The Book of Henry / YMMV

Alternate Character Interpretation:
- The story can't seem to make up its mind on whether Susan is a cool relatable mom or embarrassing and incompetent. For instance, her frequent video gaming is treated as her regressing into a woman child, yet the same scene also establishes she continues to go to work even though financially she has no need to. Additionally, the first act sets her up as being an alcoholic, and this trait disappears entirely in the following half of the film.
- Henry (while alive) is worshipped by the story and treated as functionally infallible, yet the last half relies on Susan learning to discard his instruction because he's just a child.
- Glenn is already distrusted by the Carpenters even before he turns out to be an abuser, despite that all we see of him before then is him politely asking Susan to rake the leaves out of the driveway. Since his abuse is never directly seen, some viewers expected a twist where he turned out to not be up to any wrongdoing.
Ass Pull:
- Some people felt Susan choosing not to shoot Glenn was this, because up until that point the movie had been about Susan learning to put her trust in Henry, so having a moment where she learns she has to disregard Henry feels out of left field.
- Principal Janice initially tells Henry her hands are tied as far as helping Christina is concerned. Then during the film's climax a sad look from Christina during her dance recital is all it takes for her to finally call the police on her stepdad. Meaning she very well could've intervened before, but just... didn't.
Audience-Alienating Premise: A child who dies of a tumor and wanted to help an abused neighbor... by planning to murder her father, an idea his mother decides to follow! No wonder audiences wouldn't buy something so weird and filled with contentious points.
- Similarly, it's about a quirky child genius and his relationship with his mother and younger brother...which kills off said child genius halfway through and then follows his mother carrying out a murder plot he constructed prior.
Captain Obvious Aesop: If a child urges you to murder your neighbor, don’t listen to them.
Designated Hero: Despite the film’s attempt at framing Henry as a kid who’s mature and wise beyond his years, how he acts paints a different character. From his first scene alone, Henry insults another student in an improvised essay reading and condescendingly tells his teacher that he wants to stay in a class with kids his age for his psycho-social development – even though he is never seen interacting with any other classmate during lunch or recess in the movie.^note And that’s not getting into how Henry polices his own mother with how she spends her free time, takes care of the family and pretty much how she lives. He gets even worse after he dies. Yes, the abusive stepfather should be stopped; but one should not resort to murder as their first idea, much less coach one's mother to commit the act.
Esoteric Happy Ending: The film ends with Christina being adopted by the Carpenters and supposedly living happily ever after except just being adopted into a happy family isn't gonna get rid of the emotional scars she received from abuse or the trauma from finding out her stepfather had died. And if she ever finds out how much the Carpenters were involved in his death...
The Scrappy: Henry, for being an insufferable control freak of a brat that belittles everyone around him, especially his mother, and deciding that the best solution to an abusive parent of a girl he knows is a convoluted murder plot that could possibly put his mother in prison if it failed in any way.
So Bad, It's Good: A lot of the film's detractors find the second half of the movie horrific but still entertaining to watch in a trainwreck sense due to the sheer over-the-top ridiculousness of everything that transpires.
Spiritual Adaptation: According to director Colin Trevorrow, The Book of Henry is, apparently, also a retelling of Star Wars: A New Hope.
Trevorrow: Henry was Obi-Wan Kenobi. And he died in the middle. And he left a set of instructions on how to take out the Death Star where Darth Vader was holding a Princess captive. And at the very end, when he had the target in his sights, he had to remember his training. Guided by this ghostly voice. And then Han Solo comes in with the Rube Goldberg machine and gives him the moment. And ultimately the Princess saves herself.
Squick: After learning he's going to die Susan's adult friend Sheila kisses Henry on the lips.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
- The film repeatedly makes mention of an unseen black market purchaser named Dominic, who's implied to be some kind of local crime lord. This detail never matters beyond giving Henry and Susan an excuse for purchasing a gun without any registration, with no mention of police investigating Dominic or what his cronies may be up to. Some reviewers suggested he could've led up to an ironic ending where Susan is arrested for allegedly being connected to Dominic.
- Many people have mentioned that the film's ending probably would have been more interesting if it had been revealed that Glenn was innocent and that Henry had been wrong the whole time.
Took the Bad Film Seriously: Colin Trevorrow clearly wanted to make a beloved classic both kids and adults could enjoy for generations to come and, credit where it's due, everyone involved is doing their absolute best to make it work but the completely sincere delivery only makes film's ludicrous story, jarring tonal clashes, and Henry's insufferable demeanor much more overt.
Uncertain Audience: Easily the biggest criticism of the film, aside from Henry being so unlikable, is that it seems to have no clear vision for what it wants to be, going back and forth between harshly deconstructing the idea of a child prodigy who thinks they're smarter than adults and playing the idea completely straight and it's tone being caught between a whimsical Spielberg-esque story about childhood and small town adventure and a gritty drama about child abuse where the hero is planning to murder the abuser and said hero is just a kid and not knowing wheter it wants Henry to be a borderline saint and genius or a smug little brat who's not nearly as smart as he thinks he is.
Unintentionally Sympathetic: Susan working at the diner is meant to be seen as irresponsible because thanks to Henry's stock market work the family has a good source of outside income and if she left the job she could spend more time being a mom. However she clearly already spends a lot of time with her children and given the fact the Stock Market can crash it makes it look more like Susan having a job is the responsible thing to do in case something goes wrong with the market. It's also quite possible she just doesn't wanna feel like she's making money doing nothing and wants to get out of the house and be around others besides her sons.
- Susan's lack of interest in family finances is portrayed as a moral failing that requires Henry to be the adult, but the family seemingly has no financial problems so at this point neither her nor Henry really need to keep a close eye on their finances.
Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Henry is meant to be seen as a likable child prodigy who's Wise Beyond His Years, looks after his family, and wants to save a girl from her abusive father. A lot of viewers and critics instead saw Henry as an insufferable, condescending control freak who belittles everyone and has a childish view of the world despite acting like he's grown up with Smug Snake tendencies. And even though he had good intentions for wanting to save Christina from her abusive father, the fact that his solution to the problem is murder rather than getting definitive proof can strain viewers' empathy.

YMMV / The Book of Henry

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