Warning: This post contains spoilers for HIM.
Horror maestro Jordan Peele may not have written or directed HIM, but there’s no denying that seeing his name attached to a project tends to pique fan interest. Unfortunately, this time around, the Peele-produced psychological football horror doesn’t quite seem to be living up to viewer expectations. Although it’s reportedly tracking best among weekend box office newcomers, with projections in the $15-$18 million range, HIM is currently sitting at less-than-stellar critic and audience approval ratings on Rotten Tomatoes.
Directed and co-written by Justin Tipping (Kicks), HIM stars Tyriq Withers as rising star quarterback Cameron Cade, a generational football prodigy who aspires to follow in the footsteps of his late father’s favorite player, eight-time champion quarterback for the San Antonio Saviors and professional league GOAT Isaiah White (played by Marlon Wayans). But after Cam is bashed over the head and suffers a career-threatening brain injury the night before the annual scouting combine for the USFF (the movie’s obvious fictional stand-in for the NFL), he must instead prove himself worthy of the Saviors’ QB1 role over the course of a weeklong training boot camp hosted by a near-retirement Isaiah at the isolated private compound he shares with his influencer wife, Elsie (Julia Fox).
As the week of increasingly brutal physical and mental tests progresses, Cam begins to realize strange forces are at play behind the scenes of Isaiah’s mentorship. By the time a bloody final showdown between the pair inevitably rolls around, it feels difficult to interpret HIM as anything other than a clear indictment of the pressures and politics of the professional football industry.
“[T]he game is the game. It can be joyful and beautiful and all those things,” Tipping told the Hollywood Reporter. “Boxing, free solo [rock climbing], whatever it is, people, even knowing the risks, are still going to do it. That’s what humans do. But…
