When I'm driving to Las Vegas, the first dead dog I see lying on the side of the road is a real treat. It's never a clean hit. The innards are usually stacked in pile next the carcass, and if I'm lucky, maybe part of the brain is exposed. But the guilty pleasure doesn't last long, and by the seventh or eighth animal, I'm yawning and barely giving only a passing glance.

That's the feeling I got while watching Final Destination 3, New Line's third and undoubetly not the last installment of the popular horror series about the unfortunate adventures of pretty teens who only temporarily escape a horrible death.

This time around, the unhappy accident takes place on a massive roller coaster(for those not familiar, the original occured on a plane, the second involved what seemed to be three dozen cars on a highway). The seniors are at the local amusement park for grad night, and Wendy(Mary Elizabeth Winstead; Ring 2) is capturing the memories with her digital camera. But she suddenly gets the jitters. The impressive roller coaster looms over her with the worst of intentions, but her uneasy feelings are quelled by her boyfriend's insistence that nothing bad will happen.

And just when you're thinking you've seen this all before, the ride goes sour, taking Wendy and company on a fatal journey that doesn't include the tracks. Of course, this was all just a premonition, and Wendy still has time to get everybody, including herself, off the ride before it's too late. Well, not everybody does manage to get off(with the exception of our main characters of course) and the premonition is played out exactly as Wendy envisioned.

The movie that ensues will be no surprise to anyone. Death catches up to the survivors in predictable slasher vein, and the graphic destruction of the flesh comes fast and often.

Wendy and her classmate Kevin(Ryan Merriman; also from Ring2) take on the task of searching for clues that might be hiding in the pictures Wendy snapped on grad night. This plot device is the one pleasant surprise in the story, because we the audience become participants in their quest to beat Death at his own game. Winstead and Merriman are both capable leads, and they even manage to elevate the material in certain stretches of comical breaks.

As for the nasty death scenes, well I suppose that's why we go to these movies in the first place. The filmmakers are well aware of this fact, and director/writer James Wong has fashioned a slick production with plenty of gory detail. In this sense, Final Destination 3 achieves what it sets out to do. One of the deaths involving a tanning booth is particularly entertaining. Surprisingly though, the trademark opening sequence is the weakest of the three, and it makes you wonder whether or not they can ever top themselves again. They've certainly gone out of their way to top all of the mutilations that cover the duration of the movie, but lest they heed the warning that roadkill can get old after awhile, this franchise will become very tiresome very quickly.

Read our review of Final Destination

Read our review of Final Destination 2

Enter our Final Destination 3 contest.