3/5 (A classic trope used effectively, though not groundbreaking).

The audience laughed when David accidentally called his stepson by his biological father’s name. It wasn't a laugh of mockery, but of painful recognition.

Perhaps the most honest portrayal of the modern blended family appears in the horror and thriller genres, where the anxiety of integration is made literal. The Rental (2020) and the more mainstream Us (2019) use the vacation-gone-wrong setup to expose the fault lines in step-relationships. When the social niceties drop away, characters are forced to confront who they truly are to one another. In these films, the step-sibling who refuses to bond isn’t a villain; they are a child in mourning for their original family structure, their resistance a valid, painful form of self-preservation.