I Saw the TV Glow: But should I have bothered?

A head-scratcher of a movie fails to fully satisfy.

I Saw the TV Glow
Written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun
2024

Sometimes, movies come out that seem to strike a chord with certain audiences, but others struggle to understand what the big deal is. That’s sort of how I feel with I Saw the TV Glow, which has some interesting elements but failed to gel with me. I did find it to be much better than Jane Schoenbrun’s previous movie, We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, which purported to be a horror movie about a creepy viral phenomenon but ended up being an interminably slow examination of the paternalistic attitudes people have toward younger generations (I think?). Schoenbrun’s follow-up is also pretty slow-paced, but at least it has an interesting visual style, some fairly engaging performances, and one or two scenes that actually had a sense of urgency. I don’t know if it all added up to a fully satisfying whole, but I’m glad it was trying for something, and it seems to have succeeded for certain audiences.

The story of this movie, such as it is, has to do with a couple of kids who share an obsession with an obscure children’s TV show from the 1990s, at first reading some meaning into something that doesn’t seem to be especially deep and eventually becoming so obsessed that they may have lost their sense of reality. The main character, Owen (mostly played by Justice Smith, although a younger version of him is played by Ian Foreman), narrates the movie, looking back on events from a few years in the future. While in junior high, he meets Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine, who played Bill’s daughter in Bill and Ted Face the Music), who is a couple years older, and he seems kind of fascinated by her and especially by her favorite (only?) topic of discussion, a show called The Pink Opaque that airs late at night on a cable network called the Young Adult Channel.

What we do see of The Pink Opaque seems like a cheap, cheesy drama about a couple of teenage girls who share a psychic bond and fight evil. It has some very lo-fi visuals, combining sub-soap-opera level acting with effects that look like they came out of a Guy Maddin movie. Maddy seems to focus her life almost solely on the show, and Owen shares a little bit of that interest, although it seems more like he wants to spend time around Maddy, with her filling the role of a cool older sister type. While his parents don’t let him stay up late enough to watch the show, he does sneak out to watch it with her, and she starts taping episodes and secretly passing them to him at school. The interactions they have seem to consist mostly of her discussing the show, saying that she finds it more real than her real life. Eventually, she starts talking about getting away from their placid suburban life and trying to convince him to run away with her, which seems like a bit of a strong reaction to some standard teenage ennui.

This part of the movie features what is shaping up to be Schoenbrun’s signature slow pacing, whispered dialogue, and dreamlike atmosphere, and it’s at least somewhat compelling. Owen and Maddie sort of float through their lives without finding much to be interested in, and it makes sense that they would find meaning in a show that is about human connectedness and a battle against unseen evils that the rest of the world doesn’t recognize. When their lives are so bland and boring (I liked one tracking shot following Owen as he is walking through the halls of his high school, which feature seemingly endless bulletin boards emblazoned with lame slogans like “Carpe diem” and “Pain is weakness leaving the body”), an ongoing story that reveals depths upon examination can serve as a method of escape. Thus, we get many shots of the characters bathed in the pink glow of the TV screen, looking like they’re being pulled into a more appealing world.

Things take an odder turn when Maddie decides to make good on her plans to run away. Owen doesn’t have the courage to leave his comfortable life, especially when his mom is sick with cancer, but it’s also possible that he’s just not as into this whole thing as she is. The show is coincidentally canceled at the same time as she leaves, and she sends him one last videotape of the final episode, which features a cliffhanger in which the two main characters are captured by the main villain and buried alive. When Owen watches it, he freaks out, starting to believe that maybe Maddy was right, and it’s their lives that are fake while the show is real.

However, the movie then jumps several years into the future, as Owen is trudging his way through an uneventful life. Maddy shows up unexpectedly, claiming that she knows the truth and is there to save him. Should he believe her? Should he throw away his comfortable-if-boring existence and chase the possibility that he could live another life with more meaning? Those are the questions that seem to be on the movie’s mind, and depending on the audience, they may or may not be compelling.

There’s enough in the way of unique presentation here to keep things interesting, at least to a point. As mentioned, the movie is pretty surreal and dreamlike, with the characters barely doing much more than existing as they move through a series of liminal spaces. Justice Smith does a good job of conveying the conflict his character experiences, trying to continue spending time with Maddy but not willing to take the same leaps into the unknown that she does. In many of his other roles, such as in the movie Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves or the video game The Quarry, he has a quiet, mumbly presence while conveying a sense of interiority, but here, he seems confused and frightened most of the time. His narration almost takes on a pleading quality, as if he’s struggling to explain why something so silly meant so much to him at one time in his life. But he also ends up showing a sense of despair at the opportunities he failed to seize, wondering if his life has been wasted as he just proceeded through it without actually doing anything.

As I describe all of this, I feel like I’m adding more to the movie than is actually on-screen. With such a slow pace and so many lengthy pauses, it invites interpretation. It does seem like there’s a metaphor here, but it’s almost too obvious. Is the movie about the queer experience, with characters stuck in the boring, restricting closet until they decide to leave their former lives behind and be their true selves? The movie certainly seems to indicate that this is the true message, especially in one scene where Maddy convinces Owen to wear a dress so they can act out some scenes from the show. And there’s also the pink color scheme associated with the show, making it a bright beacon beckoning them away from their near-monochromatic existences.

Perhaps that message is meaningful to people who have lived through that sort of experience, but the movie as a whole left me fairly cold. It did have some interesting elements, with some nice production design and music. But in the end, I found it to be too long, too slow, and too unsatisfying to really hit home. I can’t fully get behind it, but I’m sure there are some who thought it spoke directly to them, and I’m glad for that.