Barbie star’s new movie debuts with 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating

Barbie star Hari Nef’s upcoming movie Bad Things has just landed a 100% Rotten Tomatoes score following its Tribeca Film Festival premiere.

Directed by Stewart Thorndike, the film stars GLOW‘s Gayle Rankin as protagonist Ruthie, who has just inherited a 1980s motel from her grandma.

This gift comes with a broken mother-daughter relationship looking to be mended and a last trip to the property with her partner Cal (Nef) and their friends Maddie (Rad Pereira) and Fran (Annabelle Dexter-Jones), who risk upending their lives.

Related: First trailer for Legends of Tomorrow star’s new horror movie

After the film’s debut, critics have hailed Thorndike’s movie as a fascinating addition to the queer horror canon, one giving unlikeable female characters their time to shine and do terrible things. Though its Rotten Tomatoes score is likely to change once more reviews are in, it looks like Bad Things will be one to watch when it starts streaming on Shudder in August.

“The film’s lo-fi quality and stellar cast chemistry makes the feature an easily watchable horror film,” IndieWire‘s review reads.

“It is, admirably, a film where two-dimensional, ‘likeable’ women characters are blissfully absent, and Thorndike is very much in her comfort zone giving air time to the kinds of women that normally get reduced to villains or ignored completely,” Alliance of Women Film Journalists said in its review.

Related: Jumanji and Ozark stars join horror remake

Known for the role of Sheila in the gone-too-soon GLOW, Rankin will next be seen in the second season of HBO’s fantasy drama House of the Dragon.

The Game of Thrones prequel, whose season 2 pre-production has been paused due to the ongoing writers’ strike, will get in the thick of the Targaryen civil war in its upcoming instalment.

Rankin is set to play healer Alys Rivers, with Slow Horses‘ Freddie Fox, Raised by Wolves‘ Abubakar Salim and Penny Dreadful‘s Simon Russell Beale also joining the huge cast in new roles.

Bad Things will start streaming on Shudder on August 25.

Best Entertainment and Tech Deals

Sign up for Apple TV+

Shop Google Pixel 7a phones

Queen Charlotte by Julia Quinn and Shonda Rhimes

Now 50% Off

Shop Sky deals across TV, broadband and mobile

Sign up for Disney+

Flannel-lined waxed trucker jacket (as seen on The Last of Us)

Now 10% Off

The Little Mermaid – Ariel singing doll

Ted Lasso x Nike: AFC Richmond home kit

Jojo: Finally Home by Johannes Radebe

Now 15% Off

Best PS5 deals – where to buy PS5 today?

Pageboy: A Memoir

Now 23% Off

Anker PowerCore Essential 20,000 PD Power Bank

Reporter, Digital Spy

Stefania is a freelance writer specialising in TV and movies. After graduating from City University, London, she covered LGBTQ+ news and pursued a career in entertainment journalism, with her work appearing in outlets including Little White Lies, The Skinny, Radio Times and Digital Spy. 

Her beats are horror films and period dramas, especially if fronted by queer women. She can argue why Scream is the best slasher in four languages (and a half).