When does a horror series stop being a mere “franchise” and start becoming something more—something archetypal or, to fans of the genre, even iconic? For those who care about such matters, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006) offers a neat object lesson in the pitfalls of self-consciously pursing this goal.

Despite its occasionally successful sequences and its fleeting moments of intelligence, TCM: The Beginning is the kind of movie that’s more fun to think about than to actually watch. Yes, the story works hard to provide missing exposition. And yes, we’re carefully given several continuity connections to the later chapters of this would-be saga. But in terms of sheer horror and terror—the two main deliverables of its genre—the movie falls pretty flat. The funny thing is, one can’t much fault those who are responsible; their heads just seem to be elsewhere. The end result is a work that’s less a prequel or sequel than a full-blown remake of a remake, so closely does the film mirror the themes, style, and narrative structure of the 2003 The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (which was produced by the same team). In fact, it’s so single-minded and inexplicable in its derivativeness that for the audience it’s like watching a movie made by folks who forgot that they’d already made it once.

Although of course a certain dose of repetition is necessary to bestow franchise status, sometimes one ounce too much of the same old, same old, and you’re in the land of smug self-parody and pandering to the lowest level of expectations. Over the last quarter century, the American horror film has shown this tendency again and again, taking ideas of varying degrees of originality (the Freddy and Jason cycles, Scream) and driving them mercilessly into the pavement. One wouldn’t have thought that Chainsaw would have reached this point so quickly, especially as the story thus far certainly seemed ripe for a prequel. (Notwithstanding, of course, that the power of the original 1974 Tobe Hooper film is largely due to the total absence of backstory:  the point-of-view is so subjectively that of the victims that the audience experiences the story as a series of jack-in-the-box-style shocks that just don’t let up.)

So what do we get in terms of a compelling prelude to the ‘70s-era story elements with which we’re already familiar? An opening scene set in 1939 that lacks freshness on every level (are we surprised that Leatherface was hardly a Gerber Baby?) and a half-hearted bit of social/historical context to explain how the Hewlitt clan found itself so down and out thirty years later (you mean you aren’t familiar with the Great Texas Beef Drought of the late ‘60s?). The only other items that make the film deserving of the name prequel revolve around the isolated and cannibalistic Hewlitt clan making a kind of dry run for later mayhem. Basically, we’re witness to the various family members striving to get the logistical and moral kinks out of what will become a more turnkey operation down the road. While this kind of deconstructing-the-myth approach works to great effect in a movie like Batman Begins (2005), it is perhaps trickier and more prone to unintentional comedy in horror. Maybe that’s why there’s never been a Dracula prequel, for instance, that shows him trying on different capes or mail-ordering coffins until he finally settles on ones to his liking.

In terms of plot, TCM: The Beginning draws on the 2003 film in a way that is almost schematic. Both movies feature a carload of white twenty-somethings accosted by a gun-toting female; later these same characters are forced to drive around with a dead passenger á la Pulp Fiction; both films feature nearly identical scenes of a “sheriff” being nasty to these poor kids, and picking on one male character in particular; and in both films this somewhat wimpy character has a moment of redemption in the next act—one that is dramatized in the same way and ends with the same outcome.

And did I mention that the exact same fate befalls the dark, good-looking male romantic lead in both films? I apologize if providing this information constitutes an unexpected spoiler for you, but I guess I’m wondering if the entire earlier movie itself is a spoiler since it gives away huge chunks of the more recent film’s plot?

Besides a regurgitated storyline, the audience must suffer through the same visual motifs, color schemes, and production designs as in the earlier work. Admirers of this film could argue that such consistency can hardly be attributed to laziness or a lack of creativity. Rather, it represents an intentional effort to establish certain tropes for this series, ones that will come to be considered “classic” over time. However, it’s the foregrounding of this very intentionally that gives the film its contrived and decidedly un-classic feel. Had the script not been saddled with so many thriller cliches, often diverting but ultimately disastrous ventures into black comedy, and dialogue full of groaners (“You guys have been exchanging odd glances the whole trip”), maybe this wouldn’t be the case. If the happenings on screen had simply been more involving, it wouldn’t be so easy for viewers to notice the constantly looming shadow of the filmmakers hovering above the proceedings, kind of like a boom mike that keeps creeping into a shot.

There are some bright spots. In particular, R. Lee Ermey’s performance livens things up—but his grandstanding is a short-term pleasure that both throws off the tone of the film and hastens its descent into the kind of dumb, self-referential horror-comedy that relies on one-liners to hold audience interest rather than genuine thrills or shocks. I also enjoyed director Liebesman’s visual foreshadowing: just before the bloodletting begins, we see one of the main characters bisected again and again by compositional elements—mirrors, a car antenna, and so on. Later on, in terms of pure mise en scène, an interlude in which two older women enjoy social niceties while a younger woman lies bound to the table beneath them achieves an effectively understated Hansel-and-Gretel mood. What’s frustrating is that these high points have an overly opportunistic feel to them:  when good ideas do surface they are rarely followed up on.

Similarly, the film hints at several promising subtexts that are never fully developed—the meaning of “ugliness,” what constitutes an American family, the subversive juxtaposition of cannibalism and Christianity in scenes that evoke both the Last Supper and the rite of Communion that stems from it. Left out to dry, however, these themes come across as glib and facile more than anything else. One senses that these occurred as “interesting” ideas, but were deemed not worthy of exploring with any deep feeling.

After all, the filmmakers are too busy edifying their material. One example is how they try to lend the Hewlitt family home—as it rises dramatically from the flatlands—the same kind of stature and visual impact as, say the Bates motel/home complex in the numerous Psycho sequels. Far less subtly, the movie seeks to enshrine Tommy Hewlitt’s chainsaw itself an emblem of horror. When he first eyes the tool as his weapon of choice, the moment is celebrated by the lighting, center-composition and cresting musical score with as much aplomb as if he had just discovered the Holy Grail. (It’s as though the film wants to remind audiences that, despite the ongoing competition from a similarly named series, this is the original “saw.”) Elsewhere, as when Leatherface lumbers anti-hero-like down a lonely Texas road, the chainsaw comes more to resemble a rural-gothic Excalibur. It’s hard to know how to react to this sense of overblown self-importance that permeates the whole of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning. Recalling how Leatherface shambled about at the end of the movie, framed by an unnecessary and pompous voice-over, it’s too tempting not to sum up his unsuccessful ascent to the level of America’s Frankenstein monster with the words, “He came, he sawed, he failed to conquer.”