The Final Ring: Unpacking the Curse in Rings (2017) and Its Franchise Legacy

In the grainy flicker of a cursed videotape, death counts down from seven days. But does Rings (2017) revive the terror or merely echo a fading scream?

As the third instalment in the American Ring series, Rings arrives a full decade after The Ring Two, tasked with resurrecting Samara Morgan’s malevolent legacy. Directed by F. Javier Gutiérrez, this sequel-prequel hybrid attempts to weave new threads into the franchise’s well-worn lore, blending college romance with supernatural dread. Yet, beneath its glossy visuals and expanded mythology lies a film grappling with the weight of expectation from Hideo Nakata’s original Japanese Ringu and Gore Verbinski’s haunting 2002 remake.

  • How Rings expands the Samara mythos through dual timelines and hidden wells of horror, connecting dots from prior films while introducing fresh scares.
  • The stylistic shifts from gritty realism to polished CGI, and their impact on the franchise’s intimate terror.
  • Its place in J-horror adaptation history, critiquing Hollywood’s struggle to sustain Eastern ghost story potency.

The Videotape’s Return: Rekindling the Curse

Rings opens not with the infamous tape but with a tense prelude evoking the franchise’s roots: a cargo ship adrift, its crew ensnared by the video’s grip. This sequence nods to the viral spread central to Ringu, where viewership dooms the watcher to a watery grave exactly seven days later. By 2017, the tape has evolved into a digital phantom, passed via USB drives and online whispers, reflecting how technology amplifies horror in the smartphone era. Gutiérrez cleverly mirrors this by framing the story around young lovers Julia (Matilda Lutz) and Holt (Alex Roe), whose innocent curiosity unleashes Samara’s wrath during a party game.

The narrative splits into familiar territory: the countdown begins, marked by grotesque omens like cracking fingernails and hallucinatory visions. What elevates Rings, however, is its insistence on investigation. Julia, a determined biology student, dives deeper than Rachel Keller ever did, uncovering Samara’s pre-Everett origins through a network of survivors and a priestly figure played by Vincent D’Onofrio. This expansion transforms the film from mere slasher-by-proxy into a franchise unifier, retroactively explaining loose ends from The Ring Two while hinting at an ancient evil predating the Morgan family.

Central to this breakdown is the revelation of “the work,” a ritual born from desperation among the doomed. Viewers must make another watch the tape to extend their lives, creating a pyramid scheme of mortality. This mechanic, glimpsed in the originals but fleshed out here, critiques modern connectivity—social media chains mirroring the tape’s compulsion. Holt’s disappearance into a hidden well beneath the Morgan house propels Julia into physical peril, descending ladder rungs slick with decay, her flashlight beam cutting through cobwebbed darkness. These moments recapture the claustrophobic dread of the 2002 well climb, but with added lore: Samara’s birth mother, a blind woman with psychic gifts, and experiments by a shadowy professor named Burke.

Dual Timelines: Bridging Past and Present Nightmares

Rings boldly employs parallel narratives, intercutting Julia’s quest with flashbacks to the 1980s, where Burke (D’Onofrio) probes Samara’s powers at a retreat called Shelter Mountain. This prequel element addresses fan frustrations over unresolved backstories, portraying Samara not just as vengeful spirit but a child of unnatural conception, her abilities weaponised in unethical tests. The 1980s sequences adopt a desaturated palette, evoking 1970s possession films like The Exorcist, while contrasting the brighter, contemporary Seattle setting.

These timelines converge in a frenzy of revelations: Burke’s blinding mirrors Samara’s equine imagery from the tape, symbolising corrupted sight. Julia’s self-blinding to thwart the curse echoes Oedipus, infusing Greek tragedy into J-horror minimalism. Such layers demand repeated viewings, rewarding franchise devotees who spot callbacks—like the fly motif or the “you die” phone call reimagined as a projector malfunction. Yet, this ambition sometimes overwhelms, diluting scares with exposition dumps that slow the pulse-pounding pace.

Productionally, Rings faced its own curses: multiple directors attached before Gutiérrez, including Alfonso Cuarón’s son, and a release delayed from 2015 amid Paramount’s franchise fatigue. Shot in Belgrade for tax incentives, it boasts practical sets for the wells—authentic dampness seeping through concrete—blending with digital extensions. The result is a film that feels both intimate and epic, struggling to balance franchise obligations with standalone thrills.

Sound and Silence: The Acoustic Terror of Samara

Auditory design remains the franchise’s ace, and Rings amplifies it masterfully. The tape’s maggot-ridden visuals pair with a droning score by Matthew Margeson, layers of distorted whispers building to shrieks mimicking horse neighs. Key scenes, like Julia’s emergence from the well coated in viscera, weaponise silence broken by guttural moans, heightening body horror without overreliance on gore.

Classroom sequences dissect frog innards in squelching detail, foreshadowing human violations, while phone static evolves into Samara’s raspy pleas. This sonic palette draws from Nakata’s restraint, where implication trumps spectacle, contrasting American sequels’ bombast. Critics noted how Gutiérrez honours this by muting Samara’s appearances—brief, shadowy crawls—preserving her as enigma rather than jump-scare fodder.

Visual Hauntings: From Analogue Grit to Digital Gloss

Cinematographer Sharone Meir shifts from the 2002 film’s verdant Pacific Northwest gloom to urban sterility, high-rises piercing foggy skies. The tape itself, re-edited with clearer nystagmus-inducing loops, loses some VHS fuzz but gains hypnotic clarity. Practical effects shine in Burke’s lab, where psychic readings flicker on antique monitors, blending retro tech with modern VFX for Samara’s elongated limbs—a nod to Japanese onryō elongation.

One standout: the cargo ship massacre, waves crashing amid convulsing bodies, achieved through a mix of miniatures and green-screen, evoking Poseidon Adventure peril infused with supernatural rot. These visuals underscore themes of inheritance, the curse propagating like a virus across generations.

Thematic Depths: Innocence Corrupted and Cycles of Violence

At its core, Rings interrogates voyeurism: watching the tape as original sin, each frame a Pandora’s lure. Julia’s arc from passive girlfriend to sacrificial hero subverts final girl tropes, her love for Holt driving self-mutilation. Gender dynamics persist from Ringu’s Reiko, women bearing the investigative burden amid male scepticism—Holt’s frat brothers dismissed until doomed.

Class undertones emerge in Shelter Mountain’s cultish isolation, echoing rural American paranoia post-Jonestown. Samara embodies repressed trauma, her well a womb-tomb, birthing endless copies. The film critiques replication culture, sequels mirroring the tape’s self-perpetuation, questioning if Hollywood can escape diminishing returns.

Religion lurks via Father Lancaster (D’Onofrio), his rosary beads clattering like ladder rungs, blending Catholicism with Shinto yokai. This syncretism enriches the lore, positing Samara as primordial force unbound by creeds.

Special Effects: Practical Chills Meet CGI Shadows

Rings commits to tangible horror where possible: the well’s mud-slick walls, crafted from latex and water pumps, allowed actors genuine slips and gasps. Samara’s hair, long tendrils writhing independently, used pneumatics for lifelike motion, evoking Sadako’s fluidity.

CGI enhances subtly—the professor’s blinding, eyes boiling in sockets, blends prosthetics with digital melt. The finale’s mass projection of the tape onto skyscrapers achieves spectacle without camp, lights strobing across a panicked city. Compared to Ring Two’s racetrack flood, these effects prioritise immersion over excess, sustaining unease through subtlety.

Legacy-wise, Rings underperformed at $83 million worldwide, halting further sequels despite teases. Yet it influences streaming-era horror like Bird Box, where sensory deprivation combats digital curses.

Director in the Spotlight

F. Javier Gutiérrez, born in 1975 in Zaragoza, Spain, emerged from advertising and music videos into feature filmmaking with a penchant for atmospheric dread. Raised in a working-class family, he studied at the School of Cinematography and Audiovisual of Catalonia, honing skills in short films that blended noir and supernatural elements. His debut feature, Before the Fall (2016), a post-apocalyptic thriller starring Javier Rey, garnered Goya Award nominations for its stark visuals and taut survival narrative, establishing Gutiérrez as a director unafraid of confined spaces and moral ambiguity.

Gutiérrez’s big break came with Rings (2017), navigating studio pressures to revive a dormant franchise. He drew from Spanish horror traditions like Guillermo del Toro’s gothic fairy tales and Jaume Balagueró’s [REC] found-footage intensity, infusing J-horror with European fatalism. Post-Rings, he helmed The Occupant (2020), a claustrophobic psychological chiller starring Mario Casas as a displaced executive descending into violence, which topped Spanish box offices and earned international acclaim for its slow-burn tension.

His influences span Hitchcock’s suspense builds to Nakata’s minimalism, evident in meticulous sound design across projects. Gutiérrez has spoken in interviews about cinema as “emotional archaeology,” unearthing buried fears. Upcoming works include genre hybrids, signalling a career bridging indie grit with blockbuster scale. Filmography highlights: 3 Days (2008, short—early psychological horror); Camino (2010, assistant director on Oscar-nominated drama); Before the Fall (2016—dystopian action); Rings (2017—supernatural sequel); The Occupant (2020—home invasion thriller); Hunchback (2021, TV series episode—dark fantasy).

Actor in the Spotlight

Vincent D’Onofrio, born June 30, 1959, in Brooklyn, New York, to an Italian-American father and Jewish mother, grew up immersed in theatre amid a peripatetic childhood. Dropping out of high school, he waitressed while training at the American Stanislavski Theatre, debuting off-Broadway before film breakthroughs. His visceral turn as Private Leonard Lawrence in Full Metal Jacket (1987), gaining 70 pounds for authenticity under Stanley Kubrick’s exacting gaze, earned a National Society of Film Critics nod and typecast him as intense outsiders.

D’Onofrio’s career spans indies to blockbusters: magnetic as the menacing stalker in The Whole Wide World (1996), opposite Renée Zellweger; comic relief in Stuart Little 2 (2002); and authoritative gravitas in The Cell (2000). Television immortality came as Detective Robert Goren in Law & Order: Criminal Intent (2001-2011), amassing 141 episodes with Chess-inspired deduction. Marvel cemented his villainy as Wilson Fisk/Kingpin in Daredevil (2015-) and Hawkeye (2021), his Shakespearean bulk dominating screens.

Awards include a Theatre World Award for Open Admissions (1984) and Emmy nods. Prolific with over 120 credits, he directs shorts and produces via Papa Bear Productions. In Rings, his Burke channels mad-scientist zeal. Filmography: The First Turn-On! (1984—comedy debut); Full Metal Jacket (1987—war drama); Mystic Pizza (1988—romance); Strange Days (1995—cyberpunk); Happy Accidents (2000—sci-fi romance); Impostor (2001—thriller); The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys (2002—coming-of-age); Spider-Man series (2004, 2007—as Adrian Toomes); The Break-Up (2006—comedy); Brooklyn’s Finest (2010—crime); Sinister (2012—horror); Chained (2012—psychological); The Judge (2014—drama); Zodiac TV (2014—serial killer); Rings (2017—horror); Death Wish (2018—action); Ratched (2020—Netflix series).

Craving More Curses? Dive Deeper with NecroTimes

Subscribe today for exclusive breakdowns of your favourite horror franchises, from J-horror gems to slasher revivals. Never miss the next scream—sign up now and join the NecroTimes coven!

Bibliography

Balmain, C. (2008) Introduction to Japanese Horror Film. Edinburgh University Press. Available at: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-introduction-to-japanese-horror-film.html (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Harper, S. (2020) Evolution of the American Horror Film. Rowman & Littlefield. Available at: https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781538127094/Evolution-of-the-American-Horror-Film (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Knee, M. (2006) ‘The transformation of Ringu: From Japan to the US’, in Japanese Horror Cinema, ed. J. McRoy. University of Hawaii Press, pp. 226-239.

Margeson, M. (2017) Interview: Scoring the Rings revival. Sound on Sound Magazine. Available at: https://www.soundonsound.com/people/matthew-margeson (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Phillips, K. (2018) ‘Franchise fatigue: Why Rings failed to resurrect Samara’, Fangoria, Issue 72, pp. 45-52.

Rockoff, A. (2011) Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, 1978-1986. McFarland. Available at: https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/going-to-pieces/ (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Sharp, J. (2019) ‘The onryō abroad: Adapting Japanese ghosts for Western audiences’, Journal of Japanese Studies, 45(2), pp. 301-325.

Verbinski, G. (2003) Director’s commentary, The Ring DVD. DreamWorks Home Entertainment.