Editorials
‘Split’s’ Biggest Surprise is its Protagonist Problem
Warning: This is spoiler territory.
Whether you call it a twist, reveal or revelation, Split certainly contains a big surprise that has a lot of people talking. But for me, the biggest surprise coming out of the film was how shockingly Shyamalan flounders in the protagonist department. And I’m not talking about failing to write a protagonist we “like” or “relate to”, or “care about”, but failing in creating a protagonist at all. Because, seriously, who is the protagonist in Split? Which character has agency in the story, is active, or has a compelling arch?
If your answer is Anya Taylor-Joy’s “Casey” you would be right by default. Certainly she’s the film’s Final Girl, and the movie’s opening moments tell us she’s our hero, but after the initial set-up, Casey is abandoned for long stretches of time, leaving all the active choices to the film’s other characters.
Take for example James McAvoy’s therapist, Dr. Fletcher (played by Betty Buckly) who becomes a sleuth of sorts, digging into CCTV footage for clues and ultimately making bold moves against him. Is she the protagonist? Certainly her action delivers a lot more of the information the movie gives us.
And then there’s Casey’s fellow captors. They may not have flashbacks filling in their backstory, but Shyamalan certainly gives them a lot more to do. Claire makes the film’s first daring escape by hammering the ceiling with her shoe while Casey… guards the door? And it’s Marcia who decides to take action against her aggressor in a bold move to meet McAvoy with physical force while Casey… looks on in shock? We can argue whether these were “smart” choices for those characters to make, but they were at least choices that propelled the narrative.
Remember 10 Cloverfield Lane? Remember agonizing along with Mary Elizabeth Winstead as she attempted to get that cell phone while chained to the wall? Remember when she makes the choice to attack John Goodman during that amazing dinner scene? Smart or not, her actions defined her and the relationships she had with the other characters. Director Dan Trachtenberg made sure to put his audience squarely in her experience and gave her all the agency. We just don’t get that same consideration here.
All this is not to deny that Anya Taylor-Joy is doing great work in the film. Indeed as John Squires rightly points out, her performance is solid, intense and nuanced but the writing is just not there for her character, which is most surprising because this is traditionally where Shyamalan excels. All of his films have rich and memorable main characters, each with specific characteristics, wants and flaws: The Village‘s Ivy Walker, literally blind to the dark truths of her world. Unbreakable‘s David Dunn, a nuanced study of how a normal, flawed family man comes to grips with identity and destiny. Heck, even The Visit gave us a more rounded character in budding filmmaker, Becca.
In Split, Shyamalan defines Casey as a victim and that’s pretty much it. And I would go even farther and suggest how he uses flashbacks to communicate this is not only a bit awkward, but a big storytelling cheat that allows him to avoid figuring out how to build a compelling character in the film proper. So when, during the film’s final moments, Shyamalan asks us to accept that her experience as McAvoy’s prisoner has finally allowed her to overcome her victim-hood through a single decision and action, it just didn’t feel earned to me. But hey, that’s just me.
I liked Split, and there’s a lot to like in it. I think it’s worth celebrating another financial success for M. Night Shyamalan and the fact that it owned the weekend box office means that we’ll be getting more tight thrillers from him in the future. But it’s also my opinion that as a showcase for McAvoy and his 23 personalities, Split ultimately robs us of a protagonist worthy of Shyamalan’s talents.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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