They/Them

The story here will glue you more than any other slasher you’ve seen. This is because this is a slasher without the added-on nonsense. There is no folk tale or legend of a killer that is referenced or played up, which has become a staple of the genre. Instead, this exceptional film uses its slasher trappings as plumage to draw in the mass market mob. Fine with me. It is hard to imagine a movie with such a specific focus on the atrocities of preference conversion programs finding a platform, so if it needs to be gussied up as a stalk and stab, then so be it. Bravo to Blumhouse for getting voices like these out there where they can finally be heard.

Logan fleshes his characters out fully and gives them a lot to do before anyone ever thinks of cutting that flesh up. You are so drawn into the drama you completely forget about the slasher bookends, which are thin but decent. Throughout They/Them, the filmmaker brings attention to how many conversion methods are centered on reinforcing traditional gender roles. The scene where all the Lesbians are made to don aprons and bake pies is hilarious. However, the scenes of intentional dead-naming and pronoun attacks are not. A lot of homophobia seems to stem from how same-sex interactions threaten gender stability for society as a whole. F**k gender stability.

“Logan has excelled in his first time at bat.”

Logan also highlights the hypocrisy of converted homosexuals who have mastered traditional hetero behavior but get down with same-on-same on in private. There is also some dark history of these camps explored and imparted as it isn’t general knowledge how savage these places got. This exploration of sexual orientation is engaging, while the various stabbings provide a sense of dread.

My only major problem is the scene where a dog is killed. You can slaughter humans and stack them up to the ceiling, but it is never advisable to kill pupper-dogs or pusser-cats in the pictures. It kills off a lot of re-watch because it provides more intense secondary trauma to the audience. Yeah, I know it is being used to show how mean the baddies can get. Use something else and leave the poor little pupper-dogs and pusser-cats out of it. Outside of that, They/Them is a captivating drama that bleeds hard in the right places. Logan has excelled in his first time at bat. I can’t wait to see what he swings at next.