Horror Movie Review: Bambi: The Reckoning (2025)

The latest entry in the TCU (Twisted Childhood Universe), Bambi: The Reckoning comes from director Dan Allen and writer Rhys Warrington. The film, which is a horror-based retelling of the 1923 novel Bambi, a Life in the Woods stars Roxanne McKee, Tom Mulheron, Nicola Wright, Samira Mighty, Alex Cooke, Russell Geoffrey Banks, and Joseph Greenwood.

I am fully on board with the TCU, even if calling it that makes my stomach churn just a bit, and I have a certain amount of trust in Jagged Edge Productions to produce something worthwhile now. Which is what we get with Bambi: The Reckoning. A solid horror flick with entertaining moments, but overall, something that is unremarkable. Not the worst entry (that honour still belongs to the film that started it all off – Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey), but far from the best (Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare holds that honour).

So, how familiar are you with the Bambi story and does it extend beyond the Disney film? It doesn’t for me, but I am aware that at its core, the book is a ‘coming of age’ story. Which is also the direction this film takes, up to a point. Telling us about a young fawn named Bambi who lives happily with his mother until a poacher kills her.

Sounds familiar, right? Bambi grows up, meets a doe named Faline, they have a fawn, and together, teach it about the dangers of the world.

It’s kind of sweet, and then Faline is run over and killed by a truck filled with toxic waste, their fawn disappears, and Bambi is transformed into a violent, blood-thirsty monster by contaminated water that he drinks from a river. Water contaminated by toxic waste dumped by a local pharmaceutical company called Wibexr Pharmaceuticals.

It’s time for Bambi to open a can of whoop ass and get his revenge, but Wibexr Pharmaceuticals is all too aware of the deer’s existence and is out to put him down once and for all. Deer verses man, the ultimate battle, with an unfortunate family caught in the crossfire.

I’ve tried to make that a bit more exciting than it is as the overall story, outside of the talky intro, isn’t that compelling. Mostly focusing on two things – the family drama that intersects with Bambi and the gun-toting villains, and the conflict between the hulking beast (it looks decent, to be fair) and the pharmaceutical company. Both of which deliver enjoyable and entertaining moments but fail to connect in a meaningful way and create pacing issues.

I want to be more invested in the characters of Xana, Benji, and Mary (Nicola Wright as brilliant as always), but they’re not the stars, Bambi is. Which is fine, his name is in the title, but there’s only so much that can be done when it’s a non-talking computer-generated deer. Yet, impressively, he is more expressive than some of the lesser characters (goons be gooning) and he delivers most of the entertainment with his violent tendencies. Still, the whole film lacks someone to get invested in and even though Bambi is written as a sympathetic creature, it’s hard to really feel that when he’s goring fools and stomping on heads. At least that stuff is entertaining, with a high body count and decent looking gore.

Unlike other entries in the TCU, this one feels like a ‘one and done’ and that’s probably for the best. The subject matter is a difficult one to adapt into a horror, so credit must be given to Dan Allen and Rhys Warrington, even if the result isn’t anything special.