I’m one of the many people who loved Ready or Not and felt it was a complete story. However, I also learned long ago to stop asking Radio Silence and Guy Busick questions. It always resulted in eating crow while trying to buy merch. More importantly, I refuse to be embarrassed on Samara Weaving’s internet again. They have planted themselves at the intersection of bloody and fun, and that’s apparently what many of us need right now. So, I hustled my ass to SXSW to see Ready or Not 2: Here I Come and was giddy to learn that R. Christopher Murphy was also back to tag team this script. The gang was all together for the sequel to their movie that can only be described as “that girl.”
Are You Ready or Not?
The film picks up right where the predecessor ends. Grace (Weaving) takes a drag of her cigarette and falls over and is put into an ambulance. We’re in this anxiety attack with her as she rides to the hospital, where we also meet her sister Faith (Kathryn Newton). We learn they have beef and haven’t spoken in 10 years. While this is unfolding, we are discovering that Grace’s former in-laws, the Le Domas’, who are now splattered over their family home, were part of a much bigger and sinister situation. After all, behind every evil billionaire is another, even richer and more evil one. This is where Chester Danforth (David Cronenberg) enters for a brief but darkly comedic moment. He introduces us to his kids, Ursula (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and Titus (Shawn Hatosy), sets up the stakes, and we’re off to the races.
Sister, Sister
Grace and Faith get snatched from the hospital and awaken in a new estate with new rich people problems. The estranged sisters have to work together and are forced to work through their shit as they are being hunted. Ready or Not 2: Here I Come continues the Radio Silence tradition of making stunt women work. The girls are fighting and getting the shit kicked out of them at every turn. You watch them take the damage and keep swinging as they try to outwit their demented captors and hunters.
This sequel has no business being as funny, charming, or good as it is. There is an electricity that ignites as every ensemble member gets their fifteen minutes. However, it avoids feeling bloated because we have film nerds who understand pacing. They also understand how to leave us wanting more (whether or not we should have more is always the real question).
Film Nerds For the Win!
Luckily for all of us needing a win in 2026, everyone understood the assignment. They take the movie we love, the final girl that is the patron saint of women with commitment issues, their penchant for redecorating mansions in blood, and they go bigger. It’s hard to not clock the large cast of favorites actors. Rising scream queen Newton, Gellar, Shawn Hatosy, and the reigning chaos king Elijah Wood to name a few. However, where most films pack a cast with beloved faces and wastes their time, we’re reminded that Murphy, Busick, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, and Tyler Gillett are fans first.
This team knows that Wood is a scene thief who gets into the crevices of these weird little characters and will come back with something bizarre and iconic. They understand we need a Buffy nod as much as we need callbacks to Ready or Not. They also give us enough bread crumbs to lean in and wonder if a couple of moments are references to Abigail. They’re not just going to give you a Halloween II (1981) moment when it can devolve into a Terminator 2: Judgment Day situation instead. This is a huge part of the reason Ready or Not 2: Here I Come works.
Something For Everybody
Ready or Not yelled Grace doesn’t need a man in our faces. Ready or Not 2: Here I Come stands ten toes down on that while reminding us that there are different kinds of love, and a soulmate can be anyone. I am a fan of messy sibling dynamics because family is a complicated word for so many of us. So, I love that Grace discovers she is better off single but not alone.
The sisters heal their relationship between brutal (and creative) fights and forge a newer trauma bond. We don’t know what’s ahead for them and maybe we don’t need to know. However, we know they’re going to cross that bridge together. The duo is like a bloodier and funnier Thelma & Louise for twisted millennials like me. At the other side of the (metaphorical) cliff Grace realizes that the family she was searching for in the previous movie, was the one she was estranged from the whole time.
This Sequel is Built Different
I know we all want to side-eye sequels on sight (and we should). However, Ready or Not 2: Here I Come hits on so many levels that it’s hurts in the good ways. As a 90s kid who thought The Faculty was peak cinema, I had various thoughts about Hatosy being an unhinged silver fox. I loved watching Gellar in a role that allowed her to remind some of you that she has range for days. For people wondering why anyone in their right mind would revisit something so close to perfection as Ready or Not, it shows you these avenues to expand the lore. It’s such a fun movie that also gets that women are people and can have hobbies and adventures. As the intersectional horror lady, I would give my queendom if more filmmakers would read that memo and actually apply it.
TL;DR
Ready or Not 2: Here I Come is filled with delightfully wicked surprises coated in blood. It is giving you all the things you want from this current Radio Silence era. It also reminds you why the horror genre is lucky to have Weaving. The film is a fantastically deadly, dark, and dangerous time that reminds us not all sequels have to suck. I don’t think any of us were ready for this, but we are so welcome.
