Are you kidding me??
Hellraiser: Hellseeker (2002)
Directed By: Rick Bota
The Prologue
I’m not sure why anyone thought Hellraiser: Hellseeker was a good idea. If you have Pinhead back together with Kirsty Cotten for the first time since Hellraiser II, how come THIS is the best anyone could come up with? It almost annoys me to even dwell on it. I mean, yeah those other Hellraiser films were a bit odd and some weren’t that great, but that was whole new stories. This one has Kirsty back, damn it! Why couldn’t they give her a proper story and a proper return to this franchise? Well, it’s a head scratcher, but let’s dive into this film from 2002.
The Movie
Kirsty Cotten is now grown up and married to Trevor Gooden. Her memory of the events that took place back at her parent’s home and the mental institution have dimmed, but she is still traumatized. One fateful day, the two get into a fatal car crash, killing Kirsty. Now, Trevor finds himself in a strange world full of sexy women, greed and murder, making him believe he may be in hell. He follows the clues all the way to Pinhead…And yes, there are a few “twists”.
What a mess! What a damn mess! Kirsty is limited in screen time and we make way for her husband to be our star of the film, and it doesn’t take long for us to learn that he isn’t a very good person, even if he doesn’t recall that fact himself at first. I guess you could say that once again it’s more of a thriller than it is a horror film, and with Kirsty back (and the same actress Ashley Laurence) it’s just a shame all around that we don’t get a proper story that at least follows along with the first three of these films (maybe even part of the 4th) better. What we get is a let-down, it’s a bit confusing, and it just uses the same things we’ve already seen in this franchise a hundred times over by this point.
And while there is a twist that I won’t spoil, I don’t think I’d be too out of line to say they really go out of their way to ruin the character of Kirsty Cotten. It’s a little hard to believe we go from the Kirsty we seen in the first two to this version of Kirsty and her decent into what she ends up being. But I guess you can’t all the way blame her once we get all the details. It’s just those details and the overall plot don’t work well at all here in this Hellraiser film. There’s just soo much silly and pointless stuff going on during this thing that I’m sure any fan of Hellraiser will be slamming their heads on a wall somewhere.
So, it’s a bad plot, bad use of characters, and I haven’t even mentioned the bad CGI yet. But yeah, there is some horrible CGI in this movie too. I know a lot of people want to hate on some of the films in this franchise that were yet to come, but if you want to hate on Hellworld or Deader, just watch this one before you watch those and I think you’ll change your mind on those a little bit. But as for this one, there really isn’t many (if any) redeeming qualities. It was great to see Doug Bradley and Ashley Laurence on screen together again, but it ultimately gets wasted here. The best way I can sum this one up is by saying, it’s just not that good..at all.
The Conclusion
Now, if you want to see this you can get it by it’s self HERE or in a set HERE at Echo Bridge. And while it’s cheap enough to warrant buying the stand-alone disc, I think if you are just a fan of the franchise you should go with the collection set. But as for “Hellseeker”, it’s the worst Hellraiser film I’ve seen. Keep in mind I’ve yet to see the newest one coming out this month, but could it really be as bad as this?
The Rating (4.5/10)
Chucks website
