Darby and the dead (now on Hulu) is a supernatural teen dark comedy — or superteen darcom, if you like being short — about a high school kid who’s an honest to nasty medium capable of chatting with ghosts and all. Riele Downs and Auli’i Carvalho are co-stars, something I didn’t think was legal considering the former is a veteran of Nickelodeon productions (Henry Danger and some holiday specials), and the latter a veteran of Disney productions (Moiana and The Little Mermaid Live!). I think Mickey Mouse has come out on top here since the movie landed on Disney’s own Hulu, but will you come out on top here by watching it? Uhh… I have my doubts.
The essentials: Darby sees – how does that line go? – People who once lived but are no longer alive? Near enough. She can also talk to us and look at us, the film viewers out here who are watching her film. Why can she? Well, when she was seven years old, she and her mother were swept away by an ocean current; Darby drowned and was resuscitated, but her mother didn’t make it. After she came to, she could see and speak to dead people who did not cross to the other side; she calls them “deados”. I think that high concept implies that we, the film viewers out here watching your film, are dead and I don’t know how I feel about that. Now Darby is an all-black, teenage high school misfit who spends her Friday nights mingling with ghosts and helping them with their “unfinished business” before they complete their journey to the afterlife, and I think that implies that we, the film viewers out here watching your film, have “unfinished business”. My primary “unfinished business” right now is convincing myself not to turn off the movie.
However. There are other characters in this film that I need to identify. Derek Luke has next to nothing to do here as Darby’s father, he just would have less to do if he wasn’t there at all. Tony Danza plays a sweet grandfatherly ghost waiting for his wife Linda to die so they can cross over together; he and Darby play chess and have the following exchange: “They took Linda to the hospice.” “That’s great news!” Fulfilling the old seedy cliché of high school social dynamics, there are the souped-up mean girls cheerleaders who side-stare and sniff at people like Darby, but they’re updated to the new seedy cliché as they exist, by the dozens to take selfies per day and gather social media followers. Their leader is Capri (Cravalho) who was friends with Darby before I see people who used to live but no longer live but are now rivals. It’s worth noting that Capri is dating sensitive singer-songwriter James (Asher Angel), and Darby’s love interest is new kid Alex (Chosen Jacobs), who wears the mascot costume of the donut company that pays for advertising at school.
The plot begins when Capri accidentally kills herself via an alternate board game scenario: electrocuting with a flat iron in the dressing room. Darby and the other Mean Girls are even witnesses. In any other world without jokes about the camera or over-the-top TeenNick pilot concepts, such a gruesome event would be traumatic. But this is a dark comedy, and therefore a cruel and disturbing universe, as Capri’s spirit can now continue to torment Darby, forcing her to help with her “unfinished business” of making sure Capri’s birthday ultrabash goes on as an ultrabash memorial service , so that everyone will forever remember her as the most popular girl in school. This overbearing scheme gets even more overbearing when Capri gives Darby a new popularity makeover—trendy wardrobe, tweaking behavior, etc.—to help her convince everyone to go through with the party. This requires Darby to join the cheering squad and try not to let the grieving James fall in love with her. CHAOS RULES.
Which movies will it remind you of?: darby is less enticing in execution than his mean girls-meets-The sixth Sense Elevator pitch sounds. Exploding teen saga Spontaneous is much better at this kind of dark comedy and manages to find a resonant allegory in its gritty concept.
Notable performance: Carvalho and Downs are undoubtedly charismatic actors who undoubtedly deserve better material than this, which is undoubtedly inconsistent.
Memorable dialogue: Tony Danza’s ghost keeps Capri cheering: “You’re so young and smart, you’ve got your whole death ahead of you!”
gender and skin: none.
Our opinion: There’s a lot of stuff going on in/with Darby and the dead, and very little of it engages us in any meaningful way. I liked how the Danza character viewed the teenage drama with patient confusion. I liked Darby’s neo goth girl sensibility and supernatural Veronica Mars-isms. I liked an all too brief moment of Darby and James having a serious discussion about grief. I liked Cravalho’s energy, although slightly misconstrued as a narcissistic tyrant. The film has its moments.
But that handful of positives leaves so much to be desired: Very few films can achieve direct on-camera appeal fleasackisms; most, like darby, the idea should be flushed down the drain because it’s a proven scientific fact that too much meta-rash causes. His submean girls Dialogue clicks instead of snaps (“Cross my heart and hope to die – again”, “The topic is Coachella, isn’t it stagecoach‘, ‘You can’t be friends with a donut – that’s social suicide’. It flatly notes the black comedy as if it wasn’t fully committed to the part. It’s brimming with romance, montages, a big speech in front of a crowd and all that superficial stuff like that, like he’s being threatened with a fat fine for not sticking to teen clichés. And it ends with a confused message about Darby’s individual personality that could be viewed as satirical if you’re overly generous, or sloppy mess if you’re perfectly sane. Credit the film for trying to be dark comedy laced with sweet intentions, which is a difficult balancing act; too bad it doesn’t even come close to peeling off.
Our appeal: SKIP IT. Darby and the deadThe script from needs another pass or two to be fully functional.
John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more about his work below johnserbaatlarge.com.
