By G. E. Uke, Reporter

I’m not normally the sort of guy who goes out to watch horror movies. Faced with cinematic anxiety, impending jump scares, or embarrassment of any sort my normal response is to hide my face in my shirt and then scowl at anyone nearby who looks at me like I’m a sissy. And I’ll be honest, that’s exactly what I did in the opening half-hour of Abigail. 

The plot of this movie isn’t a surprise to anyone: a group of people kidnap a little girl for ransom at the behest of a mysterious benefactor, get locked into a mansion, and the girl turns out to be a vampire who has lured them there to eat them. From there it’s an episode of Survivor, waiting to see who is going to get voted off the island next. You know who’s going to survive right at the beginning: it’s the protagonist and nobody else.  

Nobody is trying to surprise anybody or do anything unique with Abigail. It is not a special snowflake trying to be a groundbreaking butterfly out on a holy quest to endow the world with a unique emotional experience that will alter the way we view our lives for years to come. Abigail tries to be exciting to watch, with plenty of cool sets and interesting character interplay, and it absolutely is those things. If you go to see this movie, it’s because you want to see a little girl pretend to be a vampire capering after a group of freaked-out people wearing a ballerina outfit. And you have the (arguable) good taste to know how awesome that is. So you get what you want, right? 

But there’s a bit more to Abigail than meets the eye. While the vampire is most definitely evil and murderous, she is also humanized during the course of the movie. Parallels are drawn between her relationship with her creator and the protagonist’s relationship with her estranged son. In the end, the two come to an actual understanding which results in the protagonist being spared. Normal horror movies don’t do that. At no point are the vampires redeemed, but they achieve catharsis in a way that is portrayed as a moral victory for the villains. Not something you see a lot of. 

The melodramatic beat-em-up splatter-punk aesthetic of the violence in Abigail does a lot to make its horror bearable to sissies like me. 

Rating:

ComicsOnline gives Abigail 4 out of 5 horror twists.

Join ComicsOnline for more comics, more reviews, and everything geek pop culture!

Please take a moment to FOLLOW & SUBSCRIBE to our updated ComicsOnline social channels.
We appreciate your support!

INSTAGRAM – COMICSONLINE
BSKY – COMICSONLINE
YOUTUBE – COMICSONLINE
FACEBOOK – COMICSONLINE
TWITTER / X – COMICSONLINE