With the big screen adaptation of The Mortuary Assistant set to arrive in theaters next month, the first trailer is here to remind us all that sometimes works sucks, but all you can do is power through to the end of your shift and hope tomorrow is better.
The Mortuary Assistant was something of a surprise hit in 2022: A game that puts players in the shoes of a fresh-out-of-college apprentice mortician who’s called into work late one night to handle some unexpected embalmings. But this, it turns out, is not a normal day at the office. Your boss had the good sense to stay home, but you are not alone: Before long you’re not only preparing the deceased for their funerals, you’re also conducting occult rituals to ward off demonic forces. Talk about multi-tasking!
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I suppose it’s inevitable at this point, three years after the release of the game, but the trailer for the film adaptation of The Mortuary Assistant doesn’t land quite as well for me as the game did. The game, at least in the early going, is relatively subtle: Creepy as hell, yes, but things happen slowly at first, and the tension is elevated by the inherent unpleasantness (for me, anyway) of routine mortician work.
Luke Winkie wrote in his 2022 preview that “The Mortuary Assistant is pockmarked with whiplash-inducing scares, but I think the game shines the most with its genuinely uncompromising presentation of what morticians do on a day-to-day basis,” adding that the processes of draining blood, wiring jaws, and preserving eyeballs “is wondrously, euphorically disgusting.”
The trailer for the film, by comparison, seems like a much more conventional tale of demonic invasion, where the mortuary part is almost irrelevant: It provides a ready supply of stiffs to grotesquely reanimate for various jump-scare shocks, but you’re not going to enjoy the pleasures of, say, hammering on someone’s gumline to ensure their mouth doesn’t suddenly pop open while mourners are bidding tearful farewells.
That lack of interactivity is part and parcel with movies, but the trailer lays it all out in a way the game doesn’t: There’s an “entity,” it has to be banished back to hell, it probably not going to be a very pleasant process, and you get the gig. Lots of yelling and screaming, too.
Here’s the game trailer from 2022, which I really do think strikes a different, more interesting sort of tone:
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Being different, to be clear, doesn’t mean I think it’s going to be bad, and I hope The Mortuary Assistant: The Film is as well-received as The Mortuary Assistant: The Game. You’ll have to let me know about that, though, I don’t do horror movies.
The Mortuary Assistant is set to debut in theaters on February 13. If you haven’t yet given the game a shot, you can pick it up from Steam or the Epic Games Store—and if you’re curious but not convinced, Steam also offers a free demo.
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