The third installment is an origin tale of how the paranormal activity came about and in my honest opinion, does a very terrible job of building up the suspense. The opening scene shows us Katie, Kristi and her husband Daniel in the basement going through some boxes full of old pictures and clothes. While sifting through the boxes, they come upon some old VHS tapes. These tapes turn out to be old footage of Katie during her birthday party in 1989. Not sure what the significance is, maybe I missed it. Anyways, these old VHS tapes take us back to when Dennis, Katie and Kristi’s stepfather, and Julie first move into their new home. After a couple days, the thing that brought us to watch this movie starts to happen. Now this was my first viewing of a Paranormal Activity movie in theaters, so I was excited/nervous about the reaction I was going to let go. There’s something about being freaked out with an audience that just makes it much more memorable. The cheap thrills were there, along with the truly shocking images that were not shown in the trailer, which is very satisfying to me personally.

Kristi befriends an invisible friend that no one can see but her and with the recent awkward situations, Dennis sets up his VHS recording cameras to capture whatever might be going on. Dennis has a friend/coworker that helps him named Randy. Randy is a young guy who just so happens to mention the “Bloody Mary” dare that is overheard by Katie. So, one night while taking care of Katie, Dennis is coaxed into performing the dare. Bad move.

If you are looking for more of the same from the first two movies you won’t be disappointed. New directors Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost from Catfish fame, do a
respectable job. However, fans looking for a shocking conclusion may be disappointed with the reveal. I would not be surprised to see this series push out more movies every Halloween. Go see it and have some fun getting scared.