[#22] Final Destination Bloodlines: The Genes of Horror

In film #6, the Final Destination format has been codified and algorithmised, like a genetic sequence.

The 6th Final Destination Film was released this week.

Here’s the premise. A college student inherits her grandmother's premonitions about death and tries to save her entire family after they start dying one by one. Through her premonition, she learns that her grandmother saved 100s of survivors on the top of a building called Skyview in the 60s. On that day, she robbed Death of hundreds of his victims, and in true Final Destination style, Death has been tracking all those survivors down in order.

What’s different in this film is because there were hundreds of survivors, Death took decades to go through everyone, which means that many generations have been spawned in the interlude. Generations that shouldn’t have existed and need to be erased. Hence, Bloodlines.

Overall verdict? The film is campy and fun. The horror is only one facet, and the film finds a way to make even gruesome deaths entertaining. Unlike paragons of the genre, like Haunting of Hill House, Sixth Sense, or even the first Final Destination film, I didn’t need to light every lamp when I went back home to be sure a malevolent spirit wasn’t lurking around in a corner.

In fact, the first Final Destination film was legitimately scary and horrifying. The idea that Death is coming for all the souls that escaped him. The thrill of drawing out the scare. The omens. The mystery to be deduced as the survivors start dying one by one. Each film seemed to have something to say about Death, and how he (she? It?) comes for his souls.

However, in Final Destination 6, there are no explanations, with the makers correctly assuming that we’ve got it down by rote now. In this film, the Final Destination format has been codified and algorithmised, like a genetic sequence. The deaths happen one after the other after the other, with very little emotional value to any of them. Rather, the aim seems to be to construct the modus operandi of the deaths in the wackiest way possible.

In fact, Final Destination, in many ways, is the opposite of Sinners, directed by Ryan Coogler. Sinners is impossible to codify and replicate because of the complexity of its themes. Final Destination has only one theme.

(I’ve written about Sinners here: https://grumpyowl.substack.com/p/16-sinners-2025-horror-for-the-ages)

But does that mean that Final Destination is less fun?

Hell to the no. It’s the McDonalds of viewership. Fast food, mass produced, and appealing to the broadest possible audience.

There are, however, a couple of interesting ideas in Final Destination #6 that I wish had been explored more:

👉 The actions you have to do to save yourself from the pattern. (They’re not pretty)

👉 What happens when a person not part of the pattern intervenes to save a survivor?

Some elements I wanted more clarity on:

👉 The man who cheated death – he appears once and disappears, in a cameo role.

👉 Death’s shindig has been going on for about 6 films now. What is his deal? Death has been the Man in the Shadows for over five films, and I was hoping that maybe we’d get his side of the story for the first time in this film. Hear his voice. Perhaps he could possess a survivor even.

This film wanted to shock, but mostly to evoke laughs. This idea is very similar, in fact, to the Horror-verse that Maddock has set up and made its name on. (Stree 1 and 2, Bhediya)

Would I have preferred a bit more interiority? Sure. Would I have wanted more insights on how to manipulate Death? Would I have wanted a little bit more information on how the pattern works when it comes to the bloodlines of survivors? Sure.

But did I have fun?

Yes.

Perhaps Horror is the only genre in which algorithm-based stories can provide some satisfaction.