Here's a challenge for partners in committed relationships who are fans of the horror genre: Settle in with your loved one and view Together. The 2025 indie hit has now made its launch on a streaming platform on Hulu. At first glance, it may seem like conventional biological terror, but beneath Together exists a deep contemplation about the ways we decide to love each other.
A Debut Feature Investigating Partnership Complexities
Together is the debut feature-length film for director Michael Shanks. It showcases the real-life married couple Dave Franco and Alison Brie as Tim and Millie, a pair who are not married that have remained a couple for over ten years. Having wed in reality in 2017, the actors contribute a unique chemistry to their portrayals, skillfully embodying both the good and bad of a long-term relationship.
The story starts when Millie and Tim relocate from the big city to the countryside for professional reasons. A familiar story element, of course, but that’s mostly where the tropes cease. Together evolves into as much a deep dive into the psyche of the pair’s relationship as it is a movie featuring biological frights.
A Supernatural Catalyst
While trekking near their country house, a violent storm occurs, and the protagonists tumble into an underground cave. After spending the night there and managing to escape, a strange force begins influencing the couple. This force creates a paranormal intimacy between them that goes well past emotional intimacy.
The entire film is a slow burn fright fest, blending elements of dreamlike terrors, disturbing (but tastefully done) body horror, and genuinely funny exchanges (sometimes during something grotesque). Michael Shanks skillfully blends these components expertly and wraps them up in a slowly mounting sense of impending doom.
Layered Performances
A large part of Together is exclusively the two lead actors, and they masterfully render manifold depths to the characters’ relationship. Millie’s confidence and emotional bond is suffering due to a lack of intimacy. Her subconscious resentment of Tim for his hesitance to pursue anything but his failing musical ambitions inexorably rises.
In contrast, Tim's character feels trapped and isolated by Millie, who’s the impetus they’ve relocated rural and removed from his social circle. He is terrified of the notion of completely losing his individual identity in another person. This fear is amplified by the reality he can’t drive and needs Millie for mobility.
The film's most intelligent aspect in Together avoids making one partner or the other the clear bad guy.
Both characters grapple with the kind of problems that arise in long-term unions a decade in. Fundamentally, they still love each other. They still laugh together, comfort one another, and are vulnerable at times. But beneath it all, there’s an persistent current of uncertainty about their future together.
Thematic Depth
While the paranormal elements in Together act as a metaphor for these anxieties of codependency and totally devoting oneself to a partner, the allegory does not come across as overly obvious or pretentious. Instead, these ickier, creepier moments provide a ideal counterpart to the relationship narrative. Both the frights and the fights work together in a mutually beneficial way.
A Debated Finale
Together’s ending, which remains unspoiled, has left audiences divided on the movie's final takeaway about codependent relationships. It has been said that those not in relationships have interpreted the film as a powerful case for staying single. Meanwhile, a few pairs having disagreements found that the film actually helped them reconcile.
Regardless of your relationship status, your own interpretation could potentially serve as a revealing measure of how you perceive partnership. Will the conclusion plant a sense of discomfort and fear, or a heartwarming sense of hope? Will you recognize your own traits in either protagonist and yell at the screen, or simply look at your other half and say, “I’d do that for you”?
No matter your reaction, Together is an test you can undertake right now.
Together is streaming on Hulu's platform at present.