Published :
Updated :
For all latest news, follow The Financial Express Google News channel.
All supernatural horror films are not always worthy of being memorable, but few of them have gained popularity for a long time. One of them is Bird Box, which became one of the most successful Netflix original films for introducing unconventional horror antagonists in 2018.
Unnamed supernatural entities have invaded the earth. They can't be seen, as a glimpse of them brings negative emotions and an uncontrollable suicide drive. The film became very popular worldwide quickly and even started the infamous 'Bird Box' trend on social media.
After five years, Netflix returned with the Spanish spin-off sequel with the same premise but in a different timeline and different location: Barcelona.
Bird Box Barcelona starts nine months after the entities' invasion before the original Bird Box protagonist Malorie's survival mission starts.
The protagonist of this spin-off is Sebastián, a father living in Barcelona after nine months of the apocalypse. He is trying to survive with his daughter Anna after losing his wife at the beginning of the invasion; although he looks like a survivor, he is a 'seer', someone who isn't affected by looking at the entities shown in the first film.
Sebastián poses as a survivor to get shelter from other survivors, cunningly exposes them to entities, and makes them commit suicide.
Anna conveniently disappears in action and only appears to encourage Sebastián to make more survivors victims of the entities. He also sees his actions as a way to meet his wife and daughter after his death and doesn't realize the same entities manipulate him through an illusion of Anna.
In the course of action, the illusion of freeing the survivors' souls for heaven slowly shatters. Pastor Esteban and a group of seers violently killed Anna nine months ago, leading Sebastián to realize that his dream of salvation is false.
The delusion and redemption arc ends, as Sebastián has a mission to rescue survivors Clair and Sofia from Esteban and his seers. Can he redeem himself? This 112-minute film will tell.
The most negative aspect of this film is that it brings nothing new to the table. In the first Bird Box film, Tom was one of the survivors who rescued Malorie and her newborn child twice by sacrificing himself in the end. Sebastián is literally the Spanish version of Tom, a complete stranger who suddenly decides to help some survivors without any explanation.
Although the location, language, and characters differ, the plot development is almost identical: a group of survivors trying to reach a haven free from deadly supernatural entities.
Bird Box Barcelona's ending is an obvious cliffhanger, suggesting a sequel to this spin-off by showing the story about humans' ultimate weapon against the entities. But considering Netflix has a penchant for overusing old concepts, repeating the first film concept is already bad, and elongating it into another sequel might bring disaster.