In addition to being the USA’s pre-eminent producer of original horror cinema, Blumhouse has carved out a secondary line in reviving old films and franchises for new generations of viewers. The studio found great commercial success in reviving Halloween for another three instalments; less so for their 2023 Exorcist revival or horror re-imagining of cult television drama Fantasy Island. Another attempt at a revival that fell by the wayside was The Craft: Legacy, a 2020 sequel to Andrew Fleming’s 1996 teen thriller. Clearly the COVID pandemic had an effect on box office, but with a theatrical take of just over US$2 million it’s clear audiences weren’t invested in the idea at all.

Fleming’s The Craft was an unexpected hit for Columbia Pictures back in 1996. The film itself was not great but was at least reasonably enjoyable. A combination of canny marketing, a popular cast, and a pop CD soundtrack saw it gross more than US$55m against a US$15m budget – and it found even greater success on home video and television. Not quite a cult classic, the film nonetheless was fondly remembered by the generation of teenagers that saw it. Quite why it was seen as potential fodder for a sequel some 24 years later is a mystery.

Legacy, from actor turned writer/director Zoe Lister-Jones, is for the most part a similar but unrelated affair to the original. Lily Schechner (Cailee Spaeny) is a teenager forced to move to a new town when her mother Helen (Michelle Monaghan) begins a relationship with psychologist and self-help guru Adam (David Duchovny). Bullied at her new school, Lily meets a trio of aspiring witches (Gideon Adlon, Lovie Simone, and Zoey Luna) who invite her to complete their coven. At the same time, something appears to stir psychic powers inside of Lily: including telepathy, and telekinesis.

The original Craft was a somewhat scrappy, inconsistent experience, but it did at least spend some time establishing characters and kept itself to a relatively snappy pace. Legacy drags terribly, and fails to deliver much in the way of character and depth in that time. While there are twists and surprises, they are blandly foreshadowed and easy to predict. Of the four witches, only Lily is afforded significant character development; her friends Franky, Tabby, and Lourdes are effectively consigned to being either cyphers or window dressing, depending on the scene.

Plot developments invite some moral debate, particularly in the case of a school bully enchanted into becoming an overly sensitive social justice advocate, but Lister-Jones’ screenplay shies away from adequately questioning her characters’ actions. Almost as soon as the questions are raised, they are forced to background – and then disregarded in favour of a lazy plot revelation. The resulting climax feels incredibly rushed and inconsequential. While a coda attempts to link the film back to the original, it is brief enough to frustrate existing fans while confusing fresh viewers. Whether a remake or a sequel, Legacy badly needed to commit to one iteration or the other.

The film almost feels maddeningly vague about its lead characters’ ages. At first it seems to pitch them as somewhat younger than the original coven, but as the story pushes them in sexual directions that initial feel becomes deeply inappropriate. Like the rest of the picture, it feels like the result of inattention or disinterest. Viewers of the original Craft will find this a poor follow-up. Anyone starting with this sequel will not find anything to sustain their interest at all.