Is Amazon’s ‘Them’ Too Violent for Us to Watch?

When racialized horror gets too deep, some viewers tune in while others tune out

Amazon’s Them (officially Them: Covenant) is out, and let’s just say Twitter has largely not been here for it. Over the weekend, the series trended heavily. Executive producer Lena Waithe was dragged relentlessly as many erroneously pegged her as the series’ creator and writer. (Let’s be real: Some of the venom directed Waithe’s way is residual from her 2019 film, Queen & Slim.) But Them’s creator and main writer is newcomer Little Marvin. Very few biographical details are available on Marvin, but he is an alumnus of corporate America.

To fuel the horror in Them, Little Marvin turned to California, specifically the once lily-white city of Compton, which most people today associate with rapper Eazy-E, the group N.W.A., producer Dr. Dre, and rapper The Game. Also keep in mind that viewers watched the 10-episode anthology series in the wake of a wave of racial horror and supernatural-based shows. In the past two years, HBO alone centered Watchmen around the Tulsa Massacre, and the Peele-produced Lovecraft Country was set during Jim Crow. For both, the imaginary monsters or villains proved to be not nearly as scary as their real White supremacist counterparts. The monsters in Them, by contrast, appear more as…