The UnBEARable weight of getting what you want

I recently watched Obsession, and throughout the movie I kept making mental notes on how I’d arrange it as my first Character Case File because, you know, I love sh*t like that. I guess, much like everything else I do (yes, I’m rolling my eyes at myself too), I’m just observing patterns in human behavior.

AND YES THERE WILL BE SPOILERS.

What I want to do with these articles is point out everyday sit-che-ations people get themselves into. Things that we see playing out around us all the time without giving them much thought. Sure, some of these characters take those patterns to ridiculous extremes, which honestly just makes my job easier. Sometimes their stories are relatable, and sometimes…not so much. Like in this case. I’m not sure how many of us end up eating cat sandwiches or watching the love of our life casually walk in reverse like an instant-replay demon, but hey, my point stands. Observing the characters’ choices, actions, emotions, and so on lets us see things we don’t always recognize in ourselves and the people around us.

As always, these observations are completely opinion-based. They are simply my personal interpretations based on my own experience studying behavior.

Let’s get into it!

First and foremost, I want to pose a very simple question. How well does Bear know Nikki? Emphasis on the two italicized words looking so elegant above. It’s clear in the movie that they are friends. Nikki has been there for him, and she talks to him about her writing. So the argument isn’t “Bear knows very little about Nikki in general.” Instead, I’m wondering if his crush is preventing him from seeing HER?

We can see moments of Bear admiring Nikki, like when she gives money to a homeless person, and I think it’s fair to say that her kindness is genuinely part of what he likes about her. But we also watch an entire night go by without Nikki ever really noticing that Bear is upset. When they toast at the bar, Bear says, “To Sandy.” Neither Nikki nor Ian question it, but Sarah does. She’s the one who asks why, and Nikki and Ian take off together without giving it a second thought. Speaking of those two, we later find out that Nikki and Ian have been hooking up on and off for two years. My manzez Bear had no idea. Whether it was “romantic” or just fun, who knows?

Interestingly, of the two, Ian seems to see Nikki more clearly than Bear does. Even from the opening scene, when Bear is practicing confessing his love, Ian is basically like, WTF was that? I’m not sure if everything he points out is because he likes Nikki too, or simply because he genuinely knows her better. But it doesn’t matter because Ian is never really the problem, is he? I mean, even when we see him go to get a gift for Nikki, we see him kind of just…pace. You’re so in love with this person, but you don’t know what to get her? Then you somehow land on a magical wish stick? Like, what even was the point of that? In all fairness, Nikki gives poor Bear mixed signals. There are moments of intimacy between them. So I’m not going to sit here and pretend Bear pulled the possibility of something between them completely out of his ass.

Where Bear starts looking a little villainous is when Nikki asks him directly if he likes her.

This man says, “as a friend.”

BRO.

It’s not even that Bear never gets an opportunity to put himself out there. Nikki gives him one. Actually, she gives him more than one. He could have been direct about how he felt right then, but Bear is so scared of rejection that he still can’t. He’s spent so much time imagining what being with her could look like that he’s afraid to put the fantasy up against reality. So even when Nikki opens the door, he doesn’t walk through it. Even after the wish, when she drops by his place, she tells him, “I know you like me, Bear.” The first thing out of this boy’s mouth is, “No, I don’t. Why do you? It isn't until she says she does that he finally TELLS THE TRUTH. It's too late, though, because the wish is already in motion. Beforehand, he never knows whether the real Nikki would have accepted or rejected him.

Instead, he relies on a magical stick.

(Insert facepalm here.)

When Bear snaps the One Wish Willow, it isn’t something that he sits and thinks about. We don’t know whether or not he visualized properly. LOL. It’s not like an intentional manifestation sesh, it’s an impulsive wish. He’s so paralyzed by the possibility of rejection that he says, “I wish Nikki Freeman loved me more than anyone in the f*cking world.”

Now that shit’s crazy.

Wishing out of desperation delivers some serious “results may vary” vibes. Has Bear never seen any genie movie? It’s basic knowledge that you have to be very careful with the wording of wishes. In this case, I can see why, because what does “more than anyone in the f*cking world” actually mean? Bear isn’t thinking about that. He never stops to consider what that amount of love would look like. His Desperation makes the outcome feel so important that the details stop mattering. Bear doesn’t ask for a healthy relationship with Nikki or the chance to see if one could develop. He wants uncertainty gone.

And boy does he get rid of it.

Nikki certainly ends up loving him more than anyone in the f*cking world. Literally. But what does that amount of love actually feel like for Nikki? Bear thought entirely about what it would feel like to receive that much love. He never considered what it would feel like for Nikki to carry it. That becomes important almost immediately because right after they sleep together, this chick is crying because Bear doesn’t love her as much as she loves him. And she’s right, dude. The wish changed Nikki, not Bear. She’s suddenly carrying this massive, all consuming love for someone whose feelings stayed exactly the same. Bear pmo so much, though, because he does not care. He is so happy in the beginning. They’re doing the fun stuff, and he’s enjoying her love, and everything is perfect, until it isn’t.

It escalates very quickly to Nikki watching him sleep, chopping his hair, taping the damn door shut, and eventually this woman is literally peeing on the floor because he’s leaving? Ewhhhh brothhhha. At this point, Bear very clearly understands that something is wrong. Sadly, Bear isn’t immediately thinking, “I need to give Nikki her life back.” He’s basically trying to renegotiate the terms. Love me more than anyone in the world…just maybe don’t do all the creepy shit. What’s the matter, Bear? Is getting exactly what you wished for getting a little heavy? At this point it’s not just Bear noticing everything is strange. Ian calls him out, and Bear is genuinely offended. But getting exactly what you want can be incredibly isolating when keeping it requires you to ignore everyone telling you something isn’t right. Ian isn’t threatening Bear’s relationship with Nikki. He’s threatening the version of it Bear is still desperately trying to believe in.

Enter Sarah.

She meets up with Bear, and this chick adds a whole lot of information to the equation that Bear has completely overlooked. It's obvious she is not trying to hurt Bear by exposing what is happening, nor is she doing it selfishly out of her feelings. She knows telling him the truth could potentially destroy the exact thing he thinks he wants, and she does it anyway because she knows something is wrong. Which, ironically, might be one of the movie’s few examples of a genuinely loving act. Sarah cares about Bear enough to tell him something he doesn’t want to hear. So not only does Bear's altering of the universe take away the potential for something real with Nikki, it destroys the same with Sarah. We know how that ends for her.

It takes him some time to get there, but Bear does what any reasonable person would have done several red flags ago and calls the number on the One Wish Willow. Even then, his first instinct isn’t to take the wish back. He asks if they can alter it. Because by now Bear knows this isn’t just Nikki being a little clingy. Everyone is scared of her, but he still isn’t ready to give up the part of the wish he wanted. He doesn’t want Nikki to stop loving him. He just wants her to love him in a way that’s easier for him to live with.

When he hears what sounds like the real Nikki screaming beneath whatever the wish has done to her, he requests that the wish be canceled. When they say no, Bear kinda just goes back inside and continues trying to make it work. It’s so messed up. Nikki smashes her own face, screaming it’s NOT ME, and he’s still trying to reason with her: “Just be Nikki.” Is he seriously trying to say everything was “normal” before? Normal for who, Bear? Ian has been telling him something isn’t right. Sarah has been telling him something isn’t right. Bear himself has been scared shitless by Nikki’s behavior. Nikki is obviously falling apart. Things weren’t normal. They were just convenient for what he wanted.

And that brings me right back to the question I started with: how well did Bear actually know Nikki in the first place? Because which Nikki is he asking for? The Nikki he remembers or the one he imagined? Nikki herself answers the question. When she manages to come through while the demon or whatever is sleeping, she tells him, “It’s not me.” More importantly, she tells him, “You’ve never been with me.”

Yikes.

Bear has spent all this time mourning the loss of the “real Nikki,” only for Nikki to essentially tell him that the woman he’s been with this entire time isn’t her. And even after hearing that, even with Nikki begging him to end what is happening to her, Bear walks out the fkn door! But not before saying, “What would be so bad about being with me?” And on the surface, I completely understand where he’s coming from. He likes Nikki. He thinks he’s a decent guy. He thinks he could make her happy. So in his mind, what WOULD be so bad about being with him? And it’s very simple. Does Nikki want to be with you?

This is where Sarah demonstrates the same thing from the opposite side. There’s nothing wrong with Sarah either. She cares about Bear. She notices when he’s hurting. She tells him the truth even when it might cost her what she wants. But Bear doesn’t want her. So why isn’t it equally okay for Nikki not to want Bear? Once Sarah’s face is completely wrecked, Bear finally loses it. And I think Nikki says one of the most important things anyone says to him in the entire movie:

“YOU wanted this.”

She’s right. That doesn’t mean Bear wanted Sarah dead. Obviously. He didn’t wish for his friends to disappear or for Nikki to become whatever the hell is currently vomiting all over his apartment. But he did want this one thing so badly that he never stopped to consider what getting it might cost him.

So Bear goes back to the shop, and then eventually he goes to Ian. Oddly enough, I think this might be the most authentic we see Bear in the entire movie. He's honest, and he asks for help. There’s no pretending he’s fine or trying to convince himself everything will somehow work out.

All I could think was…where the f*ck was this Bear when Nikki asked if he liked her? Had Bear shown Nikki this much vulnerability at the beginning, they could at least have tried. Maybe she would have rejected him. Maybe they would have dated. Maybe she still would have chosen Ian. I have no idea. And neither does Bear. That’s kind of the tragedy of it. He was so afraid of an uncertain answer that he chose a guaranteed one.

As for Ian, I take back at least some of the shit I was thinking about him originally. I thought maybe he was trying to sabotage Bear, but sometimes we need someone from the outside to help us understand that not everything we want is meant to be. When Bear goes to Ian looking for help, he’s also asking someone else to share the responsibility for something he created. Ian didn’t make the wish. He didn’t change Nikki. So, why exactly is it his responsibility to fix this? F*ck it, Ian. Enjoy that billion. You will also soon learn the weight of getting exactly what you want.

By this point, Nikki is behaving like she needs an exorcist more than a boyfriend, and Bear tells her he’s going to make it work. Then they sit together on the couch and share what actually feels like a nice moment. In this scene, I return to the idea that Bear isn't some evil mastermind who never cared about Nikki. I think he does care about her. I think he probably does love her. The problem is that Bear loving Nikki was never really the issue. The problem was believing that because he loved her, she should love him back.

Which brings me to Bear’s final decision. I originally read the ending as Bear sacrificing himself to give Nikki her freedom back. But of course it isn’t. This man is so accidentally selfish it’s insane. Bear is exhausted, Nikki’s suffering, and the thing he wanted more than anything has become something he can barely stand to live with. So when Bear takes the pills, is he dying to free Nikki? Or is he dying to free himself? I think it’s debatable.

There are moments that make me think there’s some sacrifice in his decision, but there are also plenty that make it look like escape. The second Nikki sounds like herself again, Bear has second thoughts and tries to throw the pills back up. Why try to take it back if dying was this completely selfless, deliberate act to save Nikki? Maybe hearing the real Nikki again makes him reconsider or believe there’s another way. Maybe it’s nothing deeper than the human instinct to survive once you realize you’re actually dying. The movie doesn’t give us a neat answer. In the end, not only did Bear never really get Nikki, he lost her completely.

Nikki is the real victim of all of this. She comes back completely traumatized. Her whole friend group is gone, and she doesn’t even really know herself anymore. Whatever Bear’s intention was when he took those pills, he gets to leave the situation behind. Nikki has to wake up in it. Bear’s wish might be over, but the consequences didn't magically disappear with it.

Maybe that's the larger lesson in getting exactly what you want. Sometimes getting it is the very thing that makes you realize why you never should have had it in the first place. We're human, and our desires don't always allow us to see the bigger picture of what we're actually asking for. That doesn't mean we shouldn't have dreams, goals, or desires. Of course we should. But maybe honesty and integrity have to exist alongside them. We can be honest about what we want. We can do what we can to move toward it. But at some point, we also have to leave room for an answer we didn't choose cause holy shit. Rejection would have saved everybody. Acceptance isn't giving up. We just have to understand that we can't always see far enough ahead to know what getting our way would actually cost us. The thing we think we're being denied might be the very thing we're being saved from.

*****Character Case Files is a collection of opinion-based character analyses. They explore emotional motivations, psychological patterns, desires, fears, symbolism, and recurring themes within a story. The goal is not to be objectively correct. The goal is to explore archetypes, spark discussion, and look at familiar characters through a different lens.

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