The Last Horrors of 2024: 4 Films to Never Look Back On

A short and random list of horror films that I don’t think I’ll ever revisit, to close the year.

2024 has been a strange year for film in general, and an even stranger one for horror. We had incredible films in this genre, such as The Substance or Smile 2, but also plenty of terrible flops that were a waste of time.

The following is a short list of some horror films that came out during the year and that I have only watched in these last few days. Some of them because they were not available in my country yet, and some others because I forgot. These are small productions that did not make much of an impression on me, neither for good nor bad. There’s not enough to be said about them to dedicate an individual article to each one, but I want to take a minute to warn you about them.

Y2K

This is one of those movies that achieves a nice style but has no idea what to do with it. If you are a kid of the 90s or early 2000s, Y2K has plenty of Easter eggs for you to find and a pleasant music selection. It’s always good to remember that once upon a time, the world had good music and not the trash we can hear on the radio right now. But I digress.

For some context, the Y2K bug, also known as the Millennium Bug, was a widespread computer programming issue that arose from the use of only two digits (19xx) to represent the year in many computer systems. This design choice was made to conserve memory and storage space, as data storage was expensive and limited at the time. As the year 2000 approached, concerns grew that when the clock struck midnight on December 31, 1999, many computer systems would interpret the date as “00” (1900) instead of “00” (2000), leading to errors and potential failures. This could have caused widespread disruptions to critical infrastructure. Fortunately, none of that happened. But in the film, the Y2K actually takes place, turning all technological devices into lethal murderers and wreaking havoc into a new year’s party full of teenagers. 

The first issue is that the characters are poorly introduced, so when the crisis starts, the deaths are random and irrelevant. In fact, the film focuses more on characters that die very early on, so we’re left with the ones we know next to nothing about.

The characters themselves are another big problem. They’re not interesting; they go through no transformation, and being honest, the acting is quite bad. Marketing the film focusing on Rachel Zegler after all the controversies that girl had last year was not a smart move, especially considering her performance was one of the worst in the project. Her character was written to be insufferable: she is not only the most popular and desired girl at school, but also a highly skilled programmer who has the answers for everything, and is smarter than everyone else.

The effects of the bug on the devices do not obey any rules, but rather accommodate what the script needs. For example, the protagonist’s computer recognizes him and therefore does not kill him on sight. Another character has a camera that is not affected, but early on, a different girl was murdered by something as inoffensive as a Tamagotchi. After forty minutes, you realize the film makes no sense and that there is no story to tell. Just an unlikable group of teenagers running around with 90s music.

Bagman

What a year it has been for Lionsgate. They gave us films that, while not commercially successful, were very decent, such as The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare or White Bird, but they also brought us unforgivable disasters such as Never Let Go, Borderlands, or The Crow. I regret to inform you that this next movie is in the second group.

Bagman tells the story of Patrick, a man who has been traumatized by an encounter with the title monster in his childhood. For years, he tried to keep the event in the past, but the realization that Bagman is now after Jake, his young son, will bring all those fears back to life.

The design of the monster is scary, and at some point, there’s even a mention of the mythology behind that terrifying being, which could have been quite interesting to explore. The protagonist could have investigated and found a way to get rid of Bagman for good.

But no. Patrick is a week individual who has not enough intelligence or energy to do something other than calling the police or seeing a therapist. He even has an advantage that characters in these types of movies usually don’t have: his wife does not think he is insane. So we see him doing nothing for over an hour, and only in the last ten minutes something slightly exciting happens, and the big plot twist is revealed: Bagman is not after Jake, but after Patrick himself. So he stuffs him in his bag, and the movie ends.

To be fair, the acting is not that bad (at least not Y2K level bad), but the excruciatingly slow pacing and lack of action put you to sleep. It took me almost an entire day to finish watching it because I had to take breaks every fifteen minutes. 

Sting

To people who are terrified of insects (like me), a giant spider needs very little to become nightmare fuel. Murderous spider and all, Sting was quite an underwhelming experience.

Charlotte, a 12-year-old girl with a complicated family situation, finds a spider in her grandmother’s apartment and decides to keep it in a jar. The apparently inoffensive pet starts growing with alarming speed, and it’s not long before it develops a taste for human flesh.

Sting is boring for 70% of its running time but achieved a few nerve-wracking moments that could be loosely qualified as “interesting.” One example could be when Sting, while still small, single-handedly murders one of the building’s neighbors. Or the sight of all the murdered pet animals, the first victims, that are very disturbing.

The only worthy thing in the film is the performance of Alyla Browne. Remember that kid that played young Furiosa? That’s her. I hope to see more of that girl in the future, because she has talent.

Long story short, the spider eliminates almost everyone in the building, except for the protagonist’s family, who manages to kill it with the garbage compactor. A short moment before the credits roll shows that Sting is indeed dead, but she left some eggs behind, teasing a sequel. If it ever happens, there is no way I’m watching it.

Afraid

I’m giving this project some credit because it’s the only movie on today’s list that did not bore me to death. That’s how low the bar is.

A family is selected to test the newest technological device: a digital assistant composed of cameras and sensors that can turn a home into a smart house, ready to anticipate the inhabitant’s every need. Once AIA is installed, she starts to learn the family’s behaviors and bond with each member. It’s not long before they start to realize that keeping them happy is not AIA’s only objective.

Afraid’s biggest problem is that it’s a rehash of elements and ideas many films and shows have already done (and done better) years ago. The opening scene, when the AI takes control of a family’s house, endangering the inhabitants, reminded me of that Mickey’s Mechanical House short that is like 25 years old. And Mickey did it better. A six-minute animation made for children was a better cautionary tale than this hour and a half film.

The idea of becoming emotionally attached to the AI is also not new. The scene when AIA creates a version of Meredith’s father on the TV reminded me of the Black Mirror episode “Be Right Back”, where the protagonist hires a service that does just that with her recently deceased husband. That episode came out in 2013. In fact, had Afraid been made into an episode of Black Mirror back then, it would have worked wonders. Or what about Her, with Joaquin Phoenix, also from 2013?

My point is that it brings nothing new to the table; it does not give a more contemporary perspective to a topic that feels more real and relevant right now than it did in 2013, or even two or three years ago.

I guess the film wanted to make a commentary on how isolated people feel these days—that they resort to something that does not exist to keep them company. I’m also guessing they wanted to highlight how technology keeps families apart. But the characters are not helpful to that goal. The protagonists, played by Katherine Waterston and John Cho are a millennial woke couple that “gentle-parent” their kids. Most of the situations presented in the story can only happen in a household where the iPods are raising the children. And I understand there are parents like that, but the film does not place it in a bad light; it does not try to criticize them, which could have been a good approach. The film wants us to believe they are just cool people with bad luck. I don’t like them.

Aside from that, when it comes to the ramifications of what the AI can do, Afraid is quite vague. AIA built herself, and she can control humans and be in every device in and out of the house, just because the script says so.

In conclusion, if you have the opportunity to avoid any of the movies on the list, I strongly recommend you to take it. Hopefully, 2025 will have better things in store for the genre.