Hell of a Summer (2025) Neon/Comedy-Horror RT: 88 minutes Rated R (horror violence, language throughout, some sexual references) Director: Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk Screenplay: Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk Music: Jay McCarrol Cinematography: Kristofer Bonnell Release date: April 4, 2025 (US) Cast: Fred Hechinger, Abby Quinn, Billy Bryk, Finn Wolfhard, Pardis Saremi, D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Matthew Finlan, Julia Doyle, Krista Nazaire, Julia Lalonde, Daniel Gravelle, Susan Coyne, Rosebud Baker, Adam Pally.
Rating: **
With Hell of a Summer, I am once again reminded how old I am. As loathe as I am to repeat the words of my parents and grandparents, I have no choice. I don’t understand today’s teenagers. I really don’t. Not even if they’re a bunch of twenty-somethings pretending to be teens. I don’t relate to them. I don’t understand their mentality. Half the time, I don’t even understand what they’re saying. OMG, I think I finally get where my parents were coming from.
Although I suspect it’s the point, I couldn’t stand any of the characters in the new slasher comedy Hell of a Summer, the directorial debut of Ghostbusters: Afterlife co-stars Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk. They also wrote the screenplay for this homage to the summer camp slashers of the 80s- e.g. Friday the 13th (1980), The Burning (1981), Madman (1982) and Sleepaway Camp (1983). I enjoyed all of these more than Hell of a Summer which is kind of a bummer. I really wanted to like it, but the annoying characters made it difficult. I found myself rooting for the killer to get them all.
The storyline is fairly standard. A deranged killer works his (or her) way through a group of camp counselors. They’re there for a weekend of training and partying before the kids show up. The de facto leader is socially inept Jason (Hechinger, Kraven the Hunter), a wimpy sort who’s been attending Camp Pineway for the past 15 summers (I think). He assumes leadership in the absence of camp owners John (Pally, Sonic the Hedgehog 1-3) and Kathy (SNL writer Baker) who get offed in the opening scenes. Hers is one of the two good kill scenes.
The counselors, a bunch of vapid types that include social media influencer Demi (Saremi, Death and Other Details), vegan Miley (Doyle, Astrid and Lilly Save the World), goth psychic Noelle (Lalonde, The Lake) and pompous gay theater director Ezra (Finlan, Orphan: First Kill), don’t like or respect Jason. They think he’s a loser and put him down at every opportunity. Of course, he’s the prime suspect when the killing starts.
The other potential victims are self-obsessed storyteller Mike (Woon-A-Tai, Reservation Dogs), aspiring filmmaker Ari (Gravelle, We Forgot to Break Up), black mean girl Shannon (Nazaire, The Hardy Boys) and moronic horndogs Chris and Bobby (Wolfhard and Bryk). The other person in Hell of a Summer that isn’t completely insufferable is Claire (Quinn, Knock at the Cabin), an inscrutable type who Jason has a crush on even though she’s not particularly nice to him. In her defense, she’s not as completely awful as her peers.
Maybe it’s a generational thing, but the teen victims-to-be in the Friday the 13th movies weren’t as horrible as the kids in Hell of a Summer. They were just a bunch of horny teens looking to smoke weed and screw before meeting the business end of whatever implement Jason happened to be wielding at the moment. However, it was pointed out to me that Hell of a Summer is more of a comedic take on the genre and the character types are deliberately exaggerated. Okay, I can accept that, but it doesn’t mean I found it funny. Some of it is mildly amusing at best, but most of it just fell flat with me. I guess I wanted something more along the lines of Wet Hot American Summer which retains the 80s setting with all the trappings. Then again, Hell of a Summer isn’t exactly aimed at mature audiences. This one is for millennials and Gen-Z.
Hell of a Summer is disappointingly light on gore. There are only a couple of good kill scenes. The one I alluded to earlier has Kathy getting a knife in the back of the head through a car headrest. In the other, the victim buys it via an axe to the skull. That’s it. Wolfhard and Bryk are really stingy with the red stuff. As a confirmed gorehound, I wanted more, much more. Then again, the makers aren’t going for a Terrifier blood feast here. Okay, fine.
The performances in Hell of a Summer are fine. All of the actors convincingly play character types that have become all too common in teen-oriented movies. Take Demi, the conceited influencer more interested in creating content than camping. You have to wonder what she’s even doing here at Pineway. She doesn’t strike me as the type who engages in any form of outdoor activity. Ari is an intolerable a**hole who treats his mild peanut allergy like a terminal disease. The way he goes off on somebody for daring to eat a nut-free granola bar in close proximity to him makes you support the killer all the more. The whole cast nails their unlikable characters perfectly.
There is no suspense in Hell of a Summer. It’s fairly predictable. You might not guess the killer right away, but it comes as no surprise when it’s revealed. In the end, the movie is no big deal. To be fair, I’ve seen much worse. I just wanted Hell of a Summer to be better than okay.
