TUBI CONTINUED… TERROR TRAIN 2 (2022) * ½

There are a lot of old, dumb movies on Tubi.  This is the newest, dumbest one I could find.  It came out yesterday, which makes sense since it’s a New Year’s Eve themed slasher.  (Just like the original 1980 Terror Train.)  It’s also a Tubi Original, and it's nice to know that they can make original content that is just as dumb as many of the older movies found on the streaming service. 

Terror Train 2 has one of the dumbest excuses for a sequel I’ve ever seen, which is really saying something.  Alana (Robyn Alomar) is having a tough time getting over the events of the first film.  Her roommate convinces her she needs to “face her fears” in order to move on.  Luckily for her, the frat who organized the Halloween train ride that was crashed by a mad slasher in the first flick, is holding the SAME EXACT train ride on the SAME EXACT train.  The only difference is that this time, it’s a New Year’s party.  Naturally, since the events of that Halloween massacre are now legendary, a group of passengers who survived the massacre have taken to wearing the SAME EXACT costumes the victims wore as a part of some true-crime cosplay thing.  I think the real reason is because they filmed 1 and 2 simultaneously and it just gave them an excuse to reuse footage, costumes, sets, and actors.  

It takes a while for the train to leave the station as there is a lot of exposition about the events of the first movie.  What isn’t made clear is if this is supposed to be the same year or the next year.  I mean, it’s kind of crass to hold another murder train party a year later.  It’s even worse if the massacre of the first film took place on October 31^st and this one happened only two months later. 

It's stuff like this you have to think about while watching Terror Train 2 because the overwhelming sense of déjà vu is a tad mind-numbing.  It’s one thing for the survivors to relive the events of the first Terror Train.  It’s asking a bit much to make the audience to relive it, especially considering the first one came out a mere two months ago.  I fully expect Part 3 to come rolling into the station by St. Patrick’s Day. 

It also doesn’t help that the body count is pitifully low.  The film does earn an extra Half-Star for the scene in which people strictly adhere to a character’s preferred pronouns, even while vociferously accusing them of being a murderer, which is something I don’t think I’ve ever seen in a slasher movie before.  Other than that, Terror Train 2 is a total trainwreck.