Messengers 2: The Scarecrow is a 2009 American horror film and serves as the prequel to the film The Messengers. John Rollins is a farmer and is struggling to keep it together with the looming drought and crows damaging his corn crops while a financial adviser, Chapman, hounds him to sell his farm. After a surprise visit from his neighbour Jude Weatherby, John erects the old scarecrow he found in the barn and suddenly his luck begins to change; the crows die, his irrigation system fixes itself, the financial adviser is struck by a truck and killed and his crops become strong and healthy.
However he's steadily convinced of unnatural events, made all the more apparent when his son pleads with him to destroy the scarecrow. Things worsen when a family friend is killed and his wife thinks he committed the deed.
Examples of tropes within this work are:
- Asshole Victim: The death of the financial adviser. He's a lot less sympathetic when you hear the conversation before he is run over; he's basically bragging about how easy it'll be to force John to sell the farm and he's putting up 'Foreclosure' signs despite the farm not actually being foreclosed. He was just trying to force John into selling. Then he's spooked in the cornfield and subsequently run over.
- Creepy Child: The children running around the corn field. They tend to giggle a lot while being covered in dirt and occasionally bleeding from the mouth. : Also the creepy little girl at the end who drags the remains of the scarecrow back into the room where it was first found.
- Dead All Along: Jude and his wife, Miranda.
- Double Standard Rape: Female on Male: Miranda drugs John when he visits her and rapes him after he hits his head. However this is moreso treated as an 'affair', which is further shown as Mary later accuses John of cheating on her.
- Fanservice: Basically when Miranda starts stripping randomly in the middle of the road and fondling herself.
- Mama Bear: Mary runs in and viciously stabs the scarecrow in the back when it starts menacing her daughter.
- Mirror Scare: When John is inside drinking a beer he glances towards the mirror and briefly sees the scarecrow. This is the final push in him deciding to destroy it.
- Police Are Useless: Deputy Milton gets knocked out pretty easily. When he later regains consciousness he's almost immediately killed by the scarecrow.
- Scary Scarecrow: Obviously. However the scarecrow is less 'evil' and moreso just doing what John wants like 'dealing' with the financial adviser and Tommy, the man who hit on his wife. John even states the scarecrow is 'protecting' him and the debt John owes it for aiding his farm and situation is technically his family's lives. Considering the scarecrow's pagan origins, a human sacrifice would be seen as a fair trade.
- You're Insane!: John says this word for word to Jude after learning about the true nature of the scarecrow.
