Arriving at the tail end of 2018, Suzanne Bier’s Bird Box was a harrowingly bleak slice of apocalyptic horror built around a deceptively simple premise: ‘don’t look’. It was the film’s acute misfortune, however, to arrive but a few short months after A Quiet Place so skilfully extrapolated its own genius proposition: ‘don’t make a sound’. But despite failing to fully bloom in John Krasinski’s shadow, Bird Box was an unqualified hit for Netflix, hailed as their most-watched original film until Red Notice usurped the title three years later. Given that, it’s somewhat baffling that it’s taken the streaming giant this long to capitalise on the film’s success — doubly so the method with which they’ve finally chosen to do so.
Josh Malerman’s original novel, upon which the first film was based, spawned a sequel, Malorie in 2020, which continued the story of the title character, played on screen by Sandra Bullock. Whether due to a lack of access to their star or some marketing exec’s bonkers take on global strategy, Netflix has side-stepped the sequel entirely, opting instead for a Spanish-language spin-off hailed as the first instalment in a regional franchise that will span different locales around the globe.
The fractionally expanded mythology only serves to demystify the threat.
Thus we find ourselves repeating many of the first film’s beats, only substituting LA and wider California for the Catalan capital. Also resurrecting the dual timeline format, the film follows Sebastien and Anna as they meet up with a wary group of survivors living in an abandoned bomb shelter and attempt to traverse the city, seeking shelter behind the gift shops and 17th century fortifications of Montjuic Castle. Then, flashing back to the creatures’ first arrival, we witness the traumatic events that brought them there in the first place.
Written and directed by David and Àlex Pastor (also responsible for the similarly Barcelona-set ‘don’t go outside’ apocalypse yarn The Last Days), Bird Box Barcelona uses its distinctive setting as ably as it can for a film that, by definition, has to take place largely behind closed doors and shuttered windows. While it possesses all the component parts of its predecessor, the spin-off packs little of its punch. Scenes of vision-inflicted suicide remain squirmingly unpleasant but, accustomed as we’ve become, none hit with the same force as Sarah Paulson’s shocking departure in the first film. Meanwhile, the (fractionally) expanded mythology only serves to demystify the threat, all the while asking questions better left unanswered (are they aliens? Angels? Or something in between?).
If there’s a saving grace to Barcelona, it’s Sebastien himself: a man haunted by demons both without and within, who makes for an unconventional protagonist, providing an unexpected perspective on the unspooling apocalyptic drama. But even seen though fresh eyes, Bird Box Barcelona feels an inessential watch, and certainly not a worthy franchise launchpad for Netflix’s ill-advised BBCU.