May the Devil Take You Too review: Timo Tjahjanto returns to the gory insanity of his 2018 horror hit

Two years after May the Devil Take You, writer-director Timo Tjahjanto returns to the world of satanic curses with May the Devil Take You Too, a bloody sequel that manages to top the original’s over-the-top violence while deepening the film’s mythos.

After withstanding a demonic attack initiated by her father in the original film, Alfie (Chelsea Islan) is now living a quiet life with her step-sister Nara (Hadijah Shahab), the only survivors of the horrific attack at her father’s old house two years prior. Word of Alfie’s demon-battling skills have apparently made the rounds in Jakarta, and inspire a gang of desperate friends to kidnap Alfie and Nara. They bring them to an abandoned orphanage (never a good sign) and explain their dire circumstances; when they were living in the orphanage years ago, they angered a vengeful spirit that is now exacting its revenge on them one by one. They need Alfie’s help to once again vanquish a demon before they are all summarily killed in the most brutal ways possible.

Timo Tjahjanto follows many of the classic horror sequel tropes here, for better or for worse. While the setting has shifted from a creepy old house to a dilapidated orphanage (two of horror’s most beloved locales), the plot is inherently similar; a group of young people has to fight off a supernatural curse initiated by their elders. The original film had a small family unit fighting off the evil, and that has been expanded in the sequel to include the group of former residents of the orphanage. Unfortunately, character development isn’t Tjahjanto’s strong suit; the expanded cast of characters are mostly all demon fodder that pop-up just to meet their fates in spectacularly gruesome fashion.

Tjahjanto does seem to be having more fun this time around, and the film’s best moments come when he unleashes his wild flourishes, from a Sam Raimi-indebted POV shot of a flying saw-blade to the copious pale-faced ghouls vomiting black goop onto their terrified victims. The film actually doesn’t actually rely on jump-scares, given that the creatures are omnipresent for almost the entire film; instead, Tjahjanto builds unease with the sheer violence and force of their maneuvers, from their creepy bone-breaking body movements to the pummelling repetition as a possessed character repeatedly smashes their skull into a door during a chase scene.

While many of the new characters are fairly forgettable, Chelsea Islan makes a memorable return as the beleaguered Alfie, who is once again thrust into this demonic nightmare through no fault of her own. She’s better equipped to deal with the undead this time, and the film takes on a welcome Nightmare on Elm Street Dream Warriors / Dream Master feel as Alfie comes to recognize her power and ability to fight back against the demonic curse.

While May the Devil Take You Too doesn’t offer much that horror audiences haven’t seen before, Tjahjanto does a solid job of expanding the world he created back in 2018 and setting Alfie up as a force to be reckoned with if the franchise continues (which it likely will). The pacing is a bit off given the film’s nearly two-hour running time, but there are enough memorable sequences here to make this an easy recommendation as we head into the Halloween homestretch.

May the Devil Take You Too begins streaming on Shudder on October 29.