One Change To Improve Every Pet Sematary Movie

Ajouté : 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]One of the only certainties in life is death. And part of life is understanding we're going to have to face that and accept it and learn to let go. Because if you don't, you'll quickly learn that sometimes dead is better.

[00:00:16]>> We stopped at a light and saw him walk in that field behind a lost river diamond.

[00:00:22]Julie said he was so creepy.

[00:00:28]>> [music] [music] >> Hey, what's up everybody? It's Nick here and today I want to talk to you guys about Pet Cemetery and more specifically one change to improve every Pet Cemetery film. Now, some necessary background here before getting into this video. You guys need to understand that Pet Cemetery from 1989 is my favorite Stephen King adaptation. I genuinely think that this movie, still to this day in my 30s, is terrifying. As a kid, it was Zelda that scared the crap out of me. And as an adult, it's a father losing his son. And what lengths would a father go to to bring his son back? As a parent, that's just horrifying. This is a beautifully tragic story and supremely messed up and I think Stephen King's best novel as well. And of course, it spawned a film franchise. Believe it or not, there's four of these movies and I'd say most of them are watchable, which is not necessarily always the case with Stephen King adaptations that get sequels. So, we begin with Pet Cemetery from 1989, a nearly flawless film for me. Sure, there's issues at the edges here and there, but I love this movie.

[00:01:53]Having said that, if I'm changing one thing about this movie, they needed to touch more on the windo and the lore surrounding the Mcmack burial ground in the film. Now, in the novel, this is spelled out more clearly. We understand more of why the burial ground is cursed, but in the film, not so much. We do get a passing mention of the windo and we hear what Jud says are loons which are not loons but that's really all we get in the movie. We are just led to understand that this is an ancient Native American burial ground and that the ground there is sour. If you bury your pet there it will come back but it won't come back the same. It'll come back possessed by a demon basically. The windo is such an interesting concept and idea and I understand that Pet Cemetery's primary focus was a story about tragedy and loss and the lengths that people would go to to write a wrong essentially. But I do think it's necessary to understand why this ground is cursed and what is controlling all of this. You don't need to make the entire plot centered around it, but since it is such a central point of this movie, you should have touched on it a little bit.

[00:03:10]I love the movie, and it may be a nitpick, but it's one that's always bothered me. Next, we get to Pet Cemetery 2, and I have gotten my fair share of crap over the years on YouTube for never having been a big fan of this movie, and I'm still not. I don't hate this thing, but there are a lot of issues with it. And I cannot believe that Mary Lambert directed this as well.

[00:03:33]They just don't seem like the same kind of movie at all. And that being the case, the biggest change I'm making with Pet Cemetery 2 is tonal consistency.

[00:03:43]This movie doesn't look or feel like a sequel to the first film. In my opinion, this seems like it wants to go more for zany, over-the-top, unintentionally funny, and sometimes just straight up darkly comedic. It makes the movie feel really crazy and chaotic. It doesn't cohhere. There are moments where they are trying to get back into tragedy, the loss of someone or something you love, and moments here and there where they're actually trying to recapture some of the scares from the first movie.

[00:04:14]Unfortunately, there are inconsistencies with the lore, inconsistencies in some of the performances, and inconsistencies in the approach of this film in and of itself. I don't hate the movie. I think you can watch it and you can get enjoyment out of it. And to be fair, a lot of people that love this movie will just straight up admit, "Oh, yeah, it's wild. It's insane. It's over the top.

[00:04:37]It's not meant to be taken all that seriously." And I get that. It's one of those movies that like, "Oh, it's so wild. It's good, but it still deserves to be called out that this should have felt more like Pet Cemetery. The tone is just all over the place. And it's probably the thing that I dislike the most about this movie. Next up, we get to Pet Cemetery 2019.

[00:05:01]And I just want to say what a massive fumbling of the bag by the marketing team at Paramount. The twist in this movie that Gage is not the one that dies. is actually Ellie is a fantastic twist. It is something that had we not seen it in the trailer would have surprised pretty much every audience member. Unfortunately, they were like, "Hey, we got to give you a hook to go see this movie." And it was the wrong decision. But if I'm changing one thing about this movie, Zelda. I like Church in this film. I like the direction of this film. I like the bits of horror in this film and gore. I think there's a lot to like about this movie. I think the cast is really good, but Zelda is a cheap imitation of what we got in the original film. She is not scary in this movie at all. I don't think the effects work with the character is nearly as good, which is crazy to say because this was 30 years later and it somehow looks worse. I don't like the changing of her death in this movie. In the first one, it was left more to the imagination, and what you got afterward was Zelda's vengeful spirit coming for Rachel. In this film, we get this weirdass dumb waiter sequence that is just a jump scare, and it's not even an effective one at that. It's supposed to be this haunting image that's going to get seared into your memory forever. And they just don't replicate anything that the original did well with Zelda. I get that you have to do this, and I'm not saying take this out at all. Zelda was the scariest part of the original movie when I was a kid. However, if you're going to try your hand at Pet Cemetery, especially if it's a remake, one thing you have to get right is Zelda, because I wanted a new generation to be just as terrified as I was as a kid. And unfortunately, they dropped the ball hard here. And to some of your guys' surprise, you may not know that there was actually a Paramount Plus exclusive just a few years back called Pet Cemetery Bloodlines.

[00:07:09]And it's a movie, I think. Now, I've got a ton of issues with it, believe me. But if there's only one thing I could change about it, I mean, just on the surface, would we at least have gotten better special effects? Now, throughout this one change series that I've done on my channel, there's been multiple movies where I've called out the VFX, and this is another one, and this one, it is pretty egregious. So, here's what I don't understand about Pet Cemetery Bloodlines. I understand that you wanted to build off of the remake because the remake was a big success commercially, and in order to do so, they felt they had to do a prequel, and that was ground that really hadn't been touched, and we'd wondered about it for years. So, okay, that's fair.

[00:07:54]But with that remake making over $100 million, why do you give Bloodline such a meager budget and send it straight to streaming? Because everything about this movie suffered because of it. The cast, although there are some people, you know, they're just not good in this film. The writing is piss poor. Some of the dialogue and the line delivery is uh egregiously bad. But the worst sin this movie makes is obvious digital effects that are not only terrible and stand out like an eyes sore, they're completely unnecessary. There's specifically a moment in a hospital having to do with a foot that did not need to be VFX at all.

[00:08:38]Like that should have been a prosthetic, but instead they chose the lazy route.

[00:08:44]And not only did they choose the lazy route, they didn't give the time or the money to have those VFX look good at all. The first time I saw this movie, that moment specifically, there are other questionable CGI moments throughout, believe me. But that moment is like, what are we doing here? I mean, seriously, this is Paramount we're talking about. This is a major studio.

[00:09:06]This is a continuation of a majorly successful film, and this is what you give us. I mean, it's just unforgivable.

[00:09:15]I was really excited for this movie because I was like, "Holy crap, we're getting more pet cemetery and ground that we had not touched yet. Awesome.

[00:09:24]Can't wait." And then we get this lowbudget turd and I'm just like, if this is what we were going to get, you should have just kept it because sometimes dead is better. And there you have it. There is one change to improve all four Pet Cemetery movies. Now, I'm going to tell you guys, as I always do, I cannot objectively say that the changes that I proposed would make each film better for everyone. They just would for me. Now, it's in your hands. I want to hear down below in the comments section if you agree with these changes that I proposed, or are there some that I'm missing that you can't believe I missed? Whatever those thoughts are, join me down below in the comment section and let's talk about it. I want to thank each and every one of you guys for watching this video. Please make sure to leave a like on it. Subscribe to my channel if you haven't already. This is Nick at the Lost River Drive-In.