Who Invited Them (2022)
Who Invited Them | A Housewarming Gone Wrong
Written by Noah Dietz: 4/2/2026
Rather than my recent trend of blindly flailing in the great sea of films that are out there, I decided to cut my options down to just newer releases on Shudder. Tactfully sidestepping the reportedly awful Mortuary Assistant (review out tomorrow), Who Invited Them caught my eye. In a desperate attempt to break the curse of getting suckered by a cool poster, I popped it on.
I’m aware that I’ve been in a little of a film slump recently that might have colored my experience, but I truly did enjoy this a great deal. The feature debut of writer and director Duncan Birmingham, this film feels anything but a beginner’s work. Obviously no project is held up by a single person, but for a first outing like this it’s a pleasant surprise to see something come together in a way that actually looks professional. The combination of a solid visual identity and a solid, if a little by the numbers, script, there’s a lot more to enjoy from this than some other things you might have seen come out of streaming.
I had a great time spending the evening with my slightly estranged friends, Adam (Ryan Hansen) and Margo (Melissa Tang). It’s easy to empathize with their situation of having a slightly bad house party, though I’m happy to not have ever had to deal with this flavor of shitty neighbor situation at all. Tom (Timothy Granaderos) and Sasha (Perry Mattfeld) feel like every bad guest you’ve ever had rolled into one. Overstaying their welcome, pushing all manner of buttons for Adam and Margo, all with the seeming intention of just trying to start a fight. It forces us to live with them in the awkward moment of making new friends, while combining it with the uncomfortable energy of being on the back foot in your own home.
Making the wise choice to keep the runtime to a relatively speedy 80 minutes, Who Invited Them is at its best when it stays in the A-plot. I found everything here engaging, if a little predictable. The side plot of Adam and Margo’s friend watching their son for the evening feels completely unneeded, adding moments of levity to be sure, but nothing of real merit. In this case I’m not personally willing to side with the complaints about “predictable writing.” While there are multiple times where I was able to predict where the story was going, I don’t think it’s fair to levy that against Who Invited Them as a criticism. I didn’t feel like our leads were kept in the dark of what the twist was going to be, or that they were acting stupid just to advance the plot. Additionally, while Tom and Sasha both feel like they’re obviously being active antagonists, there’s a moment near the end where they give an excuse that, if we didn’t know we were in a movie, would have been just enough to diffuse a lot of my concerns about them. It’s a delight to finish an indie horror film without feeling punished for caring about how our leads make it out at the end.
Who Invited Them isn’t about to be the next generational classic, but it’s a far cry from the drivel that so many horror fans are given and expected to enjoy. I could see this being the favorite movie of somebody who’s first getting into horror, in addition to being something that’s just a solid experience in general.
Film: Who Invited Them
Director: Duncan Birmingham
Writers: Duncan Birmingham
Release Year: 2022
Rating: 3.5/5
Who Invited Them is an incredibly solid addition to Shudder’s roster of original films