Here's a challenge for long-term couples who appreciate horror films: Get comfortable with your significant other and watch Together. This 2025 indie hit just made its streaming debut on the Hulu service. On the surface, it could look like standard body horror, but inside Together exists a profound meditation about the ways we decide to love one another.
A Debut Feature Exploring Partnership Complexities
Together marks the debut feature-length film for director Michael Shanks. It stars actors Alison Brie and Dave Franco as Millie and Tim, partners that have stayed together for a decade. United in marriage in real life in 2017, Franco and Brie bring a particular energy to their roles, skillfully embodying both the strengths and weaknesses of a enduring union.
The story starts when the couple transition from the metropolis to the countryside for Millie’s job. A commonly used plot device, admittedly, but that’s largely where the conventions end. Together becomes as much a deep dive into the psyche of the couple's dynamic as it is a film about physical terror.
A Paranormal Spark
While walking near their rural residence, a violent storm occurs, and the protagonists discover an subterranean cavern. After a night spent there and managing to escape, a strange force starts to affect the couple. This force creates a paranormal intimacy between them that goes far beyond simple connection.
The whole movie is a gradually intensifying of scares, interspersing elements of hallucinatory nightmares, unsettling (but never too gross) physical transformations, and genuinely funny dialogue (sometimes in the middle of something disturbing). Michael Shanks skillfully blends these components expertly and wraps them up in a gradually swelling sense of impending doom.
Nuanced Portrayals
A large part of Together is solely the performances of its stars, and they skillfully illustrate manifold depths to the dynamic between Tim and Millie. Her self-assurance and emotional bond is deteriorating due to a emotional and physical gap. Her subconscious resentment of Tim for his unwillingness to pursue anything but his struggling artistic pursuits inexorably rises.
In contrast, Tim's character senses confinement and isolated by Millie, who’s the impetus they’ve left the city and removed from his support system. He dreads the notion of totally forfeiting his individual identity in another person. This fear is intensified by the reality he can’t drive and needs Millie for transportation.
Shanks’ smartest move in Together refrains from painting either of his characters the definite antagonist.
Tim and Millie confront the kind of problems that come with any relationship a decade in. Fundamentally, they continue to care for one another. They find humor with each other, comfort one another, and are vulnerable at times. But beneath it all, there’s an inescapable undercurrent of doubt about their future together.
Thematic Depth
While the paranormal elements in Together symbolize these fears of codependency and giving oneself over to another person, the metaphor avoids being hamfisted or self-important. Instead, these visceral horror elements offer a brilliant analogue to the relationship narrative. Both the supernatural and the personal work together in harmony.
A Controversial Conclusion
Together’s final act, which won’t be spoiled here, has left audiences divided on the film’s ultimate message about unhealthy partnerships. Accounts suggest that unattached audience members have interpreted the film as a powerful case for remaining unattached. On the other hand, a few pairs having disagreements found that the film actually helped them reconcile.
Regardless of your relationship status, your own response could function as a revealing measure of how you view relationships. Will the conclusion sow anxiety and horror, or a positive outlook on love? Will you recognize your own traits in Tim or Millie and feel frustration, or simply look at your other half and say, “I understand that choice”?
Whatever the case may be, Together is an exploration you can undertake today.
Together is available to watch on Hulu now.
