Misunderstood Monsters: ‘The Faculty’ and How We All Go a Little Alien Sometimes
By Matt Konopka
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Welcome fellow monster kids to Misunderstood Monsters. This is where I, Matt Konopka, sink my fangs into all sorts of beasts, ghouls, and creatures from above while I search for the humanity behind their frightening exteriors. From monster favorites such as The Wolf Man to obscure monsters like the whistling Shadmock, there is more to these fiends than bad hair days and gooey tentacles. Within them all is a piece of ourselves.
Twenty-five years after it landed in theaters, The Faculty remains one of the most relevant horror films of the nineties. Directed by From Dusk Till Dawn’s Robert Rodriguez and penned by Scream’s Kevin Williamson (based on a script by David Wechter and Bruce Kimmel), this story about aliens taking over a small town high school hits the beats of the most successful horror films at that time. Sharp. Stylish. Smoking hot cast. But it also touches on something that all of us face throughout our lives. The universal yearning to be accepted, and the tempting voice that tries to guide us on a path to conformity, are portrayed here as the queen alien/new girl in school, Marybeth (Laura Harris).
In The Faculty, we meet a group of kids who are all representative of teen stereotypes. The “dorky Stephen King kid,” Casey (Elijah Wood). Goth loner, Stokely (Clea DuVall). Class burnout, Zeke (Josh Hartnett). Meathead jock, Stan (Shawn Hatosy). And popular mean girl, Delilah (Jordana). On the surface, these kids have nothing in common, yet they’re all battling the same monster that is peer pressure. During the opening scene, Coach Willis (Robert Patrick) shouts at Stan, “you’ve got to feel the pressure closing in on you, then you get rid of the rock.” In other words, rise above it. Easier said than done, coach. All of the teens have become unsure of their identities, questioning where they fit in the great big puzzle that is society. Enter Marybeth, claiming to have an answer: Just be like everyone else.
As we discover, Marybeth is a refugee from a dying planet who arrived on Earth to discover all of us humans in a miserable state. “You were lost and lonely, just like me. And I thought that maybe I could give you a taste of my world. A world without anger, without fear, without attitude.” Sounds great! If only it didn’t mean erasing who you are to become merely an extension of a greater organism. Pretty, sweet, exuding Southern charm, Marybeth is the manifestation of that temptation to go with the crowd. It’ll all be better if you don’t speak your mind, she says. Don’t stand out, she says. She’s the queen bee offering internal peace, and we’re a hive of buzzing bees who want to believe listening to that conformist voice will bring us just that. Hence the fact that Herrington High is the “Home of the Hornets.”
The Faculty works as a film because it understands its audience. Every one of us was either a Stokely, or a Zeke, or a Stan, etc. Me? I was a Casey. My high school experience was akin to entering a den of lions with hunks of meat strapped to my torso. Every day I wished things would be different and that my bullies would cease torturing me. Shocker, they never did. Marybeth scares me because I wonder how easily I might’ve given in to her if it meant even one day of feeling “normal.” What’s a little parasite in the brain compared to eternal happiness? Why choose to live life in fear?
Because fear is what keeps us alive. Our worries. Our stress. Those things are a part of the biological concoction that makes us who we are. Without them, we’re nothing. We’re drones subservient to society. Utopia doesn’t exist because a life without pain would equal boredom. If you didn’t experience misery, you couldn’t understand joy. And if you didn’t understand joy, what meaning would the things we love have? How could they mean anything if emotion was science-fiction?
Marybeth strikes a sensitive chord because when you get down to it, she’s just like the rest of us. She admits in the above quote that she’s lonely on Earth. Our teen heroes may refer to feeling like aliens in their school, but Marybeth really is. I don’t doubt that she believes her mission is about helping humans, misguided or not. What she can’t seem to acknowledge is that her plan amounts to nothing more than a way to fit in. As a beloved genre character once said, “if you can’t find a friend, make one.” Marybeth “makes friends” the only way she knows how: she can’t be an outcast in a world where no one is unique.
You might assume that Marybeth is evil. Or cruel. Or malicious. Yet she’s none of those things. She’s the voice inside our head that yearns for us to belong. It has no ill intent — it’s desperate and begging to escape the yawning void of loneliness. Unlike Marybeth, we can’t just split ourselves into two for companionship. So, we fight for acceptance instead. For some, it’s easier to just be someone else. Notice how in The Faculty, it’s the kids that are the most prone to pleasing others that get taken over earliest. Delilah is obsessed with being popular. So, she’s first to go within the group. Then Stan, who has spent most of his life being liked. Zeke, Stokely, and Casey are the ones most unwilling to conform and therefore put up the greatest resistance. It’s the same fight we find ourselves in constantly. That seductive voice inside our head that Marybeth represents may not mean us any harm, but it’s wrong about what would be best for us. If you have to sacrifice who you are to be accepted by someone, then their welcome arms — tendrils? — aren’t worth it.
We shouldn’t hold the desire to belong against ourselves. It’s only human. As Stan says, “I’m not an alien. I’m discontent.” No, you’re not an alien. Or a monster. Or a loser. You’re just a person who wants to be liked for who you are, not what everyone wants you to be. Marybeth’s tactics warn against the consequence of giving up what makes us human, but that doesn’t mean we can’t offer her one of the greatest aspects of humanity: empathy. No one wants to feel like an alien wherever they go. I sure don’t. But perhaps the most important lesson to take away from The Faculty is that we aren’t alone in that conflict of self vs society. Everyone has a Marybeth in them that pleads for us to discard whatever makes us different and puts a target on our backs. At a time when social media encourages us to go with the crowd by threat of ostracization, that voice seems louder than ever. Personally, I’ll take the fear, the anxiety, the heartache, if it means that when I wake up in bed tomorrow, I’m still me. Because the acceptance that matters more than anything, the understanding we all deserve, is acceptance of ourselves. Alien parasites need not apply. 🩸
About
Matt is a writer and wannabe werewolf who began his love of horror at the ripe old age of 3 with Carpenter’s Christine. He has a horror podcast called Killer Horror Critic which he does with his wonderful wife and has previously been published on Bloody Disgusting, Shudder’s The Bite, and Daily Grindhouse. You can also find more of his reviews and ramblings at his blog, KillerHorrorCritic.com.
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