Why Weapons is my Favorite Movie of 2025 (So Far)
The 2025 film Weapons by Zach Cregger is a horror/thriller about a group of children who mysteriously run away from their homes one night and vanish without a trace. The film follows six different characters in the story, showing each of their perspectives one at a time as they search for answers to the children’s disappearance.
We are first introduced to Justine Gandy, the teacher of the missing students. Because all of the students who disappeared are in Ms. Gandy’s class, she faces an extraordinary level of scrutiny from the kids’ parents. In a school meeting, one parent shouts, “She should be locked up until she tells us what happened.” (Sound familiar?) Later that night, her car is vandalized with the word “Witch” painted in red across the driver’s side doors.
Ms. Gandy is a woman who doesn’t conform to conventional gender expectations. Her role as a teacher places her distinctly within what some would characterize as the liberal establishment of the education system, which has become a prime battleground in legislative and philosophical debates between Democrats and Republicans—not least of which is the ongoing fight over school shootings and the Second Amendment.
The film then follows Archer Graff, a parent of one of the missing kids and one of the more vocal provocateurs in attendance at the school meeting. Archer represents a certain slice of society, one of status and fiscal means and perhaps a libertarian persuasion. His opposition to Ms. Gandy is a perfect encapsulation of the left versus right divide in our country today.
Frustrated by the lack of action from the police investigation of the children’s disappearance—and inspired by a dream in which he follows his son the night he ran out of the house—Archer takes matters into his own hands. He begins charting the path the children took when they left their homes in an effort to locate them.
The next character to take center stage is Paul, a police officer and a fuckboy with whom Ms. Gandy has had an on-again off-again affair. Paul’s storyline begins with his shift as a patrol cop when he catches James, a homeless heroin addict, trying to break into a house, presumably to steal money for drugs. During their heated exchange, Paul hits James and knocks him out. We then see Paul unplug his dash cam—another low-key funny albeit sadly realistic nod to corruption and lack of transparency in law enforcement.
We then begin to see the story through James’ eyes Similar to the dynamics between Ms. Gandy and Archer, Paul and James represent a different variety of tension between two vastly different social classes in America today: the cops versus the civilians in their jurisdiction.
In a somewhat ironic turn of events, James happens to discover the missing kids when, in pursuit of more drug money, he breaks into the house where they are being kept. But he doesn’t fully realize the discovery he has made until later, when he is selling his loot at a pawn shop and sees a poster advertising a reward for information leading to the children’s whereabouts.
Unfortunately for James, he again crosses paths with Paul when he comes to the police station to report his sighting of the missing children. Paul takes James into custody, probably under illegal pretenses, but James then tells him about seeing the kids, and Paul takes James in the back of the patrol car to the house where the kids are.
Next the film follows Marcus Miller, the principal of the school. At this point we are introduced to Gladys, the aunt of Alex, who is the only student from Ms. Gandy’s class who didn’t disappear along with the other kids. And this is when things start to get interesting. When Gladys learns that Principal Miller is concerned about Alex’s home life and potentially getting the authorities involved, she decides to remove Miller from the equation. This is when we discover Gladys’ secret—her ritual practice of parasitic witchcraft.
Gladys casts a spell on Principal Miller, compelling him to murder his partner and then to go after Ms. Gandy. But then once again, the film shifts perspective, this time to Alex. And at last, we finally get to the heart of the mystery. We learn that Alex’s parents have recently moved Gladys into their home as she is aging and unable to care for herself. But his parents then become the first of many victims of Gladys’ dark magic.
The perspective shifts in Weapons are part of what makes it special. As the point of view changes from one character to the next, we uncover more clues while experiencing the story through the unique lens of each person. The fact that the characters are multidimensional, and that each holds their own unique socioeconomic vantage point, reveals layers to the story which would otherwise be left unexplored.
But what’s most striking about Weapons is its relevance to the present cultural moment. I can’t help but draw connections between the themes put forth in the film and the very real and incredibly tragic phenomenon of gun violence in schools. The idea of losing an entire classroom of kids in the blink of an eye, and the incomprehensible grief of losing a child at all, is equally as tragic no matter the means by which it occurs. In a country where gun violence is the leading cause of death for children and teens, the overlap between fiction and real life is undeniable.
In the context of something so devastating and unthinkable as children being shot and killed, simply reporting events exactly the way the unfolded couldn’t possibly do justice to the reality of what actually happened. We’ve seen so many news stories about the latest school shooting that it hardly raises an eyebrow anymore. Weapons is an act of mythologizing curated for a moment when facts at face value are failing to make an impact.
I’m not so naive to think Weapons is changing hearts and minds on any real-world issues. But it doesn’t have to. Like any iconic work of art, the film is a distillation of the world as we know it as seen through the eyes of the beholder.
The ending is where the comparison with reality starts to break down, but it happens in the best way possible. Without giving it away entirely, here’s what I’ll say: Weapons is a modern-day fairy tale in which innocence and righteousness prevail over evil—a supposition that perhaps the arc of the moral universe does bend towards justice after all.
