One Woman’s Answer To Whether Alex Garland Is As Intimidating To Work With As People Say

To be fair, his movies are T-E-R-R-I-F-Y-I-N-G

Alex Garland is scarier than Stephen King

You want proof? Let’s start with the stories.

King has hit a bunch of horrifying home runs, but he’s said it himself. When he can’t get the scare, he’ll go for the gross out. When he can’t get that, he’ll go for aliens (sigh).

Yes, he’s the guy who made Pennywise, but he’s also the guy who told a story (within a story) about a boy who ate until he puked. Stephen King is eccentric, but his stories and the person seem about as dangerous as a cartoon.

Albeit one that was coked out of his mind for one or a few decades.

Compare that, instead, to Alex Garland. Is it possible to watch 28 Days Later and not move to the edge of your seat?

Alex Garland did what not even Stephen King could do

Alex Garland started off as a novelist. He was pretty good, too!

After a bunch of successful collaborations with Danny Boyle, Alex did what most writers never get to do. He got to adapt his own stuff into movies as the director.

That’s when he did what Stephen King (offsite to CBC) never managed to do: he made those movies good.

By good, I mean holy **** are these movies scary

And judging by Alex Garland’s last two movies, I wouldn’t be shocked if the man were more intense than a Skittles buffet at a Pride parade. Then again…did you ever wonder what Pennywise looks like when he’s just thinking about clouds and stuff?

He looks kinda cuddly…

Is it possible I’ve been wrong about Alex Garland??

I recently watched (and rewatched) a movie that illustrates the horrors of toxic masculinity. Am I talking about Alex Garland’s latest movie Men? Close!

The Craft: Legacy illustrates the horrors of toxic masculinity (and toxic David Duchovny) while empowering women and gender non-conforming people to finally fight back together (instead of fighting against each other).

And in his own way, Alex Garland’s intimidating (to put it mildly) movies also illustrate women and gender non-conforming people breaking free from toxic masculinity. In Ex Machina, the female-assigned AI named Ava escapes and enacts “revenge on the men who infantilised her and sexualised her.”

We need more stories told by women — not stories about women told by anyone but women.

But since men are going to keep making movies

All I’m asking is for those movies to help. And the Medium/Substack/etc writer Haaniyah Angus helped me see why Alex Garland’s movies are critiquing those men so often at the center of his stories.

See Hanniyah’s article: Could Alex Garland Be Reshaping The Landscape For Female Representation in Science Fiction?

But while that says plenty about Alex Garland’s stories, that doesn’t say anything about the man himself.

Because while there’s always a way to read a movie to make it a little less evil, there’s no denying when a man is, well, a man.

And Alex Garland has quite the reputation.

One woman’s answer to whether Alex Garland might actually be a pretty nice dude

While audiences are divided over whether the ending of Men is empowering or just plain horrifying, when the star of the Craft: Legacy spoke to The Hollywood Reporter, an off-hand question gave audiences a rare glimpse into the man behind these disturbing movies.

THR: Is Alex (Garland) as intimidating as he appears to be?

Cailee Spaeny: I had the same exact feeling. Before I auditioned for [Devs], I watched some interviews of him and he terrified the shit out of me… He’s such a strong personality, and he’s just a no bullshit kind of person.

But he’s the warmest. He’s got two kids too, and I think I was the youngest on that set, so he was very paternal towards me.

He just doesn’t mess around, and he’s pretty intimidating. He just doesn’t like the Hollywood scene. (Laughs.) During all the press that we did, he didn’t understand smiling. He was like, “I don’t feel like smiling. I don’t understand.” (Laughs.) He’s so funny and the sweetest person alive.

Stephen King reshaped horror, and Alex Garland could reshape science fiction

Alex Garland is one of the most innovative storytellers of our era.

Gosh am I glad. Someone has to take the high-concept crown now that Jonathan Nolan seems intent on doing whatever the heck Westworld is doing. Am I the only one who longs for season 1??

I wish Hanniya would write about it. In the meantime, they wrote a pretty persuasive argument why Alex Garland’s movies like Ex Machina and Annihilation work to empower women and gender non-conforming people of all types.

Even if (especially because?) these stories are told by a man.

Ex Machina

The reason as to why this film helps change the long-standing harmful tropes towards female AI is that Ava wins at the end, she gets to escape and enact revenge on the men who infantilised her and sexualised her. She is aware of the games that they are playing with her and so plays along to get what she wanted all along. Ava is not the damsel in distress but instead the mastermind.

Annihilation

Garland’s adaptation of the 2014 novel Annihilation centres around five female scientists who embark on a journey to enter ‘The Shimmer’, an unknown quarantined zone full of mutating organic lifeforms.

Not only do we get a female-led ensemble but there are characters who are Black and Latinx (overlapping with Thompson), as well as a lesbian character, both of which are rarely seen within SF but are becoming more and more frequent in contemporary fiction.

Is Alex Garland as intimidating as they say?

I’m gonna say the answer is yes.

I mean, was there ever any doubt?

But intimidating doesn’t mean he’s an asshole.

He’s just two movies deep into his directorial career, but if he keeps making movies like this, I’ll be here for the horror of however he empowers us next.