Feel like being pleasantly surprised?

In the second addition of “Bronchitis Bedridden Netflix Movie Reviews”, I mindlessly turned on Happy Death Day after skimming over the synopsis, thinking that this would help me pass the time in my neverending quest to get rid of this damn illness.

So Happy Death Day is a comedy/thriller/horror starring Jessica Rothe as Theresa, or Tree… because if your name was Theresa, you would want people to give you a nickname like Tree. Anyways, Theresa (because I refuse to acknowledge her as Tree) is your standard blonde sorority bitch who celebrates her birthday by getting murdered by a masked killer. But then she wakes up on the same day and has to re-live the day where she gets murdered until she figures out who’s doing it.

Sounds kinda lame, right? Well you, like me, would be wrong!

Gruesome and all… but why do I suddenly feel like cake now?

Consider this your SPOILER WARNING. And I highly recommend that you watch this movie so you can be wowed like I was.

Theresa starts off as a bitch and you kind of don’t mind that she dies; she’s dismissive of her friends and people she deems ‘lower’ than her, and you just don’t want her to have a happy life. I thought about how this movie was going to get anyone to feel sympathetic for this bitch if she was the heroine, but they managed.

So she re-lives the day and starts to realise how much of a c-bomb she is, and on her journey to figure out what’s happening and who’s killing her, she also begins to self-reflect and figures out that she should start being nicer to people. There we go. Getting sympathy for the girl. And when she realises that she has an “unlimited amount of lives” upon dying and resetting the day, she actually turns out to be pretty funny and relatable.

The thing that I loved most about her days resetting was how they could easily differ from one another; there was no set formula to how her day could or should go. On the first night she’s lured into a tunnel and is killed; one day she barricades herself in her room, thinking she’ll escape death, but then is killed; one night she is drowned to death (and then wakes up vomiting… nice touch.) None of her runs followed a set routine mostly (even though she would wear the same outfit for the party), and I thought that was a nice touch for this Groundhog Day inspired film.

After my disappointment with Secret Obsession‘s lack of twist, I was hoping for something good. And boy did this movie provide. At the beginning, you’re going through everyone in Theresa’s life, trying to think who could possibly have a strong enough motive to kill the dumb bitch (spoiler: everyone does). And after she deduces that everyone has an “alibi” of sorts, you’re led to believe that the person that is trying to kill her is a serial killer John Tombs that targets young, beautiful women and escapes his restraints at the hospital. But then in the end, you find out that you were very wrong.

Even though I gave a spoiler warning, I don’t want to tell you what the twist is because you will never see it coming, and boy is it satisfying when you see it for yourself.

On top of this pretty damn good storyline that successfully blends thriller with comedy, you get a stellar acting performance from Jessica Rothe, who plays the selfish, manipulative turned comedy heart of gold character so perfectly that you would think the role was tailor made to her. While the characters seemed to be very stereotypical – Theresa included – it was nice to see some of them break out of the mould.

Theresa Gelbman: a bad bitch.

The storyline, while albeit a bit borrowed and overdone, was done in a new and refreshing way, and the fact that it was done in a film that’s a blend of genres was what made it super endearing to me.

Tl;dr: this movie is way better than you would think, and you should definitely hang around for the twist ending.

Anywho, I was delighted to see that there was a sequel made called Happy Death Day 2u, so I cannot wait to watch this one and see how the legend of Theresa is continued.

– by The Black Widow