Girlfriend breaks up with boyfriend over his take on the hit horror film 'Obsession': 'It’s like he was trying to ragebait me'

JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor

Sep 23, 2026 10:00 AM EDT

Would you break up with someone over their opinion about a movie?

Movies mean a lot to us. They're how we see ourselves reflected back at us. They help us understand ourselves and our culture and our desires. A good movie can be a mirror of ourselves just as much as it can be a window into another world. Our favorite movies feel like a part of ourselves. They say something about who we are and what we love and what we value. So when someone comes into our lives and doesn't respect that, it can be a huge issue. We generally want to be on the same page as the people we choose to be in relationships with. That doesn't mean we have to agree on everything, but we want to generally hold respect for each other's opinions. That's what was being put to the test in this story.

Movies can be a great way to kick off a discussion. They bring up topics about the real world that we have to consider. The best movies leave us with some questions. When you're going out to watch something with a friend or a loved one, the best-case scenario (to me) is that you get into an interesting discussion about it after the fact. You sit down at a bar or a restaurant somewhere, and you dig into the text. Maybe you have different opinions about it, but you come together in the name of discussion.

*_{Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}*

*A couple has an argument while the woman sits on the edge of the bed*

I broke up with my ex because of his take on Obsession.

first time posting, using a throwaway for the sake of anonymity. im in my mid 20's, and was in what was my first longterm relationship from my first semester at college for around 2 years. we lived together much of that time because of

complications with university housing. there were more reasons than i can list for the purpose of my leaving him, verbal and emotional in nature; for the purpose of this rant i'll tell one story.

he was prone to anger, and we're both on the spectrum. we would show each other memes and videos pretty frequently, but i always noticed he would get mad/annoyed after 3 times that i would do it. this would've been fair and not a problem for me, people can be annoyed, if he wasnt constantly doing the same thing to me and trying to show me things while i was actively listening to a story. for context, i really love the horror genre. i engage a lot with it.

one day i decided to gently bring this up to him, and it resulted in him saying "well babe... i'm watching [his preferred media], and you're just watching like horror stuff and creepypastas and stuff. i need to actually pay attention to what i'm listening to!" to which i pointed out i also needed to pay attention to my

media to properly engage with it (all i was asking was that he give me time to pause my video/audiobook before he just shoves a video in front of me). he then went on to denounce horror as a genre to be studied and analyzed as works of literature, which is fine, people can have preferences. but this is what made the crux of this post so weird to me.

my ex watched the movie Obsession without me, knowing i'd mentioned wanting to see it, and knowing about the controversy around Bear going into it. he brought it up really casually, when i still hadnt seen it yet, and mentioned that people were "really laying into the main

dude when he's literally also a victim."; that immediately made me raise an eyebrow in a way, because... what do you mean you watched the movie i wanted to see without me? and of course i'd also heard some of the controversy around Bear, but i hadn't seen the movie yet, so i (not wanting to start an argument by disagreeing) said "what do you mean?"!

he said "he doesn't know the thing is gonna work, he never finds out for sure if it really does work, and he literally never realizes it did." which makes me wonder if he really did mean it when he said he watched it. but then he said "hes just a sweet guy who just really wants his crush to like him but she wont even give him a chance so he

wishes for her, because like he doesnt even know its gonna work. and then its just another monkey's paw story-she starts acting all f ed up and everyone treats him like the bad guy when he doesnt even know its the thing that did it"

it was just so bizarre to me why he would even do this or try to make that stance to me; he knew i was a feminist and knew i wouldve taken nikki's side. it's like he was trying to ragebait me. childish bs. all it did was make me realize why he couldnt read my emotional body language for sh; he was more concerned about having the idea of a loving but fiery and aggressive girlfriend than having who i am as a person. aka Not That.

What if someone had an opinion of a movie that changed the way you saw them, though? That's what happened in this story, where a real flashpoint of a movie, the recent horror hit Obsession, sparked some tough conversations between a longstanding couple. Sometimes it takes an errant conversation to really figure out what opinions someone really holds. The woman in this story was frustrated that her partner had what she saw as the wrong takeaway from the whole situation. Keep reading to see what happened here, and let us know what you think in the comments below.