YMMV / The Dead Center

• Acclaimed Flop: Reviewers loved the movie, resulting in a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes. But according to IMDB, the movie made just $5,325 on its opening weekend, and grossed $8,320. This is due to its very limited theatrical release; it will likely gain more traction via streaming/digital downloads.
• Critical Dissonance: As of April 2020, the movie currently stands at a very impressive 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, but the audience score is only 47%.
• Diagnosed by the Audience: In-Universe. The entire reason John Doe is taken to the psych ward is because the hospital doctors couldn't figure out what was causing the catatonia. Turns out it's a side effect of Demonic Possession.
  • Dr. Forrester himself isn't entirely well. He's a loner, has trouble expressing emotions, a cold demeanor, and can be manipulative. He also calls Dr. Gray in the middle of the night, only to give up trying to explain what's happening. Given Dr. Gray and her husband's reaction, this isn't the first time Dr. Forrester has done this. It's revealed that his mother committed suicide, and he found the body.
• Harsher in Hindsight: One of the symptoms of being possessed/attacked by the demon is severe shortness of breath. It's a bit harder to watch - especially considering the hospital setting - given the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Nightmare Fuel: Several.
  • One of the deleted scenes shows that John Doe was still - but barely - alive when he was first brought to the hospital. Just before dying, he yells and grabs one of the nurses, and Dies Wide Open. The nurse walks away because she's so creeped out.
  • A corpse coming back to life is nothing new in horror movies. Seeing one after it had been tagged and bagged is something else. Imagine being the technician who just zipped the bag up, only to see the body flailing around. Even worse, imagine having to fight your way out of a body bag and finding yourself in a hospital with no idea how you got there.
  • Some random, potentially diseased person sneaking around a hospital and taking the empty bed next your loved one, only to be discovered hours later by a nurse making her morning rounds.
  • John Doe committed suicide by going to a cheap motel room and draining all the blood from his body. Dr. Graham gets to see aftermath in person; not only is the bathtub full of blood, but the walls are covered in it.
  • Being trapped in an emergency psych ward with no memory of how you got there, or a way to communicate with the doctors, let alone the outside world.
  • Being suicidal is nightmarish enough - even if John Doe has a very justifiable reason - but imagine being possessed by something that won't let you stay dead despite your best efforts.
  • Supernatural elements aside, Michael's background is eerily plausible. Imagine a man who loses his wife, has what seems to be an emotional breakdown, leaves the kids with the grandparents, and commits suicide. It's not farfetched at all.
  • Also, some of the scenes involving daily life in the psych ward count as this via Realism-Induced Horror. It can be scary for everyone involved; the patients who are a danger to themselves or others - special mention to the one guy who tries bashing his head in, and the one who tries to make a run for it, desperately yelling to be let out - as well as the often understaffed nurses and psychiatrists who take care of them. Not to mention the old lady who likes wandering around when she's unattended, and dies after seemingly being attacked by a violent patient.
  • Michael's dad's situation is sadly realistic as well. Imagine you've been told your family member has died after going insane and committing suicide, only for them to pop up perfectly fine after being involuntarily held in a psych ward. Anyone would panic at the prospect of that.
  • The demon kills its victims by sucking the lives out of their mouths, leaving a gaping, veiny expression.
  • Just how quickly the demon makes its move once it's discharged from the psych ward. It patiently waits for Michael's father to bring him home, then kills the entire family as soon as they're all in the same room. By the time Dr. Forrester catches up, the demon has already slaughtered an entire neighborhood. Not to mention how powerful it gets in such a short amount of time; judging by the torn doors laying out in the open, it's strong enough to no longer bother with stealth.
  • Another deleted scene gives us an alternate ending in which the demon is Not Quite Dead. Michael's body flops around for a bit, gets up, and we're given a view of his head, half of which has been caved in by Forrester's attack. The demon looks at Forrester for a couple of seconds, and just walks away, ready to continue its rampage. And Forrester can't do anything about it, because he's been too badly injured.
• Paranoia Fuel: The movie is full of lingering shots, making the already creepy hospital setting so much worse. It's like you just know something is going to jump out at some point.
  • Also, there's the prospect of being involuntarily, secretly, and illegally held in a psych ward by a psychiatrist with questionable motives.
  • There's also the ambiguous ending, which raises the possibility that the demon transferred itself to Dr. Forrester.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: While the movie is perfectly serviceable as a Demonic Possession horror story, it would've been far more interesting if Dr. Forrester's perceptions were questionable, that his willingness to break the law was indicative of a dangerous obsession to help people, and that the seemingly supernatural elements really could be explained by something more common. After all, his breakthroughs with John Doe were all done without any witnesses. So instead of a supernatural horror, it could've been a Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane tale involving a psychiatrist as an unreliable narrator, and a helpless, but suspicious psych ward patient. Thus the real culprit would be left for the viewer to decide. The demonic rampage at the end was fine, but could've been so much more.