The Only Ones (PANIC) Borrows Heavily from Better Movies

Title: The Only Ones

First Non-Festival Release: August 5, 2025 (DVD)

Director: Jordan Miller

Writer: Jordan Miller

Runtime: 77 Minutes

Starring: Tatiana Nya Ford, Emily Classen, Jeb Aufiero

Where to Watch: Check out where to find it here

This film’s review was written after its screening at the Panic Film Festival in 2025.

Six friends Sarah (Tatiana Nya Ford), Valerie (Emily Classen), Nicky (Paul Cottman), Zach (Zach Ruchkin), Casey (Cayla Berejikian), and Jude (Jeb Aufiero) trek to Nicky’s late uncle’s house deep in the woods. A chance run in with some squatters (Christopher Inlow, Nancy Anne Ridder) leave the group on edge but otherwise in good spirits. It’s not until night falls that their relaxing weekend turns into something far more terrifying.

Too little, too late, The Only Ones borrows heavily from better slashers before it.

Without spoiling its premise, The Only Ones gets cheeky with its setup despite not doing much with it. Beginning with a montage of grainy slasher sequences in the woods narrated by podcast host Zach, The Only Ones quickly switches perspectives to the much less interesting story of a group of friends cleaning out an old house in the woods together. From here, the story devolves into a derivative setup that pits the friends and a few outsiders against one another. It’s sluggish pace and uninteresting kill sequences kill any momentum The Only Ones attempts to build once it gets to its slashing bits.

Featuring annoying characters beset with choppy dialogue, The Only Ones gets lost in the pacing of its awkwardly structured story. With the introduction of the cast of stereotypical young adults, there’s clear irritation amongst the group. They don’t seem nearly as friendly as one would expect as a group that all willingly drove up and planned to spend the weekend together. Not only do their actors lack chemistry, the characters, as written, do too. Partners feel stiff, best friends rarely interact, and a general lack of cohesion permeates heavily through the screen. There’s no law that characters have to be best friends, especially if the story calls for it. But The Only Ones fails to do it in a convincing way or say anything meaningful about friendship with the group.

Told over the course of a fatal weekend, The Only Ones struggles to maintain a sense of direction as its characters shuffle between set pieces. By the time the body count begins to rise, the action feels largely stagnant. What’s left is a series of deaths strung together by characters running to and from various places in the house and woods.

Good performers could elevate the material, but the cast fails to make any of the stakes feel real. Lacking much chemistry, most of the cast looks lost as they try to sell this pseudo-slasher. Even when strangers face off, there’s a level of unseriousness that calls everything into question. The cast isn’t terrible, but they lack the finesse that could make the awkward parts feel more genuine.

The few bright spots of The Only Ones shine through when it leans into its more comedic aspects. Despite some of the awkward sounding dialogue, a few brutal digs catch viewers off guard with their intensity. Otherwise, most of The Only Ones relies on its situational humor. Drenched in irony, some of the kills get pretty nonsensical in the best way. Although quick in most of its implementation, the pacing works against its genuinely comedic moments, which become too far and few between to fully save The Only Ones.

It isn’t the worst slasher, but there is a distinct lack of originality that makes it blend in with other indie slashers. Between its underwhelming story and concept, flat characters, and lack of tension, The Only Ones gets tethered in the increasingly ridiculous confines of its premise. Even the kills, typically a staple of the sub-genre, feel forced and lack the buildup or payoff to feel earned. A few well-placed jokes add enough to make up for the generic story, but not nearly enough to make it good. Entertaining and quality slashers exist. The Only Ones almost hits the right beats to be amongst them, but fans of indie horror might be moved anyway.

Overall Score? 4/10