The Meaning of I Saw the TV Glow

What is I Saw the TV Glow about?

I Saw the TV Glow is about crossroads in identity. You have two characters. One embraces their true self and escapes the suburbs. While the other is too scared so refuses to be who they really are then spends the rest of their life on mute. Owen is Shinji from Neon Genesis Evangelion in the sense that both characters fail to rise to the occasion. They become negative examples. Instead of aspiring to be like them, we’re inspired to be better than them. The story of I Saw the TV Glow is applicable to all but it specifically speaks to the trans experience. It also comments on the relationship we have with media and the role media plays in shaping our identity. 

Cast

• Owen – Justice Smith
• Young Owen – Ian Foreman
• Isabel – Helena Howard
• Maddy – Brigette Lundy-Paine
• Tara – Lindsey Jordan
• Brenda – Danielle Deadwyler
• Frank – Fred Durst
• Jonny Link’s Mom – Amber Benson
• Mr. Melancholy/Marco/Evil Clown/Amanda – Emma Portner
• Neighbor – Michael C Maronna
• Neighbor – Danny Tamberelli
• Sloppy Jane – Phoebe Bridgers, Haley Dahl
• King Woman – Kristina Esfandlari
• Written by – Jane Schoenbrun
• Directed by – Jane Schoenbrun

The ending of I Saw the TV Glow explained

Recap:

The end of I Saw the TV Glow begins following a moment of existential crisis. Owen has two options. Keep living the life he has known, or believe Maddy’s claims that he’s actually Isabel from The Pink Opaque and needs to bury himself alive in order to return to the real world of the show. He refuses to believe her, despite knowing better. 

Having made his choice, the rest of the film is the slow spiral into spiritual, emotional, and physical annihilation. His father dies. He works at the fun center but has no sense of joy himself. Twenty years later, and Owen’s at the same job and living in the same house. He’s in terrible shape. And despite telling us he has a family of his own, we never see them, only his purchase of a big screen TV. 

One day at work, in the middle of some kid’s birthday party, all of Owen’s  repressed anxiety breaks out. He screams and screams and screams. Then goes to the bathroom and cuts open his chest to reveal a screen that plays The Pink Opaque. The last moments show Owen outside the bathroom, chest normal, moving through the main area of the fun center. He apologizes to everyone he walks past. But none of them pay attention to him.  

What was real and what wasn’t real?

In case you need some orienting. I Saw the TV Glow is like Donnie Darko. In Donnie Darko, the world is based on what’s essentially a simulation where the Primary Universe sometimes gets a bug that spawns a Tangent Universe. “Deus ex machina” then steers events in the Tangent Universe to correct the bug in the Primary Universe, kind of how white blood cells attack an infection. So 99% of what we see in Donnie Darko is the Tangent Universe. It’s only at the end that we jump into the Primary Universe and see some of the consequences of the events from the movie. 

I Saw the TV Glow does something similar. Owen’s life is the Tangent Universe, the Midnight Realm. It’s a world created by Mr. Melancholy to essentially torture people like Isabel and Tara. But it’s kind of like Inception where the people in a dream start to realize they’re in a dream but in a dream-like way. So Owen and Maddy can’t just remember being Isabel and Tara. Instead, those memories manifest as The Pink Opaque. And they feel connected to the show for reasons they can’t quite explain. 

Maddy is bold enough to trust her instincts and it leads her to wake up back in her Primary Universe. Owen doesn’t have that same confidence. He’s too accepting of how the world wants him to be. We’re told that Mr. Melancholy buried the girls alive in the Primary Universe. That’s why Owen has breathing issues. In the time it takes Isabel to suffocate in the grave, decades pass in the Tangent Universe. But the inability to breathe in the PU has a direct effect on Owen’s respiration in the TU. The implication of Owen’s breathing in that final scene, as he breathlessly apologizes to unreal customers, is that Isabel’s time is almost up. She’ll suffocate.  

Meaning

At Film Colossus, one of our favorite words is defamiliarization. That’s where you take something normal and re-present in a way that makes it unfamiliar. An example I think captures the impact of the technique is if you came home and all your furniture had been rearranged. It’s your home. It’s your stuff. But you’re seeing it all from a new perspective. Fresh, unexpected, unusual. 

How does that work in narrative? A familiar story is realistic. Usually quite literal. You might tell a story where Stacy has a child but her husband is in a car crash and dies. Pick up a few years later and Stacy is still grieving. And her son looks so much like her husband that it makes her sad so she pushes her son away. That causes the son to act out and have behavioral issues. It’s an emotionally draining story but ultimately the two of them have a breakthrough and the film ends with the hope things will be better. 

The Babadook tells a very similar tale but uses a monster called the Babadook to externalize the mother’s grief and give the son something to physically respond to. When mother and son defeat the monster, it symbolizes putting the past to rest and the start of a new chapter. 

So I Saw the TV Glow takes the idea of repression and defamiliarizes it. Think about the trans experience. You’re born into this body but it never feels right. And some people are too scared or uncertain to believe life could ever be anything else—that they could ever be anything else. And so they carry on and live what is a very muted, unfulfilling existence where they’re always left wondering about what might have been. While other people transition, and their world changes, becomes far more honest and true. You’re suddenly empowered. Really alive. 

Jane Schoenbrun looked at those internal elements and found a way to externalize them. That tension between the body you have compared to who you really are inside becomes Owen and Isabel. The mundanity of suburbia versus the excitement and powers of the TV show? That dichotomy represents the difference in denying who you are compared to embracing it; something further demonstrated by Mr. Melancholy removing Isabel’s heart. If Owen had buried himself and turned into Isabel, she would have been able to reclaim her heart and everything it symbolizes. Even the idea of burying yourself is symbolism for the “death” of who you were. In real life, that might involve changing your name, buying all new clothes, getting a haircut, and pursuing interests and hobbies you had always denied yourself—like painting your nails or going bowling or becoming a filmmaker or musician. You’re a new you. Schoenbrun just decided to express that change, from old to new, as a literal death of the old and awakening into the new.  

While I Saw the TV Glow does include trans-specific details, like Owen actually being Isabel, its ethereal nature means it speaks to the broader idea of repression. Whether that’s repression of gender, sexuality, nationality, religion, love, or just something you’re passionate about. It’s universal in that way. 

What is repression if not the feeling of being stuck and unable to be what or who you want to be. As someone who grew up in a small-town of 5,000 people, Owen’s life spoke to one of my greatest fears. The quicksand feeling of the suburbs has been a popular talking point in literature, TV, and film for decades now. Revolutionary Road, The Stepford Wives, The Ice Storm, Donnie Darko, American Beauty, Desperate Housewives, The Breakfast Club, Adventureland, Lady Bird, even, in some ways, The Sandlot. 

All of those stories have some aspect of yearning to be something more. I Saw the TV Glow leans a bit more into LGBTQIA+ issues while maintaining the same elements of suburban ennui. Some of those stories end positively. Others walk a darker path. I Saw the TV Glow is like if Lady Bird didn’t go to NYU. Or if Jesse Eisenberg kept working at the amusement park in Pennsylvania. Or if all the kids from Sandlot stopped playing baseball because they got hooked on opioids. That’s Owen living at home, working at the fun center. Slowly suffocating. 

How many people feel stuck in the suburbs and long to live another life? It’s that same feeling Neo has in the first act of The Matrix, the feeling that drives him to follow the white rabbit and question the nature of his reality. And even when you escape, you remember that fear. Which is exactly what I Saw the TV Glow speaks to. That darkest version of your life, where you let fear win so never tried to be who you really are. And it slowly killed you. 

The themes, message, and meaning of I Saw the TV Glow

Repression and melancholy

Shawshank Redemption had that famous quote. “Get busy living or get busy dying.” That’s essentially the choice Maddy offers to Owen. If he listened to her, he would wake up as Isabel and could reclaim their heart and live a more exciting, fulfilling life. Don’t get me wrong—it’s still a life with somehow called Mr. Melancholy trying to defeat you. But it’s far better than the world Owen occupies. 

But Owen is too afraid. Maddy’s offer sounds like death. He’d rather wither away than seize the chance. Normally, what Maddy suggests would be crazy. The thing is—Owen knew better. He knew she was telling the truth. But he convinced himself otherwise. Why? Repression. Which we can argue is a byproduct of a suburban existence that prides itself on a sense of normality and uniformity. In so many ways, suburban life demands you don’t be different. It rewards fitting in. And often strikes down efforts to be “other”. 

From culture writer Stacey Eskelin: I grew up feeling both repelled and fascinated by American suburbs. It was the bleak sameness, the square lawn, the narrow driveway, the houses duplicated over and over again, like patterns on a chessboard. I was affronted by the nosy authority of Home Owners’ Associations chiding people about their trash bins, the aggressive cheerfulness of our neighbors, their wariness of interlopers that had an unsavory racial tinge to it. 

These were things I felt but couldn’t articulate until I was older. I lived with a kind of low-grade horror, figuring it was just me. Again. Nobody else seemed all that bothered by a perfectly manicured lawn. If I brought up the subject of my suburb-induced dread and isolation, all I got for my trouble was a blank stare. 

This homogeneity is what can make it so hard for LGBTQIA+ kids like Owen to embrace themselves. Maddy’s offer is essentially a friend who understands Owen’s transness asking him to accept it as well. To stop being Owen and claim their identity as Isabel. But Owen can’t. Won’t. Because suburbia has ingrained repression into him. And it leads to a poisonous melancholy that is all-encompassing. 

For those who don’t know, trans awakening is known as the “egg crack” moment. It’s when the denial stops. I found this quote from a trans writer by the name of NJD Hardage: Once an egg cracks, it can’t uncrack. Whatever animal is inside the egg is born twice, in a way— once laid, once hatched. Owen refuses to hatch. 

Friendship and community matter

As bleak as I Saw the TV Glow can feel, there is something beautiful about the camaraderie shared by Owen and Maddy. They’re two loners drawn to each other by a shared past neither understands, in a world that was literally designed to crush their spirits. They spend meaningful time together and it makes a difference. If Owen had trusted Maddy, they could have escaped that awful place and returned to who they really were. Instead, he rejected her, rejected his own true self, and went down a path of total isolation. 

That cutting off from any and all community is part of Owen’s existential horror. Think about the scene where Maddy appears after being gone for years. Owen had been standing alone in a supermarket. Where does Maddy take him to talk? A punk bar. It’s about the furthest thing from the suburbia we’ve been stuck in. We see Haley Dahl and Phoebe Bridgers perform and they look and feel like characters out of another movie. Dahl has this awesome outfit and makeup. Bridgers is diaphanous. The next performer is King Woman. That merging of the masculine “king” with the feminine is an appropriate name for a movie with transgender themes. King Woman begins performing right after Maddy announces she has been back in The Pink Opaque, the TV show that is at the heart of the trans metaphor. 

In that bar, we find the antithesis to suburbian isolation. It’s a gathering place for outsiders. For those who want to live more than they want to die. That’s where they find community. But Owen won’t allow himself to be part of it.   

Why is the movie called I Saw the TV Glow?

Sometimes a title is straightforward. Melancholia. I Know What You Did Last Summer. Other times, it’s a little more poetic but is ultimately vibe-driven so you get it without needing to totally define it. Like Whiplash might seem like a weird name for a movie about being in a college jazz band but then you find out it’s the name of one of the songs. But then it can refer to the tongue-lashing the instructor gives the performers. Whiplash is also a neck injury that results in a sudden change of speed, usually from a car crash. The instructor makes a big deal about tempo, going too fast and too slow. And we watch as the main character goes from working relentlessly to prove himself to an outright meltdown. So there’s this existential whiplash that occurs. The title makes sense.

I Saw the TV Glow is a little more difficult. It’s not relying on a familiar concept that we can use to frame the events in the movie. It’s a unique phrase that draws meaning from events in a film that is very surreal and symbolic. To understand it, we have to look at resonances within the story. 

The first thing that jumps out is “TV”. One of the main plot points is little kid Owen wanting to watch The Pink Opaque but his mom not letting him. So he finds ways to go stay with Maddy and watch at her place. We also know that The Pink Opaque is actually the memories Owen and Maddy have from their real lives as Isabel and Tara. That means the TV isn’t just a medium for entertainment but this gateway to your true identity. 

What about “glow”? One of the first meaningful “glows” happens in The Pink Opaque. Whenever Isabel and Tara use their special powers, a ghost tattoo on their neck glows pink. So we have another connection to the show. The movie poster also emphasizes a pink glow from the TV. Something that’s really emphasized after Owen talks to Maddy at the bar then runs home to watch the final episode of The Pink Opaque. That whole episode provides the exposition about what Mr. Melancholy did to Isabel. And Owen realizes it’s true. That he is Isabel. That he doesn’t belong in this world. He actually shoves his head into the TV screen to try to get out of there. Sparks and light erupt from the screen. But his “dad” stops him. 

So the TV and the glow both connect to The Pink Opaque, which we know symbolizes who Owen could be, who he wishes to be, that true self that hides beneath the repression. With that in mind, I think the title refers then to that idea of recognition of self and how media can play a really important role in not only shaping our identity but unlocking it. There are a dozen things you might watch that you enjoy but they don’t resonate with you. Then there are those shows and movies that cause the TV to, poetically speaking, glow, because they’re so important to who you are.

There are a number of references that underscore that theme of the relationship we have with media. I actually attended a preview screening at the Alamo Drafthouse where afterwards they interviewed Jane Schoenbrun. They had this to say:

I was watching all of this television as a young person. This was the era of Snick and Pete & Pete and Are You Afraid of the Dark and all of this media that was sort of like in this post-Spielberg way being like “Trust us, the suburbs is magical.” And I loved so much of that stuff growing up. And I think a lot of my own mythology of my childhood and coming of age was created by a lot of their shows, and how I interacted with my space that I was in, was sort of a religion that I was taught. 

I really did live and breathe Buffy the Vampire Slayer growing up. I cared about Buffy more than I cared about my real life. And just having that consistency. When I was 10 , I watched the first season of that show when it aired, and was just with it for seven years. It was such a tool of dissociation for me. In hindsight, I think very much a coping mechanism for not being able to form the kinds of deep romantic relationships that other people can form when they’re an adult in the right body. I wasn’t in a place where I could open myself up to people, but here was this show that was so emotional that I could have a relationship with. But it was going to be one-sided. This fictional world that felt very queer….it was giving me a place to go that was different than was allowed elsewhere. 

I think with Amber Benson [who plays Johnny Link’s mom] that moment comes at a point in the film when all of Owen’s mother figures have been stripped away. Very quickly. His mom. Maddy has disappeared. And the TV show has been canceled. And it just felt like an extraordinary grace note to let him get a hug and for us to kind of get a hug and see this presence who—in the context of what happened to Tara was like…for me a bit of a corrective or something. I want[ed] to see her on screen. At one point, we didn’t actually do this, but I wanted to dress her in the same clothing that she was wearing when she got killed off in Buffy. It was just really important to me, personally as a fan, to see that she’s alive.

Schoenbrun did elaborate that they wanted these cameos to not just be fun fan-service moments but tied to the deeper themes and meaning of the film itself.   

Important motifs in I Saw the TV Glow

Owen’s wheezing

The reason Owen has breathing issues is because he is really Isabel who is buried alive back in the world of The Pink Opaque. The difficulty Owen has is a direct consequence of Isabel running out of air in what will be her grave. It’s a really terrifying depiction of missing the chance to become the person you could be/should be. It’s not saying someone can’t transition later in life, or that a 60-year-old couldn’t drop everything and become a wonderful musician. But that you might reach a point where you no longer have the willpower to do so. Owen becomes a warning. An example. Don’t be him. If he frustrates you, good. Because there’s probably something in your life that you’ve been a bit Owen-y about. Hopefully he inspires you to seize the day. 

Questions & answers about I Saw the TV Glow

Was Maddy telling the truth?

Yes. The movie is a metaphor. It’s not trying to trick you. Rather, it’s trying to take an emotionally complex internal experience and represent it externally in a way that others can understand and relate to. 

Why did Owen put his head in the TV?

It was a moment of crisis. He had just re-watched the final episode of The Pink Opaque and it explained all the stuff he had forgotten. In that moment, he understood this wasn’t the real world and he wasn’t Owen but Isabel. So climbing through the TV captures a desperation to get out of the Midnight Realm. Despite that, Owen still can’t find the strength to “transition” from one world to the next. He’s too afraid. Too repressed.

How much time passes?

I Saw the TV Glow starts in 1996. Owen’s in 7th grade. Maddy’s in 9th. Then it hops to 1998. Owen’s a Freshman. Eight more years pass, so we leave the 90s for the new millennium. We then leap 20 more years ahead. So Owen goes from about 12 years old to somewhere in his 40s.

What was in Owen’s chest?

When he cuts into his chest in the bathroom, it just seems like a final confirmation that, yeah, that TV world really was inside of him the entire time. He could be Isabel. But, instead, he keeps being Owen. 

Was that Pete and Pete?

I Saw the TV Glow uses references to other media as a way to comment on our relationship with media. So a lot of The Pink Opaque’s style comes from Power Rangers. The blue moon juice is a callback to the “Ghastly Grinner” episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark. Same with Owen narrating from the woods in front of a fire. You have the two guys who played the kid brothers on Pete & Pete. Amber Benson who played Tara in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And probably a few more things I didn’t quite catch. 

For those who don’t know, the Ghastly Grinner was pretty much the most horrifying thing a kid could see. If you want to see for yourself. 

Was that Limp Bizkit’s Fred Durst?

Oh yeah. Fred is a bit of a cinephile and has actually directed four films. If you want to see some of his favorite movies. 

Now it’s your turn

Have more unanswered questions about I Saw the TV Glow? Are there themes or motifs we missed? Is there more to explain about the ending? Please post your questions and thoughts in the comments section! We’ll do our best to address every one of them.