Reader Comments Review: HIM (2025)

I was going to write an in-depth analysis of HIM, but unfortunately, there isn’t enough depth to analyze.

This movie seems to be universally recognized as bad, which honestly made me even more excited to watch it.

Y’all know I love bad movies more than good ones 😌

I was already looking forward to it because the concept is so unique.

A football body horror cult movie?

Unheard of!

Anything unique is guaranteed to grab my attention, even (and especially) if the early reviews are trashing it.

But HIM is the perfect example of what happens when you have a strong concept but no story.

Instead of building its unique premise into a real narrative, the film strings together a series of “wouldn’t it be creepy if...?” moments.

The result is hardly a plot -- it’s a highlight reel of weird beats with no escalation, no momentum, and no real character arcs.

Choose any random episode of Love Island -- I guarantee it has a stronger narrative arc than HIM.

(speaking of, is anyone watching Love Island Games? 🤔)

To be fair, there is technically a plot. And it's as follows:

A college athlete on the verge of going pro trains with his favorite NFL player, Isaiah, who’s about to retire.

At Isaiah’s remote facility, the protagonist encounters brutal training methods, sketchy medical practices, and cult-like superfans.

In the end, it’s revealed he was groomed his whole life to become the next “HIM” -- a chosen all-star in a shared bloodline of elite athletes -- and he must kill Isaiah to take his place.

On paper, this is a strong concept.

In execution, the movie only remembers its own premise in the final scene.

It feels like the filmmaker thought of two cool reveals first, then tried to reverse-engineer everything else to get there -- and failed.

The worst part is the beginning tricked me into thinking it was building to something that never even becomes a C-plot.

In the opening scene, we see Isaiah's leg split completely in half after he scores the winning touchdown during a big game (can you tell I know nothing about football?)

The injury is so intense, it realistically would’ve ended his career on the spot.

Instead, he somehow recovers and dominates the league for years after.

Naturally, I thought this was planting the seeds for the central mystery: what evil deal or sick ritual did he partake in that allowed him to heal so impossibly well?

I especially thought this is where the plot was going when the protagonist gets his head bashed in by a creepy mascot lurking in his hometown high school football field on a random weekday night.

But to my surprise, the film just.. Moves on like both injuries never happened.

For the protagonist, yes he has staples in his head the rest of the movie, but aside from this, his head injury has zero effect on him as a character or the plot at large.

Similarly, Isaiah's injury recovery is never explained, and it ends up feeling like shock value with no payoff.

One could argue that Isaiah recovered through blood transfusions from “HIM,” but the movie never bothers to show or explain this.

I personally choose to believe this is the explanation, just to give the filmmaker one measly little point for sensical storytelling. 😌

But truly if both injuries never happened, nothing in the film would change.

And that honestly explains what's wrong with this entire movie.

Setups with no follow-through.

Random scenes that build to nothing.

Threads that hang loose.

These are the key ingredients for a thematically empty film with no plot or character development.

As I said in my Letterboxd review:

And I stand by that 💅

But listen, I’ll give credit where it’s due: the editing, effects, and cinematography were solid.

Visuals alone can’t carry a film, though.

And when the best thing you can say about a football body horror cult movie is “well, at least it was shot nicely” ...

It's disappointing to say the least.

Anyway, I'm gonna watch Love Island Games for my fill of strong storytelling 😎

Did you see HIM? What did you think?

And what movie should I review next? 🤔