Here's a challenge for partners in committed relationships who enjoy horror films: Get comfortable with your partner and watch Together. The 2025 indie hit has now made its launch on a streaming platform on the Hulu service. On the surface, it could look like typical body horror, but inside Together exists a profound meditation about our choices in loving our partners.
An Introductory Film Investigating Partnership Complexities
Together is the first full-length movie for filmmaker Michael Shanks. It stars the real-life married couple Dave Franco and Alison Brie as Millie and Tim, an unmarried couple that have remained a couple for over ten years. United in marriage in actuality in 2017, Franco and Brie bring a particular energy to their roles, expertly portraying both the joys and frustrations of a long-term relationship.
The plot begins when Tim and Millie transition from the metropolis to the country for professional reasons. A commonly used narrative setup, of course, but that’s largely where the tropes cease. Together becomes as much a examination of mental states of the pair’s relationship as it is a body horror flick.
An Otherworldly Trigger
While trekking near their rural residence, a storm hits, and the protagonists discover an underground cave. After a night spent there and eventually escaping, a strange force starts to affect the pair. This force creates a otherworldly bond between them that goes far beyond simple connection.
The complete narrative is a gradually intensifying of scares, blending moments of fever-dream horrors, unsettling (but not excessively graphic) physical transformations, and authentically humorous interactions (sometimes in the middle of something horrific). Michael Shanks weaves these elements together neatly and wraps them up in a consistently growing atmosphere of fear.
Layered Performances
A great deal of Together is solely Brie and Franco, and they deftly portray numerous complexities to the dynamic between Tim and Millie. Millie's sense of self and emotional bond is waning due to a distance. Her subconscious resentment of Tim for his reluctance to chase only his struggling artistic pursuits gradually emerges.
In contrast, Tim's character senses confinement and separated by Millie, who’s the cause they’ve relocated rural and distant from his network of friends. He fears the idea of utterly sacrificing his sense of self in Millie. This fear is further exacerbated by the circumstance he can’t drive and needs Millie for transportation.
The film's most intelligent aspect is that he avoids making either of his characters the clear bad guy.
The couple grapple with the sort of issues that are inherent in most partnerships after ten years. Fundamentally, they still love each other. They still laugh together, comfort one another, and share intimately at times. But beneath it all, there’s an inescapable current of uncertainty about their future together.
Allegory and Meaning
While the paranormal elements in Together represent these anxieties of excessive reliance and giving oneself over to a partner, the allegory avoids being clumsy or pretentious. Instead, these visceral horror elements provide a brilliant analogue to the relationship narrative. Both the frights and the fights work together in harmony.
A Debated Finale
Together’s final act, which remains unspoiled, has left audiences divided on the story's concluding statement about unhealthy partnerships. Reports indicate that unattached audience members have interpreted the film as a compelling reason for staying single. On the other hand, certain partners having disagreements found that the film ended up guiding them to make up.
Regardless of your relationship status, your own interpretation could function as a telling indicator of how you view relationships. Will the conclusion inspire feelings of uneasiness and dread, or a positive outlook on love? Will you identify in either protagonist and feel frustration, or simply look at your partner and utter, “I understand that choice”?
Whatever the case may be, Together is an experiment you can embark on right now.
Together is available to watch on Hulu as of this moment.
