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Man Sees Ghost of Dead Child in Chilling Twitter Thread
“So, my apartment is currently being haunted by the ghost of a dead child…”
This past Monday morning, writer Adam Ellis (@moby_dickhead) began a Twitter thread with that opening line, going on to relay the story of his multiple encounters with the dead child in a series of tweets that went viral and sent chills down the spines of hundreds of users.
Adam, who has a book of “funny comics” coming out next year, swears that the thread isn’t part of some viral marketing experiment, but rather that this apartment is genuinely haunted by the ghost of a child whose name, he learned, is David. What else did he learn? David is trying to kill him.
We’ve embedded the entire thread below, but here’s the basic gist.
David, whose abnormally-sized head is caved in on one side, first appeared to Adam in his nightmares, but has apparently crossed over into the real world. After his first encounter with David, Adam learned in another dream that the boy only appears at midnight, and can be asked two questions if you preface them with “Dear David.”
If you ask a third question, Adam was told, David will kill him.
Naturally, Adam asked David three questions one night… and that’s when things started to get REALLY weird in Adam’s apartment.
Peruse the entire thread below, which includes pictures and the full story.
So, my apartment is currently being haunted by the ghost of a dead child and he’s trying to kill me. (thread)
— ˗ˏˋ ᴀᴅᴀᴍ ᴇʟʟɪs ˊˎ˗ (@moby_dickhead) August 7, 2017
Let’s start with the good news. Lockbox looks far better than its misleading marketing materials suggest, a supernatural horror movie so darkly lit and color graded that you’ll have to squint your way through jump scares. It’s also anchored by reliable genre performers. That’s also about where the good news ends with this rote adaptation of Knifepoint Horror Podcast story “Winthrop.”
The empathetic Carla Gugino gives her all as Ellen, a saint of a woman with boundless patience who takes on life’s hard luck with a kind smile. After giving up her career as a fashion designer to become caretaker for a dying mother, she’s then forced to reinvent herself once more when her caretaker role ends. That catches us up to the events of Lockbox, where Ellen is asked to take in a cousin she hasn’t seen in quite some time who’s dealing with severe PTSD.
Just as Ellen finally establishes a real connection with Winthrop (Lou Taylor Pucci), it’s interrupted by the arrival of peculiar neighbor Vahna (Katharine Isabelle), who spells clear trouble. When Vahna shows up dead, it sets in motion a supernatural battle of possession.
Image Credit: Aura entertainment
Director Daniel Stamm (The Last Exorcism, Prey for the Devil) and screenwriter Justin Yoffe approach Lockbox in the broadest of brushstrokes, dooming it from the start with clunky storytelling and woefully underdeveloped themes of heady topics like PTSD. Winthrop is a character that comes loaded with emotional baggage and trauma that’s piled on throughout his tragic life, but much like its title, his interiority and history are treated like a tightly guarded secret meant to prolong the supernatural mystery.
The problem here, though, is that Lockbox is too sparse to sustain mystery at all, and it instead robs Winthrop of characterization. It winds up trapping the talented Pucci without anywhere to go, toggling between wounded animal and mentally disoriented.
From there, Lockbox bounds through plot developments without any sense of stakes or purpose, peppered by a smattering of haphazard paint-by-numbers jump scares. The only unwavering constant is Ellen’s resolute faith, and Stamm seems to leave it entirely to Gugino to guide confused audiences through this inconsequential story right up until its supernatural climax.
Image Credit: Aura entertainment
To give more credit, Lockbox at least injects an unconventional exorcism here; just don’t expect much in the way of explanation. When the film finally reveals the meaning behind its title, it dangles a fascinating carrot it has zero interest in delivering. More than a severe lack of fleshing out its characters beyond plot drivers or devices, this faith-based flick also seems terrified to offer any worldbuilding whatsoever.
Yoffe’s script stretches the short story beyond its means instead of fleshing it out, and Stamm fills out the gaps with cheap CGI scares and overwrought performances; Isabelle’s Vahna is beyond cartoonish in her villainy. It’s also pretty nonsensical, treating only Ellen’s faith with the utmost sincerity and largely squandering its typically reliable talent. So much so that the final imagery, pure sunkissed saccharine sentimentality, leaves you with the feeling that this horror movie might be better suited as an entry in Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Lockbox releases in select theaters on July 3, 2026.
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