Film / [REC]

Experience Fear.

"Pablo, tape everything. For your fucking mother's sake."

— Ángela

[REC] is a 2007 Spanish horror film following a news reporter, Ángela Vidal, and her cameraman, Pablo, as they cover the night shift in one of Barcelona's local fire stations for the fictional documentary series While You Sleep.

However, the two intrepid reporters get much more than they bargained for when the firehouse receives a call from a residential building about an old woman being unwell and trapped in her own apartment. As they tag along with the rescue effort, Ángela and Pablo find themselves chronicling the discovery and progression of an apparent zombie outbreak in the building, which is sealed off by the authorities, trapping everyone inside. Soon, they are forced to fight for their lives as The Virus slowly takes over the tenants and responders.

In 2008, the first [REC] was remade in America as Quarantine (2008). In 2009, a sequel, [REC] 2, was released. A third film, called [REC] 3: Génesis (2011), takes place at roughly the same time as the events of the first two films, but follows a different cast in another location. The fourth film in the series, [REC] 4: Apocalipsis (2014), concludes the saga with the infection spreading to unknown proportions.

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This movie series contains examples of:

General

• Apocalyptic Log: All the camera footage. Everyone repeatedly says to keep the film running so there will be a log of what happened.
• Arc Words: "(You/We need to) film everything."
• Artifact Title: The latter two films in the series ditch the found footage, "recorded" style of filming present in the first two.
• Body Horror: The Medeiros girl is a shining example.
• Casting Gag:
  • Manuela Velasco (Ángela) was best known in her native Spain as "that silly Canal+ TV host" before this movie. Americans, picture Maria Menounos starring in a film like this.
  • Pablo Rosso, the film's cinematographer, "plays" the cameraman in the first two movies. Call it next level Cast the Expert.
• Closed Circle: The first and second movies take place in a quarantined apartment building. The third is in a hotel resort. And the fourth is on a ship at sea.
• Creepy Child: The infected Jennifer and the boy(s) in the attic from the first and second film.
• Death of a Child: Not only are several infected young boys lurking in the penthouse attic (with one of them getting his head blown apart in the second film), Jennifer also gets infected and is (presumably) killed off-camera in the second film.
• Demonic Possession: The true nature of the Virus.
• Downer Ending: The first three movies end this way. The fourth, however, has more of a Bittersweet Ending.
• Found Footage Films: Except for the last hour of 3, which is shot traditionally. Also, most of 4 is shot traditionally, except for security camera footage.

• It Can Think: This is what makes the infected so dangerous, as they are capable of forming plans and use their numbers to overwhelm the people they're trying to infect. It also helps that their possessed nature can help them to mimick the voices of non-infected people to lure their prey.
• Lost in Translation: No dubs, subs, or remakes do justice to the abundant, often colorful Spanish swearing.
• Ms. Fanservice: Both Angela and Clara. Every film that features Angela will have her lose layers of clothing until she's down to a white tank top by the end of it and Clara spends most of 3 in a wedding dress.
• Mystical Plague: While The Virus certainly has a biological aspect, the climax of the first movie suggests that Demonic Possession also has a part in it. The second film confirms it: the virus is actually the vehicle of a worm-like demonic entity that seemingly lives in the digestive system and can be passed from person to person.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: A rare pre-story case. The Church was searching for a medical cure for demonic possession. They were able to find the enzyme which caused demonic possession. Unfortunately, it mutated and spread. Now instead of a demon taking over one person, the demon can take over everybody who is infected.
• Noodle People: The Medeiros girl's extensive emaciation and unsettlingly huge jaw invoke this trope in a way that would give The Enigma of Amigara Fault a run for its money.
• Nothing Is Scarier: The films run on this quite a bit, especially the first film. At least, until all hell well and truly breaks loose.
• Not Using the "Z" Word: The Zombies are never acknowledged as such, even though it's acknowledged that it's a virus.
• The Oner: A few, seeing how this is done in the style of a pseudo-documentary. A good example is the introductory scene, in which Ángela and the firemen arrive outside, enter the lobby and speak with the tenants, ascend the stairs and talk with the policemen, break the door down and enter the apartment, and meet and get assaulted by the zombified woman.
• Rape as Backstory: It's explained in the tie in comic (REC: Historias Ineditas) that the Medeiros girl was raped by three priests and that's how she became possessed.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: All of the infected sport red irises.
• Religious Horror: While the infection certainly has a biological aspect, the end of the first movie strongly suggests, while the sequel confirms, that Demonic Possession also has a part in it.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The Medeiros girl. She can only affect you if you're in total darkness.
• Shoot the Shaggy Dog: Nobody survives the virus.
• Social Media Before Reason: "Keep recording, for your fucking mother!" Throughout two-and-one-act-of-the-third films, people are given to record the whole situation because they either believe they should (or are ordered to) keep a record of all the craziness that is going on. Obviously, many characters are not happy about it.
• Tank-Top Tomboy: Angela simply wears a white tank top in all 3 films she's on.
• The Virus: While the doctor character compares the outbreak to rabies and the tape to influenza, the climax suggests the contagion has a supernatural origin. [[spoiler:The second film confirms it: the virus is actually the vehicle of a worm-like demonic entity which uses it to control the infected and jump its mind from one to another.
• Zombie Apocalypse: A non-undead variety. Implied at the end of the second movie, and with the title of the next sequel.

[REC]

• Ankle Drag: The movie ends with the heroine being dragged away into the dark.
• Apocalyptic Log: The dictation machine found in the penthouse.
• Bald Head of Toughness: Manu the firefighter, a Boisterous Bruiser who's definitely the most useful character of the first REC movie. He kills more of the infected than anyone else in self-defence, manages to stand on equal authority with the policeman, and helped Ángela with Pablo get away from the mob with one last strong resistance.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Ángela spends most of the beginning bored out of her mind and wishing for something to happen so the program can get more exciting. Boy, did she get more than she could chew...
• Berserk Button: Don't touch the fucking camera! Ángela does not like people trying to mess with it.
• Camera Abuse: The policeman is constantly shoving the camera and telling Pablo to turn it off. At one point, Pablo bashes in an infected's head with the camera. Later, another infected smashes his camera light.
• Camp Gay: Cesar. He's wearing a colorful ascot, jewelry and a pencil-thin mustache. In his short interview, he mentions that he used to live with his mother and now lives alone, makes catty comments about the Asian family, fusses about his appearance, and hits on the cameraman.
• Carry a Big Stick: Manu uses a sledgehammer or mallet, as a weapon against the infected and to break down a door.. Medeiros uses a claw hammer as a weapon during the finale and the second film.
• Crazy Cat Lady: Mrs. Izquierdo, the old woman whose breakdown after being infected sets the events of the film in motion, is referred as such by other characters. However, we never happen to see any of her pet cats...
• Dangerous Key Fumble: A Stairwell Chase towards the end is heightened by ÁAngela not finding the right key for the door to the attic.
• Dangerous Windows: One older tenant is attacked from behind while standing dangerously close to a glass front.
• Dead Line News: The whole movie is a news broadcast going wrong.
• Death by Racism: Cesar. The moment he starts making racist comments about the Asian family, you know he isn't going to last long.
• Definitely Just a Cold: She's not a zombie, she just... has tonsillitis! Really!
• Downer Ending: Everybody either dies or is infected and Ángela is dragged into the darkness.
• The Faceless: Pablo, given that he's the one behind the camera. Even after he's killed, we only see a bit of his back and shoulder.
  • In the second movie we can see him as one of the infected. However, he is portrayed by another actor (a stuntman), since Pablo Rosso now is portraying the officer who handles the main camera.
• Facial Horror: The first cop has extremely nasty and gruesome bite wounds on his face after encountering Mrs. Izquierdo. Alex also sustains some nasty facial damage after plummeting several floors and apparently also taking a bite to the face.
  • Downplayed when Jennifer bites her mother in the face. The damage is bloody, but not nearly as gruesome-looking as the above examples.
• Foreshadowing: The sealed-up penthouse is mentioned shortly before everything goes to hell. Later, Ángela and Pablo find out the apartment was sealed up for a damn good reason.
• Final Girl: Ángela. Subverted in that she doesn't make it.
• Foreshadowing: So much in the starting fire station sequence.
  Ángela: Today, in "While You Are Asleep", we are accompanying a team of firemen on their nightly rounds through our city streets. But not just that, we'll see things never before revealed...
  Ángela: I'm going to be the heroine of "While You Are Asleep".
  Ángela: This will sound terrible, but I'd love the alarm to ring now and everyone to run off. I don't want anything to happen. I mean, just to go with you, to see what your real work is like. Don't get me wrong, so we can show it.
  Ángela: Álex and Manu are the fire patrol we will accompany this whole evening.
• Freak Out: Ángela has one after fighting with an infected and mistakenly believes that she's been bitten.
• Full-Frontal Assault: The Medeiros girl. Well, she is wearing underpants, but nothing else.
• Funny Background Event: Many examples of this:
  • A firefighter walks in naked while Pablo and Ángela are recording
  • The old lady appears sweeping the ground during almost all interviews.
  • You can see (and hear) César hitting on Pablo during the scene where Jennifer plays with the camera.
• Heroic BSoD: The younger officer has a brief one after he is forced to gun down Mrs. Izquierdo.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Many see Manu doing this when he chooses to guard the apartment's door alone in the darkness, while Pablo and Ángela are looking for the building keys inside.
• Hollywood Darkness: Averted: We see the action through a two-man tv crew's camera, when the light goes out, the camera light comes on, but when the camera light bites the dust, it gets very dark.
• A House Divided: Well, an apartment complex. The inhabitants never fully reach this level seeing as how the infection happens so fast people rarely get the chance to argue with one another.
• Idiot Ball / Too Dumb to Live:
  • When Cesar gets bitten by an infected scientist. The scientist locked himself away because he knew he was infected. All Cesar had to do was to stay the fuck away from the bars the infected locked himself in. He didn't.
  • At one point, they can't remember who lives in which apartment. They all forget that Pablo recorded the roll call earlier, and Ángela had already consulted the video previously. Possibly justified, given how panicked they are at the time.
    • Far more obviously, even if they had remembered the camera had recorded it, they had no safe way of checking the film. Cesar's apartment contains two of the infected (Cesar and the health inspector) so they obviously cannot stay there to consult the tape. Ms Izquierdo's apartment has 4 infected people (Ms Izquierdo, Colombian girl, the young cop, Jennifer). They know that the other infected people are roaming the apartment block searching for them, so the hallways/stairwells aren't safe. So there is absolutely nowhere they can stand still for a period of time while rewinding/viewing the tape.
  • The cop who goes to get Jennifer knows the virus is spread by biting and that people who are infected can become aggressive at any time. And yet he tries to carefully walk up to her with no gloves or protection on to inject her with a tranquilizer. He even takes his eyes off her once he's within arms reach of her.
• Delicate and Sickly: Jennifer. At first it's thought she has tonsillitis, but it quickly becomes clear that she's infected with the virus.
• Interchangeable Asian Cultures: Cesar proves he has this belief during his racist rant about the Japanese family.
• Jerkass: Cesar.
• Jitter Cam: It's a handheld, obviously.
• Jump Scare: Several.
  • Especially notable is Jennifer suddenly spitting her mother in the face (especially jarring since it comes out of the blue), followed by her later attacking the policeman.
  • Then there's the boy in the attic...
  • The scene where Alex suddenly thuds into the floor after falling from several floors. Not even the actors knew that this was going to happen.
  • Jennifer's mother. Following her death, her corpse is shown lying on the ground as Ángela and Manu search the mailboxes... and when Pablo pans back around, she's suddenly standing up...

• Lost in Translation: Non-Spanish-speaking audiences fail to realize that Cesar, the one neighbour that blames the Japanese family for the crisis, speaks with an Argentinian accent and is in consequence an immigrant himself - which makes him a genuine hypocrite as well as racist. The dubbed version tries to help out by giving him a British accent.
• Made of Iron: Mrs. Izquierdo is INCREDIBLY sturdy. After she bites the older officer she is punched in the face by the firefighters, yet she gets back up for more, takes five shots to the chest by the younger officer later on and seemingly goes down, yet later on is up and running again, at this point she takes A SLEDGEHAMMER TO THE HEAD by Manu, and apparently she's down for good, but then in the sequel she is up AGAIN and attacks Larra, who manages to fire several rounds from his rifle into her chest. Just when you think she's finally down for good, less than 20 seconds later, she's up again and continuing her assault on Larra. DAMN
• Ms Exposition: Ángela, explaining everything that we see to the camera.
• Neck Snap: After being assaulted by the infected Japanese Man, Manu breaks his neck to give him and his fellow survivors a moment of brevity.
• Oh, Crap!: A lot of these moments in the film!
  • Manu & the young cop when the military outside announce that it is a BNC (Biological, chemical or nuclear) situation
  • Angela, when she makes the connection between Jennifer's story of her sick dog, Max, and the health inspector's story about the infected dog who became violent...
  • Later, Pablo has one (although being The Faceless, you can only hear it in his voice), when he sees the Medeiros girl.
• Police Are Useless: Played with. The two police officers are unsurprisingly no match for a zombie outbreak in an apartment block, although they clearly are trying their best in a horrendous situation (and the junior officer is abruptly promoted when his senior partner dies). However, even once they have realised what the virus is and how it is spread, the younger cop continues to make a series of blunders with catastrophic results. The health inspector's blunders are arguably worse, given that he already knows what the virus is and how it is spread, yet continues to do stupid things.
• Room Full of Crazy: The closest anyone gets to an explanation in the first film is a Room Full Of Crazy covered in newspaper clips about a "Medeiros girl" who seems to have been infected or possessed, a recorder that plays back some ramblings about a virus, an infected hyper-aggressive little boy and, finally, the girl herself that kills the last two survivors.
• Raising the Steaks: Happens offscreen in the exposition dump provided by the Health Inspector. A dog who was sent to the vet because he seemed sick ended up going violent and attacked all the other animals, causing them to turn violent as well before the whole situation was finally quarantined. Said dog just happened to be Jennifer's dog Max. Soon most of the other survivors looked on at her, realizing what that means...
• Running Gag: "Get everything on tape, Pablo! We have to record everything!"
• Say My Name: "PABLO!"
  • "JENNIFER!!"
• Sinister Silhouettes: The very first appearance of Medeiros.
• So Much for Stealth: When Ángela and Pablo try to evade the Medeiros girl in the dark, of course they give their location away by knocking something over.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: [REC] ends with what can only be described as an over-the-top Spanish rockabilly number.
• Stairwell Chase: Several, as the infected increase in number.
• Taken During the Ending: When Angela and Pablo try to escape, Pablo is attacked by a ghoulish Tristana and he drops his camera. When Angela picks up the camera to use its night vision to see in the dark, she sees Pablo being eaten by Tristana, and then she's attacked and drops the camera and then is dragged into the darkness.
• Undead Child: Mom is in denial to the bitter end:
  "She just has a fever!"
• The Unreveal:
  • The origin of the virus is explained, but the fate of Ángela is still up in the air. Until [REC]2.
  • Pablo's face is never shown. Until [REC]2's promotional material.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The young Asian boy and the elderly couple. All three of them are seen fleeing when the infected start breaking down the door that's keeping them contained, but afterwards, they are never seen again, not even among the infected in the sequel.
• Zombie Infectee: Mostly averted. When the young policeman and the health inspector are bitten, the former tells everyone to get out while he stays behind to subdue the infected Jennifer before he turns, and the latter locks himself away.

[REC] 2

• Accidental Murder: As Jose is struggling with an infected Martos, Mire tries to shoot the latter. Given that she's a) scared out of her mind and b) inexperienced with guns, she accidentally shoots Jose in the head.
• Action Girl: Right at the end, Ángela, right before you discover she is actually possessed by Medeiros.
• Actionized Sequel: Averted. Although the protagonists of the second movie are special forces operatives instead of defenceless civilians, they don't fare much better than the latter. The fact that the infected cannot really be killed by bullets (just temporarily stunned) certainly doesn't help.
• Alien Geometries: The penthouse where Medeiros was kept changes in the total absence of light (the characters can only see the changes with night vision). In the original movie, the door that leads to where Medeiros was sealed doesn't appear until the lights are off. In the sequel, further exploration of this room reveals a well from where Medeiros reaches out and drags in the SWAT Chief; when the lights come back on, the well is gone, and there's only a sink in its place.
• And Then John Was a Zombie: Ángela has become the new host of the demon that possessed Medeiros, making her the lead carrier for the demonic plague. And she's now free to infect the entire world.
• Are We Getting This?: A priest follows a SWAT team through an apartment building that is constantly ordering a cameraman to film various things they encounter.
• Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Tito and Mire are two brothers that spend most of their screening time arguing with each other. However, they are very protective of each other, with Tito often grabbing Mire by the hand while running away from the infected and Mire tries to protect Tito when he gets infected.
• Back for the Dead: Jose, a fireman who briefly appears in the introduction of the first movie, comes back in this one. He ends up being accidentally shot by Mire, one of the teenagers. Ángela could qualify as well, since she is possessed.
• Badass Preacher: Owen.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: Larra.
• Boom, Headshot!: Owen kills one of the infected children this way. Towards the end, Ángela does the same to Medeiros. Shame Ángela was already possessed by this point.
• Downer Ending: Same as above, save for two teenagers who remain trapped inside the apartment building. On top of that, Ángela is possessed, manages to act normal until the last five minutes and fakes the voice of the last guy she killed so she can be released from the building and infect the whole city of Barcelona at the very least .

  • And since 'Ángela' gave the order to ''burn down the building'' they are most likely going to be toast...
  • According to the tie-in comics, the teens are shot and killed by a squad of police officers who barge into the building, under the impression that they are infected.

• Ear Ache: Jose has his ear shot off by a sniper.
• Fan Disservice: Invoked during the ending, when a possessed Ángela straddles Owen after beating the shit out of him, and mocking him before delivering the final blow.
• Gilligan Cut: When the three teens are about to enter the building through the sewers, Mire nearly leaves and takes her camera with her. She says "I've had it with your stupidities," and when Tito and Ori try coaxing her back, "I said no!" Guess where they are the next time the camera cuts back on.
• How We Got Here: Shortly after the teenagers are spotted by the SWAT team, it cuts to their camera, revealing how they got into the building.
• Idiot Ball: The teenagers... Good Lord, what a bunch of idiots.
  • And having the vial of potential demon blood uncorked and too close to the priest when he did a mini exorcism to test a small amount to see if it was possessed, leading to the whole thing going up in flames!
  • But the officer wasn't sure what was going to happen. If anything it's the priest's fault for not telling him to take a step back.
    • Plus, if you need her blood, and you just blew her head off, why not simply pick up her body?
  • Ángela in the climax. Instead of using her arms she just lies still passively as the Medeiros girl possesses her.
• Immediate Sequel: The second film chronologically starts five minutes after the end of the first.
• Improvised Weapon: A bottle rocket. Seen here at around 9:00 (SPOILERS AHOY).
• Jerkass: Tito.
• Jitter Cam: Another handheld for the main shots, but the soldiers also have helmet-mounted cams with somewhat less jitter.
• Our Demons Are Different: Possession spreads through biting people via a virus, the original is a long worm-like creature that seemingly lives in the digestive system and can be passed from person to person, and those possessed can accurately mimic voices.Also they fear religious symbols (crosses) and don´t enter in holy places (churches), and recitations of Bible verses stuns them
• Orifice Invasion: At the end, we see an extension of the ending scene of the first one, showing Medeiros vomiting a worm into Ángela's mouth.
• Sacrificial Lamb: Martos is the only member of the team to get taken out early on, getting infected barely fifteen minutes in.
• Serial Escalation: In REC, it took a little while for the infection to take hold. In this film, it seems to take seconds. According to Word of God,the amount of time it takes for the infection to set in varies from person to person.
• Stairwell Chase
• Voice Changeling: The entity is able to talk with different voices in different bodies (an infected 40-year-old talking with the voice of the infected little girl is disturbing).
• Your Mom: The demon, when asked where it [that is, the Medeiros girl] is hiding, retorts, "Your mother's cunt!"

[REC] 3: Génesis

• Action Dress Rip: After getting a sign that Koldo might still be alive, she gets to work preparing on reuniniting with her husband by ripping off the lower part of her wedding dress with a chainsaw. It definitely impresses Rafa too.
• Action Girl: Clara, while at first she's more of the Action Survivor type. Preferring to be on the run from the infected hordes. She finally has enough later on and arms herself with a chainsaw.
  "This is my [wedding] day! THIS IS MY DAY!!"
• All There in the Script: Names of some wedding guests (Wendy, Leire, Cuca and Germán) are listed in the end credits, but their names were not mentioned in the film. Clara's unnamed mother is listed as "Menchu", and the elderly woman at the chapel is credited as "Amelia".
• An Arm and a Leg: After she gets bitten by her husband's deaf grandfather. Clara asks Koldo to cut off the infected arm before it fully takes her over, unfortunately for her it doesn't take.
• And I Must Scream: Hinted at the end of "Génesis''. Clara becomes infected and is shot by the soldiers, but Koldo and her reach for each other while they are dying in the ground. This actually could mean that possessed people are aware of their status, but cannot fight against it.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: Tuna the videographer decides to commit suicide rather than be killed/eaten/infected.
• Blood-Splattered Wedding Dress
• Chainsaw Good: Not wanting to leave her husband behind when they get to the exit of the tunnels. Clara arms herself with a conveniently close by chainsaw stuck to a log and even uses it to rip up the lower part of her dress!
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • The PA system. Clara uses it early on to confirm with anyone listening that she's alive. The priest uses it later on to read the book of Genesis, paralyzing all of the infected.
  • The grandfather's hearing aid, although this is a more negative example as it leads to the film's sudden Downer Ending.
  • The multi-tool Atún accidentally drops down the sewer at the start of the outbreak, when Clara and Koldo finally reunite but are kept apart by a grate. She picks it up and it finally leads to the newly wed couple being together again.
• Death of a Child: At first it seems like the children at the wedding are gonna get away in a bus parked outside the reception. Unfortunately, the infected get inside the bus...
• Downer Ending: Everybody at the wedding reception dies, except for the priest. Clara gets bitten, and when she becomes one of the infected, Koldo decides to let her bite him so they can die together and then they both get shot by a platoon of soldiers.
• Formula-Breaking Episode: This movie differed significantly from the formula associated with the saga so far. At first it seems like it's gonna be a found-footage film like the other movies, but at the end of the first act the camera gets smashed and then it jumps to a traditional style of filming. Besides, no main characters from the first two movies appear on the third. Lastly, it has more parodic elements; it is more of a dark comedy than a horror film at times.
• Found Footage Films: It starts off like this even with it appearing to be like a DVD for Clara and Koldo's wedding. Although it gets abandoned after the first twenty minutes, when Koldo smashes Atún's camera after Atún says he wants to film everything.
• Glamour Failure: The Medeiros girl appears as the reflection of the infected/possessed people, giving more evidence to the fact that all the infected, no matter what their location, are directly under her control.
• Gory Discretion Shot: Mencu/Royalties terminating one of the infected women with a tire iron.
• Hope Spot:
  • On two separate occasions, it looks like the couple will be able to escape. Then you remember what franchise this is.
  • At first a couple of survivors and some children managed to make it to a bus and take it to safety, unfortunately the infected manage to break in and we noly hear the screams of the survivor's being overwhelmed.
• Insistent Terminology: "Sponge John", not Sponge Bob To avoid copyright issues.
• Internal Deconstruction: To the previous two films' Social Media Before Reason: Koldo gets enraged when the cameraman Atún doesn't stop recording to help (this is something that also happened even all the way back on the first film, but Angela ordered the cameraman to continue) and smashes the camera as a result.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Atún says he works for Filmax films, the production and distribution company for the REC movies.
• Lighter and Softer: While the first two films were strict survival horror, REC 3 added elements of romance drama due to Clara and Koldo's relationship and motivations. The film's use of traditional cinematography and the fact that the film actually had a musical score contributed to this trope. Genesis also features significantly more comedy than the previous two films, although it is slightly downplayed as it is still dark and very bleak overall with a Downer Ending.
• The Mirror Shows Your True Self: Mirrors frequently show the infected to be the Infanta.
• Non-Indicative Name: While the subtitle Genesis makes you think it's an Origin Story for the series (as films with those titles regularly do), in this case it is that the passage of The Bible that the priest reads over the PA system to keep the zombies at bay is the Book of Genesis.
• Pregnant Badass: At first Clara has a secret that she's been meaning to tell Koldo but never gets the chance too. However she finally reveals that she's pregnant over the PA system which serves as further motivation for them to reunite. Clara is also plenty badass grabbing a chainsaw and starting to fight off the infected to reunite with her baby's father.
• Running Gagged: The moment that the movie goes on a Genre Shift from found footage to regular horror is when Koldo gets fed up with the cameraman not helping and just standing there recording (saying that everything must be recorded in a fashion similar to other characters had said on the previous films), and so wrestles the camera away and smashes it into the ground.
• Seeking Sanctuary: The church on the hotel grounds acts as a Place of Protection.
• Simultaneous Arcs: A television in the background of the CCTV room shows news reporters on scene at the apartment building where REC 1 and 2 took place, establishing both stories taking place at the same time. Some dialogue at the beginning of the film also establishes that Adrián's uncle is the veterinarian that was to take care of Jennifer's (from REC 1) infected dog.
• Self-Deprecation: Half this, half Mythology Gag. Atún insists that he must keep recording to show the world what is happening at the wedding, the same reasoning Ángela and Pablo used to keep recording in the first film. However, Koldo has nothing of this and destroys the camera. From then on, the film proceeds in the traditional third person.
• Together in Death: Clara and Koldo at the end.
• Wedding Smashers: Doesn't gets more smashed than most of the crowd getting zombified.
• Writing Around Trademarks: The children's entertainer dressed vaguely as SpongeBob SquarePants (he's more a round loofah and has a vest) mentions that he is now known as Sponge John.

[REC] 4: Apocalipsis

• Alternate Identity Amnesia: Ángela forgets she was ever possessed by the demon once it leaves her body. It takes finding and recovering the footage for anyone to realize she was once the carrier.
• Anti-Hero: Ángela takes some downright ruthless measures in her determination to escape, including releasing the infected cook on her armed pursuers.
• Dual Wielding: After escaping the clutches of Dr. Ricarte and the remaining doctors when they try to do a vivisection, she breaks out a fire axe and carries it alongside a scalpel she stole.
• Back for the Dead: The sole survivor of [REC] 3 returns only to become infected partway though.^note  she is not actually anywhere in the prior film.
• Bittersweet Ending: The only movie in the franchise to not end on a complete downer - Ángela and Nic both survive, escaping the ship and making it back to dry land. On the other hand, the demon is still alive, and is last seen using a fish as its next host, before presumably going off to start the whole nightmare once again, potentially on a far vaster scale now that it's gotten into the planet's food chain.
• Broken Bird: Ángela is far more aggressive and brutal than in the first movie. Given what she's been through, it's hard to blame her.
• Closed Circle: The movie takes place on a ship at sea, with the lifeboats made inoperable to boot.
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: The elderly survivor from [REC] 3 is in some form of denial or shock about events in that movie, not realizing she's on a ship or that all of her family is dead.
• Covers Always Lie: Several of the film's posters, such as these◊ ones, depict Ángela with red irises. She not only never becomes infected, she's also apparently immune due to the fact that she was once the demon's host.
• Evil Gloating: Once Guzman is found out as the carrier, the demon proceeds to taunt Ángela about how it loved how tenacious she was, but she is completely useless to it now that it has a better host. Leading I Have You Now, My Pretty.
• Final Girl: Ángela, once again. For good this time, as the demon is no longer inside her.
• Found Footage Films: Averted completely for the first time in the series, along with Apocalyptic Log. The entire film is traditionally shot (albeit with Shaky Cam), interspersed with footage from the ship's security feed.
• I Have You Now, My Pretty: The demon decides that it prefers Ángela as a host after all, and tries to reinfect her. It doesn't succeed.
• Improvised Weapon: As Lucas and Guzman look through the ship's fishing supplies for more weapons, they manage to find a couple of spear guns and also a outboard motor. Just like the chainsaw from [REC] 3, it is used by Lucas, Nic and even Angela, the latter two even use it to fight against the infected monkeys. Some of the posters for the film even had Angela posing with it.
• Lethal Chef: Downplayed. After Edwin fights off and kills an infected monkey by cooking it on a pan, it ends up being unintentionally served to the crew when Goro tastes whats left of the infected monkey and lets the others taste it.
• Playful Hacker: Nic, who's also the ship's radio and security camera operator. He taps into the secret lab's cameras and recovers the footage from Pablo and Ángela's camera, overall he's a pretty decent and helpful guy.
• Recycled In Space: On a boat, actually, but in fairness it makes perfect sense. The researchers working on a cure or vaccine want to be able to keep infected from escaping and infecting a whole city. Hence, the boat also has a self-destruct.
• Retirony: Captain Ortega keeps insisting it's his last voyage. It really, really is.
• The Reveal: After Ricarte finds out that Ángela can't spread the virus via saliva, it's revealed that Guzman is now the demon's host, having exited Ángela's body and started possessing him since the apartment complex.
• Self-Destruct Mechanism: Alongside it's lifeboats being rendered inoperable, the ship has also been given one which only Dr. Ricarte can activate. As all hell predictably goes loose Ricarte activates it, to prevent the ship from spreading the virus.
• Sequel Hook: The demon worm parasite survives the destruction of the boat and gets "eaten" by a fish. Since it can infect animals, it's likely only a matter of time before it returns to land and the cycle of infection starts again.
• Typhoid Mary: Whoever is the host to the demon parasite worm is immune to the virus, and is not infected once it leaves.
• Wrench Whack: The ship's engineer Jesu saves himself from one of the infected by using a nearby wrench.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Nic showing off his hacking skills by hacking into the medical lab's cameras end up giving the Medeiros-possesed Guzman the idea to release one of the infected monkeys and start another outbreak.
• Zombie Infectee: Averted and played straight. One of the soldiers accepts having to be shot, another doesn't. Later, one of the doctors argues that they can find a cure in time to save him, unfortunately for him Dr. Ricarte just lets his soldiers shoot him in the head.

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