Saturday, July 12, 2025

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): The Wrath of Becky

2023,  Matt Angel, Suzanne Coote (The Open House) -- Netflix

This sequel to Becky is expecting a third, a conclusion to the trilogy, as we will finally get to find out what that fucking neo-nazi white supremacist key was all about. But unless someone with some indie movie money to burn makes it, I doubt we will see said conclusion. Like its predecessor, this is a very small budget, almost bottle-episode movie, a "small" movie as I am wont to say. Maybe even more so than the first.

Now 16, Becky (Lulu Wilson, The Haunting of Hill House) is not adjusting well to the foster system and finds herself on the road, with Diego, working a shitty diner while living with a nice old lady named Elena, who respects Becky's boundaries. Three "Noble Men", or white supremacist men's rights incel shitbags as I like to call them, eat at her diner, are typically misogynist towards her, and she responds in kind -- she dumps a hot coffee into the lap of one. Afterwards they follow her home, beat Becky & Diego unconscious and kill Elena. Fucking harsh opening act, but that is the point of these movies. Dads and dog were killed in the first one, her only trusted adult is killed in this one, which incurs the wrath.

Much of this movie, beyond the expected brutal violence, is the mockery of white supremacy and fragile male ego movements. The movie continuously reminds us how these men, even the capable ones, are all making up for inadequacies of one kind or another. In today's climate, where these kinds of men are being validated left, right and centre (puns intended), it is nice to see a movie unabashed in its opinions of that group. Even the "sympathetic antagonist" is a shitbag.

As for the violence, Becky is growing up. She was an avatar for teens "acting out their anger" in the first movie, but this one is more about her coming into her own as an unrepentant killer. That has its own commentary attached to it, and she is no longer the "the trauma caused her to do it" little kid; she's exchanging her childhood knitted fox stocking cap for a geared-up slayer outfit. And then the movie just jumps its own shark by .... well, having her recruited by the CIA. Well, if John Wick can start with a movie about an ex-assassin becoming a mythical agent in a alt-world-wide society, then why not Becky.

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