Will the internet ever let go of the “Martha” moment from Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice? Probably not. It’s been almost a decade since Zack Snyder gave us the “Wait, your mom’s name is also Martha?” scene, and the debate still rages across Reddit, YouTube, and any social platform brave enough to mention it. Now, thanks to A24’s Bring Her Back, that Batman v Superman scene gets a spooky horror twist.
This weekend, Danny and Michael Philippou, the Aussie YouTube twins behind RackaRacka and the breakout hit Talk to Me, unleash their second horror feature, Bring Her Back, and, surprisingly, it drops its very own “Martha” moment.
The story in Bring Her Back follows Laura (Sally Hawkins), a grief-stricken foster mother who takes in two newly orphaned siblings, Andy and Piper. Piper is partially sighted, which makes the strange occurrences in Laura’s house all the more terrifying. When Andy starts to notice something’s off, he starts taking matters into his own hands. Slowly, things spiral into the kind of emotionally charged horror that would make Ari Aster proud (he did apparently compliment the brothers, along with Jordan Peele and even Peter Jackson). Oh, and Marvel Studios has already slid into their DMs, too. So, clearly, these guys are doing something right.
But the big moment, and if you’ve seen it, you know, comes during the film’s climax when Laura, mid-possession ritual, is about to drown Piper in a pool. It’s brutal. It’s disturbing. And then, Piper screams, “Mum!” And just like that, everything stops.
Does that sound familiar? It should. The scene plays out like a horror remix of the Batman v Superman standoff. Batman has Superman pinned down, kryptonite spear in hand, and Kal-El gasps out, “Save Martha!” In an instant, Batman sees the humanity in his enemy, and the rage melts away.
It’s the same energy here in Bring Her Back. Laura, who is completely consumed by grief from the death of her daughter, Cathy, suddenly comes back to herself and realizes that she is about to commit murder. “Mum” pulls her back. A single word changes the story’s trajectory.
If you’re rolling your eyes, just hang on. Despite the memes and mockery over the years, the “Martha” moment actually does carry weight. As pointed out by fans (and even paralleled in Star Wars by @MarvelThreads), these are moments of self-recognition. Luke Skywalker sees he’s becoming his father. Batman sees he’s becoming the monster who murdered his parents. Laura sees herself as a monster mother. And they all stop before doing the unthinkable.
So yeah, Bring Her Back might not have capes or bat signals, but it does have emotional gut punches and haunted trauma that make its own Batman v Superman moment land hard. Maybe harder than Snyder’s?
