Shudder’s Pulsing Roadside Horror Hellcat (2026) is an Uneven Ride

Title: Hellcat

First Non-Festival Release: August 14, 2026 (Digital/Streaming Platforms)

Director: Brock Bodell

Writer: Brock Bodell

Runtime: 91 Minutes

Starring: Dakota Gorman, Todd Terry, James Austin Johnson

Where to Watch: Check out where to find it here

Waking up in a daze in the back of a moving trailer, Lena (Dakota Gorman) tries to figure out exactly how she ended up there. Assessing her surroundings, she realizes that her phone is missing and a sharp pain is running up her arm. Suddenly, the voice of a man, Clive (Todd Terry) informs Lena that he put her in the trailer because her wound portends a deadly fate that he is working to prevent. Racing against the clock – her captor claims she only has an hour to reach the hospital – Lena must use her wits to survive the night.

Hellcat takes its mysterious premise to its familiar but otherwise fun conclusion.

Thrust in the middle of a mystery with an apparent ticking time bomb, Hellcat gets off to a glorious start. As Lena familiarizes herself with her surroundings, Hellcat establishes a sense of danger early on with multiple factors pressing against Lena’s odds of survival. The location itself says plenty. Whatever lunatic’s lair she’s landed inside doesn’t contain anything peculiar that she can mine for clues. Old family photographs and disco ball karaoke lights tell a softer version of the foreboding male voice on the intercom, one who has a family he loves and a simple life of mundane outdoor hobbies. In a way, it makes the abduction more chilling.

Hellcat pushes on, keeping its mystery shrouded in darkness while chipping away at Lena’s character. Parts of Lena’s character are revealed in bursts of exposition, as well as a few strangely inserted hallucination sequences that offer momentary glimpses into her mind. Her mother is dead, she has a distant but loving relationship with her father, and is used to pursuing through pain. In short, Lena is in need of connection. All this is up in the air with Clive’s choice to lead her into the unknown without fully explaining her situation. Lena’s refusal to submit and die causes her to lash out in ways that make her night more complicated.

Balancing the true terror of the situation while maintaining Lena’s interiority, Hellcat effectively builds tension throughout its first half. Escalating the stakes with each situation, Hellcat believably makes Lena’s situation more untenable the longer she is thrashed about on the open road. Clive’s true nature is obscured for the better part of the film, allowing audiences, and Lena, to decide how trustworthy he can be over the intercom. Each time his temper rises and he takes steps closer to threatening Lena physically, Hellcat latches on to a particular type of horror known all too well to women cornered by men leaning on physical intimidation. The tension eventually fizzles out once the mystery fades but a few particularly fraught sequences give the film enough edge to work.

It’s once the situation becomes clearer that Hellcat becomes unsure of what to do next. A few fun revelations put a nice spin on a classic story but the bulk of Hellcat’s choices feel familiar once it is finished side-stepping the initial tropes. The biggest offenders come when Hellcat zooms out from Lena’s story and again when introducing a comically inept and evil police officer. Straining credulity at times, the final confrontations feel rushed, relying on multiple conveniences to tie all the loose ends together. Hellcat is best when laser focused on Lena’s desperate attempts to escape the camper.

It doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but Hellcat is a charming low-budget horror film that has fun with its simple premise. A solid lead performance from Dakota Gorman and a nice twist on its story elevate Hellcat just enough to overlook its structural flaws. Some gnarly flashes of body horror give the psychological elements some support through the heavier middle. Hellcat eventually unravels as it reaches its final destination but that doesn’t mean the journey isn’t executed with some finesse. 

Overall Score? 6/10