Aside from a few split-second glimpses in dream sequences, the year's best movie villain doesn't properly show up until well past the halfway mark of Weapons. Even so, Amy Madigan's Aunt Gladys makes an immediate impression: terrifying, hilarious, and deliciously evil, she's the spider at the center of Weapons' web of mystery.
With her smudged makeup, outlandish hair and clothes, and outwardly cheerful demeanour, there's something – visually at least – of the Joker about Gladys, but the character represents a much older archetype. As we gradually learn across the course of the movie, Aunt Gladys is a witch. Not a cool, young, empowered Wiccan like Willow from Buffy, nor a perfectly composed and virtuous spell-caster like Wicked's Elphaba and Glinda, but a full on fairytale monster who uses her powers to feed off the young.
The worst witch
Of course, we don't know this at first. Part of Weapons' pleasure is its tricksy structure and the piece-by-piece discovery of just what exactly is going on in Maybrook, Pennsylvania.
There are clues, though: the film is bookended with a child’s voiceover, framing the movie as a story or an urban legend, perhaps being regaled around a campfire somewhere. The word WITCH is daubed on Justine Gandy's car, though interestingly it's never said out loud about Gladys herself. There's also some unsubtle foreshadowing just before Gladys enchants Marcus (Benedict Wong) and forces him to kill his husband Terry (Clayton Farris). The couple are watching a documentary about Cordyceps, a parasitic fungus that can control insect larvae, and which famously inspired The Last of Us's zombies.
Gladys's actions are about survival. Across the course of the film we learn that Gladys is terminally ill and she uses magic to sustain herself by somehow magically feeding off her victims. She has not previously had a lot of contact with her sister, young Alex Lilly's unnamed mother, but she manages to emotionally manipulate her way into the Lilly family by playing on their kindness and sense of charity.
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It’s this ability to weaponise her frailty and ensure sympathy from her victims that is one of Gladys's most chilling attributes, partly because it's an aspect of her character that has nothing to do with the supernatural. She uses it to infiltrate the Lilly family, to get inside Marcus's home and make him murder his beloved husband (watched again recently I was struck by the sweetness of the couple wearing matching Mickey Mouse shirts just before everything goes horribly wrong), and to wrong-foot the police. She is, behind the magic and her theatrics, a very human villain.
It's Alex's chapter that I find the most affecting and upsetting in the film. There's an awful sense of helplessness to this poor kid's story as Gladys bullies and coerces him. It's an important part of the story, one that grounds Gladys's villainy in something more real: she's an abuser as well as a killer.
An awards-worthy performance
It also makes her final comeuppance feel gloriously and satisfyingly earned. There's a real sense of catharsis to the moment when Alex breaks the spell and the missing kids all turn on Gladys and rip her to pieces, in a scene that feels like it's been lifted straight out of 28 Days Later. Often, a horror movie kill is amusing rather than shocking. This one is both and also triumphant. It has to be one of the most well-deserved death scenes in recent movie history.
It should, of course, be noted that Gladys would be nothing without Amy Madigan's terrific, awards-worthy performance. That she makes a character as gaudy and on-the-surface ridiculous as this not only believable and sinister but also somehow kind of likeable is a real feat.
Madigan embodies Gladys with a glorious no shits given self-assurance as well as a certain amount of ironic physical comedy. It's clear to the audience that Gladys is in total control of every scene she's in – until the very end, of course. It may take a while for us to properly meet her in the movie, but as soon as this very modern take on a fairytale monster slowly and methodically struts into Marcus's office, all of Weapons bends around Madigan's performance and the final pieces of the film's mystery click neatly into place.
Honorable Mentions
- Lex Luthor, Superman – Many actors have played the Man of Steel's arch nemesis, but Nicholas Hoult was able to channel the genius supervillain's towering intellect and his seething rage better than most.
- Steven J. Lockjaw, One Battle After Another – In a film full of powerhouse performances, Sean Penn's was the most idiosyncratic, making the loathsome Lockjaw terrifying, funny, and ultimately pathetic.
- Jimmy Crystal, 28 Years Later – 2025 was Jack O'Connell's villain era, with his turn as Remmick in Sinners and as Jimmy Crystal in 28 Years Later. His shocking appearance at the end of that film sets up a major role in January's sequel, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple. But more on that next year...
- Krennic, Andor – Ben Mendelsohn was always terrific in the role of the Death Star's project manager, but in Andor season 2 Krennic's became truly dangerous. An interrogation scene, where he places a single finger on another character's head, is one of the show's most haunting images.
Weapons is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our list of the best horror movies, and keep up with upcoming horror movies on the way.
You can also read our breakdown of the Best Movies of 2025, and the Best Scare of the Year, too.
