My Dead Friend Zoe(2025)

Submitted by Jeremy

Merit Charles (Sonequa Martin-Green) is a former army mechanic who suffers from PTSD after the death of her best friend Zoe (Natalie Morales), whom she continues to see as a hallucination. Merit had talked Zoe out of re-enlisting when Zoe felt that she had nothing and nobody waiting for her when she got out, but Merit assured her otherwise. On Zoe’s birthday, Merit ignored her phone call, and since Zoe had been left alone and stuck at a dead-end job, she committed suicide by gunshot.

In the present, Merit must attend a court-mandated group therapy after causing an incident at her job, but she cannot get her paperwork signed because she refuses to open up about Zoe. Meanwhile, Merit’s mother Kris makes her check on her grandfather Dale (Ed Harris), a former lieutenant colonel who is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. Kris wants to put Dale in a retirement home called Shady Acres. Merit goes on a date with the manager, Alex, but her PTSD forces her to abandon their date.

Merit bonds with Dale, but he feels betrayed when he finds out that Merit and Kris were going to put him in the home. In order to mend things, Merit decides to move in with Dale to help him out. She then returns to the group session to finally open up about Zoe.