It took me a while to get around to Weapons. All I really knew going in was that it was Zach Cregger directed Barbarian, and that this was his sophomore horror feature. Full disclosure:  I liked Barbarian. I had no problem including it on The Midnight Selections. But I didn’t love it as much as those who crowned it the best horror film of 2022. Skinamarink, Incantation, X, You Won’t Be Alone, The Coffee Table– 2022 was stacked. If I were ranking 2022 horror, Barbarian would land somewhere after all of those other titles I liked more.

Like Barbarian in 2022, Weapons is currently sitting at the top of a lot of 2025 year-end horror lists. And in many ways, Cregger is clearly working from the same playbook: tonal pivots, disjointed timelines, and a steady drip of disorienting information. The difference is that this time, I was fully…fully…on board in a way I wasn’t with Barbarian.

When I put it on I was exhausted. It was already well past midnight and I fully intended to tap out after forty minutes and finish it in the morning. Instead, it pulled me in so completely that I caught a second wind and watched the whole thing straight through. It’s wild. It’s fun. But then again, so was Barbarian. The key difference here is that every directorial risk Cregger took had me spellbound, even when I incorrectly assumed the pieces wouldn’t fit together and his horror would remain unnamed and cosmic.

And then, all at once, the pieces fit and the end result is a conclusion that’s as satisfying as it is earned.

As a director, Cregger understands how to reveal information in a way few other directors do. He allows preconceptions to live in our heads, lets them marinate alongside ideas that feel timely and unsettling, and then reframes them with new context that forces the viewer to reconsider what they thought they were seeing. It’s confident, controlled filmmaking, and it confirms that Weapons is a refinement on Cregger’s developing formula.

And as I reread that list I gave of 2022 horrors, Weapons jumps ahead of nearly all of them. Sure it took the number one spot in a less impressive year than 2022, but that doesn’t make it any less deserving of a film.

Weapons starts with a narrator telling us about a tragic mystery. Almost all of the town’s children from the same third-grade classroom have disappeared. Door cameras suggest they all snuck out of their homes at 2:17 a.m., and then started running wildly.

But for some unknown reason, one student was left behind.

The story is told in vignettes that follow different characters. The first follows Justine Garner, (Julia Garner) the teacher of that third-grade elementary school class who has been put on leave and is suspected of wrongdoing, though the police have not charged her and nobody can say how. There is “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” (I’ve been reviewing old episodes of The Twilight Zone) going on here as the town is so desperate to scapegoat someone they are starting not to care less about hitting the right target.

The second vignette follows Archer Graff (Josh Brolin), the father of a missing child, as he conducts his own investigation.

The vignettes continue, but I don’t like spoiling so I’ll just say that they are short, show a slice into the lives of an eclectic set of characters, and end in an unusual place that raises more questions than answers. And though the stories often connect, they don’t connect in a way that gives answers to the broader mystery, a mystery that starts to include things like people caught in paralysis and the zombie-infected. In fact, they seem intentionally designed to raise more questions. 

And just when you’re about to give up on thinking any of this could possibly have an answer, Cregger smacks us with his reveal.    

Weapons has a bigger cast of recognizable stars then I’m used to seeing in a horror film, but this doesn’t distract from the plot. It’s a credit to his skill that so many talented people want to work with him. Especially on a film like this one where no one character is in the spotlight for very long before the focus changes. But the script is solid, and likely drew these actors in. 

(And now that Amy Madigan received an Academy Award for best supporting actress for her work in this film, I imagine Cregger will have an even easier time attracting big names to his next project.)

But on top of his many other skills, Cregger understands how to subtly employ dark humour to enhance his stories, adding an odd charm that keeps us thoroughly engaged despite its slow burning pace.

After two solid entries into the horror genre, I’m pretty much ready to say that we have another weird movie auteur on our hands in Zach Cregger. He may not have the arthouse flourishes to be labelled as a new Ari Aster, but I am not going to discount him because his films have more mainstream appeal. Both Barbarian and Weapons are daring, unconventional and ripe with social commentary. And Cregger’s skill at storytelling make him every bit as impressive an artist.

Zach Cregger, you got my attention. Can you pull off a trifecta?