The Crow : Wicked Prayer (2005) – "Do you know what a merciless angel is? It's nothing but a demon."

It’s in this freezer that my mother used to lock me.

Luc commits a murder. The victim comes back to life to seek revenge.

Yet another rehashed version of the original plot, this film is fundamentally distasteful. Although it doesn’t lack action, a polite boredom inevitably sets in, occasionally spiced up by a dizzying view of a bimbo's cleavage straight out of American Pie. Additionally, there’s an identity card introducing characters with absurd details like "origin: mixed-race" or "mission: hell on Earth... literally." The casting reaches a peak of absurdity with a Mexican actor playing a Native American, as if the casting director didn’t bother finding a real one, probably due to the genocide by the white man. The cast is improbable: David Boreanaz, a TV series veteran; Danny Trejo, a scowling actor; and Tara Reid, clearly chosen for her looks. Still, the murder with an electric bug zapper is amusing.

The Crow – "Laugh now, cry later."

What kind of tea is hard to swallow? Reali-tea.

Members of a gang murder Eric and his beloved. He is resurrected with the aim of mercilessly avenging his and his fiancée’s deaths.

Their romance is so saccharine that I bluntly wondered, "When are they going to die?" The film lacks the vision of a director like Alex Proyas from the earlier version. The writing is nauseating, with dialogues that attempt to be poetic but end up embarrassingly flat, and the plot is flimsy. The original intention seemed to be to reboot the franchise, not bury it further, but this new take fails miserably. Nevertheless, there are some delightfully gory scenes, and the film tries something new with an antagonist endowed with supernatural powers.