Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2

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Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2
File:Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey 2 poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Rhys Frake-Waterfield
Produced by <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Written by Matt Leslie
Based on
Starring <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Music by Andrew Scott Bell
Cinematography Vince Knight
Edited by <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
  • Dan Allen
  • Rhys Frake-Waterfield
Production
company
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  • Jagged Edge Productions
  • ITN Studios
Distributed by Altitude Film Distribution
Release dates
 <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
  • 18 March 2024 (2024-03-18) (London)
  • 26 March 2024 (2024-03-26) (United States)
Running time
 94 minutes[1]
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Budget $500,000
Box office $730,160[2][3]

Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 (stylised as Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey II) is a 2024 British independent slasher film directed by Rhys Frake-Waterfield and written by Matt Leslie. It is the second installment of The Twisted Childhood Universe (TCU) and a sequel to Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), which serves as a horror reimagining of A. A. Milne and E. H. Shepard's Winnie-the-Pooh books. The film stars Scott Chambers as Christopher Robin, and Ryan Oliva as the titular character, with Tallulah Evans, Teresa Banham, Peter DeSouza-Feighoney, Alec Newman, and Simon Callow in supporting roles. It follows Pooh as he embarks on a murderous rampage through Christopher Robin's childhood town to seek revenge on him for revealing his existence to the world.

Following the success of Blood and Honey, director Frake-Waterfield expressed interest in a sequel that, eventually, was greenlit in November 2022. The film utilizes metafictional and film within a film elements as Chambers, Oliva, and Eddy McKenzie replace original cast members Nikolai Leon, Craig David Dowsett, and Chris Cordell in the roles of Christopher Robin, Winnie-the-Pooh, and Piglet, respectively.[lower-alpha 1]

Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 premiered in London on 18 March 2024, and was theatrically released in the United States on 26 March 2024. It is scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom on 28 June 2024. The film received mixed reviews from critics, although it was considered an improvement over its predecessor. A sequel, Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 3, is in development.

Plot

Shortly after surviving Winnie-the-Pooh's and Piglet's killing spree,[lower-alpha 2] Christopher Robin flees from the Hundred Acre Wood and returns to his childhood town of Ashdown to seek help; the corpses of Maria and her friends are recovered from the woods, but Christopher is believed to be responsible.

The incident is dubbed the "Hundred Acre Massacre", and a film adaptation based on the murders is released, damaging Christopher's reputation in Ashdown.[lower-alpha 1] Now an outcast of the town, Christopher has nightmares about Pooh and goes to his hypnotherapist Samantha to deal with a childhood trauma when his twin brother Billy was kidnapped and never seen again.

Meanwhile, in the Hundred Acre Wood, Pooh and Piglet are forced to hide with fellow creatures Tigger and Owl due to a few people who actually believe Christopher's story. After they slaughter three university students in a recreational vehicle, Owl tries to convince Pooh to attack Ashdown instead of simply waiting for more people to come to the woods. When some hunters ambush the creatures and kill Piglet, Pooh kills them in retaliation and reconsiders Owl's proposal.

Christopher returns to undergo further hypnotherapy with Samantha after he loses his job as the town's doctor. He also meets Mark Cavendish, the hospital's janitor, and confronts him about the creatures. Mark reveals that he worked for Dr. Arthur Gallup, a scientist who forced him to kidnap children around Ashdown for experiments with animal genes. The children did not survive and were buried in the Hundred Acre Wood, where they came back as half-animal, half-human hybrids with an enhanced healing factor. Mark also admits that Billy was among the victims and was resurrected as Pooh before he commits suicide out of guilt.

Upon learning of the creatures' imminent attack, Christopher warns the town but faces ridicule and skepticism. Pooh, Tigger, and Owl embark on a rampage throughout Ashdown and kill several residents on the way, including Christopher's best friend Finn. Pooh personally kills Christopher's parents Alan and Daphne and kidnaps his younger sister Bunny. Christopher's girlfriend Lexy is also attacked but survives while the creatures arrive to a rave party at a warehouse and slaughter all the partygoers. Christopher kills Tigger and learns that Bunny was kidnapped. He returns to the Hundred Acre Wood and fights Pooh, who easily subdues him. When Christopher calls Pooh by his real name, Billy, he tries to remember his childhood but accuses Christopher of abandoning the creatures, deeming him responsible for Eeyore's death years prior.[lower-alpha 2]

Christopher is forced to kill Pooh with an axe before reuniting with Lexy and Bunny. Footage from the creatures' killing spree on Ashdown is passed to the police, and Christopher is cleared of all wrongdoing. Owl, having survived, recovers the bodies of Pooh, Tigger, and Piglet, and promises to find a way to revive them with the help of some old friends.[lower-alpha 3]

Cast

Additionally, Nikolai Leon, Craig David Dowsett, and Chris Cordell appear as Christopher Robin, Winnie-the-Pooh, and Piglet, respectively, in archive footage from Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey. Cameo appearances of Bambi, Peter Pan, and Pinocchio are featured via drawings in the end credits as teasers for their upcoming individual films, Bambi: The Reckoning, Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare, and Pinocchio: Unstrung, respectively.

Production

In a June 2022 interview with Josh Korngut of Dread Central, director Rhys Frake-Waterfield expressed interest in creating a sequel to Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, and stated that he wants to "ramp it up even more and go even crazier and go even more extreme".[7] In September 2023, teaser images were released showing the addition of the new character Owl.[8] Principal photography also concluded that month.[9] The film features a new cast and new character designs, and takes place in the town of Ashdown rather than the Hundred Acre Wood.[10] Additionally, the character Tigger, who was absent from the first film, appears since going in the public domain in January 2024.[4][11] It was written by Matt Leslie.[11]

The film was originally reported to have a budget five times larger than its predecessor;[12] it would later be confirmed that the budget had increased to ten times larger than the first film.[13] Shaune Harrison, who previously worked on productions such as World War Z, the Harry Potter franchise, and Game of Thrones, was the film's creature and gore designer, while Paula Anne Booker leads the special effects.[10] In 2023, it was revealed that Frake-Waterfield intended to have Pooh wield a chainsaw as a weapon in the film,[14] and that the film would feature over 30 deaths.[13] The film takes inspiration from Terrifier 2.[15] Winnie-the-Pooh's prosthetics in the film cost over $20,000 compared to the $770 spent on the first film's costume.[9]

Release

Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 premiered at the Prince Charles Cinema in Leicester Square, London, on 18 March 2024. It was theatrically released in the United States by Fathom Events on 26 March 2024 and is scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom by Altitude Film Distribution on 28 June 2024.[16][1]

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 53% of 32 reviews are positive, with an average rating of 4.9/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2 represents an improvement over the original in most respects, although the Poohniverse remains a place made for hardcore slasher fans."[17] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 36 out of 100, based on six critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[18]

Luke Thompson of The AV Club gave the film a positive review, writing "This is cinema at its most punk rock—a raucous, unpolished, cheap, sacred-cow shredding middle finger to the mainstream with just enough raw talent inside to keep it from being dismissable."[19] IGN's Matt Donato gave it a score of 6/10, comparing its approach to that of Terrifier 2 and writing, "It boasts a nastier midnight-movie appeal, radical practical effects, and a brisk 90-minute runtime. It's a shaky first step for Frake-Waterfield's proposed 'Poohniverse' concept – but it's a step in the right direction."[20]

Owen Gleiberman of Variety gave the film a negative review, criticizing the screenplay and direction. He concluded his review by writing, "Somewhere up in drive-in-theater heaven, Herschell Gordon Lewis and Ed Wood are smiling, even if Frake-Waterfield makes them look like Scorsese and Spielberg."[21] The Daily Beast's Nick Schager said the film "boasts a bigger budget, higher production values, and an entirely new cast. Alas, when it comes to the things that matter most—like writing, directing, and acting—it's as chintzy and inept as its predecessor."[22]

Future

Sequel

On 28 March 2024, two days after the film's release, it was announced that a third film was being developed.[23]

Shared universe and other projects

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Main article: The Twisted Childhood Universe

In November 2022, two other horror films were announced: Bambi: The Reckoning and Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare based on Bambi, a Life in the Woods and Peter and Wendy, respectively.[24][25][26] In February 2023, Frake-Waterfield announced that the various projects take place in The Twisted Childhood Universe, sharing continuity as a franchise. The filmmaker further stated that Jagged Edge Productions intends to eventually have crossovers featuring all of the characters.[27] In January 2024, a third film, Pinocchio: Unstrung, based on The Adventures of Pinocchio, was announced as part of the TCU.[28] Pinocchio: Unstrung was referenced at the end of Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey 2; while other teases to the expanded universe and future projects were displayed through drawings during the end credits.[29]

In March 2024, the series' first crossover film titled Poohniverse: Monsters Assemble was revealed, with Scott Chambers confirmed to be reprising his role as Christopher Robin as well as Roxanne McKee returning as Xana from Bambi: The Reckoning, along with additional horror iterations of fairytale characters such as Sleeping Beauty, the Talking Cricket and the Mad Hatter.[30]

Frake-Waterfield also expressed interest in making films about Thor, the Norse god of thunder,[31] as well as copyrighted franchises such as Teletubbies, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and The Powerpuff Girls.[32][33]

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023) is presented as a film adaptation based on the "Hundred Acre Massacre" that took place before the events of Blood and Honey 2. Although the events of Blood and Honey actually happened in-universe, it is presented as a film within a film, which explains the redesigns for Christopher, Pooh and Piglet.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 As depicted in Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023).
  3. ↑ Identified off-screen as Rabbit, Kanga, and Roo.

References

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  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  25. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  26. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  29. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  30. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  31. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  32. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  33. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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