Movie review
August 8, 2019 · 108 min · PG-13
Woke Score
Lower is better
Breakdown
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark.
Woke representation / casting
Prominent Latino character Ramón added specifically to show 1968 racism and slurs; fits drifter role but clearly serves identity prejudice subplot visible to viewers.
Woke political dialogue
Period lines about Vietnam draft, Nixon, and racial slurs appear naturally; no modern lectures or activist speeches.
Identity-driven story themes
Core story uses scapegoating of albino Sarah and racism toward Ramón to explore truth and injustice; monsters tie into personal fears but social "otherness" runs through the framing.
Western institutional / cultural critique
Shows powerful family covering up mercury poisoning that killed kids, electroshock abuse of the "witch" girl, small-town racism, and draft pressure as real horrors; historical 1968 setting keeps it from strong present-day activist framing.
Review
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is a 2019 horror movie set on Halloween night in 1968 small-town Pennsylvania. Teens including a Latino newcomer named Ramón discover a haunted book whose monsters come to life while they uncover a family cover-up of mercury poisoning and the abuse of an albino girl named Sarah Bellows. The film shows some 1968-era racism through slurs and suspicion toward Ramón plus Vietnam War draft pressure, along with themes of truth versus lies and institutional injustice, but these stay in the background of the creature horror and storybook scares.
Woke character or canon changes
Original Bellows family backstory and Ramón addition expand source books with cover-up and bigotry elements; not direct swaps of known characters but adds identity-focused layers to the adaptation.
Anti-woke backlash and complaints
Scattered online notes about political undertones or agenda around racism and Vietnam; no major right-leaning criticism or organized complaints.
Creator track record context
Guillermo del Toro's outsider empathy style and representation comments raise the average slightly; other key creatives show low or no activist patterns per cached profiles.
Production
