The Part Of I Know What You Did Last Summer That Has Fans Scratching Their Heads
When younger folks think of horror movies, their first thought might be the wave of found footage flicks and supernatural spookfests of the 2010s. However, there was a period not so long ago when the genre was defined, especially in its teen-geared multiplex forms, by slasher films.
The 1900s and early 2000s were absolutely chock-full of campy, self-aware movies about big unsuspecting ensembles getting gruesomely picked off one by one — this "new wave" of slashers has been, in fact, considered responsible for reviving the horror genre after the home-video and infinite sequel rut of the late 1980s (via Birth. Movies. Death.).
One of the most notorious examples of the slasher revival is the "I Know What You Did Last Summer" trilogy, which began in 1997 and concluded, somewhat less-than-glamorously, with a maligned direct-to-DVD threequel in 2006. Exploring themes of guilt, revenge, and paranoia, the films drew from the eponymous 1973 Lois Duncan novel and the famous urban legend of The Hookman to create one of the most engaging horror universes of that proudly over-the-top cinematic era.
Even by the ridiculous standards of the "Last Summer" franchise, though, one particular plot point in the 1998 sequel, "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer," was a bit too tough to take in stride. While we wait for further details on the announced James Wan-produced TV adaptation, let's have a look at the one part of these movies that fans can't help furrowing their brows at.
Horror fans are amazed at how much effort the sequel's killers put into their plan
Nowadays, "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer" is often commended for subtly indicating that Karla (Brandy) and Julie (Jennifer Love Hewitt)'s trip to the Bahamas is a sham, by having Karla tell the "radio station" that the capital of Brazil is Rio de Janeiro — a wrong answer (it's actually Brasília) that most American viewers would probably assume to be correct. But despite this dash of cleverness, the plot of "I Still Know..." doesn't make much sense on a core level, given the sheer amount of effort Ben Willis (Muse Watson) and his son Will (Matthew Settle) expend to get their revenge.
As Reddit user GiraffesForHigher pointed out in the r/horror subreddit, "Make your son befriend her so when he pretends to be a radio host and gives her and her friends a free trip to an island which unbeknownst to them is in it's offseason and empty, he'll get invited so he can assist you in murdering her. Definitely the craziest lengths I've ever seen a killer go to." Fellow Redditor Mwmani agreed, writing "Yeah, why couldn't the guy just have said he won the trip and is taking everyone?" VeryPacificQuestion added, "It would take a novel to dissect how far the father/son team went in this elaborate scheme of theirs just to ultimately f*** up in the end."
Not everybody agrees the ridiculousness is a bad thing, though. User Annaliseplasko wrote that, despite not seeing the movie, they've always found the "convoluted revenge plot" trope enjoyable, adding that "YA horror books in the 90s were great for that." The nineties, it seems, were truly a golden age for unapologetic teen horror campiness.