QUICK HIT: Control Freak [2025]

March 11, 2025

1 minute

Rating: NR | Runtime: 104 minutes
Release Date: March 13th, 2025 (USA)
Studio: Hulu
Director(s): Shal Ngo
Writer(s): Shal Ngo

We use whatever is left of you.

Val! That’s the wrong hand! The fact I thought this without even considering there was a second step in her extreme yet industrious process to rectify that presumed mistake should tell you how much confidence I had in Control Freak.

I love getting new monsters with a unique cultural spin and the whole metaphorical personification of imposter syndrome and self-loathing as a parasitic demon, but Shal Ngo’s narrative execution behind those things feels never-ending. Scratching. Futile attempt to stop scratching. Alienating loved ones via the frustration from scratching. An escalation of the scratching. Over and over.

Kudos to the gore and effects work in the third act. Gnarly stuff. Some wild real-life developments that seem scientifically impossible eventually undercut it, but maybe my fatigue with the story made me miss context? It’s stuff that we shouldn’t need to suspend our disbelief for when we’re already doing that for the psychological horror.

Despite having watched Miles Robbins act in so many movies, I couldn’t stop seeing him as Dylan from The Quarry throughout this one. The limb removal parallel didn’t help matters. Kelly Marie Tran = innocent. She’s quite good here.