Here's a test for long-term couples who appreciate the horror genre: Sit down with your loved one and watch Together. The 2025 indie hit has now made its launch on a streaming platform via Hulu. On the surface, it could look like standard body horror, but inside Together lies a intense meditation about how we choose to love our partners.
A Debut Feature Delving into Relationship Dynamics
Together represents the first full-length movie for director Michael Shanks. It showcases actors Alison Brie and Dave Franco as Tim and Millie, an unmarried couple that have stayed together for ten years. Having wed in reality in 2017, the actors contribute a particular energy to their roles, masterfully depicting both the good and bad of a committed partnership.
The story commences when Tim and Millie relocate from the big city to the rural area for her career. A familiar plot device, admittedly, but that’s mostly where the tropes conclude. Together evolves into as much a psychological exploration of the couple's dynamic as it is a body horror flick.
A Supernatural Catalyst
While hiking near their country house, a violent storm occurs, and the protagonists discover an subterranean cavern. After spending the night there and eventually escaping, a supernatural entity begins influencing the pair. This force compels a otherworldly bond between them that goes far beyond simple connection.
The complete narrative is a methodically building fright fest, interspersing bits of fever-dream horrors, gross (but not excessively graphic) physical transformations, and authentically humorous exchanges (sometimes in the middle of something horrific). The director weaves these elements together neatly and delivers them in a consistently growing sense of impending doom.
Complex Characterizations
A significant portion of Together is only Brie and Franco, and they skillfully illustrate countless layers to the dynamic between Tim and Millie. Millie’s confidence and feeling of intimacy is waning due to a lack of intimacy. Her underlying frustration of Tim for his hesitance to pursue anything but his failing musical ambitions gradually emerges.
Conversely, Tim senses confinement and separated by Millie, who’s the reason they’ve left the city and far away from his network of friends. He dreads the concept of completely losing his personal autonomy in another person. This fear is intensified by the circumstance he does not operate a vehicle and needs Millie for getting around.
The film's most intelligent aspect in Together never makes either of his characters the clear bad guy.
The couple grapple with the type of challenges that come with long-term unions over a long period. Fundamentally, they still love one another. They find humor with each other, comfort one another, and are vulnerable at times. But beneath it all, there’s an persistent feeling of questioning about their relationship.
Allegory and Meaning
While the paranormal elements in Together symbolize these fears of codependency and totally devoting oneself to another person, the metaphor does not come across as hamfisted or self-important. Instead, these more disturbing, unsettling scenes offer a perfect parallel to the character-driven drama. Both the horror and the drama work together symbiotically.
A Divisive Ending
Together’s conclusion, which is best experienced firsthand, has created disagreement on the film’s ultimate message about codependent relationships. Reports indicate that those not in relationships have seen the movie as a strong argument for remaining unattached. Conversely, a few pairs who were in conflict found that the film ended up guiding them to make up.
If you are alone or with a partner, your own reaction could act as a great barometer of how you think about commitment. Will the ending sow feelings of uneasiness and dread, or a uplifting feeling of optimism? Will you identify in either protagonist and yell at the screen, or simply glance toward your significant other and state, “We could get through that together”?
Whatever the case may be, Together is an experiment you can undertake right now.
Together is currently playing on Hulu as of this moment.
