FINAL GIRL explores the slasher flicks of the '70s and '80s...and all the other horror movies I feel like talking about, too. This is life on the EDGE, so beware yon spoilers!

Dec 15, 2023

Arise, fair Esther

2023 is winding down and I say good riddance! Sure sure, there were plenty of creamy middles and even some delicious highs. But we cannot ignore low lows from the past year either, including but not limited to The Exorcist: Believer existing, a Blu-ray release of Stay Alive still not existing, and Screaming Females existing and then not existing any longer, which means that the February show--where they were to play with Team fucking Dresch!!--I had tickets for was cancelled. With Persephone firmly tucked away in the underworld for the next li'l bit (stay strong, girl) and the sun setting at, like, 3:30 in the afternoon, the dark vibes seem perfectly fitting as 2023 withers to its end at last. 

But, soft! What choker through yonder window breaks? It is Esther's, and she is the goddamned sun! She has come to save us all with the news that Orphan 3 is in active development.


Perhaps you already know this, but regardless let me state it plain: I am such an Orphan fan. It is the goodest of good times. I never dared to wish for more, particularly as star Isabelle Fuhrman aged out of the role. But somehow, against all odds and the laws of nature alike, that not-wish was answered last year with Orphan: First Kill, yet another goodest of good times, which made me feel like a dope for thinking that Isabelle Fuhrman would ever age out of this role. Mind you, more than a decade had passed since the first film, and Fuhrman looks like a 23-year-old playing a 31-year-old playing a 9-year-old. Go figure! There are camera tricks and apple boxes galore, and we are never fooled for an instant into thinking anyone would assume she's a regular ol' child! The filmmakers also know this. None of us care. Orphan:First Kill is glorious. It's a film that probably shouldn't be at all but there it is and we as a species are better for it. 

"But no, that has to be the last? Unless...no. No, right?" Again, I daren't dream for more. But madlad William Brent Bell saw the love that lurks in my heart, and will deliver unto us more-phan. When will we see it? Who knows. It doesn't matter. Just knowing that Esther is out there in the ether is enough for me. I'm already writing letters to the Oscars, telling them to get ready to hand out all of their trophies to Orphan 3.  

Okay, in this one that choker is gonna be removed and her head will fall off at last, I just knows it!