Out of all of the modern-day horror franchises like The Conjuring Universe or the Teriffier films, the V/H/S series is the most fascinating to me. These releases usually go under the radar and since the first film’s release in 2012, there have been six films in this series with V/H/S/Beyond the seventh. While most audiences may not be aware of them outside of the first, they actually serve as the proving grounds for up-and-coming directors. Names like Ti West, Adam Wingard, David Bruckner, and the folks behind Radio Silence Production all got somewhat mainstream attention thanks to the V/H/S series, so at the very least, I like to try and pay attention to each new entry to see who may or may not make it big.
V/H/S/Beyond decides to center most of its various short films around sci-fi horror, a horror style that doesn’t get a lot of mainstream representation. While the majority of shorts are focused on aliens and extraterrestrial life, hence the “Beyond” part of the title, that isn’t to say that every short is alien-centric. Like most anthology films, it’s hard to gauge the overall quality of the film due to how different each person’s opinions will be on each short, but at the very least, if you’re looking for a nice little horror movie this Halloween, V/H/S/Beyond is a pretty good place to start.
V/H/S/Beyond
Directors: Jay Cheel (Abduction/Adduction), Jordan Downey (Stork), Virat Pal (Dream Girl), Justin Martinez (Live and Let Dive), Christian and Justin Long (Fur Babies), Kate Siegal (Stowaway)
Release Date: October 4, 2024 (Shudder)
For the sake of brevity, and to get right to the point, I think it would be best for this review if I were to tackle each short individually and assign a score based on them, then compile all of them into the overall score for V/H/S/Beyond. Again, for the most part, there aren’t any bad shorts in this entry, but not all of them are equal. Like most of the movies in this series, there is a short that serves as a framing narrative, so it would be best to start with that one before moving on to the individual shorts themselves.
The framing device is a short called “Abduction/Adduction.” It’s a more traditional documentary that flip-flops between looking at the motivation and desire for people to believe in alien life, how people can have their own bias confirmed based on evidence (or lack thereof), and the disappearance of a small family in a quiet town. The discussions of belief and explaining how footage can be doctored to appear real are interesting, especially since they get what appears to be experts to come in and voice their opinions. The actual event they’re building to, however, which is two shots of a creature appearing to someone when they sleep, is a lame way for the short, and the film in general, to end on. Also, the fact that the short is broken up between the five main shorts does prevent the ongoing narrative of the disappearing family from getting as much screen time as it deserves. Overall ranking: 5.5/10
The first actual short, “Stork,” is reminiscent of found footage movies like Rec. The film follows a group of police officers as they perform a raid on a house wherein people have been stealing babies, and the creatures they find are homicidal and definitely creepy. If you want action, this short is the one for you. It goes from zero to ten fairly quickly and even the quieter moments lead up to some unsettling scares, like a creepy lullaby and what these creatures are revealed to be doing to the babies. It can be a bit one-note once you get used to all of the action, but Jordan Downey does a good job of escalating each set piece, and the practical effects are wonderfully handled. Pretty solid and a good short to start with. Overall ranking: 6.5/10
The next short, “Dream Girl,” has a distinct Bollywood flair. We follow two paparazzi who are trying to interview the biggest star in Bollywood, an actress named Tara. Once it’s revealed that she’s some kind of synthetic creature, one of the paparazzi tries to encourage her to gain her independence, which she does… but does so as a violent rampage across the film set claiming it as liberation. This short has some of the best cinematography as we switch between a handheld camera, static security cameras, and the professional camera the in-universe film crew was making, leading to a dynamic-looking short. The violence is fun and the terror is palpable as this unstoppable monster goes about ripping faces off to wear as her own. The build-up is a lot slower, but it does lead to a more satisfying finale, and the Bollywood theming does a lot to differentiate itself from the rest of the shorts. Overall ranking: 7.5/10
Copyright: Shudder
The third short, “Live and Let Dive,” has a relatively simple premise – a group of friends is going skydiving, but their plane crashes into a UFO and both crews fall into an orange field, leading to a scramble where the humans are trying to run for their lives and the aliens are trying to kill anyone who saw them. Seeing a short in the daylight is a refreshing twist, but what really makes this short work so well is the aliens themselves. They’re gnarly to look at and their actions and appearance enhance the panic the skydivers face. It doesn’t quite match up to the chaos of the earlier shorts, but I certainly was having a lot of fun watching the skydiving sequence. Overall ranking: 6.5/10
The fourth short, “Fur Babies,” is undeniably the most disturbing, and that probably has to do with the Tusk similarity. A group of animal rights activists go into a doggy daycare owned by a taxidermist to try and “liberate” the dogs there but instead are captured by her and made into something far, far worse. Honestly, this short was tough to watch as a dog lover, if only because of how gross some of the body horror elements were. At the same time, it was undeniably effective at getting under my skin, even if it doesn’t really play into the sci-fi theming of the rest of the movie. This gives off vibes of Misery if it was crossed with Barbarian, which makes sense given Justin Long’s involvement with this short. Overall ranking: 7/10
The last short in V/H/S/Beyond, “Stowaway,” was sadly the worst of the bunch, which is a shame given that Mike Flannigan wrote it and his wife Kate Siegal directed it. The short follows a woman searching for aliens in the Mojave Desert and eventually discovering a ship and going inside to examine it… and that’s about it. The short really does play into the found-footage vibes more than the others, but it also makes certain parts almost unintelligible with how hard it is to see what’s happening. There is a distinct sadness throughout it, as scenes are inter-spliced of our protagonist as a child at her birthday party as her situation becomes more and more dire, juxtaposing her childhood happiness with her adult despair. This is a short that I’m sure would be good to read as a script, but is executed in such an amateurish way that I was more bored by it than anything else. Overall ranking: 4.5/10
Copyright: Shudder
Taken as a whole, I would say that V/H/S/Beyond hits more than it misses. Sure, it does lose a bit of steam with the last short and the ending of the framing device, but the earlier shorts do more than enough to keep the energy going. None of them are particularly amazing or revolutionary, but they’re, for the most part, varying degrees of good. I would be interested in seeing future entries center themselves on types of horror rather than specific years. If this is the direction the rest of the V/H/S franchise goes, then consider me excited for the next installment.
