Metacritic reviews

Hardcore horror audiences won’t find much that’s frightening in Insidious: The Last Key — there’s not even that wonderfully unsettling shriek of violins under the title this time — but as a delivery system for more great work from Lin Shaye, it more than accomplishes its mission.

Insidious: The Last Key may be somewhat engaging but it’s also sloppy and doesn’t amount to much.

A workmanlike but fan-pleasing picture.

Hard-core fans get the loud noises they came for, but true fear vaporizes.

The fourth installment of the Insidious series has deft scares and some nifty twists, all of which don’t entirely distract from how strangely inconsequential The Last Key ultimately feels.

With Shaye’s performance as its anchor, the movie is often a perceptive character study, at least until it’s hijacked by the same bland trickery that so often fogs up horror movies with more to offer.

Despite the indomitable Shaye’s best efforts, however, new director Adam Robitel is rarely successful in shaking the cobwebs off this increasingly creaky franchise: The Last Key is wildly uneven, confused and confusing, and it appears to leave the “Insidious” saga written into a corner yet again.

Robitel and Whannel are still too bound to the franchise here to make something truly original, but The Last Key will make you grip your armrest, squint your eyes, and prepare for the worst. Sometimes, that’s enough.

Though not a terrible film, Insidious: The Last Key fails to live up to the franchise's high standards.

The fourth film in the Insidious franchise, directed by Adam Robitel, is lazy and sometimes even loathsome.