‘Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen’ Review: Camila Morrone Leads a Atmospheric Gothic Horror Series

The idea of committing to marriage for life naturally comes with a fair amount of anxiety. Did I choose the right person? What if I made a mistake? What will life be like with them? And, perhaps most unsettling of all: what about their family? For Rachel Harkin, at least at the outset, none of this seems to matter. She’s excited, glowing in the lead-up to her wedding, and even appears convinced that Nicky Cunningham (Adam DiMarco)—who, let’s be honest, doesn’t exactly scream “the one”—is precisely that. Over the course of eight episodes, however, it becomes clear that things will grow far more complicated than she ever imagined, and for reasons she couldn’t possibly foresee.

The plan is simple: travel to the sprawling family estate owned by Nicky’s parents somewhere remote in upstate New York and host a small, intimate, five-day wedding celebration—“just family,” as they insist. But almost as soon as the road trip begins, there’s a creeping sense that, as the title promises, something very bad is indeed going to happen. Rachel (Argentine-American actress Camila Morrone) dozes off in the car and nearly causes an accident. Strange signs line the road. There are unsettling stories about local criminals that feel all too real. They encounter other travelers who’ve abandoned a baby in a car. A roadside restaurant features a single, cryptic veteran as its only customer. And everyone seems to ask Rachel the same question: are you sure he’s the right one?

None of that, however, prepares her for the real shock: Nicky’s family. A deeply unsettling ensemble, they include the suffocatingly overprotective mother Victoria (a deliciously eerie Jennifer Jason Leigh), a father who embalms animals—including the family dogs (Ted Levine, channeling unmistakable echoes of The Silence of the Lambs), Nicky’s siblings Portia and Jules (Gus Birney and Jeff Wilbusch), sister-in-law Nell (Karla Crome), and young Jude, who is obsessed with the family’s macabre lore. Among those rules: never look into the eyes of the embalmed dogs, and beware of a terrifying figure said to roam the grounds—the so-called “Sorry Man.” To make matters worse, someone has scrawled a warning on Rachel’s wedding invitation: “Don’t marry him.” What could possibly go wrong?

Created by Haley Z. Boston and produced by the Duffer Brothers (Stranger Things), Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen opens with a strong, immersive hook. The descent into horror becomes increasingly strange and disorienting, and while it leans on the familiar trope of protagonists making all the wrong decisions (any reasonably sensible person would’ve abandoned this trip within minutes), Boston and her team skillfully build atmosphere. The sense that this wedding will not unfold as planned grows steadily, driven by a smartly calibrated chain of ominous signs.

The series loses some of that momentum once it reaches the house itself—a sleek, modernist take on the classic Gothic mansion. The car arrives, the couple settles in, and the narrative seems to stall. What follows feels more conventional and predictable, almost like a darker, psychologically updated spin on The Addams Family or any number of stories about wealthy, eccentric clans in cavernous estates. Family traumas come to the surface, disturbing revelations emerge, and the past—full of curses and buried secrets—begins to weigh heavily on the present. For Rachel, it becomes a cascade of nightmares, starting with the disappearance of her wedding dress and spiraling into far worse.

Sustaining tension across eight episodes proves challenging. Around episodes three and four, the story attempts its first of several narrative pivots—some of them involving excursions into the past—but the central premise begins to stretch thin. The action becomes increasingly confined to the house and its immediate surroundings, populated by a group of characters who, with one notable exception outside the family, struggle to maintain interest. And at the center of it all is a fiancé who never quite convinces as “the one.” From Rachel’s perspective, even accounting for her emotional baggage and desire for belonging (her family history provides context), the obvious move would be to leave before it’s too late.

Still, even as the series gradually loses some of its bite, Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen retains a degree of originality. There are unexpected narrative turns, moments of genuine surprise, and, above all, a carefully constructed atmosphere that feels distinctly cinematic. In a landscape crowded with formulaic crime shows and adventure series content to recycle familiar beats, this one at least aspires to something more inventive. Its influences are clear—ranging from Edgar Allan Poe to Stephen King—but it filters them through a sensibility that feels personal rather than derivative.

For Morrone (seen in Daisy Jones & the Six and the recent second season of The Night Manager), the show serves as a long-overdue leading showcase, allowing her to display a wide emotional range. Leigh and the rest of the cast, meanwhile, are largely tasked with sustaining an air of ambiguity—sometimes misleading, sometimes not—through their deliberately off-kilter performances. By the end, the series may feel somewhat exhausting, but it’s also evident that the Duffer Brothers have a keen eye for creators with distinct voices and a willingness to take risks. That not everything fully lands or resolves cleanly feels, at this point, almost beside the point.