The Boys Fans Need To Watch A Chilling 2023 Horror Movie Burning Up The Netflix Charts

If you're a fan of "The Boys," then you're a fan of Antony Starr, the actor who portrays John Gillman, aka Homelander, on the long-running Amazon Prime Video series. More than any other actor or character, it's Homelander who's become the show's breakout star (pun intended), appearing as he does in numerous memes and other ephemera online. There's a good reason for that, of course, which is that Starr is so naturally magnetic as one of the most odious superheroes in fiction, you simply can't take your eyes off him. Starr's performance manages to keep the character watchable amongst the laundry list of horrible things Homelander does on the show. This isn't just a Walter White-style breaking bad character, either; while Homelander does his fair share of manipulating and abusing others, he commits sexual assault and even dates a literal Nazi, for crying out loud.

With such a reputation due to his performance as Homelander, one would assume that Starr appearing in a horror movie would be a natural fit. Sure enough, they'd be right, as Starr's sole horror movie to date, "Cobweb," is an underrated and overlooked gem that basically got buried when it was released in 2023. Rather, it was underrated and overlooked for the last couple of years, but that's now changed, as "Cobweb" is burning up the Netflix charts. It only makes sense, given how director Samuel Bodin gives the movie, set on and around Halloween night, a perfect spooky season vibe, something that would be catnip to Netflix viewers as we head into October anyway. Yet Starr's presence, along with co-star Lizzy Caplan, makes the movie that much more special and memorable, leading to its growing popularity online.

As mentioned earlier, manipulation is one of Homelander's specialities, and it's a quality that Starr can play to perfection. That ability served him well in playing Mark in "Cobweb," a film that isn't just about manipulative people, but is and of itself manipulative of the audience. In "Cobweb," Mark and Carol (Caplan) are the parents of 8-year-old Peter (Woody Norman), who finds himself feeling more and more trepidatious about his home life. When Peter expresses a wish to go trick-or-treating for Halloween, Mark and Carol are oddly strict in their refusal, citing the fact that another child in the neighborhood went missing several years back. Then, once Peter begins experiencing visitations from a presence of another child who may or may not be living behind the walls of his house, Mark and Carol seem increasingly sinister, hiding a secret that both Peter and his sympathetic teacher, Miss Devine (Cleopatra Coleman) become determined to discover.

"Cobweb" has a plethora of twists and turns that follow from there, reveals which I won't spoil here. Suffice to say that Bodin and writer Chris Thomas Devlin chose an appropriate title for their horror film, as it's a devious little twisted fairy tale which weaves an intricate web that you may not see coming until it's too late. What certainly can be seen is how well cast Starr and Caplan are as Peter's overbearing and gaslighting parents. Caplan turns her role into a sort of live-action version of Other Mother from "Coraline," while Starr's menacing patriarch recalls Terry O'Quinn's work in "The Stepfather" and, of course, Jack Nicholson's superlative Bad Dad in Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining." If Homelander has ever disturbed you, or if you want to see a perfectly pitched recent Halloween movie with some memorable effects, moody cinematography, and excellent performances, then you should fire up "Cobweb" on your Netflix account as soon as possible.