People are calling Weapons ‘problematic’ for regurgitating this classic horror theme

Weapons is the biggest horror film of the year in many ways. It has been an instant commercial success and box office smash, as well as a massive hit with critics. Weapons has a very impressive score on Rotten Tomatoes, and nearly everyone on my Letterboxd feed has reviewed it at least four stars. It’s a hit, I loved it and I think it will go down as one of the most seminal horror films of this decade. However, there is one key detail of Weapons that some are viewing as problematic – and it’s bringing up a lot of discourse about one of the horror genre’s most controversial subgenres known as hagsploitation.

Whether you loved Weapons like most or did find it a bit problematic, here’s why some deem the film to have a twist that feeds into old cinema misogynistic tropes about women and the female body.

Weapons spoilers ahead.

Weapons is a literal and metaphorical witch hunt

Weapons is many things, but it is not subtle in the way it signposts who the villain of this film is – once that is revealed. The witch graffiti on Justine Gandy’s car, the way the town basically becomes an angry mob looking for someone to blame when something bad happens – it’s all giving witch. When the reveal happens that the witch hunt was correct but the witch it was aimed at wasn’t the witch which it should have been, this is where the eyebrows have been raised by some people.

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Just watched WEAPONS and can’t stop thinking about how Gladys’ whole style feels like a continuation, as well as a twisted synthesis, of decades of Hollywood depictions of witches, hagsploitation, and other eccentric middle-aged or older women on the margins of mainstream horror. pic.twitter.com/2kAXdoM2wA

— Cláudio Alves 🔜 TIFF50 (@claudioalvesDC) August 12, 2025

It all comes back to a trope known as hagsploitation – in which horror films use an elderly or aging female body as something to be feared and something that’s either creepy or grotesque. Some of the most popular films in this genre are classics like Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, and it’s been ever present in recent films too like The Substance and Ti West’s X. Even Zach Cregger’s film before Weapons, Barbarian, focusses on a grotesque and monstrous woman.

Hagsploitation is also known as ‘psycho-biddy’ films, and they often play on the fact of what we expect and assume an elderly female to be, who may have a twist and more nefarious intentions we don’t expect.

Hagsploitation in general is a divisive subgenre. Is it entirely misogynistic? It’s certainly a valid argument and interpretation, but the flip side is that it tries to teach us about how society can neglect older people and women – and these films basically always present a female figure who is going to drastic measures to be seen and noticed.

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