Mill Creek’s new The Skulls Trilogy release brings all three of The Skulls films together on Blu-ray for the first time, including the original 2000 movie that started it all, as well as the two direct-to-video follow-ups.

As the opening scrawl on each of the film’s states, “Every year at certain Ivy League colleges, an elite group of students is chosen to join Secret Societies. Unlike fraternities, these Societies can conceal their actions as they mold the leaders of the future. At least four U.S. Presidents are known to have been members. The most powerful Secret Society has always been… The Skulls”

The three films all follow a similar formula. A seemingly honest and moral student has just been accepted into The Order, but when they uncover or witness something horrible and want to expose the organization or one of its members, The Skulls use their power and influence to turn the student’s family/friends against them, make them look guilty of some crime, sending them on the run and turning their life into a living hell, unless they relent and agree to fall in line.

Here’s a brief rundown of the three films:

• The Skulls (2000)

  Luke McNamara (Joshua Jackson, Dawson’s Creek, Fringe) is a working-class townie who turned around his misspent youth and got accepted to Yale. He rides a bike instead of a fancy car, and has many part time jobs in order to pay for his tuition and books and put money aside for law school. He is a strong student, and a member of the rowing team, and hopes to be tapped by The Skulls so he’ll never have to worry about money again. It would also help him feel like he’s in the same league as his friend/crush Chloe (Leslie Bibb, American Housewife, Popular). But when he is invited to join The Skulls, his best friend/roommate Will (Hill Harper, The Good Doctor) gets upset, and sets out to prove that the organization is up to no good. Meanwhile, as part of the organization’s two-week “revealing process”, Luke is paired with Skulls “soulmate” Caleb Mandrake (Paul Walker, The Fast and the Furious), a spoiled rich kid/legacy, whose father, Judge Litten Mandrake (Craig T. Nelson, Coach, Parenthood), is the current Chairman of The Skulls. Soon a student ends up dead, and the judge attempts to cover up his son’s involvement. Luke tries to reveal the truth, only to feel the full wrath of The Skulls, who make him look guilty and force him on the run. Now Luke must find a way to clear himself and take down the powerful, corrupt leaders of the organization.
  The cast also includes William Petersen (CSI), Christopher McDonald (Happy Gilmore), and Steve Harris (The Practice).

• The Skulls II (2002)

  Ryan Sommers (Robin Dunne, Sanctuary) is one of the newest students tapped to join The Skulls, along with his friend/lacrosse teammate Jeff (Christopher Ralph, Animorphs). He doesn’t really care about the money or the power that comes with membership—in fact he’s annoyed by how much time the initiation process is taking him away from his girlfriend, Ali (Ashley Lyn Cafagna, Saved by the Bell: The New Class)—but his brother Greg (James Gallanders) is a legacy, and he thought joining would be good for him. However, during initiation, Ryan witnesses older member Hutch (Aaron Ashmore, Locke & Key, Killjoys, Warehouse 13) push a girl off the roof. But when he tries to raise his suspicions to those in charge and to the police, he soon learns the massive reach of The Skulls, and the extent that The Order will go to in order to protect its secrets. The organization turns his girlfriend and others against him, and threatens him with trumped up false charges unless he drops the investigation. Ryan finds himself on the run, with his life in danger.
  The cast also includes Lindy Booth (The Librarians), Nathan West, Stephen Young, and Andrew Gillies (12 Monkeys, Orphan Black).

• The Skulls III (2004)

  For the past four years, Taylor Brooks (Clare Kramer, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) has been having the same nightmare involving her brother Sam, who was supposed to be a member of The Skulls, but died during the initiation process. Her father was also a Skull, and she wants to impress impress him, and get him to see her the way he saw her brother. She hopes that if she can become the first female member of The Skulls, he will see her as more than his fragile daughter, and finally get over her brother’s death. Taylor is an excellent swimmer and student, and there’s only reason she wouldn’t be tapped—that she’s not a guy. So she utilizes a University loophole against the organization in order to get accepted, but in the process she ruffles quite a few feathers, including the organization’s current chairman Nathan Lloyd (Barry Bostwick, The Rocky Horror Picture Show), his legacy son Roger (Bryce Johnson, Pretty Little Liars, Popular), and her boyfriend Ethan (Shaun Sipos, Krypton), who had been promised her spot. Despite her proving herself over and over again to her pledge class, the only person who’s welcoming to Taylor is her assigned “soulmate” Brian (Steve Braun). However, things take a turn for the worse when a student winds up dead, and all of the evidence seems to point to Taylor. Detectives Staynor (Dean McDermott, Pretty Hard Cases) and Valdez (Maria del Mar) want answers, but Taylor can’t even remember what happened the night of the murder. Now Taylor must uncover evidence of the real killer and prove her innocence, but the organization has a powerful reach and will make sure that doesn’t happen.

I had really enjoyed the original Skulls movie when it was released, but there was definitely a feeling of diminishing returns when binging all three of these films back-to-back. The original The Skulls is by far the best, offering an original story at the the time, and featuring a very recognizable cast. The film does a nice job of building the suspense and tension, with Luke being trapped in a increasingly dangerous and seemingly hopeless situation. And the story takes some unexpected twists and turns. My main problem with the first film is that the ending felt a little rushed and a bit of a cop out. That said I still enjoyed this film overall and thought it did a nice job of setting up a potential franchise. However, the other two films feel like the exact same formula over and over again, with fewer recognizable actors each time. It gets to the point where you start checking off the plot points in your mind as you watch… the tapping of the sporty/smart underdog…check, the assignment of the soulmate…check, the revealing…check, the murder…check, ruin new recruit’s life…check, the resolution…check.

I think the franchise could have been better has they mixed things up and done different secret societies rather than them all being The Skulls, and taking place at Yale. It feels a bit odd that with only 2 years between each film, that there is no character crossover—these students are attending a four-year college, so there should still be some familiar faces in the Secret Society, whether that be students or those in charge, and stories of what happened should still be fresh. But each film seems to reset, with all new students, a new Skulls chairman, and new murder to cover up. The second film does offer a small connection to the first movie, briefly tying the victim from the first film into the storyline. The Skulls II also has a little fun with audience expectations, humorously playing off some of the more iconic scenes from the first movie. However, the third movie provides no connection to the other two—perhaps they could have made Taylor related to one of the previous victims instead. While all three films follow the same general formula, the third film changes things up slightly, adding in a framing device. The film starts in the present with the two detectives interrogating Taylor about the murder, and the film flips between the present and the past she is recounting the events to the cops.

Fans of the films will appreciate that all three are finally available on Blu-ray. The Skulls is the only one of the films that had previously been released on Blu-ray by Universal, which had included a 14-minute behind-the-scenes featurette, 12 minutes of deleted scenes, and a director’s commentary. Unfortunately, Mill Creek’s new trilogy release places all three films on a single disc, which doesn’t really leave any room for bonus features, so none of that material has been ported over to this disc. The other two films have never had any bonus material on previous DVD releases, so there is no loss there.

The Blu-ray disc comes packed in a standard Blu-ray keepcase, without a slipcover. The static main menu offers an option to enable/disable subtitles, and a list to select which of the three films to watch. With all three films squeezed onto a single disc, one might wonder if the picture quality suffers. For the most part I thought the picture looked pretty solid, with a generally clean picture that gave a nice level of detail throughout. There were just a few moments where it looked slightly over-compressed, such as the opening shot of the regatta in the first film, and the opening shots of the third film, which came off a bit hazy and dark. But I never really found it distracting, or found that it took away from my enjoyment of the film. The audio on all three films is quite good, making effective use of the stereo and surround sound to provide a more immersive viewing experience. This is especially noticeable when characters are creeping around on stormy nights, etc.

What’s Included:

Films:

• The Skulls (1:46:34)
• The Skulls II (1:39:21)
• The Skulls III (1:41:58)
• 1080p / Widescreen 1.85:1
• Audio: English 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio
• Subtitles: English SDH

Extras:

No bonus material is included on this disc.

Final Thoughts:

The first The Skulls movie was original, had an engaging story, and a highly-recognizable cast, but the two direct-to-video follow-ups kind of feel like re-retreads of the same thing. Mill Creek’s new trilogy release drops all of the bonus material that was included on Universal’s previous home video releases of the first film, but does offer the two follow-up films on disc in HD for the first time, and at a significantly lower price than the previous Blu-ray. It’s definitely worth a look for fans who don’t already own these films on disc, or are interested in a slight picture upgrade to the previous DVDs of the two direct-to-video films.