Consider the case of the Jamison family (Oklahoma, 2009). Bobby, Sherilyn, and their six-year-old daughter Madyson disappeared while looking for land to buy in rural Oklahoma. Their truck was found abandoned with their dog inside—and $32,000 in cash, untouched. The family’s home video, recovered from a camcorder, shows them acting bizarrely, speaking of demons, and seeming drugged. The case is a Rorschach test for taboo: Was it murder? Suicide? A cult? Or a family that simply went mad together?
But the deepest taboo? The film suggests that the nuclear family is inherently fragile—that given enough isolation and pressure, any father could become a monster. The vacation, meant to heal the family (Jack is recovering from alcoholism and a violent outburst), instead destroys it. Pop culture has never let go of this image: the family trapped in paradise with nowhere to run. While not strictly “family” vacations, these films extend the logic to the joining of families. Ari Aster’s Midsommar (2019) features a couple, Dani and Christian, traveling to a remote Swedish festival with friends. It is a vacation that becomes a pagan sacrifice.
The taboo here is multi-layered. First, there is the threat of incestuous violence. The ghost of the previous caretaker, Grady, murdered his own twin daughters. The hotel explicitly tempts Jack to “correct” his family. Second, there is the psychological unmaking of the paternal figure. Jack goes from protective father to predator, chasing his family with an axe. The vacation becomes a hunting ground.
Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes a job as an off-season caretaker at the remote Overlook Hotel, relocating his wife Wendy and young son Danny. The isolation is absolute. And what does the hotel do? It weaponizes Jack’s role as father and husband.
Welcome to the world of Taboo Family Vacation entertainment. This is not your parents’ National Lampoon’s Vacation . This is a subgenre of popular media—spanning prestige drama, psychological thriller, true crime, and even dark comedy—that uses the family trip as a crucible for incestuous tension, repressed violence, ethical collapse, and the shattering of innocence.
The answer, for most of us, is nothing we want to admit. But we can’t stop watching.
Consider the case of the Jamison family (Oklahoma, 2009). Bobby, Sherilyn, and their six-year-old daughter Madyson disappeared while looking for land to buy in rural Oklahoma. Their truck was found abandoned with their dog inside—and $32,000 in cash, untouched. The family’s home video, recovered from a camcorder, shows them acting bizarrely, speaking of demons, and seeming drugged. The case is a Rorschach test for taboo: Was it murder? Suicide? A cult? Or a family that simply went mad together?
But the deepest taboo? The film suggests that the nuclear family is inherently fragile—that given enough isolation and pressure, any father could become a monster. The vacation, meant to heal the family (Jack is recovering from alcoholism and a violent outburst), instead destroys it. Pop culture has never let go of this image: the family trapped in paradise with nowhere to run. While not strictly “family” vacations, these films extend the logic to the joining of families. Ari Aster’s Midsommar (2019) features a couple, Dani and Christian, traveling to a remote Swedish festival with friends. It is a vacation that becomes a pagan sacrifice.
The taboo here is multi-layered. First, there is the threat of incestuous violence. The ghost of the previous caretaker, Grady, murdered his own twin daughters. The hotel explicitly tempts Jack to “correct” his family. Second, there is the psychological unmaking of the paternal figure. Jack goes from protective father to predator, chasing his family with an axe. The vacation becomes a hunting ground.
Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes a job as an off-season caretaker at the remote Overlook Hotel, relocating his wife Wendy and young son Danny. The isolation is absolute. And what does the hotel do? It weaponizes Jack’s role as father and husband.
Welcome to the world of Taboo Family Vacation entertainment. This is not your parents’ National Lampoon’s Vacation . This is a subgenre of popular media—spanning prestige drama, psychological thriller, true crime, and even dark comedy—that uses the family trip as a crucible for incestuous tension, repressed violence, ethical collapse, and the shattering of innocence.
The answer, for most of us, is nothing we want to admit. But we can’t stop watching.