THE ANGRY BLACK GIRL AND HER MONSTER (2024)

“If death is a disease there’s a cure for it and I’m gonna find it”. A curious thought, you say? Not for Vicaria, a teenage black girl who has seen many friends and family members perish at the hands of the senseless violence that erodes her community like a slow, rotting disease. When her older brother Chris dies as well in the midst of gang war, Vicaria is set on using her skills to find a cure. You see, she’s quite the science nut and likes to spend her after-school hours holed up in her run-down lab where she experiments, much like Herbert West or Victor Frankenstein before her, with the matter of life and death… And behold, she actually manages to bring Chris back to life! Except, the creature of her making has little in common with her brother of old. The violence that took his life now runs through his veins and now he’s going to roam his neighborhood like a vengeful spirit, bringing bloody, gory havoc to those most deserving of it.

Bomani J. Story’s re-animation of the Frankenstein myth is equal body parts Hammer, Blaxploitation (BLACKENSTEIN) and Afro-Futurism (Parliament’s “Dr. Funkenstein”). Yet, underneath the fun, campy veneer of lightning bolts and mad scientist shenanigans runs a much darker thread. One that concerns the cyclical nature of violence brought on by the systemic discrimination and stereotyping of the black community. One that also runs through, say, Jordan Peele’s body of work (GET OUT, NOPE). Personally though? We’re betting on the angry black girls of this world to ring the final victory bell. V for Vicaria!