My quick rating - 5.4/10. I went into 2025's I Know What You Did Last Summer with expectations firmly in place at “fun, dumb, nostalgic slasher,” and for the most part, that is what I received. In this installment, a group of friends make a fatal error in a car accident, quickly conclude that punishment is for wimps, and fall back upon that trusty horror movie strategy of making a pact not to speak of it again. Naturally, one year later, someone absolutely remembers. And not in a “hey, let’s talk this out” way, but in a sharp, pointy, murdery way.
The formula is very loyal to the original, but it's nice that this specific team doesn’t feel like they're carbon copies of the original group from 1997. They act like a messy, morally dubious group of friends, and this helps this flick feel like it can stand on its own merit - at least until the nostalgia train comes charging in. Madelyn Cline is clearly having a blast as Danica, the queen bee with attitude to spare, while Chase Sui Wonders brings a carefree, watchable presence as Ava. Tyriq Withers’ Teddy feels eerily similar to what we recently saw him do in HIM, and he’s also involved in one of the more head-scratching scenes in the film… the kind where you just stare at the screen and mutter, “No one thought this through, huh?”
Freddie Prinze Jr. is okay, and Sarah Michelle Gellar appears in a genuinely creepy dream sequence. The film is completely self-aware, at least when it incorporates Jennifer Love Hewitt’s iconic line, "What are you waiting for, huh?" It works…but it also reminds you just how much the OG cast overshadows the new blood.
The fact that director Jennifer Kaytin Robinson isn’t afraid of the blood and actually gets it on screen is a definite plus in my book. The kills here range from nasty and mean-spirited to occasionally brutal in a fashion that passes the test for a modern studio slasher film. There’s also a weirdly unrealistic amount of time spent waiting for someone to check video footage, set in a graveyard, no less, which had me rolling my eyes. I miss the early days of the WWW, when I bought an actual meat hook online to finish my Halloween costume. Simpler times. More buffering.
The finale? I didn’t mind it. The problem is the aggressively “Hollywood” wrap-up that follows, sanding off some of the edge the film earns along the way. And yes, in true franchise fashion, the sequel door is left wide open. Stick around during the credits, because Brandy Norwood shows up to ice that sequel cake nicely.
In the end, this is just a fun, no-brainer kind of slasher flick that comes out just above average. It’s fun, occasionally gory, and yeah, kind of retro without being completely mortifying. Too bad the new cast will never live out of the originals' shadow, but hey, what are you waiting for? You know you’re watching it anyway. You just won't be talking about it 30 years later.
