#THEM : There’s always gonna be friction when a horror creator paints the walls with something this angry, this ugly, this confrontational while people are looking to the genre to empower or comfort them. It is a precarious moment in time to be doing this on a mainstream platform.
Does that mean they shouldn’t? Ryan Coogler probably couldn’t make FRUITVALE STATION today. That doesn’t mean he shouldn’t.

THEM is so angry and so harsh as to almost come across as reckless. That doesn’t invalidate its need to be, but folks are wary of perceived recklessness.
As I said a few weeks ago, this is a much more pissed-off, extremely less polite kind of horror than we’ve seen in a while. It feels closer to the transgressive exploitation of another era, and it’s easy to see why 2021 might not be up for that. Everyone is so tired.
So the anger and pushback are valid, but I also believe this storyteller’s need to tell this story is valid.

To suggest otherwise is to suggest we are all on the same page about where we are in this country regarding our reckoning with anti-blackness. And obviously we are not.
Our first duty to each other is to listen. But whether you decide to watch the show or not, that duty to listen should include the folks who felt compelled to tell this story. It is difficult to imagine this was a particularly fun endeavor.
Horror attracts folks with different thresholds, and I know even the most severe horror is therapeutic to some. But we all know our own thresholds, and should engage accordingly.

But when someone has something to say, it’s good to always try to listen.
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