Please Don’t Feed the Children – Movie Review | Tubi (2/5)

PLEASE DON’T FEED THE CHILDREN on Tubi is a new horror movie about a virus that turns people into cannibals. Well, sort of. We enter the story after this apocalyptic outbreak, so it’s a much smaller story. Read our Please Don’t Feed the Children movie review here!

PLEASE DON’T FEED THE CHILDREN is a new Tubi horror movie addition that should entertain most on a random Friday night. While this movie doesn’t have the most innovative or engaging plot, it’s fine. Just not anything more.

Michelle Dockery is wonderful as the villain, who is (in classic genre film fashion) the most interesting and entertaining character of the movie. Unfortunately, it all feels quite forced, and I never connected much with any of the characters.

Continue reading our Please Don’t Feed the Children movie review below. Find it on Tubi from June 27, 2025.

Intriguing plot and poster art

I know the above may seem like a strange headline, but both the plot and the poster art (which is very reminiscent of several other horror movies) intrigued me.

Unfortunately, the actual movie isn’t nearly as interesting as what I was expecting. Whether my expectations were just too great or the movie isn’t all that good is a little up in the air for me.

IF YOU LIKE THIS, YOU’LL ENJOY…

The Tubi Original The Last Exit which worked much better for me >

The runtime is only around an hour and a half (without commercials), which is usually a good thing. However, for Please Don’t Feed the Children, I would’ve liked more time to get to know the characters. Everything happens too fast and feels forced.

When I don’t get to know the characters I’m supposed to be hoping will survive, then I’m just not very involved and don’t care if they don’t make it.

A psychotic woman in a remote house? *mild spoiler*

Overall, this is mostly the story of a woman who has lost a lot and desperately tries to hang on to what little she has left. Yeah, I did kind of root for her on/off as the story played out.

Not because she deserved it, but because I just didn’t care much about the other characters. So, you know, I would rather watch her as she was the most entertaining part of the movie.

Also, describing her as a psychotic woman is straight up wrong. She’s very aware of what she’s doing. I mean, you wouldn’t call the kid in Antlers psychotic, would you?! Yeah, that is a bit of a spoiler, perhaps, but nothing you won’t guess from reading the plot.

A little too all over the place

There is a bit of genre confusion for me with Please Don’t Feed the Children. From the title, which indicates that all kids are cannibals, to the fact that part of the scenery feels like a Western.

Sure, the world this story is set in is quite post-apocalyptic due to the cannibalism virus that has ravaged the US, but Michelle Dockery‘s character feels like something out of the Netflix mini-series Godless (which she was also in).

As for the title, the kids are rarely affected by this outbreak, while adults mostly are. While people are encouraged to “not feed the children”, it isn’t nearly as big a part of the story as I expected. And also, frankly, hoped for.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a good outbreak and/or postapocalyptic movie, and never mind genre-hybrids. This just felt a little too all over the place while never being anything really.

Watch Please Don’t Feed the Children on Tubi now

Please Don’t Feed the Children was directed by Destry Allyn Spielberg, who gets her feature film debut with this genre movie. And yes, she does a solid job of directing and controlling both the pace and gorgeous visuals of this horror-thriller.

And yes, Destry Spielberg is the child of iconic director Steven Spielberg and actor Kate Capshaw. Has that made it easier for her to get into filmmaking? Undoubtedly. However, that doesn’t take anything away from this accomplishment. This is a well-made movie.

The story, however, isn’t one that worked for me. The screenplay comes from Paul Bertino, and I just never engaged much with any part of it. Not the characters, the idea of the cannibal virus, or even the mission of the kids to get to a safe place.

It just did not work, which meant it never clicked for me. Even the cast was good, with Michelle Dockery as the highlight and Zoe Colletti (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark) and Giancarlo Esposito (The Residence) as key characters.

Please Don’t Feed the Children is on Tubi from June 27, 2025.

Details

Director: Destry Allyn Spielberg
Screenwriter: Paul Bertino
Cast: Michelle Dockery, Giancarlo Esposito, Zoe Colletti, Dean Scott Vazquez, Andrew Liner, Regan Aliyah, Emma Meisel, Joshuah Melnick, Lilit Grigoryev

📺 Watch trailer