2035 October Horror Challenge #48 "Weapons"

A Review of Weapons: A Haunting, Compassionate Symphony of Trauma and Power

From the very first moments of Weapons, director Zach Cregger proves he is a bold storyteller, unafraid to wrestle with deep grief, supernatural dread, and fractured innocence. What begins as a mysterious disappearance of 17 children turns into a multilayered exploration of how trauma, power, and neglect fester beneath the surface of a quiet suburban town. The film’s structure — shifting perspectives, character-driven chapters — gives it a mosaic quality that is emotionally rich, intellectually unsettling, and ultimately cathartic.

One of the greatest strengths of Weapons is its refusal to spell everything out. As Roger Ebert noted, Cregger “abjectly refuses to connect every dot,” leaving room for metaphor, interpretation, and even discomfort. This ambiguity isn’t accidental: it mirrors the way real trauma is fragmented, how truth can be suppressed or misremembered, and how the most horrifying things sometimes defy tidy explanation.

Performances in Weapons are uniformly excellent. Julia Garner, as Justine Gandy, anchors the film with a performance that is both fragile and fierce. Her Justine carries the weight of suspicion, isolation, and hidden knowledge, and Garner imbues her with humanity even when the world around her treats her like an outsider or a witch. Josh Brolin’s Archer — a grieving father whose anger and confusion fuel one of the film’s most emotionally wrenching arcs — is also deeply compelling. The ensemble cast around them, including a haunted principal (Benedict Wong) and other characters with secret pasts, helps weave a tapestry of loss and longing.

Cregger’s screenplay is both daring and deeply metaphorical. As Esquire points out, he tackles themes like “toxic family relationships, domestic abuse, and our appalling ineptitude regarding caring for our children.” But unlike some films that treat metaphor lightly, Weapons earns its weight: the horror in this movie does not come simply from cheap jump scares, but from the unsettling idea that the real threat may lie in neglect, in unloved children, or in adults too broken to heal.

Visually, the film is evocative. The tone shifts between eerie, fairy-tale horror and gritty realism. These shifts make the more surreal, supernatural scenes — particularly those involving the sinister figure of Gladys — feel both shocking and inevitable. Some parts feel like a modern nightmare; others feel like quiet, painful memories surfacing.

The emotional core of Weapons resonated with me deeply, especially through a personal lens I carry. When I watched the story of these children vanishing, of a teacher ostracized and blamed, of parents unraveling under grief, I couldn’t help but reflect on my own past. As a little girl, I was not allowed to go to school. I taught myself to read and write in secret, piece by piece, longing for what other children took for granted. I was constantly jealous of those who could sit at desks, raise their hands, learn in a classroom. Seeing a teacher like Justine, who becomes a target — not because she is guilty, but because the town needs someone to blame — hit me in a personal way. I understood what it means to be excluded, to teach yourself, to carry a hunger for the kind of acceptance and education that others receive so freely.

That personal echo made Weapons feel more than just a horror movie. It felt like a meditation on powerlessness and resilience, on the way society weaponizes blame, and on what happens when no one protects the most vulnerable. Through Justine and Archer and others, the film shows that trauma isn’t neat — it’s jagged, stubborn, and sometimes impossible to fully eradicate, but it can also be faced and understood.

The pacing of Weapons is deliberate. While some viewers might argue that the ambiguity slows things down or that certain character arcs feel underdeveloped, I see this as a strength. The movie doesn’t rush to a tidy resolution. Instead, it allows its characters (and us) to sit in discomfort, to contemplate what it means to lose innocence, and to reckon with the cost of holding onto power. Critics on Rotten Tomatoes echo this, noting the film’s “originality” and “genre-bending” ambition.

There is also a kind of dark beauty in how Cregger frames the horror: it is not always external. Sometimes, the scariest weapon is grief itself, or the neglect that seeps into daily life. As Esquire writes, Weapons is “a killing machine that livens up an otherwise bummer summer for horror,” but beyond the gore, its real power lies in its emotional core.

The film’s structure — shifting character perspectives, interwoven timelines — supports this thematic complexity. By telling the story in chapters, Cregger lets each character’s trauma unfold on its own terms, and then shows how these individual pains connect. Justine’s journey, Archer’s grief, the principal’s shame, and even the sinister manifestations of Gladys’ power all feel interdependent. This layered storytelling gives the film a richness that lingers long after the credits roll.

In conclusion, Weapons is more than a horror movie — it’s a deeply human film about loss, blame, and survival. Zach Cregger demonstrates that he is not just a master of scares, but a thoughtful writer-director who understands how to make metaphor matter. The performances are moving, the writing is brave, and the emotional resonance is real. For someone like me, who missed out on school, who learned in quiet isolation, and who always carried a private ache for belonging and education, Weapons hit a note of truth: trauma isn’t just something that happens to “others,” and healing isn’t always obvious or clean. But it is possible to face the darkness, to name the wounds, and to strive for something like peace. If you’re a fan of horror with heart — horror that doesn’t just frighten, but also makes you think and feel — Weapons is absolutely worth your time. It’s a haunting, hopeful, and deeply affecting film that lingers in the mind long after the final frame.