I Know What You Did Last Summer Review - For a franchise that knows so much, it doesn't know enough to stay in the 90's

Chase Gifford
Jul 17
5 min read

“Three may keep a secret if two of them are dead.” - Benjamin Franklin

An odd experience when getting older, something I think I am deep in the middle of right now, is seeing society’s focus change from you to the newer generations. Now that isn’t to say you’re suddenly insignificant, it’s just that you are no longer first in line. This can be true of many things. Certainly entertainment is a big one. Growing up we were given The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, the Harry Potter Saga, the beginning of the MCU, Scream and its ongoing sequels, and the heyday of Pixar. It didn’t always need to be an entire universe or trilogy either with game changing releases like The Blair Witch Project which caused absolute havoc in 1999, its influence still felt to this day. For fuck sake, Titanic. I don’t even need to elaborate with that one. The Prequels. The Matrix.

While technically these were made for everyone, it was my generation that was the focal point from the 90’s to the early 2010’s. Now, it’s changing again as it once did when the 80’s ended with music from NWA and Public Enemy and the 90’s gave us NSYNC and Backstreet Boys. Now it’s BTS and Chappell Roan. To be honest, I had to look up those last two names.

My long gestating point is that eventually the cycle starts over and one day you find yourself in the remnants of a broken down cycle that pop culture mostly left behind for greener pastures. When it comes to movies, Hollywood loves to see what worked back in the day and just redo it all. A Harry Potter series based on the original seven books is literally filming as I write this. New kids currently inhabit the characters of Harry, Ron, and Hermione and their names are not Daniel, Rupert or Emma. It’s sad but inevitable. Especially with Hollywood, the land of draining an idea for everything it’s worth and still coming back for seconds and thirds, however diluted it may be by then.

Now it would seem they’re rehashing the properties that weren’t even good, just mildly viable at one point. And so we (finally) arrive at the legacy sequel for 1997 and 1998’s I Know What You Did Last Summer and its impeccably titled successor, I STILL Know What You Did Last Summer. Ooh, spooky. And what did they name this completely new concept risen from the ashes of old? I Know What You Did Last Summer. Surely such genius does not come from one person. Such ingenuity must be a group effort. And not to spoil anything, but this will not be the last of this, I guess you’d call it a franchise? And that may just be my biggest issue with this legacy sequel. But I’ll get to that later. Right now I need to finish my train of thought.

With the legacy characters returning, it’s an obvious attempt to get original fans to return to the scene of the first massacre in Southport. But ultimately this is mostly to bring in a new generation of slasher fans with a predominantly gen z cast. It features early twenty-somethings being at the center of their own universes as the rest of us just orbit around them in awe of their youth and beauty. They like to think so anyway. Their humor is firmly in the now, using tired tropes like toxic and glow up. I almost threw up typing that last sentence. While it can provide the odd chuckle here and there, it’s intended, as we discussed earlier, for a newer generation and while we are free to participate as millennials and gen xers, we are no longer the focal point. And I think that’s key to understanding why this franchise has reared its ugly head once again. New generation, old IP, new money grab.

I previously mentioned potential for another impending sequel and I meant it. No details but this is my biggest issue with this latest addition of the cloaked figure in a fisherman’s slicker. It never justifies our return to Southport. It is, in almost every sense, a complete rehash of the original film. And it has the audacity to pry us for even more sequels guaranteed in our future within the next three years. It is a cash grab through and through. It’s why it has zero identity of its own. Everything about this new story is that none of it is, well, new. Without any knowledge of the original and its even worse ‘98 sequel, you will keep up but without any kind of nuance or depth. It is entirely dependent on what happened nearly thirty years ago. From a pair of movies that succeeded because its cast features names that were massive in their time. Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr. and Sarah Michelle Gellar to name a few. In the era of Scream, this is the franchise that didn’t need to return from the dead.

A group of friends, on the cusp of their promising lives as privileged adults begins, their dreams are soaring and their futures brighter than ever. In a single moment of shortsighted behavior, on a rural beach side road, a man is killed by this group of five friends in a road accident. But as seemingly all rich assholes do, they go to great lengths to avoid any kind of responsibility. One year later and hell unleashes as a mysterious note is sent to the five promising an eventful summer filled with reminiscing and reconnecting. Surely they have nothing to hide.

As much as this is a cash grab, and it is, it’s also an attempt to win over the hearts and minds of a new generation while trying not to alienate an already existing fanbase. At least I think there’s still fans of these. But there’s little meat left on the bone to be anything resembling something enticing.

So a rehash of what happened before would make anyone wonder what’s different about it? And aside from a half-hearted twist (no spoilers!) it feels like a movie headed both to the past for nostalgia sake and towards the future for more Last Summer sequels. It’s a clarification of what happened before hoping people will keep coming back in the coming years for the man with the hook. But with such an obviously weak premise, it begs the question - where does it go from here? Especially when “here” is just a repackaged 1997 generic slasher. To be fair, there is nothing audaciously terrible here, but it does little to nothing at all to find its own identity beyond a thirty year old B-grade horror movie.