where he wakens to the sight of his mom in a rocking chair calling his name and her head becomes Zowie’s head. WHAT DOES THIS ALL MEAN!?!
• Goose says that Zowie’s heartbeat is not registering but accounts it to it being so low. He’s a great veterinarian.
• Jeff questions Drew as to why it doesn’t have a heartbeat as if he forgot he helped Drew bury the dead dog a night ago into the Indian burial ground.
• Clyde and his friends make an effigy of Jeff’s mom to scare him with. Sad thing is, they actually do scare him with it. The face is a clear mask that reminds me of Alice, Sweet Alice.
• Is Clyde’s Halloween costume juts him wearing pantyhose over his head?

• Who told Jeff and Drew to come to the Pet Sematary on Halloween night anyway? When entering Jeff said “Where is everybody?” Who were they intending to meet? All the boys in their class are Clyde and his friends!
• Gus is pissed at his wife for letting Drew break his grounding. Gus asks her where he is forgetting it’s Halloween and he’s most likely trick or treating.
• The kids are telling ghost stories in the Pet Sematary and Clyde is telling the story of the first film but goes on that Ellie Creed went insane and killed her grandparents with an ax. Remembering how awful those grandparents were, I would love to have actually seen that.
• After Gus breaks up the party and tells Jeff to stay out of it Drew punches Gus but then gets a thrashing. Then Zowie comes out of nowhere (last we saw him he was caged up at the vet) and rips his jugular apart.
• Jeff suggests burying Gus in the Indian burial ground because it worked with Zowie. With flying colors it worked!
• They had a shovel with them already? Or did they go home for a shovel?
• Drew went too bed in his Dracula costume.
• So I realize that you’re basically a walking corpse if you come back from the Pet Sematary but what would happen if you had your head cut off or your heart torn out? Would you still come back? Asking for a friend.
• Like can you be healed somehow? Gus is bandaging up his neck because this jugular was ripped out, like would that heal over time?
• Zombie Gus rapes his wife. Her only complaint is that he’s cold.
• Didn’t Denise Crosby kill her husband like within minutes of crawling out of the grave? So now Gus is semi-normal? Wonder what changed this time.
• Creepy twin girls!

• Lady with the twin girls go to the vet because he has the stray kittens. Gilbert points them towards the back while he’s on the phone with another vet who is telling Goose that the blood sample from Zowie indicates Zowie is dead. Goose never bothered to check the kennel area in the back and the woman and kids shriek in terror at the blood bath Zowie caused the night before. He’s a terrible vet.
• Goose is questioning the old vet who also had a similar blood test come back as coming from a dead pet and he tells him it was Church the Creed’s cat from the first film. This actor was not in the first film nor do I recall the Creed’s taking Church to any vet. 
• Drew and Jeff are just sitting on the porch watching zombie Gus slaughtering his rabbits. Don’t they have anything better to do? Shouldn’t they be off Wacking off at home?
• Does Drew’s mom really not see that there isn’t anything wrong with him?
• Gus burps loudly with a mouth full of food and is laughing like a loon with the boys. Good times are being had by all.
• Why isn’t Gus killing anyone? He had more bloodlust when he was alive.
• Bewbs! Did not expect that. But it’s quickly ruined by Goose’s dead wife having a very rabid dog head. Again with the nightmare of Renee being back with a killer dog head. WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?!
• His dream was also ruined when Zowie actually attacked him in his sleep. He tried to shoot it but it jumped out the window. I highly doubt a dog, even Zowie’s size, can actually jump and crash through window glass. Reminds me of Gordon the Golden Retriever from Friday the 13th Part IV.

• As Jeff is riding his bike home, Clyde attacks him on his moped by pushing him down a ditch. He then attempts to harm him by pushing his face into the bike’s spinning tires.
• Gus to the rescue. He scares Jeff away and then takes Clyde’s moped wheel and scares Clyde with it by placing it close to his face but Clyde’s scarf gets caught in the spokes and kills him. Strange thing is Gus didn’t mean it despite being an evil reanimated corpse. This movie doesn’t give a shit about the last movie much. And it’s even the same director!
• Now Drew is being attacked by both Gus and his dog Zowie. The annoying thing is this obese kid is surviving this long. Probably the most unbelievable thing in this movie about a supernatural graveyard that brings dead animals back to life. 
• Drew hops into his mom’s car and they give chase with Gus on the highway. It’s been 7 minutes since we last had a chase and vehicular attack on this same road.
• Drew’s mom doesn’t think to actually stop the car to let Gus zoom past her. And now she’s in deep shit when he pushes her car into that potato truck going 70 MPH.
• Nice crash stunt by the way.
• Drew and his mom’s car and corpses are completely covered by potatoes. You can say they died by tuberculosis!
• Gus then goes back to Clyde’s corpse and tells it that he’s going to take him to the Indian burial ground. Guess he wants a friend that’s just like him.
• I have to give credit to these actors for being able to say Zowie in the weird way each time. I wonder how many takes they ruined by saying Zowie like Zoe.
• The caretaker at the cemetery that Jeff’s mom is buried in calls Goose to come over at night to show him that his wife’s grave was dug up. Wouldn’t a simple phone call suffice? And how about you call the police you dumb shit. What’s the town vet going to do?
• And he tells Goose that Gus stayed after her funeral with a order to exhume Jeff’s mom. That makes no sense. Gus wasn’t a zombie at the funeral so why would he want to exhume her body? Oooh. Now I get it. Ewwwwww.

• OK, this is like the third or fourth time someone has mentioned the tragedy of the Creeds. So the whole town knows what happened to the Creeds. Obviously, after Rachel killed Louis, someone had to have found her or killed her again right? I guess they didn’t do jack squat in terms of investigating the details of what happened? And then also didn’t do anything more to maybe prevent these events from happening again like heavily fortifying the Indian Burial ground? Dumbest town ever.
• I can’t let this go because now I recall that Jud (Fred Gwynne) told Louis Creed that he tried to bring his dog back to life and then later on told Louis about that kid who died in WWII who was brought back as well so this town has had at least 5 (that we know of!) zombies return from being buried there and have still not made it any harder to go there and prevent people from messing on the site. The fact that the actual Pet Sematary is still there is bad enough! 
• Jeff meets Gus at the Indian burial ground with his mom’s corpse. The magic only works if you bury your own loved one so Jeff has to bury her for her to return. I’m thinking Gus is only using Jeff to get that sweet zombie action.
• Did Gus also drag Jeff’s mom’s headstone and some flowers also to the site? Why?!
• I never mentioned Goose and Jeff’s housekeeper because she hasn’t done a thing since we met her. But now she’s most likely going to die and I’m still wondering if she’s worth bringing up.
• Goose arrives at Drew’s house and is attacked by Zowie again. He manages to actually shoot it and it whimpers away.  
• Goose finds Gus inside and asks why he dug up his wife. Gus: “Because I wanted to fuck ‘ehr!”
• Gus is beating Goose up and is saying dumb one-liners like “Do you have a permit for this?” and “No brains…no pain.” You know, real scary stuff.
• Goose then is able to shoot Gus in the head and he dies. Then Goose gets the Quickening.

• Why!! Why is the housekeeper playing dress up in the attic with Jeff’s mom’s old clothes? She even did her hair and is applying makeup!
• Jeff’s mom, despite being dead for many days (weeks even), looks absolutely fine. Remember when Rachel Creed looked like absolute shit after just a few minutes of being dead in the first film’s finale?
• Hey film, I still haven’t forgotten about Clyde.
• Oh here he is. Right on schedule.

• This movie stripped away all the horror and terror that the first film gave us. This movie is more of an action flick.
• There’s even a ton of one-liners before the kills. This is so different from the first one. It’s like if the Exorcist 2 had fight scenes. Oh wait. That’s a bad example.
• Jeff kills Clyde and comes to his senses that his mom ain’t what she used to be and leaves her to die in their burning house. That didn’t take much convincing. If only the dumb shit realized sooner that bringing the dead back to life is bad. If only he had any signs of this.
• Who wrote this shit?
• So Jeff and his dad actually survive this flick? Seriously this is terrible. Now I know why King wanted nothing to do with this.
• Now as they drive away from the town, we see vignette shots of all the people that died in this film. Wow this film turned sappy. No Zowie though. 

• Helicopter overhead shot of the Indian Burial Ground. Cool. So Goose and Jeff are just leaving without further trying to convince the town about doing something to prevent these tragedies again?

 

Was it Entertaining: 

Any Good Gore: Some. But really nothing worth mentioning. Wish they showed the gore when Clyde was getting his face rubbed off by moped tire treads but alas all we got was Gus’ reaction and blood splattering his face.

Any Nudity: Just that one shot of boobs that are ruined when the lady had a canine head.

Best Quote: Clancy Brown saying matter-of-factly in a terrible Maine accent: “Because I wanted to fuck ‘ehr!”

Best Scene: The only scene worth mentioning is Drew and his mom colliding with that potato truck. As far as vehicular homicides go, it was pretty neat.

Worst Scene: OK. I’m going to try real hard and NOT pick the finale. Just kidding it was the finale. A fight between the school bully who’s now a zombie and the main kid while his zombie mother watches is not what a good horror movie needs.

Final Thoughts: Again with a mediocre sequel. Really a terrible sequel if you want to know the whole truth. The original is still one of the creepiest and disturbing horror movies out there. (SKIP THE REMAKE!) This sequel only keeps the location and the premise of bringing the dead back to life. Remember in the original that the main protagonist had that spirit guide Pascow? Remember when the original talked at length about the philosophy and themes of death, grief, pain and guilt? This one does none of that but adds more fights, one-liners and gross-out comedy. Suffice to say, it didn’t work out. The original may have had some bad acting and a rushed ending but at least it acted like a true horror movie. I think there was a reason King didn’t write a sequel. 

Score: 4 Dog-Headed Naked Ladies (out of ten)