Warning: This post contains some spoilers for Obsession, now in theaters.

There's a scene near the beginning of Obsession when shy, insecure, 20-something music-store employee Bear (Michael Johnston) is given multiple opportunities to, at long last, confess his romantic feelings to his childhood friend, coworker, and longtime crush Nikki (a scene-stealing Inde Navarrette). Instead, he chickens out, allowing her to retreat inside her home without telling her about his overwhelming crush.

It's a moment that might make you cringe in frustration, especially once it leads to Bear cracking open the '80s novelty "One Wish Willow" toy he originally intended to give to Nikki and instead using it to wish she would love him more than anyone in the world. To Bear's surprise, Nikki immediately appears back outside his car window, acting like a different and far more unhinged person than he's ever known. But that doesn't phase him enough to change his decision to let her come over to his house, make out with him, and sleep in his bed. And that's just the beginning. Over the course of Obsession's 108-minute runtime, Nikki transforms into an self-destructive, possessive, and dangerously violent shadow of her former self as Bear's spell forces her to fixate solely on her unnatural devotion to him—no matter the cost.

If there's a message writer-director Curry Barker was trying to send about modern dating culture in Obsession, he says it has to do with the importance of putting yourself out there. "We live in a world where everybody's on the internet and human connection feels like it's at an all-time low," Barker tells TIME. "Bear is a guy who's too scared. A lot of things would have been avoided in this movie if he had just told her how he felt."

'Anytime you wish for something, it's probably going to be selfish'

Barker, 26, rose to Internet fame alongside creative partner Cooper Tomlinson (who plays Bear's friend Ian in Obsession) as the duo behind the YouTube sketch-comedy channel "that's a bad idea," before transitioning into longer-form horror with the 62-minute, micro-budget slasher Milk & Serial. The found-footage-style fright flick, which Barker wrote, directed, and starred in, went massively viral after the pair released it on their channel for free in August 2024, attracting the attention of major Hollywood studios. Now, Obsession, which was acquired by Focus Features for a reported $14 million last year following a buzzy festival debut, is heading into its opening weekend with a near-perfect Rotten Tomatoes score, while Barker is being touted as one of the next big names in horror. His slate of forthcoming projects not only includes Blumhouse horror-comedy Anything But Ghosts, a collaboration with Tomlinson that stars Aaron Paul and Bryce Dallas Howard, but also A24's new reimagining of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which Barker says he plans to take in "a very different direction than the last six or seven movies we've seen [in the franchise]."

As for what drew Barker to the age-old "be careful what you wish for" trope in Obsession, the filmmaker says he wanted to explore how our deepest desires tend to revolve around personal gain. "Any time you wish for something, it's probably going to be selfish," he says. "When people ask me, 'Curry, if you had one wish, what would it be?', I always say, 'That the movie does really great at the box office,' and it kind of gets a laugh. But really, that's pretty selfish. I could wish for world peace."

In a twist on the classic Monkey's Paw scenario, Barker says the One Wish Willow doesn't necessarily produce cursed outcomes. It all depends on the wish that's made. "Everyone thinks the One Wish Willow is cursed, but it's not. Like if you worded it very, very carefully and wished for something you knew couldn't possibly be bad for anybody, you're probably fine," he says. "But if you're forcing someone to feel a certain way about you, it doesn't really matter how you word it."

'Love should be earned'

While Bear is presented as the stereotypical "nice guy" who's been friend-zoned by his crush, his handling of the situation quickly turns sinister. Despite Nikki's increasingly erratic and terrifying behavior, their friends' concerns, and his own realization that her affection is totally artificial, Bear doesn't seem to care that his dream relationship is not only fake, but highly abusive. "The moment you're supposed to realize Bear 100% knows what's going on is at the restaurant when he asks her point blank, 'You love me more than anyone in the world?', which was the exact wording of his wish," Barker says, referencing a scene that takes place not long after Nikki's abrupt change of heart. "Then when Nikki says, 'Why does it matter?' He says, 'It doesn't matter to me.' And it's confirmed."

Nikki's agency and bodily autonomy are horrifically stripped away as she's unwillingly transformed into a ghoulish version of herself who's capable of monstrous acts. So it makes sense that the moments when the real Nikki manages to break through, alternately screaming in agony or begging Bear to kill her and end it, are some of the film's most unsettling. They also seem designed to make you lose any and all sympathy for Bear when the situation ultimately comes to a head in what feels like the most nightmarish way imaginable.

We won't spoil how Obsession arrives at its gruesome climax, but suffice it to say it will probably make you think twice about ever wishing for a crush to like you back—even if you don't have a mysteriously supernatural trinket in hand. As Barker puts it, "Love should be earned. Anything that's not that probably isn't going to work out."