Stream It Or Skip It: 'After We Fell' On VOD, Another Installment In The Sexy Harry Styles-Inspired Romance Series

Much like 50 Shades of Grey, the After series is the result of horny fan fiction. 50 Shades might have been Twilight-inspired, but After began as One Direction fan fiction. That’s right: this writer was hot for Harry Styles, and now we have film adaptations of the series that feel YA in tone but are entirely R-rated when it comes to sexy time. Threequel After We Fell, now available to rent on VOD services, picks up exactly where After We Collided left off.

The Gist: The last time we saw Tessa (Josephine Langford) and Hardin (Hero Fiennes-Tiffin), they had come face-to-face with Tessa’s long lost (and very drunk) father Richard (Atanas Srebrev). After We Fell picks up in this exact moment, as Tessa helps her father clean himself up and they talk about why she hasn’t heard from him in 9 years. Hardin, ever the protective boyfriend, threatens Richard, but the two end up bonding later when they go to a bar and start throwing hands to defend Tessa’s honor. Richard hits the road shortly after, but not before promising he won’t disappear this time.

Tessa and Hardin, meanwhile, are facing their own issues; Tessa is ready to move to Seattle for her dream job, while Hardin can’t understand why she’s so happy to go leave him behind. He doesn’t want to move to Seattle because there’s really nothing else there for him, and this causes quite the rift in their relationship. The two continue to get into fights over pretty silly things (like, Tessa potentially having had a crush on her old coworker while she wasn’t even really *with* Hardin) and allll the makeup sex in the world can’t solve their problems. Tessa’s move actually ends up being a good thing for the two of them, and they seem to be working their way towards a somewhat healthy relationship when Hardin decides to bring her to London with him for his mother’s wedding. What begins as a pleasant trip soon reveals itself to be full of upsetting revelations that may change things… forever.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: After We Fell definitely wants to exist in the same world as 50 Shades of Grey and even Twilight, and will also likely appeal to fans of The Kissing Booth. It also feels like it exists in the world of your favorite sleazy CW teen shows?

Performance Worth Watching: Mine. For enduring this “movie.”

Memorable Dialogue: It’s so hard to choose! Do I go with classics like “never let me go!” or fresh new hits like “fuck me ’til you forget about that dream”?! There are so many gems.

Sex and Skin: After We Fell tries to heat things up again this time around, indulging in ice cube play, apology cunnilingus, jacuzzi sex, nightmare sex (as in, Hardin is devastated because he has a nightmare about Tessa having sex with someone else. It’s shot like it’s out of a horror movie), phone sex, sex in a gym with way too many mirrors, sex, sex, sex. A lot of it. (And safe sex, to their credit!).

Our Take: Even at just over 90 minutes long, After We Fell feels like an eternity, dragging its way through lackluster sex scenes set to B-list pop songs and very little actual conflict. I don’t normally derive pleasure from panning something, but the After franchise deserves it. The fun about series like 50 Shades of Grey is that they’re so bad they’re good, almost in on the joke, and stocked with some genuinely great cast members. The After franchise doesn’t really have that going for it, with the exception of random appearances of performers like Selma Blair, Peter Gallagher, and 50 Shades vet herself Arielle Kebbel. But most of the supporting cast from the first film (and some from the second) have been recast by now, so if you have a hard time keeping up, you’re not alone. Not that knowing who the characters are matters that much anyway.

After We Fell essentially feels like a yawn-inducing continuation of After We Collided, picking up exactly where it left off and schlepping along at a pace so slow and uneventful I kept checking how many minutes were left. After We Fell rehashes the same emotional beats as its predecessors, going around in circles that involve Hardin getting mad or jealous and Tessa having the same teary reaction until the two of them wind up having sex in whatever location is most convenient. It’s barely a movie. From the half-hearted attempts to shake things up sexually to the bizarre use of The Fray hit “Never Say Never (Don’t Let Me Go)” as the closing dramatic tune (there is a 0% chance either of the romantic leads in After We Fell know who The Fray are), none of it makes much sense. And there isn’t any real heat here, either, so it’s barely worth watching just for the soft core sexy stuff. Save yourself some time and queue up 50 Shades instead. You’ll get all the toxic relationship content you crave and a little bit of self awareness, which is far more than any of the After movies have to offer.

Our Call: SKIP IT. After We Fell is an utter slog, a snooze-fest of an attempt at sexy teen fare likely to please only the most diehard of franchise fans (and even they might be disappointed).

Jade Budowski is a freelance writer with a knack for ruining punchlines, hogging the mic at karaoke, and thirst-tweeting. Follow her on Twitter: @jadebudowski.

Where to Stream After We Fell