Bird Box Barcelona Explained- Are The Monsters Seraphim or Quantum Beings, And Does Stress Really Change Your DNA?

The monsters we last saw(or mostly didn’t see) in 2018 squaring off against Sandra Bullock have taken new shape in Netflix’s mostly successful attempt at developing an entire visually affecting monster universe. Bird Box Barcelona is a standalone story that happens parallel to the origin story from Josh Malerman. It has nothing to do with his sequel novel Malorie either. What it is is proof that whatever happened in the US also affected Europe. This version leans heavily into two things. The first is a tiny nugget ripped from the original movie that some people can look at the creatures and survive. Instead of choosing to kill themselves, they become obsessed with the creatures. The second is how grief and hope can be manipulated and used against us. Here’s everything you need to know about Bird Box Barcelona, the monsters, Anna, Seraphim, and the experiments.

The same apocalyptic event that rocked the US also destroyed most of Europe’s population. Sebastian, our entry into Bird Box Barcelona, was an engineer, father, and husband. Initially, he is presented as a devoted father trying desperately to give his daughter some normalcy in this terrible world. He gets jumped by a group of people looking for food and finds help from another group of survivors when he tells them he knows where to find generators. They tend his wounds and offer him a safe place to sleep, and in return, he drives one of the buses they were sleeping in outside and forces them to look at the monsters. The ones who couldn’t get out of the bus burned when one of them set fire to themselves and the bus.

Sebastian’s wife died in the initial wave of deaths. His daughter was killed on her birthday by a crazed Priest with a third eye branded onto his hand. He forced her to look at the monsters after marking her with a third eye on her forehead in ash. She jumped off a building in front of him. The perversion of religion is a strong theme throughout.

Understandably the grief was profound, and it seemed whatever entity was behind the monsters had found a new way to get to people. Using pain, fear, hope, and grief as tools, they turn those who can survive looking at them into double agents to infiltrate groups and make them look at the monsters, thus killing themselves. They can also talk to any survivor now by looking inside their minds and preying on their weak spots. They pretend to be lost loved ones. It’s a serious level-up because it means no one is ever safe.

After losing his daughter, he became convinced the monsters were angels or seraphs. When he looked at the monsters, his daughter’s ghost came to keep him controlled. From that point, he was urged to “save” as many people as possible by forcing them to see. He was tricked by the constant presence of his daughter and the fact that each time a person lost their life, he saw a glowing orb ascend presumably to Heaven.

After Sebastian meets another group of people, some of which he gets killed, he finally breaks the hold his mania had on him. In the group was a young girl about the age of his daughter, and she provided the catalyst he needed to turn away from his new faith. The majority of the group either dies, leaving only Claire(Georgina Campbell) and Sophia(Naila Schuberth). In a desperate attempt to save themselves, the trio gets separated, and Sebastian sacrifices himself killing Padre Esteban. Claire and Sophia make it to a safe zone at Castle Monjuc, where a military installation and a large contingent of survivors greet them. Sophia’s mother is among them.

Claire has her blood drawn and is told they are looking for markers in her DNA that seers have. They are using animals and a monster they caught somehow to test what happens when living creatures see the entities.

Are the monsters Seraphim?

Sebastian is tricked into thinking the monsters are Seraphim. Seraphim are the highest-ranked angel. They are six-winged beings designed to serve God. One set of their wings is used for flight while the other two are interestingly used to conceal. One set hides God’s holy glow, and the second is used to cover their feet when in the presence of God. In the Judeo Christain bible, Seraphs came to Isiah to help him see God’s glory and his own unworthiness. Upon looking at the Seraphs, his eyes were opened to his heart’s dark parts and inadequacies. They did not let him remain in that depressed state, though. The Seraphim absolved him of his sins. They were often used to show the transformative power God had. There are accounts of Seraph being beings of fire and other versions having four faces. Those include a man, lion, eagle, and ox.

Sebastian and Padre Esteban and his followers are told the creatures are Seraphs because this is the easiest way to control them and use them to kill more people. Although we don’t know what the monsters are, it is unlikely they have anything to do with God or angels. It’s more likely they are beings more akin to Q from Star Trek, only with bodies that can be caught, which is why the military has one.

Is Anna real?

Anna is no more real than any of the other things people hear or see. However, she is not Sebastian’s daughter; her only purpose is to kill more people. She is a manifestation of the entities that are used to control Sebastian. Everyone hears and sees something different. The monsters pick whatever triggers inside each person and use it to manipulate the person. Some see a loved one, and others see or hear a horrific memory. All of it is designed to convert more people into seers or have them kill themselves. We don’t know why the monsters are so Hell-bent on destroying us.

What about the experiments at the end?

At the end of Bird Box Barcelona, it is revealed the military in Spain has managed to capture one of the creatures, one of the seers, and has been testing theories about how they work and how humans might be able to create immunities. Their working theory is extreme stress changes a person’s DNA. Some of those changes make people vulnerable to attack by invading their minds, and it might also explain how some people become seers. They think they could create a vaccine from the captured seer. We see the latest of the experiments, and although we don’t see what happens to the animals exposed to the monster, it doesn’t seem like the vaccine works yet.

In Sebastian’s case, the extreme stressor was watching his daughter die. It altered his DNA and allowed the monsters to warp his love for her into a terrible thing. Claire tells the doctor not all of the seers are unreachable. She is a psychologist and thinks she might be able to save some of the seers.

Does stress really change your DNA?

Stress can change your DNA. Doctors have determined that stress and trauma can cause physiological changes in our bodies. Increased levels of hormones cortisol and adrenaline can be seen, and physical changes to our bodies can be seen. Increased blood pressure, fatigue, depression, headaches, pain, sleep disturbances, and muscle pain are all possible symptoms. Additionally, doctors have found proof of changes to our DNA in the epigenome. These changes continue to proliferate in the person and are passed on to offspring. Stress is terrible for the body, and it is why hair can fall out, turn gray, gain or lose weight, and are at greater risk for heart attack and stroke. Bird Box Barcelona took this core idea and expanded on it.