Weapons

“Weapons squanders its potential by rehashing outdated stereotypes.”

Title: Weapons (2025)
Director: Zach Cregger 👨🏼🇺🇸
Writer: Zach Cregger 👨🏼🇺🇸

Reviewed by Gavin 👨🏼🇬🇧🌈♿

—MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD—

Technical: 4/5

Following in the footsteps of Jordan Peele and Oz Perkins, Zach Cregger has transitioned from actor to acclaimed horror filmmaker. Barbarian (2022), Cregger’s feature debut as a solo writer-director, was a hit—beloved by audiences and critics alike and earning a hefty $45 million at the box office. Following up a breakout film is no easy feat, but Cregger delivers a surefire success with Weapons.

Like Barbarian, Weapons is best enjoyed without knowing too much about it. As the cryptic, minimal marketing explains, the story sees 17 children from the same elementary school class disappear overnight. The narrative unfolds in several chapters, each one following a different character and their perspective of the town’s fallout after the strange event—not unlike Rashomon (1950). We first follow Justine (Julie Garner), the teacher of the missing students. The perspective then shifts to a father (Josh Brolin), and later chapters focus on side characters who initially seem unimportant.

It isn’t just the narrative structure Cregger has fun with. Weapons is a surprisingly funny film, injecting moments of dark comedy throughout the runtime. Audience members in my screening were laughing out loud as much as they were gasping. But don’t let the comedy fool you; Cregger and his team have crafted several nerve-shredding sequences and nightmarish images. This is thanks to controlled, precise directing, cinematography that uses lighting and expansive framing, and smart editing. As someone who doesn’t usually get scared during horror films, I certainly had fear instilled in me.

Weapons isn’t quite a home run, however. The reveal of what actually happened isn’t very satisfying, and the chapter explaining the backstory of the mystery drags on too long. But it’s easily forgiven when the finale is so bonkers in the best way. Despite Weapons’ faults, watching it on the big screen with an audience is a blast.

Gender: 3/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? NOPE

Although Weapons has an ensemble cast, Justine is positioned as the film’s lead and played with nuance by Garner. A presence in every chapter, Justine grows and changes throughout the entire story, portrayed as flawed but relatable. She truly cares for the kids in her class, but when the entire community turns against her, she cracks under the pressure and makes several bad decisions, including turning to alcohol as a coping mechanism.

Another key female character comes into the picture, but I daren’t say much else as to ruin any surprises. Outside of that character, though, Justine is surrounded by men. Since most of them are in positions of power—bosses, police officers—one could suggest Cregger is making a statement about patriarchal power dynamics. But that argument is probably a bit of a stretch. Cregger seems simply to have created a man’s world, but Justine does stand out in it.

Race: 2/5

Benedict Wong, a British actor of Chinese descent, plays Principal Marcus. Seen in different chapters, he’s mainly used for comic relief—a tired man dealing with angry parents and troublesome teachers. And even though he gets his own chapter, it only serves to develop the larger plot. There isn’t much insight into his character, much less any interest in his experience of being Asian in a very white community.

People of colour also dot the background and have minor roles, but not much else. Out of the six chapters presented, only one is centred on a non-white character. The other chapters are notably longer, too. All the other leads make decisions that affect the progression of the plot, whilst Wong’s character is passive and becomes the victim of other people’s actions. Every character has dimensionality and personality, and not everyone gets a happy ending, but Principal Marcus is undoubtedly treated differently.

Deduction for Age: -0.75

Weapons uses imagery of ageing, such as close-ups of wrinkles and strands of silver hair cast in ominous lighting, to generate frights. Often referred to as Hagsploitation—a term coined for horror films that portray ageing women as villainous or terrifying—the trope was especially popular in the 1960s, and it’s disappointing to see it now in Weapons more than 50 years later. As writer Billie Walker wonders, “How are women ever going to come to terms with the inevitability of ageing when the only representations of our older bodies are used to horrify?”

Bonus for LGBTQ: +0.00

Presented as a gay character, Principal Marcus shops and lives with another man. On the surface, it’s great to see queer representation, but here it provides nothing. Principal Marcus’ sexual orientation is essentially box-ticking. The queer experience isn’t explored at all, the pair is never intimate (they don’t even share a kiss or affectionately hold each other), and their characters only exist to serve the plot.

Mediaversity Grade: C- 2.75/5

Cregger delivers another well-crafted film, and early casting news of Pedro Pascal and Brian Tyree Henry suggests that the film was meant to be more racially diverse, at least before the 2023 SAG-AFTRA writers’ strike delayed scheduling. But the final cast is very white, and Weapons squanders its potential by rehashing outdated stereotypes about ageing while sidelining its only notable character of colour. The result is disappointing.

Like Weapons? Try these other psychological horror titles.

Grade: CLiAugust 9, 2025