"Hell House tortures women’s bodies to send messages about morality, chastity, and the peril of sexuality. The bodies of the lost are feminine in shape. A girl, who is date-raped at a rave, later commits suicide while being slut-shamed by a death monitor. An abortion gone wrong kills another young woman, but not before we hear her ear-splitting screams and see her anguish, physical pain, and so much blood. A husband chokes to death his adulterous wife. A drunk driving boyfriend crashes his car killing both him and his girlfriend. A disastrous drug deal begins with one dealer’s girlfriend being shot to death in front of him. Before these female characters die, men insult, threaten, choke, slap, push, and rape them. These young women die by their own hands or the hands of another, death monitors drag them to hell. An angel spares the abortion girl, who cries out to God to be saved. She finds salvation, but loses her life. Women’s bodies appear broken and wounded. They are clearly victims. Yet, the victims are the ones punished for eternity while their victimizers suffer no such fate. Hell House normalizes male violence while vilifying and damning female victims. Trinity’s teens role play at sin, but the effects of sin appear starker for young women than young men. Who wants to play as a rapist or domestic abuser? Unless they both walk away from consequences in everyday life and the afterlife. Salvation and damnation are gendered. Hell House makes that clear."
~ Kelly J. Baker
"Hell House" – Sacred Matters Magazine
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