Macabre...ish Horror Review: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, 1986/ 101 min.

Two drunk kids race down a desolate road, shooting signs and harassing a radio dj, on their way to a college football game. They pass a pickup and they and their car is attacked by Leatherface and his saw.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is relegated to myth and history since no evidence was found of Sally Hardesty’s story. But there have been attacks by saw up in North Texas and one cop, Lt. Boude ‘Lefty’ Enright (Dennis Hopper), who also happens to be kin to Sally and Franklin, thinks it might be related to that story, fourteen years prior. But no else does, except the radio dj Stretch, (Caroline Williams) that has the attack on tape. Except he doesn’t believe she has anything. Though he has been investigating saw related attacks happening all over the state for the last 13 years.

After testing different saws, Lefty goes to the radio station to hear the tape but he wants her to air it on the radio to garner attention for his investigation. Meanwhile, Drayton Sawyer (Jim Siedow), wins the chili cook off at the school those kids were heading too. Drayton is head of that family of cannibals, including Leatherface. It looks like they moved up north. Drayton and the family are heading to the radio station because the massacre has been playing every night on the radio.

Later, the Stretch is met by Bobby ‘Chop Top’ Sawyer (Bill Moseley) and Leatherface. Chop Top, a repulsive flamboyant character, is busy being weird while burning a hanger and digging it into his own head, eating the pieces that he scratches off.

Stretch ends up back at the new Sawyer place, which happens to be an old dilapidated carnival. It’s littered with human bones, lamps and trash. Lefty arrives at the carnival, ready for a saw standoff and hopefully to rescue Stretch. Who witnesses Leatherface skinning her sound engineer. He ends up waking up and she ends up wearing his face.

At the same time, an angry Lefty is wandering around the park cutting into structural supports. And he gets really pissed when he finds Franklin’s corpse, still sitting in it’s wheel chair.

And somehow Stretch gets invited to dinner and it’s the worst dinner ever. Oh and grandpa is still there and clocking in at 137 years old.

This movie is to the first one like Evil Dead 2 is to Evil Dead, is sillier but still graphic and gory but the physical effects are more over the top, ridiculous and gross.