Recently I was scrolling through Netflix and came across a new movie, “Time Cut.” But when I read the description I felt déjà vu — didn’t I watch this movie last year?
No, that was Amazon Prime’s “Totally Killer” which essentially has the same plot. Both movies are time-traveling, teen slasher films — a high school girl accidentally goes back in time to prevent a series of murders that devestated her family.
And sure, reusing popular film tropes is nothing new, but to me, it was bold for Netflix to release a movie with the same plot, intended for the same audience a year later and hope no one would notice.
And the worst news for Netflix? In my opinion, “Totally Killer” was better.
“Time Cut,” stars protagonist Lucy Field (Madison Bailey), who travels from 2024 to 2003 right before her older sister Summer (Antonia Gentry) and her best friends get murdered.
“Totally Killer,” stars Jamie Hughes (Kiernan Shipka), who ends up back in 1987 after her mom is killed in the present and has to stop the killer’s original murders 35 years earlier. The teenage and adult versions of her mom, Pam, are played by Olivia Holt and Julie Bowen, respectively.
Despite having such similar plot arcs, there are a few ways that “Totally Killer” outdoes “Time Cut.”
Violence, gore and fear are all essential parts of horror movies, which “Time Cut” lacks due to Netflix’s over-censoring. There were a total of six deaths during the 91 minutes, with most of them being a quick, single stab that quickly cut away from the body. In comparison, “Totally Killer” showed 10 dead bodies throughout its 104-minute runtime and a lot more blood. Characters were getting stabbed multiple times with close-ups on corpses.
There were also more fight scenes in “Totally Killer,” like the opening which involves an epic knife fight between the killer and adult Pam. The final battle between the killer and Jamie takes place on a zero- gravity carnival ride. In “Time Cut,” only one character, Lucy, puts up a fight when faced with the killer. The rest of the victims just try to run away before quickly getting caught.
“Totally Killer” also does a good job of balancing all of this death with humor. Teenage Pam and her group of friends care more about having fun than their homicidal stalker — a fact that frustrates Jamie to no end. “Time Cut” is meant to be more heartfelt but to me it’s more depressing, particularly watching Lucy’s parents tell her that they only wanted one child, confirming her fear that she was a replacement for Summer.
The killer in “Time Cut” is revealed to be a future version of Quinn, Summer’s classmate who has been helping Lucy since she arrived in the past. Lucy’s arrival in 2003 creates two timelines — one in which Quinn becomes a killer and one in which he doesn’t, thanks to his friendship with her. Although they now exist in a timeline where he isn’t a killer, the future Quinn travels back in time and kills Summer’s friends for bullying him. He tries to kill Lucy after he is unmasked, but she gets the upper hand and kills him.
In the end, Lucy has to stay in 2003 after preventing Summer’s death, because there would be no reason for her parents to have her in the future. It’s definitely a happy ending, but it seems a little too convenient to me how quickly Lucy decides to give up her original life and ignores the complication that she has no real identity in 2003.
In “Totally Killer” there are actually two killers. The original one was a classmate of Pam’s who wanted revenge on her friends for bullying his girlfriend and causing her to drive drunk. The second killer who murders adult Pam is the host of a true-crime podcast looking for fresh material. He follows Jamie back in time to kill her and protect his secret, but she ends up killing him.
Jamie then travels back to the present, where her mom is now alive and there have been some changes in her life, most notably a new older brother named Jamie (her name is now Colette). This ending felt more satisfying to me because she had to experience the effects of time traveling when she returned to her original life.
I am not the only one who preferred “Totally Killer” as it scored 87% on Rotten Tomatoes to become “Certified Fresh” and 6.5/10 on IMDb while “Time Cut” only earned 28% on Rotten Tomatoes and 5/10 on IMDb.
