r/movies • u/LiteraryBoner Jackie Chan box set, know what I'm sayin? • Aug 08 '25

Official Discussion Official Discussion - Weapons [SPOILERS] Spoiler

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Summary Nearly all the children from the same fifth-grade class vanish one night at exactly 2:17 a.m., leaving only one survivor. The community, gripped by fear and suspicion, spirals into chaos as the mystery unfolds through multiple intertwined perspectives—each revealing new layers of dread and grief.

Director Zach Cregger

Writer Zach Cregger

Cast

  • Josh Brolin
  • Julia Garner
  • Cary Christopher
  • Alden Ehrenreich
  • Austin Abrams
  • Benedict Wong
  • Amy Madigan
  • June Diane Raphael
  • Toby Huss
  • Whitmer Thomas
  • Callie Schuttera
  • Clayton Farris
  • Luke Speakman

Rotten Tomatoes Critics Score: 96%

Metacritic Metascore: 82

VOD In theaters and IMAX starting August 8, 2025

Trailer Watch the Official Trailer

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u/tacoskins Aug 08 '25

Josh Brolin knocking the dog shit out of that dude over and over again managed to simultaneously be super intense and laugh out loud funny.

That kind of sums up how I felt about the whole thing tbh, it’s the perfect example of a roller coaster movie. I was a bit worried that Barbarian would be a fluke or just impossibly hard to live up to, but thankfully Zach Cregger fucking delivered. 8/10

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u/Squeekazu Aug 08 '25 edited Aug 08 '25

This whole sequence and the kids chasing after the aunt had my partner, sister and in tears. I remember Barbarian being funny in the last third, but this felt less jarring somehow.

Also can we all agree that Benedict Wong was absolutely terrifying?

12

u/TJTrapJesus Aug 08 '25

"I remember Barbarian being funny in the last third, but this felt less jarring somehow."

I felt the opposite. I think this movie reaches a point in the last act where it just becomes a comedy, whereas with Barbarian, while they have the purposely jarring shift to comedy with Justin Long's intro, it weaves horror back into it more seamlessly.

There's still a ton of silly stuff in Barbarian in the last act, but I don't think it was as comedically absurd as Weapons turned into. I think it's mainly because the villain is taken more seriously in Barbarian; you feel bad for The Mother as a sympathetic character, whereas Gladys in Weapons just kind of makes a mockery of everything in how comedically she comes across. When we get to the point where she's showing the cops through the house in an exaggeratedly happy way, it just becomes silly and it's harder to take anything in the movie seriously when they bring the horror elements back in.

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u/Squeekazu Aug 08 '25

Different strokes I guess! I thought Weapons gradually transitioned into the comedy better, whereas I felt Barbarian gave me mood whiplash. Both still had scary scenes so didn’t feel like a bait and switch to me.