A cold case in Fincher blues that grows teeth, then stays a little too long.
The Cycle | Jordan Downey | 2026 |
The Cycle Review: Forensics, Family and Something Unscientific
- Director Jordan Downey
- Starring Deborah Ann Woll, Jeffrey Donovan
- Distributor Shudder
- Subgenre Creature feature, police procedural
- Reviewed by Hope Madden
A forensic scientist is called to a grisly animal attack in a small coastal town, where one of the bodies turns out to be her long-absent father, and it is far too well preserved.
The Cycle is the new Shudder original from Jordan Downey, the director of ThanksKilling and The Head Hunter. In her The Cycle review, Hope Madden follows Deborah Ann Woll as a forensic scientist pulled into a case that gets far too personal. Downey starts with a police procedural and lets a creature in through the back door. His team brings the craft that made his last film work, from sound to set design. The question is whether the new mythology holds up once the monster shows its face. It is just the kind of throwback our horror movie reviews love to dig into, so here is Hope’s verdict.
Deborah Ann Woll gives The Cycle its quiet power, and Jordan Downey bathes her case in cool, Fincher blues before the monsters arrive. A handful of creature moments land hard, but the film runs long and asks for too many leaps. Spooky Season fans after throwback cinema will still find plenty to chew on.
The Cycle Review: Forensics, Family and Something Unscientific
Seven years ago, ThanksKilling director Jordan Downey crafted the nearly wordless folk horror The Head Hunter. The medieval fantasy relies on framing, sound design, set design, creature design, and one brooding central performance to compel rap attention and generate real dread.
The filmmaker’s new Shudder original The Cycle flexes many of the same team muscles for a police procedural turned creature feature.
Downey’s film follows Meg (Deborah Ann Woll), a forensic scientist called in to help a coastal town police force with a new crime scene. Two victims, both mainly eaten, obvious animal attack. One additional body on the scene, long dead. Meg’s dad.
What the police, including chief Marks (Jeffrey Donovan), can’t figure out is why his body is there and why the maggots haven’t had their fill of him yet.
The emotional core of the film is the conflict within Meg, who ceased thinking about her father decades ago, when he abandoned her and her mother. Instead, she focused on what she could see, study, and figure out. That happened to be corpses. The conflict comes first from having to grapple with the human reality of her father, and then something else decidedly unscientific.
Woll is up to the task, and Jordan bathes her investigation in the cool blues of a Fincher investigation. The cast around her supports without overshadowing, allowing the lead performance quiet power.
But where Fincher’s forensic investigator would be working against the clock to stop a serial killer, Meg’s case is more related to a calendar than a clock, and the killer requires a lot more prosthetics than any of the monsters Fincher unveiled.
Downey’s no stranger here, although the creature work in The Cycle isn’t always on point. Cinematographer (and co-writer) Kevin Stewart relies often on shaky cam to keep the FX hidden, but there are a handful of very impressive monster moments.
The film goes on for too long, and while Downey has found a new entry point to an old mythology, he asks viewers to make a couple too many big leaps in logic. More attention paid to the mythology, streamlining the rest would have resulted in a more satisfying scary movie. But for Spooky Season devotees looking for some throwback cinema, The Cycle fits the bill.
3out of 5
The verdict
A cool, well cast procedural turned creature feature, with some fine monster moments, but too long and too fond of leaps in logic.
Watch it if: you want Spooky Season throwback cinema, a moody forensic case and a few strong practical monster scenes.
Skip it if: you need a lean scare machine with a mythology that holds together from start to finish.
The Cycle review in short: when even the maggots refuse to finish their dinner, the forensics team should expect a very long night shift. Ginger Nuts of Horror suggests strong coffee and a well sealed evidence bag.
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About Ginger Nuts of Horror
Ginger Nuts of Horror is an independent horror review and culture site based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Edited by British Fantasy Award nominee Jim McLeod, it publishes horror book reviews, film reviews, author interviews, features and cover reveals. Ginger Nuts of Horror won Best Inclusive Film & Book Review Platform at the SME News UK Enterprise Awards 2026.
