User blog:AustinDR/PE Proposal: Maggie (Incarnate)

https://villains.fandom.com/f/p/3179493162221867733



WHAT IS THE WORK?
Incarnate is a 2016 supernatural horror film starring Aaron Eckhart in the role of Dr. Seth Ember. Now...the film is not your typical exorcism movie. In this case, Seth is able to travel into the subconsciousness of the possessed victim through a rather complicated process. He is called to help free an 11 year old boy when he gets possessed by a demon all too familiar to him.

WHO IS MAGGIE?
The nameless demon is nicknamed Maggie after the host it possessed.

MORAL EVENT HORIZON
Years ago, Seth learned how to use astral projection -- where he could enter into other people's dreams -- and kept that as a secret for a long time. As such, this garnered him the unwanted attention of several evil spirits. One such demon? Possesses a woman and through her crashes into Seth's car. The accident renders Seth to using a wheelchair, but he lost his wife and son. He had since dedicated his strength into finding Maggie.

Cameron Sparrow gets attacked by a hooded stranger who was harboring "Maggie." When the stranger died, Maggie then jumps into his body. From there as already mentioned, Maggie traps Cameron within his mind, its ultimate intention being to feed on his energy to sustain itself. When the possession became more pronounced, Seth is notified of the case but only takes an interest when he is told that the demon responsible may as well have been Maggie. Arriving to the house, it is explained that Seth had only about 8 minutes before his heart gave out to evict Maggie. It is also explained that demons cannot truly possess people; rather, they would have them in dreamlike states.

As a means of getting Cameron to realize he was dreaming, his father Dan is given word about the exorcism. He arrives to assist in the exorcism/eviction...only for him to get badly injured from Maggie's assaults and dying. Shortly afterward, Ember returns to Cameron's subconscious, and uses a ring that Dan had given him prior to leaving to make Cameron realize that nothing was real. Just as it seemed that the two were to escape...Seth wakes up in a hospital. And he sees his deceased wife and son overseeing him. In despair, Seth begs Maggie to take him instead, which it does...and Seth is immediately injected with a vial of blood from a possessed victim and uses that opportunity to jump out of the balcony, killing himself. Despite being warned not to touch Ember's body, it looks like Maggie succeeds at possessing some other hapless sap before Ember succumbed.

NO SYMPATHY
So like I had said, initially after seeing the film, I thought Maggie was a disqualifier on the grounds of despite being sadistic, it is ultimately apparent that part of the demon's motivation was self-preservation as these demons are definitely not like the ones you are used to. With that being said...I ultimately feel that two scenes in particular go too beyond the point of necessity. The deaths of Ember's family was simply unnecessary. It didn't try to possess either of the two to sustain itself, and ultimately there was no reason to. But what makes the tragedy worse is when Seth tried to escape with Cameron: he wakes up in a hospital with his family alive and happy. The fact that Maggie takes this personal tragedy and rubs it in Seth's face does edge her out slightly from being just a predator trying to feed itself. And then there are the other instances of sadism.

MORAL AGENCY
While a demon, this is still under the Christian definition of what a demon is i.e. an evil spirit that chose to rebel against God of their own volition before falling.

HEINOUS STANDARD
Has a pretty low body count, but of that body count included a child, and then there's placing another child in a Lotus Eater Machine to slowly drain away his life. There are also its acts of sadism.