He Falls Flat at the 1-Yard Line

Credit: Image: Universal

Across its 96-minute runtime, director Justin Tipping coaxes tension with the relentlessness of an NFL defensive front. When this Jordan Peele–produced football thriller finally detonates, the final act is a barrage of brutality so unremitting that it threatens to erase everything that came before.

That cathartic surge, however, plays hollow for viewers. By skimming over the film’s initial mysteries and failing to meaningfully explain its setup, Tipping robs the finale of emotional weight.

Spoiler warning: the film’s ending is discussed below.

The film opens on Cam — first as a kid enthralled by football, then as a young prospect (Tyriq Withers) on the brink of a life-changing contract. Days before the scouting combine, a masked assailant ambushes him, leaving a severe head wound stitched in a pattern that resembles a football’s laces.

Him largely skips the investigation that would normally follow such an attack. Instead of exploring consequences or motives, the narrative jumps to the combine, where Cam withdraws at the last moment, worried about aggravating his brain injury. Just when his career seems to stall, he receives an invitation to train with legendary quarterback Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans) — an apparent fast track to becoming the Saviors’ next starter.

Isaiah’s regimen is brutal and unorthodox, and Cam’s tandem physician (played by Jim Jefferies) is regularly administering a mysterious red elixir. Isaiah also keeps vials of his own blood, explaining to Cam that its elevated oxygen levels help give a competitive edge when needed.

Predictably, the film reveals that Isaiah’s team has long practiced transfusing the quarterback with the predecessor’s blood to ensure dominance. How long this ritual has persisted isn’t spelled out, but a room lined with vintage jerseys implies the tradition has been going on for decades.

As the tradition demands, Isaiah and Cam are forced into a lethal confrontation. Cam survives, returns to the field and finds his agent (Tim Heidecker), Isaiah’s widow (Julia Fox) and the team’s elderly owner waiting in ceremonial robes. They reveal that much of Cam’s life — including the initial assault — was engineered to place him where they wanted, and they threaten his family if he refuses to sign. In response, Cam grabs a nearby weapon and slaughters them all.

The film concludes with Cam standing bloody and triumphant. The intended emotional release — a rebellion against a corrupt institution — lands with little resonance. Because the film never fully establishes stakes or clarifies Cam’s psychology, the final catharsis feels thin.

Is Cam driven to the massacre by madness, rage, cold calculation, or some mixture of motives? Him never decisively says. While unabashed gore can serve as a legitimate horror payoff, here it reads more like an abdication: spectacle without sufficient connective tissue between setup and payoff.

Him is in theaters now.

Source: Polygon