Passenger (2026) Review 🩸🚘

Im on the highway to hell!

Let’s start by showing y’all the trailers shall we?

So before I even begin this review I gotta say this. I was actually excited for this movie. Andre Øvredal directed this. The same guy who gave us The Autopsy of Jane Doe and The Last Voyage of the Demeter. Two movies I genuinely love. Especially The Autopsy of Jane Doe. That movie didn’t play safe. The main characters die. The horror wins. It feels bleak and unsettling and memorable.

And that’s honestly why Passenger disappointed me.

Not because it’s the worst horror movie ever.

Not because it offended me.

But because this movie just feels generic. Safe. Corporate. Cookie cutter. Like it was assembled by a committee.

And that’s the real problem.

This doesn’t feel like an Andre Øvredal movie.

It feels like it could’ve been made by anybody.

And that sucks because there ARE flashes of creativity buried inside this movie. There are moments where I was like okay now THIS is creepy. But every single time the movie gets close to becoming something unique it immediately retreats back into generic horror tropes.

And eventually I just started sitting there thinking:

“This was your vision? Really? Okay… are you sure?”

Non-Spoiler Plot Overview

The movie follows Maddie and TY, a couple who decide to move out of their apartment and live the van life. TY is one of those people who romanticizes the open road and freedom while Maddie is way more hesitant because she spent most of her life in foster care bouncing between homes and never really having stability.

And honestly? That part actually worked for me.

Maddie wanting a real home made sense. She literally tells TY that she wants somewhere she can properly call home because she’s spent most of her life moving around.

Meanwhile TY is all:

“It’s the shackles that hold us down.”

Ohhhhh he’s one of THOSE people.

As I like to call them:

wealthy young adults with parent issues.

Because seriously where DOES this guy get his money from?

This dude constantly buys gas, reserves romantic hotels, pays for motel rooms, works out at gyms, travels constantly, and lives full time in a van, and we NEVER see him working. This guy must secretly be loaded.

This guy must secretly be loaded.

But the movie just kind of goes:

“Forget about it. Aren’t these two adorable together?”

Anyways after six weeks on the road TY proposes to Maddie. He originally had this romantic hotel proposal planned but because Maddie wanted barbecue and traffic delayed them he has to improvise by decorating the inside of the van with Christmas lights and proposing outside in front of a neighborhood before immediately getting told to leave by neighborhood watch.

Honestly that scene kinda made me laugh.

Then things start going wrong when Maddie is driving through a winding forest road at night.

And this is where we officially enter dumb-ville.

Maddie is driving on a curvy road in the middle of the night in a dark forest and instead of focusing on the road she starts playing with her engagement ring while driving. She hits a bump and the ring falls onto the floor.

And instead of waiting until they stop driving?

She bends her entire head down to pick the ring up while still driving.

Yeah.

Because that’s definitely what normal people do.

That’s where I officially said:

“Ohhhh really!? People don’t act this dumb, now we’re just manufacturing tension.”

And that right there sums up the entire horror structure of this movie.

Everything feels manufactured.

Every time a scare is about to happen the characters suddenly start acting stupid because the screenplay needs horror to happen.

And once I started noticing that pattern I couldn’t stop seeing it.

The Opening Is Actually Really Good

Ironically the best part of the movie is probably the opening.

The movie opens with two guys driving down the same winding road at night joking around. One guy is making fun of his friend for always having dry lips and starts joking about diabetes.

The guy says:

“No I just drink a lot.”

Then his friend says:

“Just don’t have to go pee.”

And the guy responds:

“Oh come on, I’m like a camel. I can hold it in.”

Then immediately realizes he has to pee.

Honestly that dialogue actually felt natural.

That’s the thing.

The movie IS capable of writing believable scenes. The two pull over in the middle of the forest and the guy goes to take a piss while his friend waits in the car. Then suddenly the car horn starts blaring. Doors start opening and closing. The guy runs back to the car and finds his friend missing. Then his friend suddenly slams onto the windshield screaming for help before getting dragged through the air and thrown behind the car. The surviving friend panics and drives off leaving his dead friend behind. Honestly? That reaction felt believable. If I just saw my friend get thrown through the air by some supernatural thing I’d probably leave too. Then the movie introduces the creepiest idea in the whole film. The road loops. The same creepy figure keeps appearing in the exact same spot no matter how far the guy drives. THAT was creepy. That was the kind of weird psychological road horror I wanted more of. Then the figure suddenly appears beside him in the passenger seat and the movie smash cuts to the title.

Good opening.

REALLY good opening.

Too bad the trailer spoiled literally all of it.

And when I say all of it I mean ALL OF IT.

The trailer basically spoiled the entire first five minutes beat for beat.

So instead of wondering what was going to happen I was just sitting there like:

“Yep. Here comes the windshield part.”

Maddie & TY

Maddie and TY aren’t bad characters.

That’s the weird thing.

They’re not annoying. They’re not toxic. They genuinely care about each other.

There’s actually a scene later where TY says he’ll sell the van and try to get their apartment back because he realizes Maddie wants stability.

And Maddie responds by saying she sees how happy van life makes him and she’d never want to take that away from him.

I respected that.

I genuinely did.

The problem is there’s nothing to latch onto.

They’re just generic goodie protagonists.

I’m not gonna walk away from this movie saying:

“Wow those are iconic horror survivors.”

I’m not gonna walk away saying they’re the new final people of horror.

They’re just… there.

Decent people.

That’s about all the praise I can give them.

The Horror Problems

This movie has a HUGE problem with manufactured tension.

There are so many scenes where characters separate for absolutely no reason besides the movie needing a jump scare.

The gym sequence is a perfect example. Maddie leaves the gym alone at night while wearing earbuds to walk back to the van. Somehow every single car from the crowded parking lot has vanished except for their van parked way off in the distance. Uh huh. Movie. I see what you’re doing. It’s not working on me. Now to be fair there IS one genuinely creepy moment in this sequence. Every time Maddie looks behind her the van is somehow farther away from her. THAT was clever. That weird impossible distance thing was genuinely unsettling. That’s the kind of weird psychological horror I wanted the movie to lean into. But then the movie immediately falls back into generic demon stuff. She gets inside the van. The cameras stop working. She sees the figure inside the van. It attacks her. And how does she stop it? By using a religious necklace. Because of course.

Demons hate holy stuff.

Been there. Done that. A hundred times.

And honestly I’m just tired of demon horror.

Not because demons CAN’T work.

But because Hollywood keeps using the same exact formula:

demons hate churches

demons hate crosses

holy ground burns demons

religious objects repel demons


The moment the movie revealed the Passenger was just another demon I kinda sighed internally because that’s not interesting anymore. And the design of the demon isn’t creative either. He basically looks like a pale creepy old man with black eyes, long hair, and a priest outfit. Honestly he just looks like discount Marilyn Manson.

And creepy pale old guy with black eyes just isn’t scary anymore.

That design has been done to death.

The Dialogue Is Way Too On The Nose

This movie constantly tries to sound profound and it keeps failing. There’s this scene where Maddie meets Diana at a rave and bonfire gathering and Diana tells her, “People don’t take trips. Trips take people.” 🤦‍♂️ What does that even mean? The movie keeps trying to sound deep and mystical instead of naturally creepy. Then later Diana describes the entity as “a highwayman from hell.” I’m sorry WHAT? A highwayman from hell? Am I high or did she really just say that? That sounds like the most generic horror dialogue imaginable. Then later she tells them, “You have to know how to read the signs.” Get the fuck out of here. The dialogue in this movie sounds like a haunted Pinterest board.

And don’t even get me started on “hobo lore.” YES. THAT’S REAL. Maddie literally researches the entity online through something called “hobo lore.” What the hell is hobo lore? That sounds like two random ideas Andre Øvredal smashed together.

And honestly? That’s what frustrates me.

There ARE interesting ideas buried in this movie.

The idea of road folklore passed around by drifters and travelers could’ve actually been really cool.

But the movie keeps reducing potentially interesting ideas down into generic spooky nonsense.

The Movie Peaks Too Early

The further Passenger goes the more predictable it becomes.

There’s this entire tire scene that honestly felt like horror movie parody.

The tire blows. TY removes the bolts. The bolts mysteriously disappear. Ohhhhhh whatever happened to the bolts? Well if your guess was “they rolled under the van,” congratulations, you’ve seen a horror movie before. Because OF COURSE they rolled under the van. And OF COURSE TY has to crawl underneath the van. And OF COURSE the jack holding the van up starts failing. And OF COURSE Maddie gets dragged off into the woods while TY is trapped under the van. And OF COURSE the van falls onto his leg. Sighhhhh. Again are we SURE this script wasn’t written by AI or a committee?

Every scare in this movie feels telegraphed.

You can practically see the screenplay activating horror mode.

The fake out where TY finds Maddie in the woods and hugs her only for it to actually be the demon pretending to be TY?

Yeah.

Saw that coming instantly.

I’m pretty sure anybody who watches horror movies regularly saw that coming.

The Good Stuff

Now despite all my complaints I don’t think Passenger is terrible. There ARE things I liked. The atmosphere in the first half is solid. The looping road stuff is creepy. The van distance sequence is genuinely unsettling. The field full of bodies covered in blankets was creepy too. Especially when TY insists they’re illusions and they drive over them anyway. Even though they’re supposedly illusions hearing the crunching noises of bodies under the tires was genuinely uncomfortable. Ewwwww. That got a reaction out of me. And honestly the movie keeps ALMOST becoming interesting. That’s what makes this frustrating. There’s a genuinely creepy movie buried inside Passenger.

But every single time it gets close to becoming unique it immediately retreats back into safe generic horror movie tropes.

Final Thoughts

Passenger isn’t awful.

It’s watchable.

It has atmosphere.

It has flashes of creativity.

But it’s also painfully predictable.

Everything feels choreographed.

Every scare feels telegraphed.

And the biggest issue?

This movie doesn’t feel like Andre Øvredal.

That’s the real disappointment.

This feels like it could’ve been made by anybody.

That’s not what I wanted from the director of The Autopsy of Jane Doe.

That movie felt bleak. Unique. Confident. Memorable.

Passenger feels safe.

And honestly?

That’s worse than being bad.

Because bad horror movies can at least be memorable.

Passenger is probably just going to fade from my memory over time.

And that sucks.

Rating

6/10

And honestly I’m being generous.

I can’t go any higher than that because giving this movie a 7 would feel dishonest.

Spoiler Warning ⚠️

Alright.

Now let’s talk about this absolutely bizarre third act.

Spoilers ⚠️

The third act completely loses me.

The movie spends the entire runtime building the Passenger up as this relentless unstoppable force. Then suddenly the third act turns him into a complete idiot. Maddie and TY go searching for this hidden church in the middle of nowhere because apparently “you have to know how to read the signs.” Then they drive through the field of dead bodies and finally reach the church. And from here the movie just becomes accidentally hilarious. The demon attacks TY inside the van but instead of immediately killing Maddie he slowly waddles toward her while she escapes. She reaches the church, slams on the brakes, and the demon FLIES out the windshield like we’re in Looney Tunes. Smoke starts coming off him because “holy ground” and Maddie literally says, “That’s right. Holy ground.” Then she starts ramming him with the van while the demon grabs onto the hood Indiana Jones style. AND THIS IS THE MOMENT THE MOVIE COMPLETELY BROKE ME. The van horn starts blasting the HAWAII FIVE-O THEME SONG. YES. THE HAWAII FIVE-O THEME SONG.

While this demon is clinging onto the hood of the van for dear life. I am not joking. At this point I genuinely stopped feeling horror. I just sat there wondering, “What movie am I even watching anymore?” Then Maddie impales the demon on a church statue, then he melts, then burns, then explodes, then the church catches on fire. All within like two minutes. And both protagonists survive. The end. I’m sorry. That ending is dumb. Not offensively bad. Just bizarre. It feels like the movie accidentally turns into horror satire. And the Hawaii Five-O horn choice is genuinely one of the weirdest music choices I’ve seen in a horror movie in a long time. I still don’t understand why it’s there. The entire third act feels tonally confused.

And honestly?

That pretty much sums up Passenger as a whole.

As in I felt like a passenger the entire time, and not inna good way, anyways hope y’all enjoy today’s review. This week the Backrooms Movie finally releases, ill be seeing it this friday (reveiw will be out next Monday), here’s the trailer for the movie if anyone is curious.