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The Other
Movie

The Other

2025 • Horror, Thriller

Woke Score
6.8
out of 10

Plot

Unable to conceive, a couple seeks to build a family with a young orphan, survivor of a tragic childhood. But their act of love turns to horror when they realize the violence in their foster's past has returned to destroy the new ...

Overall Series Review

The film attempts to be a psychological horror about the dark side of foster care, focusing on a white couple who adopt a mute black girl with a troubled history. The narrative quickly shifts from a universal horror scenario to one framed through a lens of racial and systemic critique. The adoptive white mother is positioned as the primary antagonist whose inability to connect with her black daughter is interpreted as cultural insensitivity or outright bigotry. The story repeatedly highlights the white family’s shortcomings and the black child's subsequent ostracization. A secondary character with Down syndrome is included for representation but is reduced to a mystical, almost supernatural figure, reinforcing a problematic trope. The core horror is derived less from a supernatural evil and more from the tension of a transracial family unit that is fundamentally flawed by the privilege and unconscious bias of the white parents. The film's primary function is to deconstruct and criticize the family unit through an intersectional perspective.

Categorical Breakdown

Identity Politics9/10

The plot centers on an interracial adoption where the white adoptive mother is framed as the primary villain and a 'bigot' for ostracizing her black daughter, Kathelia. The film uses the dynamic between the white family and the child of color to lecture on racial issues and the irreparable psychological damage of transracial adoption. Character merit is entirely secondary to immutable characteristics and perceived systemic power dynamics.

Oikophobia6/10

The traditional Western institution of family, specifically the white, middle-class home, is presented as fundamentally broken and a source of trauma. The mother's home and family-building efforts are the source of horror and destruction, suggesting an inherent corruption within the nuclear unit. The foster child's 'dark past' is not entirely demonized, as the adoptive parent is equally a source of evil, yet the critique remains focused on the home's failure rather than a broader condemnation of civilization.

Feminism7/10

The female lead (Robin, the adoptive mother) is portrayed as unlikable, unconvincing, and actively incompetent, coming across as a 'bigot' and 'the bad guy' of the story. The narrative emasculates the father who is passive while positioning the mother as the source of the family's conflict, though not as a 'Girl Boss' but as a flawed, toxic woman who fails at motherhood. The initial plot is driven by the couple's inability to conceive, framing traditional motherhood as a difficult, potentially failing endeavor.

LGBTQ+1/10

The narrative does not include prominent themes of alternative sexualities or gender ideology. The central focus is on a traditional male-female couple attempting to form a nuclear family through adoption. Sexuality is not a central subject for political lecturing.

Anti-Theism5/10

The film's horror is explicitly supernatural, involving a force that is either a vengeful spirit or possession, which generally avoids an explicit anti-theist stance. There is no direct vilification of Christian characters or institutions, nor an overt promotion of moral relativism, as the evil entity provides an objective 'bad.' The spiritual element is primarily a plot device for supernatural horror.