Warning: deadly spoilers for Final Destination Bloodlines are in play. However, we won’t be held responsible for any premonitions that give away the game.
It’s hard not to be excited over a new Final Destination movie, especially when the latest entry of mayhem through mortality has made it to the big screen. I’m still shocked that this 2025 movie schedule product was initially developed as a streaming original, only to reverse course and head to a theater near me.
What’s more, this dance with death has been given the royal treatment in premium format. So much like I gushed about Sinners’ 4DX-cellent variant, I need to tip my hat to Warner Bros. for giving us something I feel everyone needs to experience: the Final Destination Bloodlines 4DX Death Chair.
Warner Bros.’ 4DX Marketing For Final Destination Bloodlines Impressed Me
We’ve gotten used to movies promoting every premium format through exclusive trailers and posters that do a decent job of highlighting why you should spend the extra scratch on a movie ticket. However, I can’t recall anyone going as hard on selling 4DX as Warner Bros. has with Bloodlines’ cinematic run. To prove my point, please look at the promo shared below, which hypes up this premium choice rather nicely:
Wherever the spirit of horror legend William Castle is at this moment, he must be smiling. As you’ll read in our Final Destination Bloodlines review, the balance between a plot serious enough to invest in, but campy enough to enjoy with glee, is a very important ingredient. And the camp is very well served in 4DX, thanks to the experience living up to syncing your auditorium up with those gloriously gruesome kills.
The Blood Flows Freely in Final Destination Bloodlines’ 4DX-travaganza
Turning back to Sinners for a moment, I was bowled over by how, any time a vamp got staked, the seat-mounted water cannons gave me a generous dose of liquid thrills. It’s more than a spritz, but not quite a splash – and frankly, that’s the sweet spot any picture should aim for. Especially if you’re a water-based narrative like Moana 2’s 3D/4DX journey!
Once again, the lack of watery thrills in that Disney picture have been outdone by the horror genre, showing us that this movie wasn’t subtitled Bloodlines without a good reason. None of the various decapitations, impalings, or any significant moment involving the red red kroovy presented on screen skimps on those water effects; and boy howdy, does it enhance the jump scares that come from flashing back to previous kills.
Final Destination’s Latest Entry Is Bookended By Major Motion Effect Set Piece
There is no time wasted in getting to the good stuff in Final Destination Bloodlines. That counts double for its 4DX version, as there’s a whole bunch of subtle effects present while we watch young Iris Campbell (Brec Bassinger) interfere with Death’s plan to claim the lives of all present for the Skyview Restaurant’s opening night.
By the time the premonition starts to kick in, we’re nice and warmed up for anything that can happen. Which means that from the moment “Shout!” starts playing on the dance floor, the power of 4DX is firmly in place – and it gets pretty wild with those motion chairs.
Everything from a penny being thrown to a piano dropping on the person who tossed the offending coin will throw you around. The same goes for the last two major set pieces towards the end of Final Destination 6, which sees Kaitlyn Santa Juana’s protagonist Stefani Reyes fighting Death alongside on-screen brother Charlie (Teo Briones).
While I know I’ve warned you all about spoilers being present, I’m not going to dig too much into why the motion seating is given one final showstopper to close on. All I’ll say is if you’re still traumatized by Final Destination’s iconic kills, this fifth sequel in the series cranks up a fan favorite up a couple of notches, in the name of traumatizing a new generation.
The MRI Twofer Proves That No Final Destination Bloodlines Kill Is Wasted
It would be very easy to save the big guns for only the Final Destination kills that are deemed the most impactful. (No pun intended.) That’s not what the 4DX wizards who converted Bloodlines did, though, as every death takes advantage of the opportunity it’s been given through this format. Which leads to the one scene I will spoil, a moment I call the “MRI Twofer.”
As you may have seen in Final Destination Bloodlines’ trailer, brother Erik (Richard Harmon) and Bobby (Owen Patrick Joyner) try to cheat death in a pretty ingenious way. Since Bobby’s allergic to peanuts, Erik thinks all his brother has to do is chomp down on a peanut butter cup, die, and then be revived as a sort of workaround the Campbell family curse.
Unfortunately, these guys haven’t seen the Final Destination movies streaming through an HBO Max subscription, nor do they heed the warning given to them by medical examiner William Bludworth (the late Tony Todd). The boys fucked around with Death’s plans, and as a result, an MRI machine is allowed to crank up to levels of power reserved for research projects.
Since Erik is pierced everywhere a human can get pierced (giving us some darkly comic laughs for a moment), he’s pulled into the machine with a wheelchair. After which Bobby is impaled by Chekov’s Vending Machine coil against said MRI machine.
While I think I’m still partial to the Skyway Restaurant premonition as the kill of the game in Final Destination Bloodlines, the MRI Twofer is really making me question that belief. Between the setup, the slow burn, and the final execution of this hospital-based fatality, you’re given almost the full spectrum of 4DX thrills – save for scent and light, which were sparingly (or in the case of the latter factor, not even) used.
However, that is the final kill that I’ll leave you to ponder when thinking about how you want to see Final Destination Bloodlines. I understand that directors. And while Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein did film this picture for IMAX, I’d say you should go for the ultimate horror throwback experience, and take this journey in 4DX.
I can personally attest to the fact that a lot of other moviegoers have seemed to choose this option. I had to shift plans from seeing this on Friday night to Saturday afternoon, all because I hadn’t secured tickets as a result; so take this as your premonition to not suffer the same fate!
