Remember, kids; it’s cool to hate popular things as long as you have absolutely no argument for your stance and are standing your ground with the goal of adjacently participating in the more myopic circles of counterculture.
Jokes aside, how we as a species determine what makes a good movie is a topic of infinite curiosity that seems to shift around every other day between individuals, social groups, and, we presume, the Academy.
No genre has come close to flirting with this phenomenon the way horror has; the best have the loudest detractors, and the absolute worst have the most dedicated fandom. Indeed, the world has a topsy-turvy relationship with horror films, as we may expect from a medium that houses one M. Night Shyamalan.
Today, r/horror has chosen violence, opting to drag the most beloved freaky flicks that they feel are overdue for a good old-fashioned slagging.
One target was Barbarian, Zach Cregger’s feature film debut and arguably one of the best horror films of 2022, which is quite the distinction given the slate we got last year. As one would expect, the “why” behind these opinions was almost entirely absent, so bringing it to the table is a surefire way of wasting everyone’s time.
Another 2022 target was Ti West’s X, which kicked off a delectable trilogy that continued with Pearl and is set to conclude with MaXXXine in the future. We’ve said it once, and we’ll say it again; if you somehow manage to miss all the subtext that West offers up here, maybe brush up on your media literacy before giving a weightless opinion, or, again, at least offer more of a “why.”
Luckily, the original poster was kind enough to offer up a meatier opinion that wasn’t some form of “I disliked this because I did.”
It is absolutely, positively okay to dislike things, and it is just as okay to dislike things without really having a reason to do so, but if you take away anything from this, it’s to consider the value in saying something for the sake of having an opinion, and saying something for the sake of adding to a discussion.