There’s nothing more appealing in a potential romantic partner than confidence, empathy, and honesty, and much of the success of Heart Eyes is tied to it being abundant in all three. Even while bathing in some of the most tired tropes of both slashers and rom-coms, there’s such a warmth and charm to the whole thing that it can’t help but come off as endearing.

It helps that there’s a walking embodiment of that principle in the form of Jay (Mason Gooding), a consultant brought onboard at an ad company when their creative director, Ally (Olivia Holt), blows an absurd amount of company money on a campaign that recreates famous death sequences from the movies. The campaign might’ve actually been a success if not for the fact that a serial killer—wielding a machete, and wearing a mask that looks like someone put little cartoon...