The first sequel to Poltergeist did quite well, easily enough for the powers that be to want to make another film, but most of the cast had had enough. But when did a little thing like 80 percent of the cast refusing to return stop a studio from trying to cash in yet again on a successful franchise?  They talked 12-year-old Heather O’Rourke into coming back as Carol Ann and sent her character off to live with some relatives in New York City. Naturally, the ghosts follow her.  It’s actually not half bad, all things considered.

Carol Ann was sent to New York to attend a special school for kids who are both gifted and have emotional problems.  She lives with her Aunt Patricia (Nancy Allen), her Uncle Bruce (Tom Skerritt), and their daughter Donna (Laura Flynn Boyle).  Bruce is in charge of a fancy, new, very modern skyscraper, which they all live in.

Carol Ann is having a pretty rough time at it. Patricia is annoyed at her existence, and didn’t really want to take her in. Bruce is more sympathetic, but he’s very busy running the place and doesn’t have nice things to say about the rest of her family (he thinks they dumped her on them because of some bad real estate deals Carol Ann’s daddy got into, and doesn’t believe any of the haunting nonsense). Donna is very nice, but she’s also a teenager more interested in partying with her friends and dreaming about boys than dealing with a young girl’s problems.  The dude that runs the school is a jerk, thinks Carol Ann made up all the paranormal stuff from her life, and is faking her newfound psychic abilities. 

So yeah, her time in New York has been tough, and now the ghosts are coming back, especially the specter of Kane, who now is fully a ghost and can’t take on a physical form like he could in the last movie. He’s after Carol Ann because she can lead him to the next life or something.

Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein) comes back too, mostly to explain to the family that the ghosts are real and Carol Ann’s powers are true.  Most of the story is utter nonsense, but the skyrise is a nice setting for this sort of thing. Most of it seems to be made of mirrors, and the ghosts now live inside mirrors, so there is a lot of fun with reflections and the like. I’m honestly not sure how the special effects team pulled some of the visuals off. 

It isn’t a very good movie by any means, but I liked it more then the second one. The mirror work really is quite fun, and they also do some cool stuff with puddles of water.