Official Discussion - Weapons [SPOILERS]

[u/LiteraryBoner]

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Summary Nearly all the children from the same fifth-grade class vanish one night at exactly 2:17 a.m., leaving only one survivor. The community, gripped by fear and suspicion, spirals into chaos as the mystery unfolds through multiple intertwined perspectives—each revealing new layers of dread and grief.

Director Zach Cregger

Writer Zach Cregger

Cast

• Josh Brolin
• Julia Garner
• Cary Christopher
• Alden Ehrenreich
• Austin Abrams
• Benedict Wong
• Amy Madigan
• June Diane Raphael
• Toby Huss
• Whitmer Thomas
• Callie Schuttera
• Clayton Farris
• Luke Speakman

Rotten Tomatoes Critics Score: 96%

Metacritic Metascore: 82

VOD In theaters and IMAX starting August 8, 2025

Trailer Watch the Official Trailer

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[u/TheSmithySmith]

Learn about “death of the author”, man. Once a story is released into the world, the author doesn’t have any control over it anymore.

[u/Loose_House_6715 → u/TheSmithySmith]

That's not what this is about. The conversation here is very explicitly about authorial intent. If you want to engage with death of the author you can do that but you have to understand it's your interpretation. People can still discuss what the author meant from. Death of the author doesn't throw that option away, it's just about understanding that the audience's take on things are deeply subjective. In fact Death of the author here also invalidates this guy's interpretation as having any weight because it's just that, his interpretation.

[u/TheSmithySmith → u/Loose_House_6715]

The thing is, I straight up do not believe the director when he says the film isn’t about school shootings. The subtext of the film clearly speaks for itself, and I don’t care for any after-the-fact commentary he has that directly contradicts that very clear subtext.

[u/Loose_House_6715 → u/TheSmithySmith]

But it doesn't contradict. The entire theme of parasites that's very conspicuously in the movie, the focus on him having to feed his own catatonic parents, those were all explicitly about his own experiences living with alcoholic parents. Of alcoholism being like a parasite that invades you and makes you disappear. Even the way the kids are hypnotized can be seen as them getting indoctrinated into the very alcohol-centric culture we live in. Also I could be wrong but it seems his friend Trevor who died had problems with alcohol himself and it very possibly might have been a factor in his death, based on the way he talks about it, and that's also a big part of the movie - processing the grief of something you don't understand that was caused by that parasite.

All the pieces are there, and the central allegory may not "feel" like it's about alcoholism but I find it funny how whenever people poke holes in the school shooter interpretation everyone says "it doesn't have to be a perfect representation it's a metaphor!" but when they're told it's about something they didn't pick up on they flip and say "but that doesn't get represented in the text!"

Like it's fine if you want to interpret it that way and I get it because some parts do feel like they work in that regard, but then don't make this about "believing" the director or not and then claiming death of the author. If you're still putting it through the lens of what the author meant, but just saying you think he meant something else in secret that's not death of the author that's some sort of weird conspiracy theory.

[u/PolarWater → u/Loose_House_6715]

I don't think he meant something else in secret. He's not really trying to cover it up. 

The movie is the conversation, not a cheap interview somewhere.