The Next Generation is the fourth The Texas Chainsaw Massacre film from the year 1995.
A bunch of teens drive off from prom night grounds and end up in a car crash. This leads to further trouble as they encounter the crazy Texas family we all know.
This film has the examples of:
- Actor Allusion: At the beginning of the dinner scene, Vilmer says, "Alright, alright, alright!"
- Affably Evil: Darla is polite and kind to Jenny and reassures her in contrast to Vilmers sadism.
- Asshole Victim: Barry is introduced cheating on his girlfriend Heather, is constantly whining and rude to everyone and suffers from a severe case of Never My Fault. Nobody will shed any tears when Leatherface kills him.
- Artificial Limbs: Vilmer's weird leg contraption.
- Body Horror: Rothman's abdominal mutilations.
- Call-Back: The movie ends the same way the original did with Leatherface flailing his chainsaw in the air.
- Leatherface puts Heather on a meat hook and is left to suffer in agony, similar to what happened to Pam in the original.
- The Cameo: Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain and John Dugan (Sally, Franklin and Grandpa from the first film) all appear briefly at the end of the film. Marilyn Burns is the patient on the gurney Jenny stares at but was credited as "Anonymous".
- Canon Discontinuity: The director intended the film to be a true sequel to the original, though it ends up eschewing that film as well, placing it in its own standalone continuity.
- Car Fu: Vilmer repeatedly runs Sean over with his tow truck.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Darla, the insurance agent who the kids meet when they need a phone to call a tow truck. She turns out to be the girlfriend of Vilmer, a member of Leatherface's family.
- Rothman, who appears at the dinner scene but leaves and isn't seen until the end of the movie when Jenny is running from Vilmer and Leatherface.
- Creepy Crossdresser: Leatherface puts on some female clothes (and skin) for the usual "messed up dinner scene".
- Deus ex Machina: Jenny is rescued by Rothman in a limo allowing her to escape from Leatherface.
- The Ditz: Heather.
- Domestic Abuse:
- Jenny's asshole stepfather.
- Vilmer has a habit of smacking Darla around, though she's perfectly capable of hitting back.
- Dysfunctional Family: Leatherface, W.E., Vilmer, and his girlfriend Darla.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": A character with whom the protagonists are involved in a car crash is credited as "I'm Not Hurt".
- Extremely Short Timespan: The movie takes place over the course of one night and ends early the next morning.
- Failed a Spot Check: Barry enters the Slaughter household and uses the bathroom, not only does he not seem to notice that walls are decorated with taxidermied flesh, he somehow doesn't see or smell the rotten corpse in the bathtub until he's finished peeing.
- Final Girl: Jenny.
- Gainax Ending: It says a lot about the ending that a plane suddenly flying down, killing Vilmer with its propeller and then vanishing again is one of the least objectionable things that happens.
- Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday: The film starts on a prom night, which quickly goes down south.
- Idiot Ball: All four protagonists, including Jenny, hold the ball at various points in the film.
- It Works Better with Bullets: Jenny finds a revolver and tries to shoot Leatherface, only for it to have no bullets. She managed to get W.E.'s shotgun on Vilmer but once again, pulls the trigger and nothing happens.
- Makes Just as Much Sense in Context: Even though it is regarded by the director (Kim Henkel, co-creator of the original TCM) as the "real" sequel to the first one (in the form of a Soft Reboot), many elements of this film make no sense whatsoever. Among them are the facts that Leatherface is now apparently a transvestite (possibly a Shout-Out to Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs), who's brother is a trucker with a self-made cybernetic leg, and the whole family belongs to the secret society known as the Illuminati (which, according to the film, planned JFK's assassination), which is run by the government, whose leader is shown to be somewhat alien in nature.
- Man on Fire: Heather ends up in flames.
- Neck Snap: Done by Vilmer to the unnamed injured driver in the woods.
- Never Trust a Title: The only film in the franchise where nobody is killed with a chainsaw.
- The Omniscient Council of Vagueness: Whatever is controlling the family.
- Police Are Useless: Especially the cops in the Bud's Pizza scene who notice Darla acting suspicious around the open boot of her car, question her about it, only to then dismiss the weirdness when she acts coy around them.
- [[Rasputinian Death:]] Heather goes through a series of fatal circumstances before finally dying. This includes: being hung on a meathook and somehow eventually managing to free herself (The fact that she didn't bleed out is miraculous within itself). Then when she is intercepted and brought back to Vilmer's house, she is implied to have had her face cut off. Then she is set on fire. Finally, Vilmer puts Heather out of her misery by crushing her skull.
- Revenge of the Sequel: The film is also known as The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The grandfather leaves during the dinner scene when things get too crazy.
- Self-Harm: Vilmer repeatedly cuts into his chest and arms during this films dinner sequence... for some reason.
- Shock Stick: W.E. uses a cattle prod as his weapon of choice.
- Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Vilmer. He chews the scenery and gets almost all the kills (Leatherface is only responsible for one).
- The Stoner: Sean, and to a lesser extent, Jenny. The whole reason they get wrapped up in the plot is because they were getting high in the back of Barry's car.
- Too Dumb to Live: When Sean witnesses Vilmer killing a knocked-out driver, he runs away while Vilmer starts chasing him. Rather than try and hide in the forest, Sean carries on running in the open field. Predictably, he doesn't get far, trips and gets run over.
- Wicked Cultured: W.E. has a tendency to quote famous authors and historical figures in his one liners.
