paulclaassen Good in its own right, but not as a sequel. Instead, it plays more like a prequel. This film is more of a slasher, although justified since the murders are not random and well explained. The plot is not that great either, but the film was nevertheless still enjoyable.

utgard14 Mean-spirited and ugly direct-to-video sequel to a great '80s horror film. Starts off with a flashback to some kids taunting a boy with some kind of disfiguring disease. The taunting turns to murder. This is an especially bleak way to start the film. Back in the present day, Sheriff Braddock (Andrew Robinson) moves his family from New York to the small Southern town where he grew up. His daughter (Ami Dolenz) starts hanging out with the wrong crowd. The wrong crowd in this case looks like three Saved By the Bell rejects and a kid dressed up like Judd Nelson in The Breakfast Club.Wrong crowd kids run down the mother of flashback victim. They take her home, where they discover she is preparing to do the ritual to resurrect her son. Why she waited decades to do this is never explained. Then, the leader of the wrong crowd kids (J. Trevor Edmonds) steals a vial of blood and the spell from her house. He and his friends then go do the spell and raise Pumpkinhead. Why they do this makes no sense. Just being morons I guess. From here, you can pretty much guess what happens. Pumpkinhead starts killing people off right and left. A couple of these scenes are fairly amusing. Obviously an inferior sequel in every regard. The performances of the cast range from bad to bored. Roger Clinton was obviously cast for publicity purposes. I refuse to call what he does here acting. He speaks his lines, let's put it that way. Special effects are cheap and don't compare to Stan Winston's first film. Makeup effects for the old lady are far less impressive and Pumpkinhead design is unimaginative. Suspense and atmosphere is non-existent. Directed by Jeff Burr. He's just a terrible director who has made some really awful films his entire career. I guess he knew the right people because talent did not keep getting him work. It's a crap sequel, to be sure, but sadly better than the mess that would follow in the 2000s.

Michael_Elliott Pumpkinhead II (1994) * (out of 4) Horrid sequel to the 1989 cult favorite has a new sheriff (Andrew Robinson) moving to town where his teenage daughter (Ami Dolenz) gets mixed up with four bad apples and soon the five of them bring back the evil demon Pumpkinhead who of course goes on a killing spree. It seems the demon is avenging the death of a deformed boy but the sheriff and daughter must try to find a way to stop him. This "sequel" really doesn't have any connection to the first film so in many ways one really could look at this as a standalone entry. No matter how you want to look at it it's hard to argue that this is a horrid little film that has very little going for it. I think the worst thing is without question the screenplay, which seems to confuse itself from time to time. As with many low-grade horror movies, the screenplay here forgets to write any interesting characters and instead we just get a bunch of stupid stereotypes and all of them are fighting to see which one can be the most annoying. The five teenagers are all extremely annoying and it's impossible to care for any of them and that includes the so-called good ones. Even worse is that the screenplay throws in this stupid backstory that never really goes anywhere and you can't help but roll your eyes as the evil demon tries to be shown as a "good" guy just trying to avenge something bad. One of the most annoying things about this film is that for the life of me I couldn't figure out why the teens wanted to mess with this demon. I mean, they're shown as simple, pot-smoking idiots but why go after a demon? Oh, that's right, so that people would rent this sucker from their video stores. The performances are pretty bland with some of the actors delivering their lines so poorly that you'd think they were just making fun of the actual film. Robinson comes off the best in his part and there's some good eye candy but this here can't save an otherwise worthless film.

DeviantSon13 After the well-crafted production and stylish production of the first "Pumpkinhead", I have to say that this one was extremely disappointing. I can understand its appeal with the gore and violence that far exceeds the first one. Not to mention that it's also more fun than the original, I guess. But I can't say that it's even all that great of a film, much less a sequel.The story has absolutely no continuity to the original. In fact, this is not even the same creature that was in the original film. Rather, it's the spirit of a dead boy who was rejected for being seriously deformed- think Rocky from "Mask" (1985). He is evoked from the dead by some teenagers screwing around for a good time.What's insulting to me about the movie is that these are just the typical, sex drugs and rock'n'roll kids in all the slasher movies. Whereas in the first Pumpkinhead, there were kids, but they were smart, down-to-earth kids that were looking for a wholesome, good time.There were also undying clichés in this film- the busty blonde standing motionless and screaming at the monster's advance, running and tripping repeatedly in the woods and the unavoidable "reasoning with the beast" formula. And they weren't really done with any interesting twists of any kind that might have allowed us to forgive them, either.The creature effects, themselves, should have been filmed more sparingly for how much of a step down they were from the original. Granted, this was a made-for-TV movie, but it shows weak cinematography.In short, it's a sequel that makes absolutely no sense. It feels rushed and obviously shows itself as far less of a labor of love than the original. Its gratuitous nature can make it fun at times and that's undeniable, but it's missing the real genuine touch that made the original so worthy of being cherished by aficionados of the genre of dark fantasy.