Dumb, horny guys are one of the mainstays of the horror genre. Whether they're beach bros getting eaten alive on beaches in Jaws or Piranha, isolated writers following naked women into bathtubs in The Shining, or ancient sailors stupid enough to sail close to the Sirens, lovable idiots have often been the first victims of monsters, curses, and haunts galore. 

But in 2026, as gender dynamics are shifting and men and masculinity are called more into question, Hollywood was ripe for an interesting new take on who's really at fault in these dude-in-distress narratives. Obsession, directed by online sketch comedian Curry Barker in his theatrical debut, taps into this niche flawlessly, recruiting a strong cadre of relative newcomers to offer a fresh spin on curses, gore, and, most scarily of all, gender roles. 

Bear (Michael Johnston) is, while friendly enough, a little bit of an incel. His hopeless romanticism towards his longtime crush Nikki (Inde Navarrette) isn't just not requited — it's never even broached as a subject with her, as Bear is constantly chickening out at the last moment. Even when Nikki shares that's giving notice at the music-store job they share to move towns, Bear is paralyzed with annoying indecision, nominally worried that his feelings will be unrequited and he'll mess up their friendship.

So, when he stumbles across a gimmicky mystic shop and the "One Wish Willow" toys the owner casually claims will grant anyone one wish, he uses his chance to wish that Nikki loved him more than anyone else in the world. Suddenly, Nikki's interested. Very interested. She canoodles closer to him from the passenger seat, insists they go back to his place, and practically demands they have sex before spending the night and making him breakfast in the morning. Bear is caught off-guard but, like the dumb horny guy he is, chooses to overlook the yellow flags in her sudden change of heart to start a relationship with her. 

Those yellow flags quickly turn red, as Nikki's love starts taking disturbing, alien, and increasingly psychotic turns. She creeps around the house and hides in corners. She exhumes his dead dog. She scares anyone who might come between her and Bear, such as friend Ian (Cooper Tomlinson) and potential romantic interest Sarah (Megan Lawless). Not only does Bear turn a blind eye to Nikki's psychological state in favor of casual sex and some semblance of a girlfriend, he chooses to ignore the role that the One Wish Willow had in her change — with disastrous consequences. 

Barker doesn't pull any punches inverting the gender roles that have become so trite in horror. The 2020s have given us no shortage of old-woman villains, for example, from Ti West with X (2022) to Zach Cregger with Barbarian (2022) and Weapons (2025) to Parker Finn with Smile (2023). Meanwhile, from his early cowardice in telling Nikki how he feels when explicitly invited, to his repeated rebukes of careful and caring friends in their worry for Nikki's mental health, Bear is a cute young guy who's also entirely the villain. Sure, Nikki is the one who's unstable, but she's a victim of the immediate curse placed on her by Bear as well as a society that is less equipped to protect her when things go wrong. Friends that try to step up to help Nikki are repeatedly overly deferential to Bear, and she's soon trapped in a prison of her psychoses. 

Speaking of Nikki, Inde Navarrette balances the character's dichotomy perfectly, playing girl-next-door kindness before the Willow and comically overly-attached yet somehow terribly entrapped soul afterwards. Her squinty grin cuts both ways as her character fights for her personhood against inner supernatural forces. In both split seconds that Nikki "wins" (such as a jarring early moment in bed with Bear chalked up to drugs) and "loses" (like a climactic midnight scene), the actress' commanding horror and uneasy discombobulation come from real talent. 

In creating the complex main engine of the film, Navarrette is aided by an exceptional crew, too. One of the most memorable tricks is how, once the Willow has been invoked, Nikki is oftentimes framed as a pitch-black silhouette with bright backlighting. Although the genre always plays with light and shadow, Obsession's coloring and shades are especially effective, as cinematographer Taylor Clemons and gaffer Christopher Oh execute on Barker's vision, communicating that not everything's right with Nikki before she even speaks. The same is true for slow, methodical pans towards some of the most upsetting reveals of the film, which allow the audience to make independent sense of a cat in the kitchen, a sandwich bag, or a bunch of duct tape, and let each unique horror dawn at its own pace. 

The world of Obsession is impressively lived-in for being made by a director whose online fare mostly relies on quick cuts and easy jokes. Supporting actors are all strong, like the two equally bizarre but very different crystal retailers (the deceptively distracted Haley Fitzgerald at the start and the flippantly creepy Darin Toonder at the end) or Tomlinson and Lawless as worried friends, light comic relief, and the surprisingly sympathetic core of the film. Even Barker himself, in a teeth-clenchingly stressful phone call, makes a voice cameo. And settings like Bear's grandma's house or the local bar add realness to the otherwise supernatural scares, thanks in part to a now very publicly cranky production designer.

Playing with the fact that although obsessive girlfriends can be creepy or annoying, it's the men who pull the strings who are the real bad guys, Obsession is both contemporary and deliciously scary.