#psycho analysis

Motivations, Goals, and Backstory: All Bear wants to do is ask out his childhood friend Nikki, but he lacks the courage to do so. To that end, he uses a One Wish Willow to make her obsessed with him and only him. It’s a very simple motivation with a very simple solution, but it’s not this simple start that’s important; it is the lengths Bear goes to to ignore everything that is wrong so that he can enjoy the fruits of said solution. At every twist and turn he makes sure to ignore anything that might help him in his situation if it jeopardizes what he has with Nikki. It ends up being equal parts pathetic, idiot, and truly disturbing for reasons that will soon become clear.

Performance: Bear would not work as a character at all if there wasn’t an exceptionally strong performance behind him, and Michael Johnston doesn’t disappoint. He manages to inject just the right level of pathetic wet puppy charm into Bear that it’s easy to get sucked in and least have a tiny bit of pity for him, and even when that pity evaporates Johnston still manages to make Bear chillingly compelling. People have rightfully been praising Inde Navarette for her performance as Nikki, but I don’t think that performance would hit quite as hard if she didn’t have such an excellent partner to bounce off of. Her phenomenal acting would just not land if Bear wasn’t holding his own, you know?

Evilness: Bear is quite literally the reason women choose the bear.

While he at first comes off like a pathetic, insecure, desperate manchild who is just incapable of having a spine and spitting out his true feelings, he pretty quickly grabs a sled and starts sliding down the slippery slope. He’s put off by Freaky Nikki at first, but he pretty quickly gets over it and then continuously has sex with her and does so little to actually solve the obvious problems that it’s genuinely callous. And then comes a moment where everything is explicitly laid out to him in terms he couldn’t possibly ignore, and the response he gives…

This guy is a fucking 5/5. He might be one of the single biggest pieces of shit in modern horror. Just a wholly selfish, vile, and irredeemable chud.

Final Fate: After getting all his friends killed and Freaky Nikki has completely lost it, Bear decides the only thing left to do is kill himself and end the wish. In a moment of true selflessness, a moment of self-reflection that shows that these horrific experiences have finally made him realize what a cunt he was, he downs an entire bottle of his pills so he can free Nikki from her tor—HAHAHA oh my god I can’t keep going with a straight face, of course Bear pussies out and tries to save himself by vomiting up the pills, because he is a fucking irredeemable asshole.

Too bad he didn’t count on Freaky Nikki using the One Wish Willow to make him love her with all his heart… his heart which is now in the process of stopping, since he’s so in love he forgot to vomit them up. He drops dead, Nikki is freed, and now all she can do is scream at the carnage as she is surrounded by the corpses of her most cherished friends. What a happy ending!

Keep in mind that Bear could have avoided all this if he had paid attention at numerous points instead of continuing to selflessly exploit a woman for his emotional and sexual gratification. Dude ruined half a dozen lives because of how much he sucks and he couldn’t even die properly, with even an ounce of dignity.

Standout Scene: It’s hard to single out just one moment, but I think the entire opening sequence that establishes his character and then sets him up to be sympathetic so all the rug pulls later hit harder is what I’m going to go with. We some him flubbing a practice date, establish he’s a complete pussy who can’t ask out his dream girl, and then on top of everything else he comes home to find his cat dead. You can’t help but feel bad for the guy… and that’s what makes how evil he ends up being even more disturbing.

Best Quote: For most of the movie, there is a level of plausible deniability Bear can be granted. He’s stuck in a bizarre supernatural situation he doesn’t understand, and while that doesn’t make his actions any less gross, pathetic, and creepy I could at least see a few shreds of sympathy afforded to him since he radiates such a pathetic, hopeless energy.

And then comes the scene where Nikki lays it all out for him. Freaky Nikki is asleep, which gives her a brief moment of control that allows her to explain her situation and how she is essentially a prisoner in her own body, that Bear isn’t with her and is loving a shadow, and then begs him to kill her to free her from the suffering. His response?

Coldly replying, “What’s so bad about being with me?”

Let’s be clear: Before this, he was at best a massive scumbag. From the point of view of his friends he has been taking advantage of an emotionally unstable woman going through an emotional breakdown, and he has been pretty placid and unquestioning with regards to the morality of his wish. He had sex with Nikki a lot, and even if he’s too stupid to realize it at first we as the audience can understand he is raping her. But this right here? This single line fully and completely erased any shred of sympathy I had for Bear. This is where he fully and completely embraces his role as a villain protagonist, and it makes every ounce of suffering that occurs after entirely his fault.

It’s also the most blatant, glaring sign that tells the audience that Bear doesn’t actually care about Nikki. He coveted her, lusted after her, and was fine enjoying her stripped of agency and obsessed with him until she started killing his friends. The fact he is so utterly cowardly that even with the numerous instances of disturbing behavior exhibited prior to this moment, and he still says that… he’s a true bastard.

Final Thoughts & Score: Bear is one of the single best villain protagonists in recent memory, and is a big part as to why Obsession is as good as it is. I mean, a story like this can’t work if half of the main characters

I like how at the start, it’s actually easy to be sympathetic towards him. His cat dies tragically, he has an unrequited crush on a girl, he lacks the confidence to say anything to her, and his friend gives him awful advice… He’s trying, but he’s pathetic to an almost endearing degree. And then he gets the One Wish Willow and in a fit of irritation due to his own cowardice, he magically roofies his crush and despite all the red flags pretty quickly enters a “romantic” relationship with her, complete with lots and lots of sex (read: rape). And despite the numerous points in which he is confronted with how awful what he’s doing is, he steadfastly refuses to grow and change, selfishly clinging to his disturbing relationship. In fact, he practically embraces being evil, and even in his final moments his cowardice and selfishness rear their heads and ensure the ending is black as coal.

In terms of vileness, I actually think he’s comparable to Humbert Humbert, the villain protagonist pedophile narrator of Lolita. Both of them are completely deluded into believing their actions are right, and that their constant rape of their victims is not only not rape but also better than any alternative for them. I mean, should they not love this? Is death or harm truly worse than their love? While I wouldn’t say Bear is quite as bad as a serial child rapist, being someone who strips a woman of her autonomy so he can fuck her repeatedly and then just ignore her pleas isn’t too many steps down from that if I’m being honest.