Unless you were living under a rock in 2018, you wouldn’t have been able to miss the phenomenon that was Bird Box on Netflix. The movie, starring Sandra Bullock as the wishes-she-were-blind main protagonist, was based on a book of the same name by author Josh Malerman.
Here’s the TLDR; the world suddenly becomes host to some form of Creature, one which remains unseen by the audience, which drives people insane, suicidal, and homicidal when sighted. Malorie, having given birth and also all but adopted another child on the same day (hats off to her, honestly) during this crisis, raises the two children and then takes a blindfolded trip down a river to what she hopes is safety.
The movie doesn’t actually tell us much about the Creatures, leaving it all up to the imagination, which is arguably part of the reason that the movie became as huge as it did. However, as I said, the movie is based on a book (Bird Box, 2014) by Josh Malerman. There’s also a direct sequel novel, Malorie, which was published in 2019 (and is absolutely not based in Barcelona).
So, like the ever-diligent researcher I am, I watched the movie (twice), ordered both books and read them in the space of a single weekend to try and figure out some facts about the Creatures. This information is mostly from the books, and there’s some interesting discoveries.
A word of warning, this will feature a lot of spoilers, particularly from Malorie. There’s some parts of the movie which were heavily changed from the source material, too, so if anything here doesn’t quite make sense in relation to the movie – that’s why.
They’re described as infinity
This is alluded to in the first book, when Tom is describing what the previous owner of the house, George, saw before he took his own life after seeing one. However, the theme returns much more heavily in Malorie. Without going into too much detail, the concept is that they are something we are incapable of comprehending, and that itself drives us insane.
As Gary says in the second book, imagine growing up with no knowledge of the existence of Whales. Seeing one, so huge and daunting, would be enough to cause a crack in anyone’s idea of reality.
Some people are immune to them
In the second book, Malorie, it’s revealed that Olympia (the child) is immune to the effects of the Creatures, likely due to Olympia (the mother) seeing one while the baby was still attached to her by the umbilical cord.
This means that, for her entire life, Olympia (the child) has been able to traverse without a blindfold, looking directly at the Creatures without any form of madness taking over. This explains the very bizarre moments in the movie which are never explained, and also alludes to a genetic component, which gives hope for the future of humanity in the story’s universe.
Some people are also immune based on their level of comprehension. This would explain why people with mental illnesses who have a hallucination symptoms can view them without being driven insane – they’re already used to seeing things that they can’t explain, so why would this be any different?
They’re capable of growth and reproduction
Perhaps ‘reproduction’ is the wrong word. There are multiple instances in the second book where the Creatures are described as “not necessarily taller than they were before, but wider”, and we’re informed as readers that there are three times as many of them as there were during Bird Box.
With Malorie being set approximately 12 years after Bird Box, this seems to mean that the Creatures are either multiplying, or more of them are arriving from whence they came.
Despite the effect they have on humans, they’re not violent
The only cases of purposeful attacks on humans are recorded as having happened in densely populated areas that already had an abnormally high prevalence of violent crime, which says to me that the Creatures were either trying to defend themselves, or they were a scapegoat for other violent acts. As stated in Malorie, “There are no verifiable accounts of a Creature forcing a person to look at it”.
No, rather than attacking humans, the Creatures seem to be on Earth more as observers. In the second book, after it’s revealed that Olympia can view them safely, it’s also revealed that multiple creatures have been living alongside Malorie and the kids in the lodge which became their home. Never attacking, never harming, simply watching. Often, the Creatures seem to shy away from human contact as much as we avoid contact with them.
They congregate in densely populated areas, such as Indian River
The eventual destination of the second book, Indian River, is densely populated by a group of people who are trying to find a method to safely look at the creatures while avoiding madness in the hopes of returning to some form of pre-creature normalcy. While traveling on the Blind Train (yes, that’s a thing), the owner tells Malorie that there are far more Creatures surrounding Indian River than in any other location in the length of Michigan.
Perhaps this goes hand in hand with the previous fact, that the Creatures are here to observe and are drawn to bigger populations, which would also explain why cities were affected first in the first place.
You don’t hear them move, you hear the world move around them
In the second book, Malorie, there is a list of things that are known about the Creatures. Here’s what it says:
“They make noise, though not traditional sound. There is no flat-footed creak upon floorboards. Rather, it’s as if the floorboards themselves momentarily morph before returning to their natural state”.
This suggests that rather than hearing the movement of the Creatures, you hear the world around them adapt to their presence. The grass crunches under their feet, if they have any, rather than the sound of that foot stepping down onto the grass.
They aren’t evolving, though people once thought they were
The second book begins with Malorie and the children at the School for the Blind for two years, and all hell has broken loose after a Creature has managed to get inside. But how could a Creature drive blind people insane? Well, the theory that spread was that the Creatures evolved to ‘infect’ by touch.
However, this isn’t the case. It turns out that people were simply pretending to be blind in order to fit in with the actually blind people around them and not be judged or feared. This, in turn, led to hundreds of fake-blind people at the school being driven insane, killing those around them and then themselves.
Malorie, though, believed they could infect by touch and went on to wear full body coverings any time she was outside for the next ten years. She isn’t happy when Olympia (the child) finally reveals she knew it was unnecessary the entire time.
Blindness is the best protection outside of immunity
This is pretty obvious, but if you can’t see at all, then you can’t see the Creatures. This isn’t a fact that isn’t revealed in the movie, however, there is one moment in the first book that I just have to talk about.
Malorie, trying to save the children when they’re babies, actually considers and almost carries out the voluntary blinding of two babies by pouring paint stripper into their eyes. This is possibly the clearest display of the fear instilled in people by the presence of the Creatures.
Animals can sense them better than humans
While we already know that birds can sense them, thanks to their use as an alarm system (which, in the books, only happens while at the house and aren’t taken down the river with them), they’re not the only animals who can sense them.
In the first book, not only does Jules have his own dog called Victor, but he and Tom (the adult) head out in search of more dogs to act as guide dogs. Dogs, as it turns out, are much more able to sense the presence of Creatures and can help protect humans by altering them if they venture outside with blindfolds on.
They can be viewed through two way mirrors
Quite how it took 16 years for someone to figure this out, I’m not sure, but in Malorie it’s revealed that Tom (the child) has invented a visor made from a two way mirror which was once in the lodge they stayed in for 10 years. At the end of Malorie, he tests the visor and, as luck would have it, it works.
The concept behind this revelation is that by forcing the Creatures to do something we can comprehend and relate to, viewing themselves in a mirror and looking within, we can therefore view them without being driven insane from the other side of said mirror. They’re not beyond comprehension, and therefore we can begin to understand them.
