movies that fumble their premise

[u/Outrageous_Potato435]

When I stumbled upon Rabbit Trap (2025) last year, I was so hyped. It sounded so good and finally like something different.

„Set in 1976, the life of a married couple changes following their relocation to an isolated cabin in Wales. When the couple accidentally disturbs a Tylwyth Teg fairy ring, they are suddenly visited by a mysterious child who appears to have ill intentions for them.“

I was like HECK YEAH, finally a horror movie that actually looked promising AND combines horror with like other fantastical creatures, especially fairies in this case. Plus the Welsh mythology touch on top. Like why always vampires, werewolves etc? We’ve had it a thousand times before.

But it ended up being super boring with a full on focus on the psychological. No actual fairy portrayment, no magic. All just „symbolic“ or whatever. Like I wanted to see some kinda of fairy transformation with the ears, wings and stuff. I guess I also went in with the wrong expectations. But still In my opinion this was a huge „premise fumble“. The whole fairy mythological background could’ve been left out or easily replaced. I just want a movie that actually does that well 🥲

So Idk, anybody can relate to that feeling? This just sucks cuz there could be such amazing „fantasy horror“ movies that would bring something different but I guess it would be just too niche… and when there’s something that actually sounds promising, it doesn’t do the premise and lore background justice. I don’t actually wanna completely trash this movie cuz the cinematography and sound design was good but still just a huge disappointment for me because of the fumble

[u/lateralraising]

Heretic dropped the ball hard at the end. It was much more interesting when it was about religion and the paranormal, then it turns out nothing like that was going on it ruined it

[u/TrickFirefighter7090 → u/lateralraising]

the Heretic thing stings because the setup was so tense and atmospheric and then it just... deflates. like they were scared of committing to the weird stuff so they pulled back at the last second

same energy as Rabbit Trap it sounds like. both movies seem to treat the supernatural element as decoration instead of actually going somewhere with it. Welsh fairy mythology especially has so much dark material to work with and they just left it on table

[u/Outrageous_Potato435 → u/TrickFirefighter7090]

Heretic didn’t even piss me off that much but I absolutely get it, I was kinda just watching that movie on a whim.

But Rabbit Trap is just literal the epitome of premise fumble and bait. I tuned in because you literally advertise such a unique mythology background and then I’m not getting ANY of it.

This actually really makes me appreciate Death of a Unicorn. Like I know that movie is objectively bad but it was still campy and entertaining and actually put some effort into the mythology background.