THEM: The Scare Review: Is More Horror but Less Repulsive Than Season 1
Cast: Deborah Ayorinde, Luke James, Pam Grier
Created By: Little Marvin
Streaming Platform: Prime Video
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 3.5/5 (three and a half stars)
From 25 April on Prime Video, THEM: The Scare is available for streaming, the second season of the horror anthology TV series which debuted in 2021 on the Amazon streaming platform with a story that struck, and continues to hit, violently, anyone who looked at it (and if like us you missed it at the time, you’d better catch it, trust me). Compared to Them Season 1 (the subtitle of the first season), this second chapter is perhaps more horror, and certainly more complex in its narrative structure. But just as surely, The Scare causes less anger, disgust, and heaviness of the soul. Before explaining why, let’s briefly and without spoilers summarize the series’ plot. The black wave of horror, inaugurated by Jordan Peele a few years ago, allowed many terrifying stories to mix with social commentary to reach large stages.
In the context of television series, the trend has caught the interest of many authors, determined to tell new stories through a stylistic exaltation that only in horror manages to strike the right chords. Among these, the Them series represented a curious discovery in 2021: released on Prime Video without too much fanfare, the Little Marvin series surprised many precisely for its ability to merge the horrors of America with the more macabre ones of the paranormal, bringing together wide acclaim among the public and critics. A different approach, this time driven by the desire to tell a broader context of the small provincial community and by the desire to immerse oneself in the heart of a suffering city. Facilitated by a more important production and the interest of many experts in the genre, the second season of Them marks an important step forward for the show. It conquers a prominent place among the most intriguing productions on the platform. All without being afraid to dare, constantly playing with the viewer and with the stylistic features of the genre.
THEM: The Scare Review: The Story Plot
From the first season in 1953, this season 2 leaps forward to 1991. Geographically, however, we are more or less always there, in California, in the county of Los Angeles. The protagonist is Dawn Reeve (Deborah Ayorinde, who played mother Lucky Emory in the first season), an LAPD detective who, as an African American, particularly suffers from the climate of tension and hatred in the city after the sadly well-known beating of her colleagues in uniform against Rodney King. One day she is called to investigate the case after a murder so brutal that the other policemen can’t even hold back their vomit: the victim is a foster mother of several orphaned children. And Reeve’s colleague, who has no qualms about hiding her violent racism, takes little time to accuse the eldest of the foster children, a black boy.
But Reeve has no intention of letting him get away with it, also because that boy reminds him a bit of his son Kelvin, with whom he lives together with his mother, the boy’s grandmother. “Then” we meet Edmund: clumsy if not downright clumsy, he works in an entertainment center for kids but the dream he cultivates is to be an actor. Unfortunately for him, however, the auditions to which he is called are always for minor roles such as “gangster 1” or “drug dealer 2”, and considering his character he just can’t get cast. We won’t tell you what Edmund has to do with Reeve and his case, and why we told you to catch up on the first season to avoid spoilers, but if we’ve intrigued you so far perhaps you’ll want to watch the official trailer for THEM: The Scare.
THEM: The Scare may not achieve the same resonance as many other shows, but it confirms itself as a production to keep an eye on in the future – especially if you are a fan of the genre. Little Marvin and co were able to repeat the success of the first season by taking risks with a narrative closer to the interest of the general public, without however getting lost trying to convince everyone. Indeed, the critical gaze towards society remains the same and is even exalted in telling the sad vicissitudes of the Edmund of a phenomenal Luke James: the series exploits multiple levels of reading, from the social to the horror one, telling a more intimate dimension of anxiety. The horror, here, starts from trauma and evolves in unexpected ways, more disturbing than ever, bringing to the stage a dialogue between terror and pain that is worth the entire viewing of the series.
THEM: The Scare Review and Analysis
The key to understanding this story is clearly explained in the title: “fear”. Fear becomes an entity in itself in Little Marvin’s work, a disease that spreads from generation to generation and takes frightening and terrible forms. If in the first season, we talked about a constant fear of being killed simply for being black, the story was set between the first and second half of the twentieth century, here things are not much different even if they have become slightly more subtle. Police violence against the black population – but more generally against immigrants in the United States, in fact, we also meet a Mexican and a Korean family – is out of control and it is impossible to obtain justice if you live in a certain part of the city. Dawn’s struggle to be treated as an equal by her colleagues, and for certain investigations to be carried out with greater objectivity, seems to be against windmills, and as much as she tries to be the best there is always something that pulls her back: his sex and the color of his skin.
Fear is something that is passed from one generation to another, a trauma that comes alive and returns to haunt its victims: the monstrous killer of this series – a disturbing red-haired man – is the result of an unhealthy environment, of a sick society and wounds inflicted on this generation, but also on the previous one and the one before that. Little Marvin’s perspective is once again extremely fascinating and proceeds through allegories and metaphors so effectively as to touch even an audience far from the cultural context in which the story is set. The setting chosen by the author works perfectly to tell a story like this, if the fifties and sixties of the first season took us into a very specific context of enormous change for the black population of the United States, the period between the Eighties and Nineties tells us a very different situation. We are no longer in the white suburbs of the American suburbs, but in a dirty, crowded metropolis, at the mercy of the most famous serial killers in history (Manson and Richard Ramirez, The Night Stalker are mentioned), in those neighborhoods populated only by blacks and immigrants, where if someone disappears, if someone is brutally killed, it’s not that big of a problem…
The attention to the horror plot, as we anticipated at the beginning, becomes predominant in the last episodes of the season, perhaps neglecting a little the social criticism that had always been at the basis of the narrative. It’s not necessarily a flaw, after all, THEM: The Scare is first and foremost a horror story, but the ending, unfortunately, loses a bit of effectiveness. Both Deborah Ayorinde (who played the protagonist Lucky in the first season) and Luke James hold the weight of the narrative on their shoulders very well, showing great interpretative versatility throughout the episodes. Pam Grier in the role of Grandmother Athena and the young Joshua J. Williams, Dawn’s teenage son, are also convincing and are capable of giving life on the screen to that fear that increasingly grips their lives.
The finale closes the horrifying plot without leaving too many questions unanswered but opens up – linking to the previous season – to a possible third tranche of episodes. The connection between the two seasons is rather consistent with the discussion of “intergenerational trauma” created by the author and gives the work a further complexity that we appreciate. It remains to be seen how Little Marvin will want to continue his story, whether we will start from where the second season ends or if there will be a further time leap. There is also the possibility that the final twist remains an end in itself, in any case, it perfectly reiterates the message of the series: fear can transform into a monstrous disease, which is transmitted from parents to children, from generation to generation. Is it possible to interrupt this terrifying chain of trauma? The series does not give us an answer, perhaps because to date we have not yet found a way to free the society in which we live from diseases such as racism and discrimination.
If in the first season, it was hatred and prejudice that manifested themselves, even in the form of intangible monsters (but capable of causing damage), in the second season we find ourselves faced with the materialization of the sense of guilt. Selfish choices by immature adults that are harmful to children end up turning out to be ghosts of the past ready to demand compensation. At a high price. The tension grows episode after episode. If in the first two episodes of the season, we begin to become passionate about the investigative case that Detective Yves is dealing with, thinking that we are faced with a different narrative style and different atmospheres, from the third episode we acquire more and more awareness. We were fooled: we hadn’t yet noticed the thin red line that unites the first and second seasons and which becomes more and more evident as the episodes go by.
As happened in 2021, we begin to share with the protagonist’s terrifying sequences, inexplicable events, and a seemingly unfounded terror that is promptly justified. As secrets emerge from the past, the challenges become more and more pressing. I’m not talking about a thin red line that ties Them in the two random seasons. I’m talking about it because this season the dominant color is red, the color of blood. Everything is filtered through lights, shadows, and red objects. In a crescendo of horrors and ruthless killings, together with Dawn, we hunt a killer who seems to be unstoppable. In a direct reference to the work of Jordan Peele.
Together with the red of the warning lights, the sirens of ambulances and police cars, and the ornaments of the dolls, we find ourselves catapulted into the waking nightmare that our detective is experiencing together with her entire family. Like her, we too risk losing contact with reality, confused between what is real and what is only imaginary. But Them doesn’t want to confuse us, she just wants to make us aware of the level of confusion, fear, and uncertainty that grips Dawn’s soul. An extraordinary protagonist, who chose to wear the badge so that what was too often repeated under her in her eyes would no longer happen. Changing the System from the Inside: That’s what Dawn was trying to do when she came across the case that changed her life forever. But we know, because her story has taught us, that change requires a long, painful process, which always involves a large number of people. And of generations.
In terms of themes, atmosphere, and strength of its ideas, The Scare is a product that simply cannot be limited to the niche. Probably to some, it might even seem like a little “horror” work on the surface, but the intention to explore something that goes beyond the graphics, or the surface is evident. Not all the choices prove to be completely right, but to fully appreciate the series it will be enough to find a way to live with the feeling that perhaps even more could have been dared (especially in the social story). Not everyone would have appreciated it, but by now we would be talking about a truly shocking work. Beyond instincts, Them confirms itself as one of the most interesting productions on TV horror and appears more aware, convinced and attentive on almost all fronts. By allowing an intrinsic trauma to emerge that transcends the boundaries of time, Little Marvin demonstrates that he knows how to narrate a complex context in an extremely fascinating (but above all effective) way, allowing anyone to experience the social horror of his work.
THEM: The Scare Review: The Last Words
THEM: The Scare is a truly engaging operation, which despite some flaws succeeds in its attempt to mix horror and crime to bring to the stage a powerful story about pain. Alternating paranormal and real in style, Little Marvin confirms himself as an author to keep an eye on for the next seasons of his anthology. A crime thriller-horror with a female detective who must solve a murder in which prejudices and supernatural forces mix to the point of confusion: here is a possible extreme synthesis of Them 2. But also True Detective 4, if you’ve noticed: who knows if this new story will also attract the same controversy as True Detective Season 4 or Them?
THEM: The Scare Review: Is More Horror but Less Repulsive Than Season 1 - Filmyhype
Director: Little Marvin
Date Created: 2024-04-25 18:59
3.5
Pros
- The horror plot is really engaging
- The social metaphor is very effective
- The connection with the previous series is interesting...
Cons
- ...but we need to see if the author decides to delve deeper
- The ending doesn't hit as hard as it should
