> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.helluvabird.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Hey Brother podcast tackles 'Obsession' - URL: https://www.helluvabird.com/obsession-curry-barker-hey-brother-podcast-31-of-october/ - Published: 2026-11-11T16:50:14.000Z - Updated: 2026-11-11T16:50:14.000Z - Description: I was delighted to have multiple opportunities to express my thoughts on one of the year's best movies. - Author: Connor Tapp - Tags: horror, Podcast, hey brother Two weeks ago, [I wrote a post on my brother's blog](https://www.patreon.com/DrewTapp/posts/why-obsession-by-173659587?ref=helluvabird.com) about why Curry Barker's *Obsession* feels like a magic trick. I'm going to re-publish that below and below *that* I'm embedding the just-published episode of our podcast, Hey Brother, where we talk about *Obsession* as part of our quest to watch and podcast about 31 horror movies. The embed below is through Spotify. If that's not how you like to watch/listen to podcasts, most of the major alternatives should be listed [on our LinkTree page.](https://linktr.ee/heybrotherpod?ref=helluvabird.com) --- If *Obsession* is not a perfect film, it is – at the very least – a perfect story. There isn’t a wasted scene or line of dialogue. Each moment needs to happen and needs to happen precisely when it happens, from the opening diner scene to its gut-punch ending (which I will spoil by the end of this piece). When the credits roll, you feel like you’ve just seen a magic trick. The twists are stunning in the moment, but in hindsight they could not possibly have happened any other way. Throughout the film, the male lead, Bear (Michael Johnston), walks a tightrope between affable, well-meaning coward and abusive monster. While there is no end to online arguments as to how much of a villain Bear actually is, the fact that there is an argument at all is a testament to Curry Barker’s inch-perfect storytelling. If Bear tips too much one way or the other, the spell is broken; the magician’s assistant *actually* gets cut in half and the audience runs out of the theater, horrified. What Bear knows about his predicament and when he knows it are essential to keeping the audience onside. For instance, there is no reason on earth for Bear to expect that a jewelry shop tchotchke will actually have the power to make Nikki love him “more than anyone in the fucking world.” Or that the displacement of Nikki’s soul by a murderous demon would be part of the fine print. After all, who among us hasn’t idly wished that a crush would return our affections? Perhaps even going so far as to throw a penny in a well or engage in some other act of ritual superstition. Nevertheless, when Nikki’s behavior abruptly changes, Bear wonders if the One Wish Willow played a role. But a late-night Google search soothes his concerns. One Reddit user, hilariously named u/Berenstain\_Bear\_Facts, claims “My mom who has been ugly her entire life is gorgeous now!” But otherwise the consensus is, “Of course it doesn’t work, you idiot. The One Wish Willow is a gift shop trinket.” This is one of Barker’s best storytelling techniques, and you can trace it from *Obsession* back to his YouTube shorts. Barker loves to introduce an absurd or supernatural premise but then have the characters play it completely straight. You see it in Bear’s struggles to navigate this crisis. But Barker has also said in interviews that he kept hammering home to Inde Navarrette not to play Nikki as if she was possessed by a demon but as if she was a clingy girlfriend. When Nikki disrupts a house party by refusing to let Bear kiss the person to his left, as required by the rules of the drinking game, she comes off as exactly that. The other guests recoil in disbelief and out of concern for what appears to be a toxic, abusive relationship – not a possession. The short that got Barker noticed, “[The Chair,](https://youtu.be/mhazCS14Tas?si=JowDqfZcnmhRtbAi&ref=helluvabird.com)” involves a man picking up a used chair on the side of the road that turns out to be haunted. Before we arrive at any exploration of the supernatural properties of the chair, the first order of storytelling business is the strain that having a haunted chair places on his relationship with his wife. What resentments are drawn out by this cursed object? What history of personal failures? *Of course* his wife doesn’t believe that the chair accounts for his unexplained disappearances – why on earth would she? There’s a similar moment in *Obsession*, when Bear confesses his wish and its terrible consequences to Ian (played by Barker’s writing partner, Cooper Tomlinson), who – even having witnessed Nikki’s abrupt and appalling behavior – does not believe him. Again, why on earth would he? Instead of undoing Bear’s wish, Ian sarcastically wishes for a billion dollars, which promptly rains down upon him. Now (and, tragically, too late) Ian finally believes. Ian’s disbelief is our disbelief, and it lets Bear off the hook, too, for having doubted his culpability in Nikki’s fate. ## Sign up for Hell of a Bird Thoughtful and thought-provoking essays on politics, media, film, and history. Subscribe Email sent! Check your inbox to complete your signup. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. Part of what’s at work here is a “but then, therefore” storytelling technique Barker says he cribbed from Matt Stone and Trey Parker of *South Park*. Barker explained in an interview with CBC’s *Q* that the way this plays out in *Obsession* is that Bear is planning to ask out Nikki but then Ian says he should wait, therefore he does. But then Bear discovers his cat dead of an oxycodone overdose, therefore he doesn’t want to go to trivia. But then Nikki calls and says she’s quitting the music store, therefore Bear goes to trivia to ask Nikki out. “Everything should lead to the next thing, should be consequential to the next thing,” Barker said. “As opposed to and then this happens, and then this happens, and then this happens.” > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DduDcophVCr/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) This logic sets up *Obsession’s* twisted *Romeo and Juliet* ending. Bear, finally confronted with the unmistakable reality of his and Nikki’s peril, can no longer reason his way out of it. The One Wish Willow customer support guy (voiced by Barker) has already planted the idea that there is only one escape hatch, so Bear swallows a handful of the same oxycodone that killed his cat. But then Bear, the consummate coward, chickens out and forces himself to throw it all back up. Nikki’s last-minute intervention ultimately leads to the most harrowing moment of the film. The magic trick is over. Nikki returns to her body and realizes she has been forced to murder her closest friends. She is the lone survivor, the lone witness, the final girl – and yet will almost certainly shoulder all the blame. The storytelling chops on display in *Obsession* give me plenty of confidence that Barker (who recently turned 27) is going to be making great movies for a long, long time. In [a write-up of Barker for the Time100 Next2026, Seth Rogen wrote](https://time.com/collection/time100-next/2026/curry-barker/?ref=helluvabird.com), “I’ve seen Curry’s next film, *Anything But Ghosts*—and for those of you who, like me, are uncomfortable with this amount of talent in a person so young, I have bad news ... it’s even better.”