[Review] Blumhouse Television and Epix’s Unhuman
Imagine you’re back in high school (for some of us, that can be a nightmare), anxious about the day ahead. You and your best friend set off to school and the day already starts off with quite the bang–an accident, a brief awkward conversation, and a slight scuffle with the school’s seemingly popular trio. You two finally make it to school only to prepare for an extra credit field trip with a teacher who is anything but professional, and with plenty of personalities aboard. Once the trip is underway, all seems well until a wrong turn is made, and the trip becomes anything but routine. This wasn’t the extra credit you were aiming for.
Director Marcus Dustan (The Collector, The Collection, Feast) brings us back to a period in our lives that most of us would rather forget while throwing the unsuspecting characters into a genuinely terrifying situation involving blood-thirsty creatures and being lost in the woods. Starring Brianne Tju (I Know What You Did Last Summer), Drew Sheid (Halloween), Benjamin Wadsworth (Your Honor), and Uriah Shelton (Freaky), Dustan sends our characters on a wild ride through the woods all while trying to discover what is hunting them down.
We begin with Ever (Brianne Tju) having a harmless talk with her mother who wants to connect with her daughter. It’s short-lived as Ever, like any teenager, would rather eat chalk than expose current events in her adolescent life with her parent even if she is very supportive. Ever carpools with her best friend Tamara (Ali Gallo), and on the way encounters Randall who she has hit with her car. They also come in contact with the popular threesome who make it very clear that they can’t be bothered by the likes of Randall, “sharing” a slushie with him making sure that it splatters all over him.
Once they arrive at the school, the field trip is underway and teacher Mr. Lorenzo collects their phones at the door of the bus, to which Ever states she has none–an interesting admission as most kids nowadays have a phone, especially in high school. Once all of the students have boarded the bus they are on the way to the destination when the driver decides to take a different route, our first clue that something will indeed go wrong. And it does.
On the detour, the bus is quickly defaced with a smattering of what looks to be blood on the window. It throws off the driver and sends the bus into the woods where it collides with the trunk of a tree, sending students to greet their faces to the front of their seats. There are minor casualties among the students once the bus stops its descent. The students and teacher begin to assess the damage done when a stranger comes to their door. This quickly escalates as the teacher foolishly opens the door when everyone agrees that he shouldn’t with a fool-hearted quip: “Do you have insurance?”.
This is where all hell breaks loose in the film and it’s meant to make us feel like our students don’t stand a chance. However, we get to see what they are truly made of in the face of a blood-thirsty, rampaging monster. Although they are written with typical teen tropes in mind, we get surprised by a few role reversals when it comes to who is truly the antagonist in this film. Thankfully, Dunstan doesn’t show his hand until the film is more than midway through, and what a lovely twist it was.
Tju and Sheid deliver amazing performances as a would-be power couple until we’re hit in the gut with the reality of the betrayal that takes place. Uriah Shelton’s character makes you root against him originally, a testament to how well he can play the “bad guy”, but we’re able to witness his metamorphosis in real-time.
There are moments in the movie where you’re unclear about the direction, but they're quickly remedied by actions that follow up by our characters. You’re also unsure about the monster as well and how they’re able to transfer their sickness into the victim, especially once you arrive at the twist in the plot and discover what’s really going on. The film also touches on the topic of bullying and reveals with Benjamin Wadsworth’s character Randall that hurt people essentially hurt others, especially if they have gone through tough situations involving bullying. When our true antagonists are discovered to be those who have been bullied and have decided to try and take their power back by endangering the lives of others, we understand it but are still too caught up in the chaos they’ve created using their “zombie”. The message may get lost as it’s intertwined in what we thought was going to be a zombie film.
Overall, Unhuman delivers when it comes to a fun, part zombie, part slasher film with some moments of comedic relief. There are very few jump scares, which makes it safe for those who are new to horror and need something light to watch. With the theme, it would also be ideal for young adults who are looking for a decent summer scare that’s not too heavy on the blood and guts.
You can stream Blumhouse Television’s Unhuman on Epix on
