From over the top, cheesy situations to horrifying demons, Annabelle: Creation possesses the power to make audiences scream out of both terror and discomfort. The visual of a little orphan girl transforming into an 8-foot demon right before your eyes combined with a few popping and locking noises is enough to creep a person out. Not only this, but the tension throughout the movie is overwhelmingly exciting. So, would I recommend you watch it? Yes. Would I recommend you watch it at night? No. That’s a bit too spooky.

The movie’s opening scene is similar to that of Coraline, or any other movie that claims to be dark and mind-boggling. It’s that classic doll-making intro topped with close ups of stitching, sewing, and random doll parts that will win you over. Not such a unique way to set the twisted tone for the rest of the movie.

The story goes like this: A group of orphans need a new place to stay with their nun caretaker, so naturally they trust a random old man (who lives in the middle of nowhere) and his wife (who they never saw until the end when the plot was unravelling and also happens to be missing an eye due to paranormal happenings). The overly-curious orphan with polio, Janice (Talitha Bateman), is the one who gets possessed by the entity in Annabelle’s old doll. Oh, and (spoiler) Annabelle passed away.

A demon proposes that it, posing as the couple’s beloved Annabelle, goes into the doll’s body in order to communicate with the humans. The parents, of course, give it permission. The rest of the movie is dedicated to running away from the demon, except for the last 10 minutes, when they finally find the solution to the problem. The solution is so simple, it is aggravating. However, the process to get there is very intense and intriguing.

Quick shots of the demon’s appearance proves to be cheesy as well.

The line between actually scary or over-the-top is blurry, however. When the ghost of Annabelle says that she needs Janice’s help. Janice asks what she needs, and Annabelle turns and answers in a stereotypical deep demon voice: “Your soul!” A bit too predictable. In addition, some scenes looked too staged, as if they were rehearsed until the actors were numb and almost sick of performing it. This dulled down the scare factor quite a bit, and made it difficult to connect to the actors’ emotion. These scenes were about as scary as your next door neighbor’s last minute haunted house which he put together with tarp and plastic battery operated rats.

Annabelle: Creation had its highs and lows. While some scenes had me jumping out of my seat, others had me giggling a bit because of how cheesy and corny it seemed. But, you’re into horror movies, this one is still worth your time.