Obsession (2026): What's so bad about dating me?
Film & TV27 October 2026
AuthorAva Hutchinson
PhotosImage: Heyuguys.com
In Obsession, a wish for love becomes a nightmare about control, consent and the cost of making someone yours.
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o be blunt, Obsession is a horror film. It’s meant to scare audiences, to keep them on the edge of their seats in anticipation. However, its scare factor is very different from your normal slasher film. Instead, the film makes audiences scared through the horror of what men will do to women when they aren’t guaranteed love. The horror of Obsession leaves audiences feeling grossed out and disgusted with the actions of men.
Curry Barker’s Obsession follows main character and villain Bear as he uses a one-wish willow stick on his friend Nikki hoping she would fall in love with him. This works horribly well and Nikki becomes obsessed with Bear to the point that she kills others for him.
I really liked how Barker effectively portrays that the couple would never work through Bear being different to Niki. It emphasises that even before the wish, the two could never work. In the beginning Niki says she wants to leave her small town to be a writer. Bear is content with his life and staying at home and he is seen to use AI frequently through the film which contrasts Niki’s creative ambitions. It shows that the pair's love was nothing but a wish, it's not meant to happen. It makes their love forced and unnatural.
Bear and Niki's love is completely artificial, something that’s not meant to happen, the love only a willow tree could muster. Niki says at the beginning that the two are friends and she’s weirded out when romantic assumptions are made about the two of them. Niki sees Bear as a younger brother, someone who’s fun to hang out with in a group. The film does a great job of bringing the audience into the friendship groups drama because we find out Niki is seeing Bear’s friend Ian. This obviously changes when Niki becomes obsessed with Bear and Ian becomes concerned. This is when Bear's character started getting questioned because Ian started asking if Bear was taking advantage of Niki. Bear’s character is unlikable because later on in the film it is implied Niki’s friend Shara has natural loving feelings for Bear which he doesn’t see. If he let go of Niki for one moment, he could have had something healthy with someone who actually liked him. It’s even sadder when Nikki kills Shara and we see a possible relationship destroyed.
The really unpleasant scenes in the film revolved around Bear and his reasoning with Niki’s new personality. While on phone calls with his friends he says that she’s freaking him out and he doesn’t know why she’s being so controlling. He plays the victim saying its Niki’s fault when this isn’t true at all. He goes out of his way to get another one wish willow stick for Ian so he can wish for Niki to love him normally. This emphasises that Bear is so desperate for Niki’s love that he doesn’t see how toxic his actions are becoming. This film has a very modern take on the extent men will do for love if it isn’t guaranteed. Nikki had her own life but after Bear makes his binding wish she throws it away for him. Bear's wish is entirely selfish because he wants to be with Nikki it is never reciprocated. His wish diminishes her wants and objectifies her as a vessel for him. When the two have intercourse, the camera zooms in onto Niki’s face to show that her face is emotionless. She never consented to having sex with Bear because her real self is trapped behind the willow stick curse.
That’s the horror of this film. At the start, their relationship is sweet and loving yet when the curse on Niki becomes more powerful her love becomes dangerous and violent. We are not supposed to feel sad for Bear. We are meant to feel horrible for the girl who’s been trapped away by a curse as she commits violent acts or gets violated. The ending is where the horror element shines through best in my opinion. When Bear realises he can’t undo his wish, he tries to kill himself. It’s implied that while they’re arguing, Niki snaps a willow stick for Bear to love her. However, Bear dies which lifts the curse off of Niki. She then snaps out of it as she realises everything that has happened. When I saw this for the first time, I was really shocked. Everything that happened in the film was Bear’s fault. However, he got away with it all through death. Leaving Niki, the actual victim, to atone for everything. Barker revealed that in future projects we would see Niki again, but she would be in jail paying for Bear’s actions.
Bear and Niki’s artificial relationship made me reflect on the ‘Man vs Bear’ online trend that was popular online a few years ago. It was a debate on if a woman would rather be trapped with a random man or with a Bear. Most women say the wild bear because men have the power to do more damage. Niki can’t choose an animal because in both worlds she would be choosing to be with Bear. Having the main villain called Bear in a film about consent and being stripped of autonomy and consent is not just a coincidence.
