Hermeneutics, homiletics and horror TV: Reading Midnight Mass through a 'wordy' liturgical lens.

This article analyzes Mike Flanagan’s horror miniseries *Midnight Mass*, focusing on its distinctive use of extended monologues and dialogues that engage deeply with spiritual, philosophical, and social issues, particularly critiquing Catholic Church doctrine and hegemonic power structures. Set on Crockett Island during Lent, the series centers marginalized characters who “talk back” to dominant ideologies through homiletic speeches, addressing themes such as addiction, abuse, religious hypocrisy, racism, and queerness, while reinterpreting vampiric monstrosity as a metaphor for systemic oppression. The show’s phonocentric style recalls early television’s emphasis on spoken word, contrasting with contemporary visually driven media, and uses horror’s capacity to explore “monstrous” identities to foster empathy for the oppressed. Ultimately, *Midnight Mass* exemplifies a trend in horror television that amplifies marginalized voices and challenges normative cultural narratives through a blend of theological discourse and genre storytelling.