Several years after the tragic death of their little girl, a doll maker and his wife welcome a nun and several girls from a shuttered orphanage into their home, soon becoming the target of the doll maker's possessed creation—Annabelle.
Ratings
Curator score: 2.5/10
IMDb: 6.5/10
Letterboxd: 3.03/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 71%
Metacritic: 62
TMDB: 6.6/10
Director
David F. Sandberg
Production
Atomic Monster, New Line Cinema, The Safran Company, RatPac Entertainment
Cast
Stephanie Sigman, Talitha Eliana Bateman, Lulu Wilson, Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto, Grace Caroline Currey, Philippa Coulthard, Samara Lee, Tayler Buck, Lou Lou Safran, Brad Greenquist, Mark Bramhall, Joseph Bishara, Alicia Vela-Bailey, Jessie Giacomazzi, Adam Bartley, Lotta Losten, Brian Howe, Kerry O'Malley, Annabelle Wallis
Where to watch
Max
Curator Review
Verdict
A solid, above-average haunted-doll sequel that improves on the original with stronger atmosphere, cleaner scares, and surprisingly effective emotional setup. It’s still a familiar studio horror ride, but the craft is polished enough to make it an easy recommendation for mainstream horror fans.
Best for
fans of supernatural horror and haunted-object stories
viewers who like tense, old-fashioned jump scares with moody production design
people who enjoyed the Conjuring-style universe but want a more self-contained entry
audiences looking for a creepy but not overly extreme PG-13 horror watch
Skip if
you want genuinely original horror plotting
you are tired of doll/possessed-toy movies
you prefer graphic, hard-R horror over restrained studio scares
you dislike movies that rely on familiar genre beats
Overview
Annabelle: Creation is the rare franchise prequel that feels more confident than the movie that spawned it. David F. Sandberg leans into shadowy farmhouse dread, patient camera movement, and a few well-timed jolts, giving the haunted-doll premise a sturdier sense of place than it usually gets. The result is a slick, efficient scare machine that knows exactly what kind of movie it is.
Worth noting
What helps most is the orphanage setup, which gives the story a little emotional weight and a stronger vulnerability than a standard possession setup. The performances from the younger cast are effective, and the film keeps the doll itself just uncanny enough to remain unsettling without overexposing the gimmick.
Bottom line
It does not reinvent supernatural horror, and some of the logic is very much in service of the scares. But as a studio horror sequel, it’s unusually watchable: polished, tense, and better paced than expected. If you want a creepy mainstream horror film with solid craft and a few memorable set pieces, this one earns its place.
Top Letterboxd reviews
David F. Sandberg (0.5★) · 3383 likes
Plot made no sense. Why would the general hide the plans inside the Pentagon when he knew he wouldn't be able to get back in there after his cover was blown? And what was the ultimate plan of the bad guys? Say the plan had worked and the EMPs actually went off. Ok, now all electronics are dead, all bank records are gone, but now what? Where would the billions of dollars actually come from? Also, no way that much explosives could fit into an eyepatch.
owen (3★) · 2334 likes
annabelle be like:
🎀 🎀
👁 👁
👃🏻
👄
Buddy O (3.5★) · 1614 likes
If you told me 3 years ago that i'd really like the sequel to Ouija and Annabelle I would've told you to get fucked.
Billy Langsworthy (2★) · 1120 likes
I give it a year before the scarecrow has its own spin-off movie.
lola gumball (1.5★) · 1015 likes
i personally think annabelle and chucky would make a great couple