2025 has already been a fantastic year for horror, with The Monkey, Heart Eyes, Wolf Man, Borderline, and more giving us thrills, chills, and spills in theatres this year. We’ve still got the likes of28 Years Later,Sinners, Final Destination: Bloodlines,Until Dawn, The Conjuring: Last Rites, andMegan 2.0to come too. However, maybe the best of the year so far is Companion, which is coming to HBO Max on April 18.
Having released Jan 31 to a moderately successful box office ($37m off a $10m budget), Companion was part of an increasingly controversial trend when it arrived on VOD to buy or rent just a couple of weeks after it hit cinemas. However, this arrival on Max is more in-keeping with typical time schedules from theatrical release to streaming debut. Anyone who missed it the first time and deigned to buy or rent it should check it out now.
Companion Is The Latest Step For A New Kind Of Scream Queen
Starring Jack Quaid (best known forThe Boys, but also the lead of another 2025 cult hit in Novocaine, which was added to VOD with an even shorter window) and Sophie Thatcher (most recognisable as one of the centralYellowjackets), Companion offers a modern twist on the Terminator formuula. Thatcher plays Iris, a sex robot programmed to be deeply in love with Quaid’s beta male character Josh, as a violent and bloody conspiracy erupts.
Often compared toThe Menufor how it seems to present one tired twist before turning in a completely fresh direction, Companion is one of 2025’s highest rated movies in any genre, logging a 94 percent Critic Score and an 89 Audience Rating on Rotten Tomatoes.Described by MovieCryptas “a spiritual sequel to Ex Machina”, it goes far deeper than its simple premise might suggest. The film is also the most popular movie released in 2025 with the ‘Horror’ tag on Letterboxd.
It also marks a step in the continued rise of the careers of both leads. Having made their names in television (though Quaid’s name was arguably ‘premade’ by father Dennis and mother Meg Ryan), they have stepped onto leading roles on the silver screen, Quaid in the aforementioned Novocaine, plusOppenheimer,Spider-Verse, andScream, while Thatcher has established herself in the horror genre through The Boogeyman, MaXXXine, her lead turn in Heretic, and now Companion all in the last two years.
