The Drama of Modern Relationships and The Fear That Something Very Bad is Going to Happen
Image: A24
Notice a curious uptick in media representation dedicated to failing marriages and turbulent relationships lately? You’re not alone. Hollywood’s cinematic universe has become saturated with filmic depictions of volatile marriages and the dissolution of modern on-screen relationships. This trend can be traced across a laundry list of acclaimed, multi-genre, contemporary Hollywood productions, most notably in successful productions like Backrooms (2026), The Drama (2026), Something Very Bad is Going to Happen (2026), Obsession (2026) and Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022).
These productions motion toward an ostensible frivolity within on-screen modern relationships, where the act of marriage or matrimony as a climax or end goal erodes and where interpersonal connection fizzles out. In Haley Z. Boston’s Something Very Bad is Going to Happen, the pursuit of matrimony begins to deteriorate due to a surviving generational curse, and all pending nuptials are met with supernatural hurdles. The series succeeds in problematising the age-old ideal and lofty quest of finding one’s soulmate, while further complicating the process by situating the narrative within the context of contemporary aversions towards traditionalism. Nevertheless, stubborn nuptial rituals persist throughout the series, although in very occult ways.
PhD fellow at the Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, Franka Heise, suggests that the representation of marriage as a pinnacle stems from the view of matrimony as a central sociocultural institution. Heise also echoes the narrative sentiment of Kristoffer Borgli’s The Drama, which defines weddings as “performative by nature.”
The Drama reveals how fabricated intimacy and a meet-cute founded on a lie can snowball into a series of unfortunate events. The plot centres on the emotions of Charlie, played by Robert Pattinson, and his sudden disenchantment with his bride-to-be, Emma, played by Zendaya. The marital procession suffers as Charlie struggles to come to grips with Emma’s past. Not only does Emma and Charlie’s relationship suffer, but so too does the relationship between her and a female friend.
This is a recurrent motif across male-centred plot devices in media, as well as in real-world scenarios. Dr Berit Åström, an Associate Professor of English Literature at Umeå University in Sweden, says that when the suffering of women is featured, the narrative focus is shifted to the emotions of fathers, husbands and lovers; the pain suffered by the female body is thus referred to and filtered through the male mind. Dr Åström confirms that this phenomenon persists even in present-day narratives and transcends the boundaries of genre, suggesting that this trope is not historically or spatially confined.
She further highlights that the texts focus on the men’s emotional suffering rather than the physical experiences of the women, regardless of how peripheral or central the women are. This occurs plainly within The Drama, as Emma’s psychological trauma resulting from being bullied and ostracised is overlooked by Charlie, all while her character is essential to the plot. As the narrative is shaped according to his consciousness, the dimensions of Emma’s character fail to extend beyond Charlie’s perception of her, and his inability to reconcile with her past.
This archetype appears frequently in media where female characters are able to love male characters with monstrous characteristics, while male characters are commonly depicted as being intolerant of female characters who express divergent personalities, leading to their villainization within the narrative. Films like Beauty and the Beast, The Shape of Water, Deadpool, Frankenstein, Twilight, and The Mask all convey this. Ultimately, The Drama and Something Very Bad is Going to Happen redefines the term “shotgun wedding” in macabre ways, while simultaneously conveying the fear of knowing and being known.
These pieces of media all succeed in capturing the metamorphic definitions of modern relationships while representing a younger demographic’s anxious approach toward traditionalism. For instance, Clark’s dysfunctional marriage to Barbara and his inability to come to terms with their inevitable separation ultimately precipitate all the psychologically horrific events which unfold in Backrooms. Clark villainises Barbara, which leads to a distorted version of her in his mind and subsequently, a fragmented version of her who becomes trapped in the backrooms. Clark’s unwillingness to stop blaming Barbara and his reluctance to move forward result in his psychologist, Dr Mary Kline, venturing into the backrooms out of concern, only to meet a disastrous fate.
As the narrative is centred around the emotions of Clark, Dr Kline’s character is disassociated from any character progression. It then begs the question: why are successful pieces of media heavily laden with and reliant on filmic depictions of unsuccessful marriages and divorce? Could it be that these filmic representations capture a collective anxiety towards the future, as a result of real-world socioeconomic tumult? Studies do indicate that evolving economic constraints can impact decisions regarding getting married, staying married or pursuing separation. These studies highlight how these decisions are more often influenced by broader systemic socioeconomic factors rather than interpersonal dissatisfaction.
These pieces of media ultimately take the cultural temperature of off-screen modern relationships and transform understandings of shared intimacy through filmic associations of intimacy with narrative violence and gothic thematic devices. This pattern of fictionalised suffering is corollary to the way in which modern relationships are formed during times of sociopolitical and economic unrest. Films like Everything Everywhere All at Once, however, hold up over time, as socioeconomic landscapes of modern relationships shift in nontraditional and unexpected ways. In the film, the sentiment of “just doing laundry and taxes with you” depicts how modern relationships survive in spite of it all.