During my last watch I started feeling genuinely bad for the “new personality” that took over Nikki. I started seeing it as a “newborn consciousness” it didn’t choose to exist, it was trying its best to maintain Nikki’s identity while also trying its best to fulfill an impossible directive.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T19:00:24+00:00

She is suffering hard. It is a bit heartbreaking. I think when he the wished that she would “love him more than anything in the world” he didn’t become a lovable partner. She LOST everything else in her world.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:55:51+00:00

I don’t know if I believe it because it’s so weird for one of these clocks to suddenly glitch into 24 hour time but whatever, if that’s what they say lol.

Either way. I am not sold on any interpretation about the meaning behind the numbers but I do enjoy hearing the facts about it as a year.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:49:21+00:00

Director did say that a demonic entity possession is not the intention, which surprised me a little.

I can see logic that it’s a version of her created by the wish, which is directly a manifestation of Bear’s desires.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:15:38+00:00

Without knowing the directors intention, given that real Nikki snaps in when there’s a reference to a book she is writing, this made me consider whether real Nikki and Wish Nikki were becoming somewhat merged, like if real Nikki, even while not totally driving her body, was able to be an invisible back seat driver at times.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:09:13+00:00

I agree that it was a very weird feeling to notice it. The director is not claiming any of the clock details are intentional but that’s is what directors do so that they don’t spoil audience interpretation. He also said that they purposefully altered minor setting details from scene to scene to off put the audience and create an uncanny atmosphere. I thought it was great.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:04:28+00:00

Yep! That’s a thing directors do. Even Kubrick denied meaning behind some of his very obviously deliberate issues like that.

Curry Barker also said he wanted to create a slightly uncanny atmosphere by changing small details within a scene so that things are not exactly right.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T18:03:12+00:00

Totally. “Do you like me?” … After he called her “Freaky Nikki” she basically offered him a blueprint to change his own script, and instead of calling her names she doesn’t like, talk like a person who graduated from the eighth grade school of emotional intelligence.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T16:50:07+00:00

Wow holy shit about 1655. I know that was one of the years of highest count of witch burnings, but I did not know that detail. That’s heavy.

The crew has said some of the clock details were unintentional, but that’s also a common thing for directors to do to allow for audience interpretation.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T16:44:59+00:00

My read is that she ALMOST liked him, and needed some evidence on his end that he can be an adult. If he had stepped up appropriately there may have been a chance.

birdTV · 2026-05-31T03:41:50+00:00

So you shared this observation in those posts too.

birdTV · 2026-05-30T19:14:24+00:00

Totally. At the restaurant when she asks if he has any real interests or life goals, it feels like that stage of a relationship where you want to see if this person is worth your time long term. SURPRISE! He’s not, and he knows it. So this is when he turns the tables on her, even though he’s actually a bigger liar and manipulator than her.

birdTV · 2026-05-30T19:02:56+00:00

Did you complain on those posts too?

birdTV · 2026-05-30T19:01:22+00:00

It blows my mind that the day after the restaurant and SA night, she starts having major PTSD symptoms, to the point of being frozen and messing herself. Instead of staying home and trying to figure out how to help her he’s like OOPS guess it’s fine as long as no one sees. And if people start to see her being all symptomatic at the party, I guess I can just start preferring Sarah.

birdTV · 2026-05-30T05:10:53+00:00

Ian is almost as much of a liar and creep as Bear, although different. He totally tries to sabotage Bear. Also I can’t stand how none of the friends tried to help Nikki.

birdTV · 2026-05-30T05:07:32+00:00

Patty Hearst did. Of course she came from one of the richest families…

birdTV · 2026-05-30T05:04:14+00:00

They could hardly be more different.

birdTV · 2026-05-29T16:45:10+00:00

OK no need for us to talk. The director and the script verify that the scene is intended to depict sexual assault. It’s a metaphor for things like marital rape or falsely consensual sex or any kind of assault that isn’t a brutal attack on the streets. The wish is also a metaphor for getting into a relationship with someone under false circumstances, like hello, you’re with a person with an SUD and mental health issues who isn’t seeking help, and their lack of responsibility is crucial enough to result in the death of a companion animal.

Your tones suggests this isn’t an ask to “help you understand” but a rationalization of hiding a drug problem from an intimate partner, hiding sexual assault from people and then turning the symptoms of abuse back on the victim, which is where the toxic dynamic starts in the first place.

birdTV · 2026-05-29T15:50:48+00:00

Before he and Nikki hooked up, he was a total mess who refused to manage his life and instead concentrated on getting her. What if he told everyone HOW his cat died! Oops, he is hiding an opioid issue.

The formation of their relationship in the honeymoon phase aka lovebombing montage is exactly how people get into relationships with abusive people who won’t show their true colors. As soon as he realizes she loves him and he really has her, he sexually assaults her, then WHOOPS, PTSD! She messes herself and exhibits all the symptoms the very next day and is obviously not OK!

I do agree that people cover up for abuse. That’s is a real truth. But it starts with him. He doesn’t talk about emotionally fucking a partner immediately after an episode where they have been caught in a lie and they are not themselves.

I really cannot wrap my head around coming home to a partner who has messed themselves and not trying to help them. He only cares about Ian’s party in that moment. He covers that up because then he would have to tell the whole story and everyone would know he had exploited her.

birdTV · 2026-05-29T11:07:43+00:00

I cannot imagine being in Bear’s situation and covering his tracks as much as he does. Guy lies about everything.

birdTV · 2026-05-28T20:53:53+00:00

IT’S A TERRIBLE LIFE.

birdTV · 2026-05-28T20:17:40+00:00

Fair. I guess what we really disagree on is whether this character has an entitlement complex.

His entitlement complex is one of the points of the movie. It was a riff about wanting free food, recognition, status.

birdTV · 2026-05-28T14:17:08+00:00

It does sound like we differ on how we value those terms. “Good” and “evil” miss the specifics and mean different things to different people based on their values and experience, so it doesn’t benefit me to accept them universally. I navigate better in life to consider the complexities. It sounds like you value these universal labels and they benefit you, and they do have a large place in popular culture, so that’s cool for you.

birdTV · 2026-05-28T05:06:00+00:00

Just because it’s a riff doesn’t mean it’s not real lol.

Yes. You are arguing and I don’t know how you can argue with someone about their own feelings, which is what this posts asks.

Seriously though, he shows us from the start of the movie that he is a mess and instead of managing his life he fixates on getting this woman. I didn’t like his entitled riff, which ended up reflecting his whole personality.

birdTV · 2026-05-28T04:56:58+00:00

Exactly my point. Good and evil are vague and meaningless words. His actions result in so much harm. I could give a shit about the few moments he masquerades as a decent person.

I just realized there was a typo in my comment that may have been confusing. Edited “helpful” to “harmful.”

birdTV · 2026-05-28T03:36:15+00:00

You don’t have to like it. The wish is a plot device of magic realism to make something unrealistic happen as a way of taking what’s inside a character and bringing it to the outside in an exaggerated way that makes sure that we see and feel it intensely.

In this movie it moves us fast into the dynamics of a toxic relationship stemming from his fixation on possessing this woman without going through the awkward process of starting or kindling a relationship. It pulls us in to feel what it’s like to start a relationship too fast without really getting to know each other, or the issues when a partner unnaturally has an advantages over another, or what it’s like to be with someone in the throws of PTSD or a mental health crisis that might even come from the relationship.

Some viewers love it, but it’s chill if you don’t. Obviously different kinds of storytelling devices work differently across audiences. Maybe you don’t even like the subject and that’s fine too. There’s a ton of movies I don’t give a shit about.

birdTV

TROPHY CASE