Four twentysomethings on their way to Vegas for a Batchlor/Batchlorette party decide to take a side road that is guaranteed to save them time. I guess they never say The Hills Have Eyes or Wrong Turn! Anyway their 80’s station wagon has no oil in it so the engine overheats and throws a rod. Stranded in the desert miles from the last gas station, they walk until they come across a large abandoned house that is reminiscent of the Firefly clan’s house from Devil’s Rejects (sans all of the animal carcasses and bones.) Predictibly the house appears abandoned so they break in causing rather excessive damage, to look for a phone. After searching the house, they go out to the garage, which happens to have a pristine ‘71 Chevelle with the keys in it and a full tank of gas. They leave a note for the owner promising to return the car and pay for damages and off they go. As fate would have it (or the writers) the house and car happen to belong to the deranged trucker with the cb handle of “Rusty Nail” who, after dispatching of a Lot Lizard in the opening scene of the movie, is headed home for some downtime. Rusty, or Mr. Nail if you prefer, comes home to find his door smashed in and his car gone. As any crazed killer would do, he decides to track down those responsible and inflict some serious damage. In order to keep from turning this into a recap of the entire movie, I will end my teaser summary with hijinks ensue.

For the most part I liked the actors in Joy Ride 2. I admit I did miss Ted Levine (Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs) as the voice of Rusty Nails but the new voice was decent as well and served the purpose. Nicki Aycox was great as “Goldielocks” and carried the lead role well. She was a character you actually cared about as opposed to being just fodder for the slasher. Nick Zano was also solid as the captured boyfriend that the group spends most of the movie trying to rescue.

The gore effects in the movie are great, especially the chainsaw blade scene (I promise, no spoiler details!) and there are some nice explosions. Much of the film was set at night and they did a good job at making Rusty Nail’s truck take on it’s own evil persona and become a character in the movie by hissing out smoke and looming in the background.

Joy Ride: Dead Ahead has a pretty average assortment of extras. I enjoyed the storyboard comparison to the the final film. Hint: make sure you watch the movie first because the storyboard is the big finale scene and will ruin the movie for you! The making of featurette was ok but nothing overly exciting. Blood and Guts: The “Make-Up” of Horror featurette kept my attention more than the making of, as it is always facinating to me to see how the FX artists work their magic.

If you liked Joy Ride, then you will like Joy Ride: Dead Ahead as well. It stick close to the formula that made the original somewhat of a sleeper hit back in 2001. The thing is that this formula still works for Dead Ahead. I thoroughly had fun with it and will be queueing it into rotation for the next horror movie night at the Bulin Mansion. If you want a mindless slasher movie with good chase scenes and great kills, then go pick this one up, it is much better than the other Sequels coming out this year.

Recommended

Bonus Features:

• Joy Ride 2: The Making of Dead Ahead featurette
• Blood and Guts: The “Make-Up” of Horror featurette
• Storyboard-to-Scene Comparison

Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead is available as of October 7th, courtesy of Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment.

To switch for Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead, or to order it from Amazon.com, click here.