They/Them, a gay empowerment/anti-conversion therapy horror film, was supposed to help put the Peacock streaming network on the map.
Well, it has, just not in the way it had hoped.
Over at Rotten Tomatoes, with 48 reviews logged in, They/Them has earned a terrible 29 percent rotten score from critics. The audience score is even lower — 15 percent.
Although the cast is all gay, lesbian, transsexual, and whatever else is out there now…
Although the writer, director is gay…
Here’s a taste of the results…
Kevin Bacon runs a gay conversion therapy camp in this queer thriller that’s light on scares and long on self-loathing.
…
Studios began to shove political commentary into every horror movie, whether it was “The Forever Purge” pitting Mexican immigrants against gun-toting MAGA gangs, or the latest “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” turning Leatherface into a displaced victim of tech gentrification. Horror fans can sense when films force satire into a bloodbath and it’s annoying: They’re being sold a market trend and usually all they want is good clean bloody fun.
Sadly, “They/Them” goes for the convenient tactic — in life and media — of blaming homophobia on repressed, self-hating queerness. In one of its few moments of real wit, a faux-heterosexual couple of counselors engage in foreplay by showing each other photos of people of the same sex on their phones. But elsewhere, the film gets much blunter.
The Daily Beast really flipped out:
It’s unfortunate, then, that all of the potential in They/Them is squandered by paper-thin characters, nonsensical writing, and a true misunderstanding of the real horrors that exist inside those camp gates. Even its masked killer doesn’t provide a single tremble. The real scares in They/Them are found in its cringeworthy screenplay, particularly one scene that I’ll never be able to shake. The only thing scarier than a conversion camp is one where your fellow campers start a P!nk singalong.
Here’s a clip of that singalong…
This same Daily Beast critic then slams the filmmaker for choosing a Pink song.
Why? Get a load of this…
Pink isn’t woke enough:
What’s more, [that song] is from P!nk’s greatest hits album, which is boldly entitled, Greatest Hits…So Far!!!, … that album also features a little song called “Stupid Girls,” the hottest slut-shaming song of 2006. So forgive me if I am not one to sympathize with P!nk’s perspective on apparently living an embattled life when one of the most popular songs in her oeuvre was hellbent on tearing women down for shopping and dating.
Or what about when P!nk got on stage at an event held by the Human Rights Campaign (already questionable) and began her speech by saying, “I’m gay…actually I’m not.” Personally, I think it’s very cool and fun to treat coming out like a silly little joke. Let’s throw a couple thousand dollars of film royalties her way as a thank-you.
For those of you awaiting my They/Them review, It will be up just as soon as Hell passes out snow cones. I don’t watch anything anymore where there’s even a chance two guys might kiss. It just makes me too uncomfortable. Hey, you can’t blame me for being born this way.
Horror movies work best when based on social commentary. But the commentary needs to be clever, thematically driven, subtle, and something universal. Or, it has to be over the top satire, which requires walking a fine line very few filmmakers are able to successfully navigate.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.