Insanely wrong, like didn’t-watch-the-same-movie wrong
I literally scrubbed through the movie again as I was replying to you to make sure I had everything correct and to pull direct quotes, so maybe you’re the one who is misremembering? In that scene, we hear the MUSIC of the box when Nikki opens it, and that is when he panics and starts trying to vomit. THEN we hear the snap of the wand, his face changes, and he goes out to her. And of course she wished for him to feel the same way - that was obvious.
He did not know he was raping Nikki because there were two Nikki’s sharing the same body, and the one actively controlling the body consented. That’s why I referenced Severance, but there’s all sorts of fantasy and sci-fi about the horrors of the nature of consciousness and physical form. LATER in the movie, we finally hear from the real Nikki that “I’ve never been with you Bear”, which is reinforcing this.
She is absolutely messed up, and she doesn’t have any real ability to consent regardless of if she is possessed by a wish or if she is on drugs or if she is having a manic episode, so any sex he has would 100% be rape
Earlier in the movie, we see Bear initially backs away from Nikki’s advances when her behavior is disturbing. He The date scene happens after a montage of what appears to be weeks of them in a happy and consensual relationship, including having sex. The date scene is only the 2nd moment she shows of any odd behavior, and that behavior is still relatively mild and within the realm of normal humans being human. The horror lies in the dramatic irony that we, the audience, know that is not the real Nikki while Bear does not.
Couples have arguments and difficulties, and they have make-up sex too. Bear is trusting Nikki to communicate her own boundaries and respecting those boundaries when she does, like not wanting to talk about her father. As soon as they move on from that conversation, Nikki’s behavior reverts back to normal - she is clearly not on drugs or having a manic episode. I interpret that scene as him forgiving her for lying to him about her father and being willing to move on from it. To repeat - the horror lies in the dramatic irony that we, the audience, know that is not the real Nikki while Bear does not. The fake Nikki is in control of Nikki’s body and experiencing consensual sex while the real Nikki is experiencing rape. In fact, you might describe the entire past few weeks of having another consciousness take control of your body as rape, not just the sex scenes in particular. That is not something Bear chose or was even aware of at first, but rather something the One Wish Willow did.
It is also worth noting that is the last time that they have sex. That night is when Bear catches her watching him sleep, and THEN her behavior degenerates into things like cooking his cat and taping the door shut.
debating that makes you an incel because that is what incels would do. I don’t make the rules on that last part.
It sure seems like you’re making the rules and making up new definitions for what an incel is. This is basic media analysis and criticism, and I’m not insulting you for having takes I disagree with about a movie.
It is weird you think he cares about her because he brings her to the hospital when there is the long pause where he zones the fuck out while people are yelling at him to bring her to a hospital after she smashes herself in the face with a brick after telling everyone her poem about incest (ya know, because she thinks of Bear like a brother.)
The pause is for the pacing of the movie, to let the shock of it all hit the audience. To show his fear and uncertainty. It’s creating drama and tension. This scene happens after the point when their relationship has deteriorated - it is not as if we are treated to another happy-go-lucky montage of them having fun together after this. It is not as if Bear is trying to use her vulnerable moment here to get in her pants. In fact, once they get home Bear tells her he plans to stay the night at Ian’s. Something he probably should have done long ago, but once of his character flaws is that he’s slow. This scene is also more evidence that he cares about her - she uses that to manipulate him into staying with her. If Bear did not care about her feelings and emotions, fake Nikki would not have been able to manipulate him into staying with her as long as she did.
Bear is the villain of the movie. Just because he doesn’t seem like the villain at first doesn’t mean he is a good guy
Let’s do some character analysis.
Nikki is the biggest victim in all of this of course. Her free will and body were violated in a horrific manner, and I think we both agree there. Honestly I think most of where we disagree is that you seem to want to stop there and ONLY view the movie from Nikki’s perspective and no one else’s.
Sarah is a victim. She’s a relatively minor character, but she clearly has a crush on Bear. From her perspective, she had a conversation with her friend Nikki in which she expressed that, and Nikki talked about how she only saw Bear as a friend, then suddenly they are dating and Nikki has abandoned her entirely. So she feels hurt that Bear does not return her feelings, and she feels like Nikki lied to her and betrayed her by dating Bear. And, of course, she ends up getting violently killed by Nikki. It is worth noting that, despite being Nikki’s friend, she does not really show much concern for Nikki and is instead focused on her own feelings, but that’s understandable given the circumstances.
Ian is a victim in that he ends up dying. He’s also the most directly malevolent and selfish character we see. He tells Bear not to express his feelings to Nikki, and recommends calling her “freaky Nikki”. He has known about Bear’s feelings for Nikki for some time and appears to be his friend, so at first we assume this is simply honest and misguided advice. We later see him express some concern about their relationship, and think he is trying to be a good friend. Then Sarah reveals that Ian and Nikki have been secretly “hooking up” for the past 2 years, which changes the context of all of those interactions. We now see that Ian was actively lying to Bear to sabotage him, and that his “concern” for Nikki was actually him being upset that he was no longer having sex with her. When Bear shows up at his house distraught, covered in blood, and asking for help, Ian plays it off as a joke and dismisses Bear. Then he makes his wish, gets his money and… is too happy about suddenly having a billion dollars to care about what this means for Bear and Nikki. I would still not call Ian a “villain”, but he is certainly an antagonist.
Bear is neither a “villain” nor a “good guy”, he’s just the protagonist. He is flawed: he does not understand what love is, he is insecure, he is passive, he is too trusting of others. He trusts Ian’s advice about things like not telling Nikki about his feelings and calling her “freaky Nikki”. He trusts the fake Nikki with all of her reassurances and consent. He never tries to manipulate her - the only thing he does is express his desire in a moment of privacy and frustration. He doesn’t wish for her to have sex with him, he doesn’t wish for her mind to be replaced with some evil entity that is obsessed with him, he doesn’t wish for her to change, he just wishes that she loved him. He DOES care about Nikki, and the fake Nikki uses that against him.
In the opening scene, he doesn’t say a single thing about who Nikki is for why he likes her. He only says things about himself. He says she makes him feel good, that she was there for him. But he doesn’t say anything about her that doesn’t involve him. Because he doesn’t love her.
In the opening scene, yes he talks about how Nikki makes him feel, but not in a passive way. He does not want to go out with her because she’s hot or has social status, but because she is kind and caring. When he talks about her being there to support him, I interpret that as a pretty strong statement about who Nikki is. He literally says “Well, I realized who you are. And then, after Nana passed, you were the one that called called” We do not know - was Ian there to support him? Was Sarah, who has a crush on Bear?
He then goes on to say, "So I keep telling myself, “Don’t tell her. She’s too good. And she’ll… you’ll lose her. But maybe you should know… that I would choose you over everything.” And when he says that, the anonymous waitress sitting as a proxy for Nikki smiles and laughs and seems almost charmed herself. Ian stops him and says he is cringey, but the waitress says she thought it was sweet. That is not just Bear talking about how she makes him feel, but hard evidence of Bear believing that he knows who she is and caring for her. And, of course, foreshadowing that he will eventually kill himself for her.
Finally, this gets a bit more abstract, but I would lump the One Wish Willow, the company that makes it, and fake Nikki into one magical entity that comprise the closest thing to a villain that the story has. The clerk in the beginning mentions other people coming back and complaining, meaning that Bear is not the first victim. What Bear receives is not really love, it is… Obsession.
I did not think people like you actually existed, but here we are…
When Nikki says she’s writing a love story, Bear replies, “What? A romance novel?” She says, explicitly, that there is a distinct difference. The director is saying to Bear–to people like YOU–that Bear does not understand what love is. He assumes that love and romance are the same thing, and that’s kinda the point. He thinks he loves Nikki, but he doesn’t.
The watching him sleep angle is insane, too. She is watching him sleep because Wish Nikki does not like her dreams. It’s heavily implied that Nikki has some limited control over Wish Nikki throughout the fucking film, and this is another one of those cases. She doesn’t like her dreams because the real Nikki has more control there.
When Bear dies at the end of the movie, why the fuck does Nikki immediately shove Bear’s body onto the fucking floor once she’s free and begin sobbing? Not really a thing you do to people you are supposed to see as a hero. I would argue that she understands that Bear was a fucking monster who raped her, which is also not a heroic thing to do, but maybe I just understand the movie better than you do. Just kidding, the director who made the fucking movie has pointed out repeatedly that Bear is the villain in interviews. So have the fucking actors.
So, maybe you think you know the movie better than the director and actors, but I would argue that part of what makes Bear such a compelling villain is that a lot of men see some portion of themselves in Bear, and the more you see of yourself in Bear, the harder it is to rationalize that he is the villain. He doesn’t start off as a monster. His wish isn’t intended to harm Nikki at the beginning. But, his complicity in harming Nikki throughout the film makes him the villain. The fact that he rapes her and he does not show any sort of remorse for that is just… So fucking obvious that he is the villain that it should really make you think about your own capacity for remorse.
I did not think people like you actually existed, but here we are…
This is all you have, isn’t it? You aren’t addressing any of my actual points. In fact, you seem to be fundamentally misunderstanding them or ignoring them, and even putting words in my mouth, and then just insulting me. Very productive.
The watching him sleep angle is insane, too. She is watching him sleep because Wish Nikki does not like her dreams. It’s heavily implied that Nikki has some limited control over Wish Nikki throughout the fucking film, and this is another one of those cases. She doesn’t like her dreams because the real Nikki has more control there.
Fake Nikki is watching Bear sleep because she is OBSESSED with him. In a movie called “Obsession”. It is not just implied, but ESTABLISHED that the real Nikki can exert some control whenever the fake Nikki is asleep. But that is not established until AFTER the scene where she watches him sleep. I’m not sure why you are bringing this up anyways, or what point I made earlier that you are addressing with this.
When Bear dies at the end of the movie, why the fuck does Nikki immediately shove Bear’s body onto the fucking floor once she’s free and begin sobbing?
Because it’s a BLOOD SOAKED DEAD BODY. If she loved him, we might expect her to cling to his corpse. But the real Nikki did not ever love him, so her reaction is very natural. This is quite plainly highlighted by how the fake Nikki is embracing him as he loses consciousness and starts to foam at the mouth, and is starting to be concerned until he dies. That’s when fake Nikki ceases to exist and real Nikki is finally left to deal with the bloody aftermath.
Not really a thing you do to people you are supposed to see as a hero. I would argue that she understands that Bear was a fucking monster who raped her, which is also not a heroic thing to do, but maybe I just understand the movie better than you do.
I never once called Bear a “hero”, just to clarify. If you think protagonist = hero you need to go back to middle school literature class.
Just kidding, the director who made the fucking movie has pointed out repeatedly that Bear is the villain in interviews. So have the fucking actors.
Give me a link to the quote. I have looked around and cannot find anything remotely like this. In fact, I could find this quote from Michael Johnston, the actor who played Bear:
I never thought of Bear as a villain, but what really drew me to this story was the gray morals of it all. I love that it’s not black-and-white. I love that it doesn’t tell you how you should feel. It’s really up for interpretation, because the truth is, Bear has good in him and he has bad in him, like all of us. I do think that he leans more toward the bad in a lot of ways. But it was really important to keep the audience rooting for him in some ways. So when I played him, I just had to stay completely focused on what he wanted more than anything else, and try not to judge any of his decisions. But I would say he definitely starts as the protagonist, and I would tend to agree that I can see him becoming a bit of an antagonist. I love that. Fully, the antagonist, though? I don’t think I would say fully, because the key thing is he didn’t know that the wish was going to work. Sure, his desires were incredibly selfish. Totally, 100 percent, but he didn’t know the wish was gonna work. And then he dug himself into such a deep hole that he didn’t really see any chance of getting out, so he just kept digging himself deeper. But I love it. I love the discourse, it’s amazing. It’s so much more interesting.
So you are really just making shit up because you REALLY, REALLY want this movie to be about gender wars. I am not saying that incels or the manosphere are not problems. I am not saying that horror movies using those themes to express how terrible those communities cannot or should not exist. What I AM saying, is that this movie is not doing that. And the actor who plays the lead is on record in agreement with me.
I literally scrubbed through the movie again as I was replying to you to make sure I had everything correct and to pull direct quotes, so maybe you’re the one who is misremembering? In that scene, we hear the MUSIC of the box when Nikki opens it, and that is when he panics and starts trying to vomit. THEN we hear the snap of the wand, his face changes, and he goes out to her. And of course she wished for him to feel the same way - that was obvious.
He did not know he was raping Nikki because there were two Nikki’s sharing the same body, and the one actively controlling the body consented. That’s why I referenced Severance, but there’s all sorts of fantasy and sci-fi about the horrors of the nature of consciousness and physical form. LATER in the movie, we finally hear from the real Nikki that “I’ve never been with you Bear”, which is reinforcing this.
Earlier in the movie, we see Bear initially backs away from Nikki’s advances when her behavior is disturbing. He The date scene happens after a montage of what appears to be weeks of them in a happy and consensual relationship, including having sex. The date scene is only the 2nd moment she shows of any odd behavior, and that behavior is still relatively mild and within the realm of normal humans being human. The horror lies in the dramatic irony that we, the audience, know that is not the real Nikki while Bear does not.
Couples have arguments and difficulties, and they have make-up sex too. Bear is trusting Nikki to communicate her own boundaries and respecting those boundaries when she does, like not wanting to talk about her father. As soon as they move on from that conversation, Nikki’s behavior reverts back to normal - she is clearly not on drugs or having a manic episode. I interpret that scene as him forgiving her for lying to him about her father and being willing to move on from it. To repeat - the horror lies in the dramatic irony that we, the audience, know that is not the real Nikki while Bear does not. The fake Nikki is in control of Nikki’s body and experiencing consensual sex while the real Nikki is experiencing rape. In fact, you might describe the entire past few weeks of having another consciousness take control of your body as rape, not just the sex scenes in particular. That is not something Bear chose or was even aware of at first, but rather something the One Wish Willow did.
It is also worth noting that is the last time that they have sex. That night is when Bear catches her watching him sleep, and THEN her behavior degenerates into things like cooking his cat and taping the door shut.
It sure seems like you’re making the rules and making up new definitions for what an incel is. This is basic media analysis and criticism, and I’m not insulting you for having takes I disagree with about a movie.
The pause is for the pacing of the movie, to let the shock of it all hit the audience. To show his fear and uncertainty. It’s creating drama and tension. This scene happens after the point when their relationship has deteriorated - it is not as if we are treated to another happy-go-lucky montage of them having fun together after this. It is not as if Bear is trying to use her vulnerable moment here to get in her pants. In fact, once they get home Bear tells her he plans to stay the night at Ian’s. Something he probably should have done long ago, but once of his character flaws is that he’s slow. This scene is also more evidence that he cares about her - she uses that to manipulate him into staying with her. If Bear did not care about her feelings and emotions, fake Nikki would not have been able to manipulate him into staying with her as long as she did.
Let’s do some character analysis.
Nikki is the biggest victim in all of this of course. Her free will and body were violated in a horrific manner, and I think we both agree there. Honestly I think most of where we disagree is that you seem to want to stop there and ONLY view the movie from Nikki’s perspective and no one else’s.
Sarah is a victim. She’s a relatively minor character, but she clearly has a crush on Bear. From her perspective, she had a conversation with her friend Nikki in which she expressed that, and Nikki talked about how she only saw Bear as a friend, then suddenly they are dating and Nikki has abandoned her entirely. So she feels hurt that Bear does not return her feelings, and she feels like Nikki lied to her and betrayed her by dating Bear. And, of course, she ends up getting violently killed by Nikki. It is worth noting that, despite being Nikki’s friend, she does not really show much concern for Nikki and is instead focused on her own feelings, but that’s understandable given the circumstances.
Ian is a victim in that he ends up dying. He’s also the most directly malevolent and selfish character we see. He tells Bear not to express his feelings to Nikki, and recommends calling her “freaky Nikki”. He has known about Bear’s feelings for Nikki for some time and appears to be his friend, so at first we assume this is simply honest and misguided advice. We later see him express some concern about their relationship, and think he is trying to be a good friend. Then Sarah reveals that Ian and Nikki have been secretly “hooking up” for the past 2 years, which changes the context of all of those interactions. We now see that Ian was actively lying to Bear to sabotage him, and that his “concern” for Nikki was actually him being upset that he was no longer having sex with her. When Bear shows up at his house distraught, covered in blood, and asking for help, Ian plays it off as a joke and dismisses Bear. Then he makes his wish, gets his money and… is too happy about suddenly having a billion dollars to care about what this means for Bear and Nikki. I would still not call Ian a “villain”, but he is certainly an antagonist.
Bear is neither a “villain” nor a “good guy”, he’s just the protagonist. He is flawed: he does not understand what love is, he is insecure, he is passive, he is too trusting of others. He trusts Ian’s advice about things like not telling Nikki about his feelings and calling her “freaky Nikki”. He trusts the fake Nikki with all of her reassurances and consent. He never tries to manipulate her - the only thing he does is express his desire in a moment of privacy and frustration. He doesn’t wish for her to have sex with him, he doesn’t wish for her mind to be replaced with some evil entity that is obsessed with him, he doesn’t wish for her to change, he just wishes that she loved him. He DOES care about Nikki, and the fake Nikki uses that against him.
In the opening scene, yes he talks about how Nikki makes him feel, but not in a passive way. He does not want to go out with her because she’s hot or has social status, but because she is kind and caring. When he talks about her being there to support him, I interpret that as a pretty strong statement about who Nikki is. He literally says “Well, I realized who you are. And then, after Nana passed, you were the one that called called” We do not know - was Ian there to support him? Was Sarah, who has a crush on Bear?
He then goes on to say, "So I keep telling myself, “Don’t tell her. She’s too good. And she’ll… you’ll lose her. But maybe you should know… that I would choose you over everything.” And when he says that, the anonymous waitress sitting as a proxy for Nikki smiles and laughs and seems almost charmed herself. Ian stops him and says he is cringey, but the waitress says she thought it was sweet. That is not just Bear talking about how she makes him feel, but hard evidence of Bear believing that he knows who she is and caring for her. And, of course, foreshadowing that he will eventually kill himself for her.
Finally, this gets a bit more abstract, but I would lump the One Wish Willow, the company that makes it, and fake Nikki into one magical entity that comprise the closest thing to a villain that the story has. The clerk in the beginning mentions other people coming back and complaining, meaning that Bear is not the first victim. What Bear receives is not really love, it is… Obsession.
I did not think people like you actually existed, but here we are…
When Nikki says she’s writing a love story, Bear replies, “What? A romance novel?” She says, explicitly, that there is a distinct difference. The director is saying to Bear–to people like YOU–that Bear does not understand what love is. He assumes that love and romance are the same thing, and that’s kinda the point. He thinks he loves Nikki, but he doesn’t.
The watching him sleep angle is insane, too. She is watching him sleep because Wish Nikki does not like her dreams. It’s heavily implied that Nikki has some limited control over Wish Nikki throughout the fucking film, and this is another one of those cases. She doesn’t like her dreams because the real Nikki has more control there.
When Bear dies at the end of the movie, why the fuck does Nikki immediately shove Bear’s body onto the fucking floor once she’s free and begin sobbing? Not really a thing you do to people you are supposed to see as a hero. I would argue that she understands that Bear was a fucking monster who raped her, which is also not a heroic thing to do, but maybe I just understand the movie better than you do. Just kidding, the director who made the fucking movie has pointed out repeatedly that Bear is the villain in interviews. So have the fucking actors.
So, maybe you think you know the movie better than the director and actors, but I would argue that part of what makes Bear such a compelling villain is that a lot of men see some portion of themselves in Bear, and the more you see of yourself in Bear, the harder it is to rationalize that he is the villain. He doesn’t start off as a monster. His wish isn’t intended to harm Nikki at the beginning. But, his complicity in harming Nikki throughout the film makes him the villain. The fact that he rapes her and he does not show any sort of remorse for that is just… So fucking obvious that he is the villain that it should really make you think about your own capacity for remorse.
This is all you have, isn’t it? You aren’t addressing any of my actual points. In fact, you seem to be fundamentally misunderstanding them or ignoring them, and even putting words in my mouth, and then just insulting me. Very productive.
Fake Nikki is watching Bear sleep because she is OBSESSED with him. In a movie called “Obsession”. It is not just implied, but ESTABLISHED that the real Nikki can exert some control whenever the fake Nikki is asleep. But that is not established until AFTER the scene where she watches him sleep. I’m not sure why you are bringing this up anyways, or what point I made earlier that you are addressing with this.
Because it’s a BLOOD SOAKED DEAD BODY. If she loved him, we might expect her to cling to his corpse. But the real Nikki did not ever love him, so her reaction is very natural. This is quite plainly highlighted by how the fake Nikki is embracing him as he loses consciousness and starts to foam at the mouth, and is starting to be concerned until he dies. That’s when fake Nikki ceases to exist and real Nikki is finally left to deal with the bloody aftermath.
I never once called Bear a “hero”, just to clarify. If you think protagonist = hero you need to go back to middle school literature class.
Give me a link to the quote. I have looked around and cannot find anything remotely like this. In fact, I could find this quote from Michael Johnston, the actor who played Bear:
So you are really just making shit up because you REALLY, REALLY want this movie to be about gender wars. I am not saying that incels or the manosphere are not problems. I am not saying that horror movies using those themes to express how terrible those communities cannot or should not exist. What I AM saying, is that this movie is not doing that. And the actor who plays the lead is on record in agreement with me.