What Obsession’s Ending Really Means

Obsession is a massive breakout hit. Filmmaker Curry Barker’s relationship-horror flick has earned nearly $150 million at the box office, on a budget of just $1 million (or less). Moreover, Obsession has hit that stratosphere where it’s seeing a surge in attendance weeks after its release, based solely on raving reviews from critics and casual viewers alike.

The film and its young stars, Michael Johnston (Teen Wolf, X-Men ’97) and Inde Navarrette (Superman & Lois), deliver a pretty straightforward horror parable about wishes gone wrong, which is not hard to explain. However, a few quick twists in the final act of the film have sparked a lot of ongoing debate about what Obsession‘s ending delivered, and what the final message or meaning the film sets out to deliver.

Obsession Ending Explained (SPOILERS)

Obsession‘s dark story kicks into gear when lonely and troubled young man “Bear Bailey” (Johnston) snaps a “One Wish Willow” branch in half to make the wish that the girl from his friends group, Nikki Freeman (Navarrette), will fall madly in love with him. The wish works, but too well: Nikki becomes obsessed with Bear to a terrifying degree, like only moving or functioning when Bear is present. Eventually, the infatuation escalates into the brutal, violent murder of a girl Bear nearly connects with, making it clear to Bear that he has to undo what he’s done. The final act of the film sees Bear stuck in a bind: he gets two more One Wish Willow branches from the store, but finds he physically cannot break them due to the “one wish” policy. Bear tries to get his friend and Nikki’s sneaky link, Ian (Cooper Tomlinson), to make the wish, but it backfires when Ian blurts out he wants a billion dollars, and gets it.

In the final showdown, Ian is killed by Nikki, and Bear tries to commit suicide as the only other way to free Nikki from the wish. But Nikki gets another idea when she finds the last One Wish Willow branch: she snaps it in half and wishes for Bear to love her just as much. The wish kicks in just as Bear is trying to vomit up the pills he’s overdosing on; he is hypnotically drawn ot Nikki and embraces her, only to die from the pills. Nikki is emotionally destroyed and tries to shoot herself, only for her Bear’s wish to wear off at the last second. She drops the gun and is confused by all of her dead friends and the blood all over her, screaming hysterically.

The Deeper Meaning of Obsession’s Wish Magic

The key element of Obsession‘s story that some viewers are getting confused about is the nature of the wish from the One Wish Willow. The film goes to great stylistic lengths to make it clear, visually, from the moment Nikki goes from normal to obsessed, that there is something else possessing the girl, and it is not “Nikki” per se. The mythology is never explored in depth (nor should it have been), but the implications throughout the film are hard to miss.

Most notable are the scenes where Nikki’s face is obscured by shadow, yet the pupils of her eyes can be seen glowing with menacing light (showcasing the talent of cinematographer Taylor Clemons). “Possession” would be a fair word to substitute for “Obsession” in the title, as that is what the wish is, really: robbing the victim of their free will and consciousness and replacing it. It’s a powerful subtextual metaphor that feeds into the larger, often uncomfortable, metaphors that Obsession is working with. The title ironically refers to Bear’s obsession with getting Nikki to like him, even through some creepy, non-consensual way that acts as a metaphor for toxicity, if not assault.

So, at the end, both Bear and Nikki experience moments of having their agency snatched and returned (respectively). Bear’s moment is one of penance: he’s too cowardly to actually sacrifice himself to free Nikki (character psychology that the cast and director have since confirmed), and the karmic retrobution is his victim taking away his consent and forcing him to love her. Nikki doesn’t have to kill Bear in revenge: his own shady behavior comes back to bite him.

Nikki’s ending, on the other hand, is one of retribution and painful acknowledgement. She manages to survive the gross manipulation she endured (a change that was made to the film’s darker original ending), but is steeped in horror and trauma she’ll never fully recover from. Nikki’s final scream is a perfect ending that can be taken on several levels, from the comedic punchline of her agency returning to the worst of “WTF?!” circumstances, to some who take it as a feminist statement about the “horror” of male objectification.

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Obsession’s Darker Alternate Ending Explained (Would It Have Been Better?)