THE RISE OF JULIA GARNER

Julia Garner as Justine Gandy in Weapons (2025) (Image: Warmer Brothers)

For someone so young, Julia Garner has had an extensive career, excelling in numerous roles since her movie debut in 2011. Today, she is one of the most recognizable actresses with a promising future to look forward to. To show how she got there, I will examine four roles that, in my view, were instrumental in her rise.

Most viewers will remember Garner as Ruth Langmore in the Netflix series Ozark (2017−2022). The main show protagonists are husband and wife Marty and Wendy Byrde (portrayed by Jason Bateman and Laura Linney) who move to Lake of the Ozarks to continue laundering money for a Mexican drug cartel. While in the Ozarks, they come across a trailer park family, the Langmores, most of whom are petty criminals. Ruth, however, is unique in that she has not only criminal skills but intellectual prowess as well. As an accountant, Marty recognizes Ruth’s potential and asks her to assist him in his business. At some point, Marty even considers getting out of money laundering and asks Ruth to continue his work.

While none of the characters in Ozark are law-abiding citizens, Ruth is the most sympathetic. On the surface, she looks like an ordinary trailer park woman, but her tough, loud, vulgar, and sarcastic attitude immediately grabs your attention. She is also unwilling to be the victim of her unfortunate upbringing and instead embraces every opportunity she comes across. As she becomes Marty’s protégé, we see what she is capable of. We also get a sense that, if she had come from a more stable background, she would have had an amazing life and career. Garner’s portrayal of Ruth has earned her three Emmy awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress and a Golden Globe award for Best Supporting Actress.

While Garner’s next project was a miniseries, she is no less memorable as Anna Sorokin in Inventing Anna (2022), based on the true story about a con artist who pretended to be a wealthy German heiress in order to gain access to the upper-class New York social and art society. In addition, Anna managed to deceive and defraud financial institutions, banks, hotels, and countless individuals. She convinced them that she was planning to open a private club featuring not only art exhibitions by major artists, but also fine restaurants and stately rooms where members of high society can mingle and socialize. As I was watching the miniseries, I recalled an observation by a CPA tutor, “Just because they are rich, it doesn’t mean they are good with money.” I was stunned by how many powerful people believed Anna’s identity at face value and didn’t bother to do basic background checks that would have revealed Anna as nothing more than a fraud. At the same time, Anna seems to really believe that her goal of a private members’ club would come to fruition if she manages to keep enough people fooled for long enough. Yet, not everyone is gullible and Anna’s con eventually begins to unravel.

Garner is an actress who can look very glamorous when she chooses to be. With the right looks and personality, Garner makes us believe that the upper class would consider Anna as part of their milieu. Even in prison, Anna continues to believe she would have achieved her dreams if she was given more time. In that sense, Garner also does a great job of portraying someone who is so lost in her own delusions that she is completely unaware of her actual situation. It is thus befitting that Garner earned a primetime Emmy nomination and a Golden Globe award as best actress for portraying Anna.

The success of Garner’s movie roles is therefore not at all surprising. Still, I will focus on The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Weapons that are currently showing in cinemas.

In The Fantastic Four, Garner is the Silver Surfer who delivers the news that Earth is about to be destroyed by Galactus. Although she was forced into a relationship with Galactus because she was trying to save herself, her child, and her planet, viewers can appreciate her noble motives, making her terrifying but also sympathetic character.

In my previous article, I predicted that The Fantastic Four would become even bigger success than Superman. Although I was wrong, as The Fantastic Four did not turn out to be a huge box office success, Weapons certainly is. Weapons debuted at number one in the box office with 42.5 million in its first week and, this past weekend, it held onto the top spot at 25 million. So far, it has grossed 89 million in the US.

Weapons is a mystery-horror film about seventeen children, all from the same classroom, who wake up at exactly 2:17 AM, walk out of their respective houses, and disappear into the night never to be seen again. The next day, their teacher Justine Gandy (played by Garner) arrives to class to find it attended by only one boy, Alex (Cary Christopher). The police investigate her and Alex but are unable to come up with any clues. After a month with no sign of progress, some of the children’s parents begin to suspect that Justine may know more than she is letting on, as all missing children were her pupils.

I am only going to describe the premise of Weapons because I believe that you will enjoy it more if you know less about the plot. Part of its appeal, in my view, lies in its non-linear storytelling. Like peeling away onion layers, we gradually get to find out what happened to the children but are also introduced to the characters in more depth. For instance, we learn what kind of teacher Justine is but also how she lives her private life.

As Garner also has a high-profile role coming up, I am keen to see how she will approach it, given that playing pop icon Madonna in a biopic is no small feat. Initially, the project was delayed when Madonna decided to go on tour, but recently, Garner announced on a podcast that the movie would proceed. Garner also revealed that, in her audition, she had to dance and sing, and that she even sang with Madonna.

I read somewhere that Garner started taking acting classes as a hobby to overcome her shyness. That is very fascinating because the four characters in focus of this review are far from shy, and no one could use that attribute to describe Madonna. If I ever met her, I would congratulate Garner on her amazing career and her ability to shine in every role.