Hate Watching with Dan and Tony

Hate Watching Obsession: Half Measures in Modern Horror

Dan Goodsell and Tony Czech Season 1 Episode 297

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94% on Rotten Tomatoes should feel like a slam dunk. Instead, Obsession (2026) sent us into full detective mode: how does a movie with gorgeous shots, impressive sound design, and strong acting end up feeling so slow, so consequence-free, and so weirdly safe?

We walk through the wish premise (a guy wishes a woman will love him more than anyone in the world), why that setup should be terrifying on a consent and agency level, and why the film keeps slipping away from its own most disturbing idea. We also get specific about what works: a genuinely hilarious helpline call, a couple of scenes that finally lean into horror, and a handful of lines that have become instantly quotable. Then we get into what doesn’t: unclear monster rules, characters who don’t feel like they have consistent opinions, and cutaways right when the story should force real emotional fallout.

Along the way we ask the question we can’t stop asking: is this a horror movie, a thriller, or a collection of TikTok-ready moments stitched together? If you’ve watched Obsession (2026) and loved it, we want to hear why, because our brains are still stuck on the “half measures.” Subscribe for more contrarian movie talk, share this with the friend who defends the 94%, and leave a review with your take: what single rewrite would fix it?


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Vacation Banter And Energy Check

SPEAKER_04

Just quick, how was your vacation? Yeah, a good time.

SPEAKER_01

I had a wonderful time.

SPEAKER_04

I don't want to I did not want to go back.

SPEAKER_01

So here's the here's the thing, right?

SPEAKER_04

That's the thing about you, Tony, is you enjoy vacation. You like there's there's no vacation that you're ever gonna go on that you're gonna come back and be like.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, it's just so nice to not you know have to think about stuff. You know what I mean? You just you're at the beach and you're just like, what are we gonna do today? Who cares? We're just at the who cares, we're at the beach. And we came back Thurs, went Thursday. Thurs Wednesday, yeah. And now I've been home for a couple days, and Dan. Oh, you came home Thursday. There's a good chance that I'm not going back to work on Monday. You know what I mean? Just because you don't want to? Yeah, I'm just done. I think I'm done.

The 94% Rating That Breaks Brains

SPEAKER_03

I hate watching with Dan and Tony. I'm Dan. I'm Tony.

SPEAKER_04

We watch the movies, the movies, the movies, movies, and then we take we have opinions that are very different than everybody else in the world.

SPEAKER_01

Apparently, 94% of audiences and 94% of critics. Wild stuff. That's a crazy stat to me. Sorry. That is a crazy stat. I don't I want to be clear, even before we tell you what this movie is, I don't hate this movie. But this movie is not 94%.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I watched another movie that's like 94% weapons. I rewatched the beginning of weapons.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_04

And I love that movie, and I realize it's not as much of a horror movie as it's not. And that's why I hated it. I mean, I hate, quote unquote hate. It's not a horror movie. It's uh it's a thriller suspense with supernatural elements.

SPEAKER_01

And the one of the funniest scenes in the world. That ending with the kids chasing her, and she's I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. Ten out of ten, no notes.

SPEAKER_04

One of my favorite performances, one of the favorite new characters added to the Hollywood Pantheon.

SPEAKER_01

Sure, sure.

SPEAKER_04

This is an all-time character, people will dress up as this character forever, blah, blah, blah. That movie, you know, whatever you want to say about it, has the same positive kudos on Rotten Tomatoes as the movie as the movie that you watched this time. And I I don't I don't get that at all.

SPEAKER_01

I'm part of me's relieved that you also don't get it, but part of me is bummed because I really like people love this movie.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I have a couple, I have a couple of thoughts as to why people love this movie.

SPEAKER_01

I okay, I can't wait to hear it because I don't I don't know them. Yeah. No, I and I have now seen this movie twice because I watched it once, and then I was like, oh, we should do this for the podcast because this something's something's weird here. Uh so I've watched this twice in the span of two weeks. And what's it what is this movie? Oh, right. I'm so sorry. This is the uh the mega hit summer blockbuster, rags to riches story, uh Curry Barker's obsession. Uh-uh. That's what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, inspired by uh Simpsons Tree House of Horror episode.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, really? Okay. I don't watch Simpsons, even though it's the longest running show of all time. Sure. I've seen a handful of episodes. Well, you know what? Yeah, yeah, no, totally. Treehouse of Horror is also something we had on DVD back in the day because, you know, we like Halloween, so that was the only Simpsons we would ever watch. Yeah. Anyhow, so I didn't I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, so this

Plot Setup And The Missing Twist

SPEAKER_04

movie has amount about as much plot as a Simpsons uh Treehouse of Horrors thing, which is I believe in in a 22 minutes they fit three of them, so it's about seven minutes of plot.

SPEAKER_01

Sure. So it's not gonna that's true, because it's not just one full episode when they do the treehouse.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, uh just the first note, of course, is there's no twist. Just be prepared. There's no twist. We set it up, which yeah, we go there, and then it's ending, then it ends, and we're like you don't they don't even do they don't even do the horror twist. I wrote I wrote the horror twist at the end, and I was like, well, why didn't they do that?

unknown

Nope.

SPEAKER_01

Sure. I have a lot of changes that I would make, but I can't wait to hear what your what your note is at the end. I also don't know if I agree that we fully go there. I think we set up what the deal is, and then we don't really play the game most of the movie. We have two scenes where we play the game that we've set up, and to me that's it. One of them's great, one of them's fine, uh, but there's only and don't come at me, everybody. Uh in my opinion, there's only two good scenes in this entire movie. Well, I'd probably say that's that's more than I would give it. Okay, well, let me just tell you, I'm just gonna tip the bit right now. My two the two scenes that I like in this movie. I like the car scene when he's alone and he calls the helpline. I think that is that scene is so funny, and I don't I think it's meant to be funny. I I can't ever tell with this movie if I'm laughing for the right reasons or the wrong reasons, and that's not a great start. I laugh a lot during this movie. Oh, okay, and if this movie was a comedy, yeah, then I think it does a great job. As a horror movie, I think it does a terrible job. The other scene I like is the only horror movie scene of the movie, which is when he's in the car with the girl and she comes through the window and smashes her head on a brick. That's great. Really?

SPEAKER_04

We need more of that in this movie. Oh, okay. You so you wanted it to ride off the rails in what happened. Oh, I I thought you were gonna sort of say the scenes where the two of them sort of interact in the situation. Oh, okay, you think those are bad. Okay, because you know that I I I mean, those are the sort of scenes that I was like, well, at least we're sort of pushing, you know, we're sort of pushing what the premise is, which I mean, for those of you that haven't seen it, now we'll spoil it. Uh a guy makes a wish for the girl to be more in love with him than anything else in the world, and not surprisingly, that doesn't go well, and she just does exactly what you would think she does. But the one thing that's interesting about this one, the only the only thing that's new in this movie is that the girl's psyche is basically packed away in a pocket dimension or something. But only sometimes. But she leaks through occasionally, and and the leak throughs make make for sort of interesting scenes and give the girl that plays Nikki. She's great.

SPEAKER_01

Something to do. She's great. Of course. Yeah, yeah, of course.

SPEAKER_04

Everybody plays their characters great in the movie.

SPEAKER_01

Um especially for a low budget horror movie.

SPEAKER_04

I think, yeah. I think $750,000. I don't know how you make that movie. I think something like that. I don't know how you make this movie $750,000. Um it's it's well that's there's some drama around that, but yeah. Okay. Um it's beautifully shot. The oh yes, the production design is beautiful, the sound design is unimaginable, the music is great.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

And the, you know, the act all every actor's good or even great.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

But the movie's boring as fuck.

SPEAKER_01

Right. And so that's a problem. So boring.

SPEAKER_04

So boring. I don't care. I don't care about anything. I care nothing about any of these characters.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah. Um, okay. I so maybe, maybe we should get into it soon, but the movie is very slow for like 90 minutes, and why? Like, what is let's have some fun. We you I know that it's terrible, right? He's made this wish and she loses her her uh what's what's the right word for it? Agency. Agency, great, great, great, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um but and I I'm trying not to sound problematic because that's a terrible thing, and I get all that, but I don't feel like we do enough with that because she doesn't do much. Well, he never feels bad about it. Oh, he never feels bad about it, and they there is a discourse somehow online of like he's not the villain of the story, and that's crazy to me. If you see if you watch this movie and you're like, well, he's not that bad of a guy, you have a problem. No, he's a giant piece of shit. Right, oh god, he's the worst character in the history of cinema.

SPEAKER_04

You're awful. You're like at a certain point, they set up that the only way that the thing will end is if he dies, and you're like, and I'm like, oh good, he's gonna die. Oh god.

SPEAKER_01

And yet he almost doesn't. Um, I have huge problems with the ending, too. But so she never really goes off the rails until the very end.

SPEAKER_04

I wanna see her You want to see her actually ruin his life in real life. That's what you want to see. Yes, you because all she does is sit in a room and sit at his house and make him uncomfortable. He he never gets he never truly gets made uncomfortable, right?

SPEAKER_01

No, he never gets what he deserves. That's I think that's one of my big problems with this, because he is trash and he just he just kind of goes through it and he's like, I guess I'll just kind of kill myself. Spoilers saying the movie. And it's just no, he needs to go through some shit. Um, the only time he goes, he's like scene is the only scene where he kind of gets to go through it a little bit. Exactly. And I also have problems with that scene because I don't think it goes far enough, but yeah, the only the only time he like really, really goes through shit is the final act where she

Two Great Scenes In A Slow Film

SPEAKER_01

kills the girl and then he goes to the friend. And like I like that sequence. He goes to the friend, the friend wishes for a billion dollars, which is very funny. I don't know if it's supposed to be funny, but it's very funny. And then he goes back home and she kills the friend, but he never has to live with any of that. There's not enough of him living with the consequences of his decisions, which is where I think the scarier stuff could come from is if he was actually going through some shit and getting what he deserved. Uh, and then more even I and then she has to go through more stuff, and that sounds weird, but like the phone call where she's screaming in the background, it means nothing in this movie in the end.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I think I think you really you really hit it on the head because the one scene where she does something in public is in the they're in a restaurant at one point, and she gets up and she she does a ba-da, she freaks out or something.

SPEAKER_01

No, no, no, don't do that. And we quote that all the time because it's hilarious. And also not that but sorry, yeah, continue.

SPEAKER_04

But he doesn't it it has no effect. The people in the other places, we don't get the reaction shots of all them, we don't get the wait staff, we don't get the police call, we don't get the Because honestly, that's not I've seen that happen in real life.

SPEAKER_01

You know what I mean? Like, sure, they had a small public tiff. She yelled one time, she's like, I thought we were having a good date. And he's like, Hey, we are, we are sit down, we are, sit down. She never goes full crazy.

SPEAKER_04

That should have been the first one. Then the next, yeah, the next time it has to be that times five.

SPEAKER_01

Like, he needs to have to leave that restaurant because she will not stop making a fuss over it. She shouldn't just sit back down and be like, I'm sorry, we're back, we're normal again. It's like, no, she has to do something. She has to do something. Like, it has to make him uncomfortable. And then the more uncomfortable he is, yet the more he chooses to subject her to this terrible thing. That's where the tension comes from. There's only one, maybe two scenes in this movie where he gets the point to be like, Well, I'm gonna keep doing it because fuck you. I need more of that. I just need more, I need more of everything. I need more everything. I think this, I in my opinion, this movie plays it way too safe and in and then is boring. I don't know. Very boring. 94%'s crazy to me. This movie. No. Tell me why I'm wrong, everybody.

SPEAKER_04

Um, and I think I think what it is is that young people watch this and they they lock into either him or her.

SPEAKER_01

Sure.

SPEAKER_04

And and look at it like that's their situation, right?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

I'm so like him in this way that this, you know, and I I think a lot of people probably the people that saw this movie that loved it, did that. You know, that they they, you know, had some sort of connection with either of these two characters. I I look at them, you know, she's not a character. That's the first thing, because she's possessed or upset, you know, she's well, we don't know what are the rules. Continue. Sorry. What are the well that she has to do it, but she le she just leaks out a little bit, you know, and then gets dragged back. You know, it doesn't really matter. Why? Is it an entity?

SPEAKER_01

Is she inhabited by something? How is she on the phone? How is her I her essence somewhere? I just I don't understand how things are working or why they're working, and therefore it's not scary to me. Because it was written that way. That's why. So you you say that, and I think you're being slightly facetious, but no, I'm no I'm like Reddit, and they're like, well, that's what happens. I'm like, that's not an answer.

SPEAKER_04

No, no, well, that's to make it to make the writing more interesting, the writer chose to do that, right? Which makes it more interesting, which just doesn't make it the because it's easy to because we've seen that movie a million times, so they were like, Okay, let's make it more interesting, where she leaks out every once in a while, and the that because it gives the actress something to do, right? If she's just yeah, yeah, and so it gives you a hot and cold, which uh is sort of reflected in that first sort of interaction between him and her before it happens, where where you're like, I I I I don't I don't trust either of these characters. I don't I well first of all, yeah, I don't believe this situation. Um But I I don't I don't have faith in either of these characters, I don't trust either of them, right? I I don't trust either of them as as being good partners in a relationship. And so you're like, well this is never gonna this is never gonna work anyways. And you know, if if either of them would just pull the band-aid off and just get it over with, I think I don't know that she's maybe not teasing him, but it it certainly seems like she kind of plays with him a little bit. But but but but in a little bit way so that y I hate her even more. If she was actually playing with him, I would respect I would respect her as a character. If she did seem to care about him, then I'd respect her as a character, but just sort of playing, it's it's like you said, everything's half measures, right? Yeah, just like him. He's like, you've known this girl for a million years and you haven't done anything and she can't figure out what your fucking pro you know, it's like, come on. Yeah. Because the other super aggravating thing about the movie is the actual hot girl in the movie, he is in love with him and he has no interest in her. And I'm sorry, but if you had like a super hot girl and you were interested in this other girl that's sort of hot, you're like, I I I don't get it at all. It it's like he would know that the super hot girl was into him because the the Ian guy would tell him, his best friend would tell him she's into you, all you gotta do is go knock on that door,

The Wish Premise And Lost Agency

SPEAKER_04

and it will instantly happen. But he never says that. So you need to you need to have set up that there's a reason why he doesn't go with the super hot girl.

SPEAKER_01

There's well boy, you said so many great things there, Dan. Um, first of all, I love that you agree on that dynamic.

SPEAKER_04

You can't make that other girl so hot. You just you can't ever do that. It's insane. I agree with that. What the fuck? She comes in walking wearing those boots at the one point. You're just like, what? What? And you want little stringy, whatchamacallit? Uh what? Explain that to me.

SPEAKER_01

Huh? Agreed. Uh yeah, couldn't couldn't agree more on that. Um, what though? So I want to go. There's so you said so many things. In the the first thing you were talking about is that she's like hot and cold. So what's interesting is Naomi read an interview with Curry, and he shot it both ways. He shot it uh one way where she is into him, and then shot it one way where she's not into him and knows that he likes her. And then he used clips from both. And I was it's so funny that you picked up on that.

SPEAKER_03

Well, of course you pick up on it. I am human-ish.

SPEAKER_01

I know she's I just well what's funny to me is that you and I were both annoyed by that. And he and he's like, Well, I don't want to make a decision because you know, one they they both play so differently. Like, I want it to be a bit of both. And it's like, what do you know? Make you got you have to make a it's a character. That that character would have an opinion. She would know, either way, she knows that he likes her. Everyone knows that he likes her. That's how the world works. Like, you don't have secret. I'm sorry, you it's very difficult to keep your feelings in. Like in a friend group of four, you would know.

SPEAKER_04

It's a friend group of four that all spend time together constantly, and the one guy's fucking her. You know, she's just like, what the what the hell?

SPEAKER_01

So she would know, so let's give her an opportunity, give this character an opinion to start. I don't care which one you choose, uh, but just make her a person and then stick with it. And then what happens to her will matter more to me because she had an opinion and now, oh shit, now we're dealing with this, and I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Well, you either want to care about her or think she's think she, you know, think in some part of you, well, she sort of deserves this, right?

SPEAKER_01

They're all that she's either all terrible people, or this character, you know, I I want to like her to begin with.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, you know what I mean? And and when you when you set up these, you know, and the the dude is just like he's horrible. You're just like just a just a terrible chance. They give him a thousand chances to to sort of do a thing, and you know, and and then he never does it. So it's like if you're gonna set up a character, give him a thousand chances, and he's gonna he's gonna fumble every single one of them, blah, blah, blah. I'm not gonna ever care about him.

SPEAKER_05

Yes.

SPEAKER_04

He's not my he's not my hero, but he's also not my villain.

SPEAKER_01

He's no one. So that and that's he he is my villain just by inaction, and I understand that that's the point. Personally, I want him to get darker. Sure. I want him to start as this coward that's like, oh, mm-hmm, why I can't make decisions because I'm a piece of shit. But then as it's happening, I want him to be like, no, I like this. Like, I I like this. And that's to me, that's the difference between a movie that is kind of meh to me and like a dark, fucked up movie. Because he has they have that scene where she's like, kill me. She wakes up, we'll talk about that. She wakes up in the middle of night, she's like, It's me, bear, kill me. And he's like, What would be so wrong with being with me? That's the character. That yeah, that guy, at that point, he's making the choice, and I need him to make that choice more times. So you you actually want him to punish her. Not I want him to have an opinion. Well, because I want anyone in this movie to have an opinion, I think.

SPEAKER_04

Because that's the thing, is he says it, what would be so bad about being with me? And at a certain point, he's gonna be resentful of her. Yes. You know, he's gonna be resentful of that piece of her. The piece of her that keeps creeping out, and you know, it's like, no, you are this now, you know, and it's like, ooh, ooh, I don't know. Make us really not like this fucking guy.

SPEAKER_01

So that's the thing, is like he needs to be like, no, this is what I want. I want this, this is how we're doing it. And then as it gets worse and worse and worse, he slightly changes. And then when she has the line that's like, this is your fault, this is what you wanted, it all makes sense, and it's like now he gets his comeuppance, and that's what we all really want. We want this guy to get punished for being a bad guy. He never really gets punished. It's just everything's half measured.

SPEAKER_04

And death is a way of sneaking out of it.

SPEAKER_01

And I think I got problems with that too.

SPEAKER_04

I think that's why the kids like this one is because that's how they see the world. Wishy-washy? Yeah, they see the whole world as uh this, you know, I I'm not gonna make a decision. And it's like, yeah, you know, get ready. Life, you're gonna have to make those decisions. You know, it's like they exist in the in a world where they don't have to make decisions where they can just sort of, I don't know, I don't just make a decision and let's fucking get it over with, people. Yeah, no, that's not what this movie is. Half measures. Half measures. Boom. 94%, baby. Obsession 2026,

Character Motivation Problems Start Piling Up

SPEAKER_04

hour forty nine minutes. I was like, how are they gonna make this last for well they somehow made it last for an hour and 40 minutes.

SPEAKER_01

Draw it out.

SPEAKER_04

I wrote Nerd in a Diner. He's pouring out his heart to Nikki. And then we figure out find out that this is a this is a dry run that his buddy has set up and he's talking to the waitress.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

It's weird. It's just a real weird situation. Um and right away, and I listen, I you know it's great when men are in touch with their feelings, right? I'm not trying, it's not toxic masculinity what I'm about to say. I mean it might be, but he already he immediately comes off as creepy and unlikable in this scene. The things that he is saying is like, oh no, God, dude, no, no, no, no. What are you doing? I'm coming apart at the like what are you talking? She's your friend. That's weird. So he's so he's already super unlikable, which is fine. I'm fine with that. But the waitress doesn't feel that way. And that's my problem. She was like, oh no, that was cute. It's not cute. What he said is not cute. What he said is weird and creepy and stalkery, and you need to have that opinion. So she can't just be like, oh, it's cute. The waitress should have had a look at her face like Right. This is an uncomfortable day for her. This is not what she came to work for. She needs to be not she doesn't have to be furious, but she needs to be like, This is weird. Can I please go now? And then they let her go. It's weird that she doesn't have that opinion because I have that opinion, and I just got here.

SPEAKER_04

Uh so then we set up that he should the the friend says, says, Bear, you should call her freaky Nikki because she had trouble when people called her that because she got bullied.

SPEAKER_01

So just bring that up.

SPEAKER_04

Bring that up because that's what women like. They like, you know, the the dipping the uh pigtails in the inkwell. That that whole thing.

SPEAKER_01

Oh wow. Wow, Dan, going back to the 1800s there.

SPEAKER_04

And we set up that there's trivia on Wednesday, and this is weird. Bear's gonna try to say something then, but Ian's like, don't do it, cuz that's all I have.

SPEAKER_01

What is he talking about? I don't, I don't know. It's you know, it's all a joke because he's like, I wake up rock hard for trivia. I it's just written to be, I don't know. It's jokey, it doesn't make any sense. He's not a real character.

SPEAKER_04

Bear goes home, finds his cat dead on the floor. This is the point at which I realized I was glad that I didn't watch this with Shannon.

SPEAKER_01

This was the point the first time, and Naomi warned me, she was like, it happens right away. And I was still like, don't need to watch this movie. Oh shit. I'm gonna turn it off. There's no reason. Here's my thing. Here's what you know what I'm gonna get on a soapbox here for a second. You know what we don't usually do? Kill dogs, right? Because everyone loves dogs. We don't give a shit about cats. I'm gonna tell you right now, cats are better than dogs. I don't care what you say. Cats are smarter than dogs. Oh no, do you have your puppy? I'm sorry. Oh, she's so cute. So she doesn't have to hear this. She here's listen, we don't have to talk about cats at all. Don't listen to the terrible man. You have to earn a cat's love. A dog will love you no matter what. That to me means so much less. I mean, I love dogs. Let me be very clear. I love all animals. But we have this, we have this thing that we're we are against killing dogs in movies, but we don't care about killing cats, and we need to change this. Make it a bunny, okay? Kill a bunny rabbit. I don't care about that. Uh yeah, it makes it very upset. And then we just like keep keep doing the dead cat thing, and that's it's not good.

SPEAKER_04

I usually rail against it. I'm like, this is the this you will destroy your movie with this. In this movie, well, we don't ever we don't set up the cat beforehand, so we didn't lose the cat.

SPEAKER_01

It was never an alive cat, which does help.

SPEAKER_04

Which does help, but at the same time, I just don't I I won't say I don't care about the cat. I just it just doesn't even it never means anything. It never means anything that they even to the dude when they sort of talk about it, he doesn't even act like it he cared that much.

SPEAKER_01

And when he cries, he cries on his bed at so when they do the obsession thing. I don't even think he's crying about the cat. I really don't.

SPEAKER_04

He's certainly certainly not broken up about it in a way that that he should be. Like if you're yeah, it makes me hate him even more. If you're losing your childhood cat, which we have to assume this cat is it, because it's probably been alive for 15 years, yeah. You know, and he's what, 25 or something, maybe? If yeah yeah, so he's had this cat for most of his more, you know, more than half of his life. And he cries for the cat, but then never again does it seem to be mean much of anything to him.

SPEAKER_01

No, never means anything. He's back guy, everybody.

SPEAKER_04

So the cat, um the cat ate his pills. So we sort of he's got oxycodone and he's got all these pills in there.

Cat Death And Why It Means Nothing

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So does that mean he's got psych issues? He's got all sorts of issues, it seems. I don't know. Like there was there's nine when he opens it at the end of the movie, his his cabinet, there's so many pills in there. I have no idea what's going on. Uh yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

And do they show what he does with this cat? Because this cat is left extant.

SPEAKER_01

In the house. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

I'm telling you this. Yeah. My cat dies, my dog dies, whatever. If it dies in the house, I am going and buying a shovel, and I am burying that creature because I love that creature, and I want to put it in the ground where it's not going to rot in front of me, cause sma I don't want to smell my rotting animal that I love more than anything.

SPEAKER_01

100%. Or you bring it into the vet and you cremate it, and then you get a nice little a nice little what is it called? Not a urinal. What's it called? A urn. Maybe just an urn. An urn! An urn! A urn. A urinal?

SPEAKER_04

A urn? An urn.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, I'm so stupid.

SPEAKER_04

I have both both of my dogs are in on the bedside stand, and that's where they will always be.

SPEAKER_01

Both my cats have a little shrine.

SPEAKER_04

They're they're they're our babies, and we and I don't believe in any of that stuff, but you know, these are these are my creatures.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, he just he just doesn't give a shit. Um, which again, is if that's a character choice, you have to make it stronger, um, or let him care about his pet.

SPEAKER_04

He puts on a hazmat suit to clean up this this this poor dead creature. He doesn't even take he doesn't really take care of it.

SPEAKER_01

So what this is a huge strike against him instantaneously, like you know it's just strike two already for me, because strike one is when he's a creepy creepersin in the diner. So he's done. I hate this character already. Then they put the word obsession on his blanket.

SPEAKER_04

It's beautiful. It's beautiful, it's beautiful, but nothing. I don't know. It doesn't have to do with anything, sure. Yeah, like I don't know. And that's that that is the problem with this movie is they're like, hey, this is a good idea, let's just do that. You're like, that's a good idea.

SPEAKER_01

And then once there are there's a lot of good ideas, but they don't connect together.

SPEAKER_04

They don't connect together at all. Okay, uh he's doom scrolling over Nikki, and then she calls him, and then I mean the hardest part of of getting to know someone is having the casual conversation part out of the way, right?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04

You're spending time and casually conversating with her, but she's still at a giant distance to you? I I don't understand that at all.

SPEAKER_01

It's very weird.

SPEAKER_04

It's very weird. Usually the people that you obsess over are people at a distance who you don't know. He knows her intimately.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

He should understand something about her intimately, especially if he's screwing his best friend. You you would you would Tony, you're a normal human being.

SPEAKER_01

Dan, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me.

SPEAKER_04

I'm not at all a normal human being. Would you if you this was in your friend you had you had a friend group, right, when you were in high school in DR?

SPEAKER_01

I sure did. Yeah, those were good days.

SPEAKER_04

Did did what did anything ever come out of the blue that you were like, wait, what's happening? Or did you guys always know what the hell was going on?

SPEAKER_01

I something really I can't a story I can't tell. No, no, you you know, you know it's good. Because you talk about it. You're with each other all the time. Like nothing can surprise you.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

You know?

SPEAKER_04

And they the but they had this the intimate gathering party, and there was 25 people there, or 20 people. So there is an extended friend group that gets together and they don't know each other, you know, on occasion, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So but these people work with each other every day. They do trivia once a week, all together. Like they're with each other a lot. Constantly. This is like how I met your mother level of friendship.

SPEAKER_04

Yes. Okay. So let's see. So she's quitting in two weeks, and then she vibes him into coming to trivia.

SPEAKER_01

I guess, yeah. I guess. But not really. She's just like, well, you should come. He's like, Oh, okay, I'll do it. But she somehow took her crystal necklace and threw it down the drain. Threw it down the drain, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I don't know how listen, I don't wear jewelry, but I'm pretty sure that's hard, isn't it?

SPEAKER_04

I mean, I'm crazy, but I've never lost a ring. You know, I've never dropped my phone even once.

SPEAKER_01

You know Have you never dropped your phone? I drop my phone all the time. But that's why you get these really nice cases, you know, otter cases. Whew, don't even matter. Maybe I've dropped it once. Maybe, maybe once. I lose my ring all the time. This is like my sixth wedding ring, but I get the rubber ones, so they're like $15 a piece. Doesn't even matter.

SPEAKER_04

It shows he cares. So he's gonna go get her a new thing. He goes to the local

The Spooky Store And The Wish Toy

SPEAKER_04

spooky store. We do a little bit with the stuff.

SPEAKER_01

As if there are local spooky stores all over. I don't think that's true. We had a local spooky store where I grew up. Did you really? I don't think I had a local spook store. I wish I had a local spooky store. We just got our Ouija boards from Target, you know?

SPEAKER_04

This was in the 80s. So if you're living in a real place, there's spooky stores. Um he ends up buying her this one wish willow, which amazed your friends, and then the spooky ladies all like, people complain. He's like, Do they complain? He's like, No, they don't complain. You're like, Do they complain or don't they complain? I don't know. They do, they don't. Some do, some don't.

SPEAKER_01

She's purposefully being like weird and obtuse, and uh that's it's dumb. It's really dumb. Um, but I do like the bit that she's on her phone. You know, like they do funny bits, but they don't really fit into the movie. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Oh, she says something on the phone and he thinks it's to him. I think they do a little bit like that.

SPEAKER_01

And it's like, yeah, that's that's fun. You know, I I I get it, I like it, I'm I'm enjoying it. But then you do that weird thing at the counter where she's he makes a joke of, like, oh, what, does it ruin their lives? And she's like, Yeah, something like that. What are you talking about?

SPEAKER_00

It's so stupid.

SPEAKER_04

Um, they get to the pub, there's the four just the four of them. We don't ever see any trivia, which is strange.

SPEAKER_01

I believe they say we're starting trivia at one point, but we don't actually get to see them play trivia. Did you see what the pub is is called, Dan? It's called the pub. Barker's pub. No. It's his last name. He named it after himself. Oh, that's cool. Yeah, it's a fun little fun little nod.

SPEAKER_04

I like that. I thought you didn't like this.

SPEAKER_01

No, I don't. It's weirdly self-indulgent. Like, what are you talking about, dude? Should have been the Tony Zek pub.

SPEAKER_04

That's right, the TCP. So he she's gonna go get drinks, she goes up there, orders beers, and then he orders a pina colada, and she mocks him. Nikki mocks him for ordering the drink that he would always Right.

SPEAKER_01

Like unless this is he's for some reason ordering something different, but we don't get a vibe where he's like, I'm gonna try something different, or try to impress her with a new drink that I'm ordering. Like, there's no so this, yeah, it it would appear that he would always drink a foo foo drink, right? I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

I don't know. It doesn't make any sense because these people have known each other ostensibly for years and years and years, right?

SPEAKER_01

And they do this every Wednesday at the same bar. Very confusing.

SPEAKER_04

I was uh you know, like I I think I told Tony this before we started, is I rewatched I started re-watching weapons because I want to see how a good movie is and how you just it just characters do things and they make sense and you know they're gonna add up to things later on in the movie, and then the movie's gonna be it's gonna be a completed the puzzle is going to complete, right? Yeah, and you're watching it and they they're setting up the kids running, and then you know that the kids all run in the direction of one house, right? So there's like sort of this information, and you sort of know where the kids are heading. And I think in the movie we set up that the kids were there, but he makes them go out to the woods and then they come back. All good, but it's this piece of information that if you really think about it and you were really looking at that thing, you wouldn't abandon that house where they were all headed directly towards. You'd you go back to that and you think about, but when you're watching a movie, you can get away with a little bit logical inconsistencies, especially since this one was also on a weapons was on a tight time frame of like 30 days and it was gonna be done. You know, she was gonna do her thing, then she was gonna be gone. So you're like, okay, yeah. So you forgive those things. But in a movie like this, when they're being all weird like that, and they they make you sit in it, people like us don't forgive those things. Yeah, and that's what this this movie just stacks up all that stuff. Like, why doesn't she gotta know? How does she not? You know, we're sitting there at the beginning. This is the first establishing the relationship between these two characters in person, and she doesn't know his drink, and he's acting like he has to explain his drink to her.

SPEAKER_01

No, you have that make no sense, you know.

SPEAKER_04

She has to say, why do you always get that? Right? Because great.

SPEAKER_01

Look at that, we know that it establishes a pattern of them knowing each other and having drinks with each other. Wow, that's so weird, Dim.

SPEAKER_04

When you're doing an improv, you can get the same information, you just have to actually act like the characters know each other, and then they're pushing buttons with each other to get the information out. But but this isn't it's not a script that's been gone through the ringer where someone points that out. It's like, why is this here? Just switch it around and make it make sense within the context of the game.

SPEAKER_01

It makes sense. The kids love to say that, and it doesn't.

SPEAKER_04

Does um we set up that there's a gun in the break room safe. I'm like, oh, I guess we're gonna have a gun at the end. Yeah, but and we do technically, but when did she get that?

SPEAKER_01

We didn't see that.

SPEAKER_04

I don't even know where the break room safe is. I don't know why she would have access to that. I don't even know why she went and got a gun.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I don't know. Nobody knows.

SPEAKER_04

Uh let's see. So oh, this was it. Yeah, so Sarah is there, she's the hot girl, and she he tells her about the the his cat dying, and then she gives him this soup long hug.

SPEAKER_01

Did it feel like he was saying it to get sympathy from her as opposed to actually feeling that emotion? Because that it felt very manipulative to me. Oh, okay. I didn't really pay attention to that. Because he he doesn't tell anyone, and then the love of his life just like made fun of him and then walked away, and she is the friend is still there, and it just felt like he's like, Well, I just need some sort of sympathy, so hey, I can't die. See, that's that's even more horrible what you're saying. Yeah, he's a bad guy, Dan.

SPEAKER_04

And I just feel like we need to lean into it more. That means he's emotionally manipulating Sarah, knowing that she does she so he does because when she leans on him at that one point, yeah, he's like uh

Monster Rules That Never Stay Consistent

SPEAKER_04

he and he doesn't act strange. He's like, uh almost like he's expecting it. Uh-huh. Yeah. Oh, he's an even bigger shit, bigger piece of shit than I thought. I mean, that's that's the way I see it. He's a bad guy, all around. Okay, they're leaving. And Ian wants to keep going to bars, I guess, but Nikki wants to go home, I guess.

SPEAKER_01

And so she But aren't they banging? So wouldn't he just be like, oh, cool, I'll bring you home and have sex with you? I don't, it's it seems weird that he's like, no, come out more.

SPEAKER_04

You mean wouldn't wouldn't Ian be changing his situation to try to be with Nikki? And wouldn't there be a little bit of a competition for the Nikkiness?

unknown

Yep.

SPEAKER_04

There'd be like a weird tension. Yeah. But no, but that would that would cause a weird tension, which might make us care about the situation.

SPEAKER_01

Sure. Oh, I see. You're right. My mistake. Take it out.

SPEAKER_04

Instead, they're just a bunch of lines. There were a lot of times in this movie where I was just like, I don't know. I mean, I don't know what's going on. I don't know why, yeah, I don't know what the subtext of any of this is. None of this, none of that makes any sense. Why Ian wants to keep going, why she doesn't want to keep going, why he wants to do this, and she I'm like, ah, I don't get it. I don't get it either. So uh they ride home, they commiserate about the cat. She says you can always call me. She wants to be a writer, which we have one little one little play with.

SPEAKER_01

Um I will you know what? She should keep her day job just based on that. You didn't like her weird writing? Nope, sure didn't, Dan. We'll talk about it.

SPEAKER_04

I want to feel love. Uh, you're the only one I can talk to. That's what she says to him. You're the only one I I'm sleeping with Ian, but I can't tell you about that, but you're the only one I can talk to.

SPEAKER_01

But that because that's just sexual. You know what I mean? Like the emotional connection comes from you.

SPEAKER_04

Okay. Um, and then she's like, Sarah likes you, and then he chickens out, and then as she's walking away, he freaky nikkies her, and she comes back and she's pissed, and then she's all like, Do you like me?

SPEAKER_03

And then he's all like a friend.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that was pretty good. That was a good impression. Why?

SPEAKER_03

I don't know.

SPEAKER_01

Because he's the biggest coward in the world. Yeah. Um, and it's uh it makes me hate him even more.

SPEAKER_04

And then he's like, he was gonna give her the wish, but instead he pulls out the wish and he Okay, let's talk about the wish. Let's talk about the wish. The wish is in a little little triangle. You pull it out. I guess it's a stick. They don't give us a close-up of it at any point in the movie. You know, you can sort of see it in the second half of the movie when they use it.

SPEAKER_01

When he's trying to break it over the steering wheel later, it kind of looks like those finger traps, but just you know, I guess it's hard. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Uh it's like a little piece of willow, I guess, but it's sort of Yeah, I guess, but not really.

SPEAKER_01

I don't, I mean, I don't know what a willow tree looks like. Um I one thing I want to say is I love that it plays music when you take it out. I thought that was a fun little thing.

SPEAKER_04

I hate that it plays music when you pull it out. Oh, really? This is why I hate the the packaging styling is from the 50s. The musical tone thing is something that would have been from the 80s and 90s.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, because oh toy guys.

SPEAKER_04

Logical consistency. I love this. Yeah, no, it's great. Why does it play that music?

SPEAKER_01

So that later you know what's happening when it's off screen. Yeah. See, that's a you don't like it. It's annoying to me. I thought it was cute, but you're I mean, listen, I'm I was like, oh, that's fun. I would keep I would buy a bunch of them and just pull them out. You know? That'd be a real treat. Dan, you'd be so mad if I did that with old toys, though. Very, very, very mad. Um that's interesting. That's a great point, though. That those are those are two very different time periods, right? Because it does look like it's an old timey present. That's a good good eye, Dan. You toy, you toy freak.

SPEAKER_04

I was watching this guy talk about uh the Indiana Jones movie. And Indiana Jones when the government guys uh the first one rated as the last arc, when they show up and he has to explain the arc to them, he pulls out this book and opens it up to this illustration of the arc, you know, smiting all the people. And the guy doing the review was like, it looked like some, you know, one of those old golden key comic books. And I was like, I put my hand in my hair. I was like, shut up. If you don't know what you're talking about, don't don't don't make a connection that's that's wrong, right? That's wrong. Yeah, because the comic books are in color. The thing he was really thinking about are classics illustrated comics, and you're just like, be the expert on the stupid shit you're an expert on, right? Don't don't yeah, don't, you know, because you're not experting everything else. You're just like Dr. Mike, David, my opinion you know, your opinion's wrong. The production designers on fucking Indiana Jones were fucking correct. And and that's why this movie's stupid is because the production designers were fucking wrong.

SPEAKER_01

Well, the kids and not that that's not saying kids are stupid, but they're stupid. Yeah, exactly. Somebody with a fucking brain. They're not stupid. They're young. They're young. Stupid. Same thing. Yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Ah, Jesus. That's the wish. Love me more. Wait, hold on.

SPEAKER_01

What I want to talk about real quickly is so he bought this one wish willow. Yeah, one wish willow.

SPEAKER_04

Why? To give it to her as a present because she didn't want to get it. Why? Because he didn't want to get her drew. And the reason why he didn't get her jewelry annoyed me. He should have not wanted to get her jewelry because he's like, oh, this is too personal. And you're like, oh yeah, because you're a fucking asshole. That's right. Let's get her to this novelty piece of crap.

SPEAKER_01

Right. It's it doesn't make any sense. And it doesn't connect to like, oh, she lost her jewel down the drain, so now she can wish for it back. I like there's no there's no real reason for him to buy this for her. Now I'm fine if we agree that he always bought it for himself and he knew that when he bought it, that's fine. No. But it's just it doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_04

So uh love me more something, something, love me more than love me more than anyone in the fucking world.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

She comes back and she's like, where's my president?

SPEAKER_01

This is my favorite shot of the movie, by the way. Yeah.

Montage Romance And The Boring Middle

SPEAKER_01

With they cut, they cut wide after he makes the wish, and she standing in the door frame in full silhouette. I think it's such a beautiful shot. It's gorgeous.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Whoever shot this thing. I think it's Curry. I don't, I mean, I don't know. He directed. I don't know if he shot it, but he definitely directed, and it's it's fucking beautiful. There's a lot of really beautiful shots in this movie. It's a really well-made, terrible film.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and you know, the it's way too dark, of course. And that's for sure. That's the other thing I love about weapons, is they shoot that movie so bright. In the in the light of the day.

SPEAKER_00

Full daylight.

SPEAKER_04

And you're like, God bless you. God bless you for saying, you know what? Let's let's shoot let's shoot how people's eyes work. As opposed to this, which is like, that's not how my eyes work.

SPEAKER_01

No, it's not. But there's a lot of beautiful shots. Uh the kids, listen, the kids got a future. So I think we could all agree with that.

SPEAKER_04

Like, this is well, you you never know in Hollywood, man. Hollywood, if you get screwed up so hard. If you don't I hope he's got a great future. Hopefully, he'll work with somebody that can write a script and develop it properly. Uh so she comes back and she tries to draw him inside, and then she's like, I lost my cat. And he's like, What do you mean you lost your cat? I lost my cat. She's like, Oh, yeah, I got confused. You lost your cat.

SPEAKER_01

You're like, What? So, this is the first part of me not understanding the rules.

SPEAKER_04

So Well, they don't do it. Yeah, you're I know what you're gonna say. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Well, I just like because what what does the entity know? I'm just gonna call it an entity because we don't know what we get no explanation of what it actually is. Oh, I see. But what does it know?

SPEAKER_04

See does it so you're thinking that there's a creature, you think there's an entity inside him that doesn't have access to all of her memories in a really interesting oh that's see that's interesting. I know that. You don't have to tell me that, Dan. Tony, your idea is okay. I accept you having an idea. Now let me fix it. Um yeah, fix it. Fix it, Dan. So you think it's a separate entity and it's just having a hard time parsing out what's going on.

SPEAKER_01

My thing is I don't know because they never make a choice. Yeah. Because there's there's the points where sh it doesn't seem to understand how to be human, and then there's times where it totally understands how to be human. There's times where it's like, I don't really know how to be Nikki, and then there's times where it totally understands. So it doesn't make any sense to me. And I mean I need them to make a choice of what are the rules, what are the monster rules here? And then during the sleep time, she's like, she she is asleep, and so it's me. What are you talking about? She's asleep. What does that mean she's asleep? You're awake. How is the how is the entity asleep while you're awake? That doesn't make any sense. There's just there's no consistency to how this wish slash monster slash whatever it is works, and that drives me crazy.

SPEAKER_02

Well, they probably shot it three different ways, and then he just cut it in.

SPEAKER_01

We're gonna do one where it's a creature, one where you're possessed, and one where it's just you know, whatever. I don't know. So I just I need consistency of the rules for it to a be scary to me, and B to make any form of sense whatsoever.

SPEAKER_04

So the what we end up doing is she's like, my dad's dying. And so she's like, I can't be alone, so let's go to your place.

SPEAKER_01

Would totally work, by the way. Uh 100%. That line would work every time.

SPEAKER_04

Well, the other thing is he would go in. He is is he a dude?

SPEAKER_01

Uh, great question. I don't know the answer to that, Dan. Does he have a dick attached to him? Supposedly.

SPEAKER_04

He would have been in her house in one second. For sure. Would he have sex with her in one second? Not necessarily, but he would have been inside her house in one second. He'd be like, yeah, okay, let's go inside. Yeah, she's that's great. Yeah, let's go, let's go. She invites him in for drinks. Uh, I don't think I should give go have drinks. What are you fucking talking about? This is your wish.

SPEAKER_01

You literally just wish for it. You would go inside.

SPEAKER_04

This is weird, but they wanted they wanted it all to play out at his house for unknowable reasons. I mean, it I kind of understand.

SPEAKER_01

They only have so many sets, Dan. It's a low budget movie.

SPEAKER_04

So many sets. So boom, they go to his house. She's like, Wow, I've never been inside your house before.

SPEAKER_01

That's confusing. What? Right? I don't, and he's like, Yeah, it was my grandma's. Did you just move in? I he did not just move in. He's been in this house for five years. He's been in this house for one day, okay? No, it doesn't make any sense. She's never been to that. Come on. It's so weird.

SPEAKER_04

Um, she's in his bed, she lures him into his bed. She's uh not she doesn't have a top on, but she has a bra on. Uh, and then they end up kissing, and then she goes, What the fuck? and then pushes him away, and she's like, I thought I saw something, I'm sorry, I had a panic attack. Bah right.

SPEAKER_01

All very confusing. I so, and maybe this is just a me thing. I need a trigger. I need a trigger of when she takes control. But that's not the way it happens every time. Oh, sure. It needs to I need to understand that there is something that allows her to take back control, however briefly, because the rules don't make sense. If she's locked away somewhere, why is she getting why is she able to escape every once in a while? Just because? Just because we're like, yeah, this will be fun a moment for it to happen now here. Yep. When they're right, and that's not okay. That's not okay with me. That doesn't work. Give me a reason. Is it I I don't I don't know. Like, what is could it be like some sort of like she's she's so revolts revolted by kissing him that that's what brings her back. Like the fact that it's really you know, I find I don't care what you decide, but you have to decide something.

SPEAKER_04

But then they have lots of very successful sex.

SPEAKER_01

Not right, not right now, but later.

Cat Sandwich Gross Out And Cutaways

SPEAKER_01

No. Is it successful? We're gonna have to talk about that scene. I don't know about that. Well, I mean, they're his boxes are half half down his butt. What's happening? Just get naked, dude. You're such a weird guy.

SPEAKER_04

He sleeps on the floor, uh, he looks up the wish thing, and we sort of see a Reddit post where half the people are all like, this is real. And the other half are like, This isn't real.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Um, did you notice what the the Google the quote Google search was called? No. It's called probe, and then the O is an alien face, so it's like an alien probe. I thought it was very funny. Oh, yeah. Dan doesn't find it funny. I thought it was very funny, Dan.

SPEAKER_04

I'm like, okay, well, whatever. And then she's like, what are you doing? And then he has to lay with her some more. Okay, gets up, breakfast on the table, she's found the dead cat and made a memorial on the kitchen floor.

SPEAKER_06

Yep.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, it's you weren't offen.

SPEAKER_04

I wasn't offended, I was just like, I don't understand, I don't understand what this is.

SPEAKER_01

Right. So, and this is this happens to me several times in the movie. I don't understand where this comes from, right? So her thing is she loves him more than and maybe I'm too too much of a stickler for the rules. I don't know. She loves him more than anything in the world. So her move is to make a memorial of his dead cat in the kitchen where it died after he threw it away ostensibly. Now that can only make sense if the creature doesn't understand how to be a human being, right? Because it can misconstrue that and be like, this is a present for you because I don't understand how to be a human. But then 90% of the movie, it totally understands how to be a human, except for like one other scene where it rolls around and poop, which we'll talk about. Um, so I just I just I just don't understand it. So it just feels weird. It doesn't, it's not ominous to me, it's not scary, it's just like, what are we doing? This doesn't make any sense in the movie. Not like I'm watching the movie, I'm like, oh, that's so weird. I'm like, why is this happening in your movie? It doesn't make sense.

SPEAKER_04

Well, it takes takes you out of it, takes takes me out of it. I'm just like 100%. Yes. And if they take you so far out of the movie, you don't care that they're manipulating a dead animal for no reason. Correct. And that that's the only, you know, the reason why we get pissed off when the dog or cat gets killed is because we care about that dogger cat, and then we care about them in relationship to the movie. I guess there's that, what's there's some new movie coming out where the it's a guy and his dog and they do all this stuff, and everybody in the comments, it's like a Stephen King or somebody real, you know, some real person. Yeah, yeah. Every it's not Stephen King, but something like that. Every comment is like they have to let us know that this dog is going to survive, otherwise, we will not go to see your super movie.

SPEAKER_01

100%.

SPEAKER_04

I mean, it's like it's like two-thirds of the comments are like that.

SPEAKER_01

So as they should be. I agree with that notion a million percent. So weird memorial, and he's all like, it's fucked up that you did this bad. You're like, uh, okay. Yeah, and so she says the line, oh no, it was supposed to be nice. And so to me, that points to the monster doesn't know how to be human. But then we contradict it. It doesn't that never happens again like that. Yeah, you just gotta make it make a choice. You can't just think of something and be like, oh, this would be a weird thing to put in the movie, and then just put it somewhere. You have to make it make sense.

SPEAKER_04

Boom, they go to work. Uh he's he now starts to lie to everyone about Nikki. And so he his lie to tell everybody why she's being so weird is that her dad is dying, even in front of constant contradictory effect, because he wants to keep his wish thing super secret.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

And then we sort of set up this like, well, maybe she was on Molly last night, so that's what it is.

SPEAKER_01

Again, by the way, it's Molly again, so they're just avid drug users, I guess, which I guess is fine. I'm sure, you know, euphoria or whatever, I've never watched it. But you know, I guess the younger generation loves drugs, but that's just weird to me.

SPEAKER_04

I the thing I love, the thing I love most of all is you're like, you're like more of a more of a teetotaler than me. And I'm the worst. I'm the absolute worst person on the planet. I've done nothing ever. You know, I've been I've been buzzed with alcohol twice in my whole life.

SPEAKER_01

Zero times.

SPEAKER_04

Tony, Tony's at zero. So um, no, this this girl, she does Molly, period. She does all the time.

SPEAKER_01

That is this girl so much. She loves the Molly.

SPEAKER_04

And that's why, you know, that's why it's like, uh, I I really, you know, why are you in love with this girl? She's she's a party girl. She's yeah, she's no good. Yuck. She's a big yuck, she's a she's a yuck. Don't yuck my yum.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Um and then Can I ask you a question, Dan? This this music store that has it a minimum of four employees on the clock at the same time, yeah, never seems to have any customers in it.

SPEAKER_04

You mean they're they're okay. Hold on. We'll talk about this in one second. They're well, they're

Helpline Call Comedy And Screaming Mystery

SPEAKER_04

eating lunch on the floor. Just in the middle of the showroom floor. What are you talking about? More importantly, they do a whole you've never seen Shop Around the Corner. You you've seen uh well, Shop Around the Corner is is uh I think it's you've got mail.

SPEAKER_01

It's yes, yeah, it's the old, boring version.

SPEAKER_04

But in the olden days, you'd have a music shop, right? Like that, that where you where they'd buy stuff, they'd sell stuff, they'd sell music boxes, they'd sell sheet music. Then you'd have an amount of people that would be there and they'd say, Well, I'm interested in buying this sheet music. They would put it on the piano and play you the song. Yep. They sort of set this up like that.

SPEAKER_01

Right.

SPEAKER_04

And I'm just like, because they say that, I think. That you have to do it. They sure do.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, you have to play some sort of song at some point. Somebody said that. Yeah.

unknown

I'm like, what?

SPEAKER_01

I don't know, dude. I have no idea. It's so phenomenally weird. Did I tell have I ever told you the time that I tried to get a job at a piano store? This was like my last, my last year in Minnesota. I was like, oh, I'm gonna try just to get because I played piano growing up. I took lessons, but I haven't played piano in you know 15 years. And I went to the interview, things were going great, and he was like, Yeah, just want to play me something? Just play anything you want. I was like, oh, fuck. And I kind of remembered the Jurassic Park theme. That's just like so. I used one finger and I went to bow now, bow, bow, and I went flat on the fourth note. And he goes, Okay, thank you. That was it. He ended the interview, and I had to leave ashamed. It was very sad. It's tough, it's a tough world out there. That's what I'm saying. These people wouldn't work at a music store.

SPEAKER_04

I just love that you just like waltz in there, like I had a lot of confidence growing up.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know what happened. I came to LA and I lost it all, but yeah, I was just like, I don't need a no piano to work at a piano store. It's fine.

SPEAKER_04

So I guess there's the next scene, it's nighttime, and he does something with Ian. I don't know what he did.

SPEAKER_00

I don't know. Um, is this where Ian was like driving me home? No. I don't know, whatever.

SPEAKER_04

I don't know. Nothing important. He goes home, boom, boom, boom, knock on the door.

SPEAKER_01

It's Nikki. Oh, Ian takes her home tonight that night. So they're in the cars, and uh Ian was like, I'm gonna take her home today. And so they drove separately. Oh, and then Ian calls him and is like, Yeah, dude, she was just on drugs, so like don't worry about it. Got it. He and then she shows up at the door.

SPEAKER_04

Boom. Knock, knock, knock, goes in there, she tells, she says she was on Molly and says you didn't take advantage of me. I know you like me. No, I do.

SPEAKER_05

You know you like me, bear.

SPEAKER_04

Uh would it freak you out if I said yes? It happened over time, then last night, and then they have the big sex and relationship montage.

SPEAKER_01

Right. So this is this again, one of my biggest problems is what's the passage of time, you think, for this relationship montage? I mean, it's at least a week. It seems like a week, but I really think it's two days. It might be. I don't know. I can't here's my thing. I can't tell. I have no idea, but it's uh it's an amount of time in which she never does anything weird, apparently. Yep. Like this entity, whatever it is, is totally normal for some amount of time and then just malfunctions doesn't make any sense. There has to be a catalyst. He has to, I don't know, get bored, he has to go out with Sarah, or something has to happen where this creature like switches from well, I'm the perfect love for you to now I'm gonna make your life hell. He's already she's already leaving the cat.

SPEAKER_04

Day point point one is she's already leaving the cat on the floor, right? Right. And so then how do we already shift into montage of things being perfect? Exactly. Doesn't make any sense. We gotta start with perfect.

SPEAKER_01

And then get get a little weird, and they get a little weirder, and then get super fucking weird, and then he's like, what's happening here? And but that's not what we do.

SPEAKER_04

Now we go to the restaurant, Ian's calling him, and then we do a whole closed book thing, and then the food critic bit. I'm sure you really enjoyed the food critic bit. Oh my god. Is this even a bit different? Do we want to talk about it? I don't even want to talk about it. Does this does he want to be a food critic? No, for sure not. He this character has no interest in him. I no, no, no, that's not my question. In Curry Barker's brain, does he want to be a food critic?

SPEAKER_01

Is that maybe he does. Maybe that's his ultimate dream, and this is just where he ended up was making YouTube videos and movies, you know. No, no, no, not for the character. So you're saying, as the writer of the movie, does this character want to be a food critic? That is my question. My answer is no, he does not. I don't believe you. I think he doesn't do anything else the rest of the movie to be a food critic. He never mentions it. He was just being silly. I think he was just being silly. Oh, okay. It has to be that because otherwise that doesn't make any sense because this character has no motivation to do that whatsoever. Okay, right? I I couldn't tell. I don't know either, Dan. I don't know. I don't understand it.

SPEAKER_04

So eventually he takes the call.

SPEAKER_01

Wait, so this scene, I just so this scene is interesting to me. And I hope that this is not super offensive, but it's probably a little offensive. The phone buzzes, she gets annoyed. The phone buzzes again, she gets more annoyed. Then he's like, I have to answer it, and she's mad. That's just like a normal human thing, right? Any human would feel that way, so that wasn't weird. Then he comes back and he asks her point blank, is like, hey, does

Party Jenga And Public Meltdown

SPEAKER_01

your dad really have cancer? Because it turns out I don't think he does. And then she gets all upset. No, no, don't do that. I thought we were having a nice day. Why would she like none of that is actually that weird, right? Like, that's that's just like a pretty normal. She lied and now she's caught in her lie and she gets upset. I I don't know. It's not weird to me. It's all pretty normal. It was weird the way she did it. No, I guess she sure she acts like it, like it's weird, but her getting upset, none of that's really weird. Okay. I need more. I need more.

SPEAKER_04

So she melts down and says, I don't know if her dad's dead. And then we then we go back and this is oh, this is this is the sex scene, the industrial music sex scene. Yeah. Then we do the industrial music sex scene.

SPEAKER_01

Because she's got like the dead, the dead eyes. But I guess I'm curious. So does the entity not enjoy the physical act of love then? I I this is a genuine question because she loves the whole the wish is she loves him more than anything in the world. Wouldn't that count for loving making love with him? No. Tech no, you don't think so? You know, if you love someone more than anything else in the world, you wouldn't want to be with them sexually. I just I have a hard time believing that. Not to that music. I don't think the music's in the room, Dan.

SPEAKER_04

I don't know. 3 45 a.m. He wakes up, she's gone. He's all like, where's she at? Where's she at? And she's in the corner. Why I'm watching you sleep.

SPEAKER_01

Why? You know what's a better view of watching someone sleep laying next to them? Or in a chair, but but or in a chair, anything but the corner of the room for no reason whatsoever. But then when she comes out and then she goes back, she can like go back like it's a video game. Right. Yep. So you it looked good. It looked great. Doesn't make any sense. It and what part of her being in love with him more than anything else in the world, it makes her stand in the corner and be like, I'm afraid of my dreams. What are you talking about? I don't know. She's all like, go back to sleep. I'm like, yes. Which is very funny. I don't know if it's supposed to be funny, but it is funny to me. I just it just it feels like they made decisions that were like, hey, wouldn't this be weird? And the answer is yes, it's weird, but if it's not motivated, it's just so Stupid to me.

SPEAKER_04

Then she gets a flower in a pot and she holds it in front of her face. I mean, this is that's my favorite shot.

SPEAKER_01

That's my I love that. I love that shit. It's so beautiful. It's very brilliant. Why does she hold it there so long? Because it's because it looks good. Yep, that's the answer. But that's not a movie answer. Yeah. I get that.

SPEAKER_04

Sometimes, Tony, you gotta put the lights in the car to illuminate down. No, you do not.

SPEAKER_01

I refuse to believe. Just motivate it. Just motivate it. Just give me a reason. Just give me a I don't care what it is. For Sandy, okay? Uh yeah. That was good. Good line. I like that. It's fine, but it's just justified. For Sandy. But what no? What's the her having it is justified, but she holds it for so long before she says for Sandy. That's not motivated. He tries to get up, but she's like, stay.

SPEAKER_04

And I was like, I laughed. That one I left.

SPEAKER_01

I left. That's my biggest laugh in the movie. So the no, no, no, don't do that. And stay. Naomi and I quote that all the time. Every time she goes to the bathroom, I go, stay. I don't think she thinks it's as funny as I do.

SPEAKER_04

See, that's why people love this movie, Tony.

SPEAKER_01

That's why people love this movie. Here's my thing. I I enjoyed a lot of this movie for parts of it, right? Just because I laughed a lot. I think it's I think there's some fun ideas. It's not scary. I think we can all like let's stop pretending it's a scary movie. Yeah. Because people are saying it's the scariest movie they've ever seen. And I just think those people have never seen a movie before.

SPEAKER_04

Well, that's also because there's there's they I think people probably put themselves in her place and are all like, oh, what would the how would I react if this was me?

SPEAKER_01

Here's the thing it's a horrible situation, but the movie doesn't really deal with that. Yeah, and that's my problem. I the setup of it is like that's horrifying. This this could be a horrifying thing, but the movie doesn't actually care. Yeah, the movie doesn't really deal with the horror of her not having control over her body. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Wakes up in the morning, she cut off some of his hair, and she's like, Did you do that? She's like, Yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_01

I I do love how sh nonchalant she is. Well, she's like, Yep. It's like, okay.

SPEAKER_04

Last night was weird, sorry, it's terrifying. She smooches him up, and then he like goes to the door and she's put duct tape all over the door, and hilarious. Yeah, it's kind of funny, and then he sort of has to pry it open.

SPEAKER_01

And there's it's a it's a funny scene, but it doesn't mean anything. Wow. She doesn't yeah, she doesn't try to keep him home. No, she doesn't, she never again tries to like limit him leaving the house. So again, it's just like, hey, you know, it'd be a fun idea if she duct taped the door. Sure, it is. You gotta motivate it. Well, but I will say the line that she says, did you hear the line she says when he's opening the door? She goes, if you're having trouble with the door, maybe you should just stay. Very funny. Uh I think it's hilarious.

SPEAKER_04

But it just doesn't, it doesn't really make any sense. Well, it's not the character, right? We gotta set up who the character is. And if she's gonna make jokes like that, you know, if you stay, and then she's gonna she's gotta cling to his leg and she has to drag him out and pry him off. And you know, it has to be this bargain. She has to be this constant bargaining with her to the point where, you know, and he has to drag her out, and then the neighbor has to look over and be like, Well, I mean, I great, yeah. I like you said with the budget, they didn't have that, they did not have that exterior, they did not have that neighbor. So you're gonna have to be smarter with what you have inside. And they're not super smart with what they have inside.

SPEAKER_00

I

Real Nikki Breaks Through And The Core Idea

SPEAKER_00

yeah, I don't think so.

SPEAKER_04

What they got is some nice performances from like this girl who does great.

SPEAKER_01

Knock knocks it out of the park, right? I mean, I yeah, no notes, no notes. Great. This is now my least favorite part of the movie, by the way. Hold on. Oh, when we cut back to her and she pees or cries a giant puddle. No, she pees. It's pee. Yeah, yeah, she's definitely peeing on the ground. Why? Why? I don't know if it's pee. Other than that it's weird, it is, damn. Because when she when he comes home, she's covered in poop. She's not covered in poop. That's like dog food or something, cat food. No, I think it's I think it's feces. No, it's not. I think it is. I don't think it is. It's too weird looking.

SPEAKER_04

Well, you're right about that. She packed him a lunch. He gets there, he's with Sarah. Sarah's like all over his stick. Um, weird how you're dating all of a sudden. Uh there's and then it is weird. We set up that she's trying to get into art school to be a tattoo artist, which we didn't set up before, and she's she's down to her last two letters, and they got the one letter, and it just came back as a no, and so she needs his love, and so she snuggles, and then he opens his lunch, and then the these couple of crazy Polaroids, and then a little post-it note, and he starts eating his sandwich, and then Sarah looks at one of the post-it notes, and we realize that he's eating the cat, which I guess she's cooked.

SPEAKER_01

I guess. So, yeah, there's a couple so the Polaroids are weird, and I don't I'm sure someone on Reddit can explain to me. But one of them's a picture of him that says you, and then there's a picture of them together, and it says not me underneath her pictures. So, like is is this Nikki doing this part of it, or is this the monster doing this part of it? I don't understand. Um, and then he's been eating the sandwich, like he's taken a couple bites. I I guess you can convince me that if I bit into a sandwich and it was cat, that I'd be like, I this is a normal sandwich. I have a very hard time believing that. But what puts it over the top is when he's cuddling Sarah, Sarah goes, Your lunch smells weird. It smells weird, then it tastes weird. That's a rule. That's just a rule. So you wouldn't just be eating weird smelling meat and not be like, what the hell is in this sandwich? So dumb. It's so dumb. Also, why is she cooking the cat? Explain that to me. What does that have to do with her loving him? Nothing. Absolutely nothing, other than, hey, you know what would be weird? What if she cooked the cat? So dumb it drives me crazy.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Unless you can explain it to me right now, Dan.

SPEAKER_04

I think the screenwriter wanted to have him eat the cat so that he could barf it.

SPEAKER_01

Ah, okay, that's a perfect explanation.

SPEAKER_04

Got it. Um, and that's the other thing about this movie I was gonna make a point of, which this movie always cuts away when people have to explain what the fuck is going on. Yeah. Like, why are you barfing? What's going on?

SPEAKER_01

Don't worry about it. Okay, that's cool. That's fine. Okay, that's totally fine. I would just let you walk away after that. Don't worry.

SPEAKER_04

Ian wants a ride home. He talks about a party, but he doesn't want uh freaky Nikki coming, so he's like, it's just a boys' night. And then um, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, nothing. Yeah. Um he's like, oh, it seems like you're taking advantage of her or something. I don't know. Whatever. It's a silly, silly conversation.

SPEAKER_04

He pulls out the wish thing and wants to understand the wish, so he makes the call. You want to talk about the call?

SPEAKER_01

This scene is so funny. I don't I think it's supposed to be funny. I think this is one of the times where this is meant to be funny. Yeah, but he calls and the guy's like, Oh, you want to cancel your wish? To which the character responds, No, I don't want to cancel it, I want to alter it. He's a bad guy, he's a terrible guy. He wants to keep the wish. Oh, yeah, it's true. And he's like, Oh no, we don't really do that. And he's like, Okay, well then I want to cancel it. And he's like, Yeah, we don't really do that. It's such a great setup. It's so funny. And then Bears Bears says, uh, what you said, you you were the one that mentioned canceling. He's like, I was just trying to guess your intentions, man. It's so funny. I just I love this scene, I think it's great. Um, and then and then it gets weird because it's like, do you want to talk to her? And then it's just her screaming bloody murder. That doesn't really make any sense. Why is she is she being tortured or is she just screaming because she's not in control, like she's in a glass cage, like, ah, let me out or something, but she's just screaming, she's not saying anything. I don't know, it's super weird. It's it's a nice, you know, character moment because he just hangs up and he's like, Oh, I don't want to hear that. That's no good. Um, but I just again, like, I don't understand the rules, Dan. How is he talking? How how? How? He gets home. Yeah, just move on. Nikki's like, I ain't a bug.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Right. Dan, I looked it up, by the way, Google it. It's for sure feces. Yeah, she's covered in poop. I don't think she is. There's a disturbing scene where Bear leaves work and Nikki stands catatonically in the same spot when he's the entire day. When he returns, he finds she has soiled herself, covered in her own pea, vomit, and feces from neglecting her body needs.

SPEAKER_04

Now, I don't have to

Car Window Attack And Final Act Violence

SPEAKER_04

talk about that.

SPEAKER_01

I don't buy that.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. She's she's wet. She's she's wet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like her whole body is wet.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, because I think she was just kind of rolling around the floor in it. So the thing is, like, but even with just her peeing in the beginning, it just doesn't make any sense. It's are you trying to tell me the monster shuts down when he's not around?

SPEAKER_04

Because we have already seen that that doesn't tell me stop with the rules. Stop with the rules. You have to have rules! You can't make a movie without rules. You if you're gonna apply the I want to sort out the rules by look, there are no rules in this movie. There are they did not set up rules, so you can't keep exp can't have the expectation of rules in every scene because none of the scenes have rules.

SPEAKER_01

Because people like this movie, it's got 94%, but it doesn't make a lick of sense. So I this is not to you, Dan. This is to the 94% of people that's in this movie. Explain to me how that's scary or interesting. I don't get it.

SPEAKER_04

So she goes, she has to go take a shower. There's poop and barf and cat food and god only knows what.

SPEAKER_01

Lots of stuff. Yeah, there's lots of stuff.

SPEAKER_04

So they go to they go to they go to boys' night together. He brings Nessie.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, you you're gonna skip over her in the shower, which is very funny. Oh, what was it? It's a very funny scene. Well, he just tells her, he's like, he's he says, Did you cook the cat? Sorry, I can't even say it without laughing. Did you cook the cat? You can't do that. I'm very upset. It's just like, what are we doing?

SPEAKER_04

What are we doing here? It's insane. And it I guess this would be a funny movie or interesting movie if it he was like living with a demon, if it was a demon possessing the girl. Sure, right? Sure, great. And he gets home and he's just like, she's so hot. You know, like she looked like Sarah instead of this stupid girl. And so she was like so hot, and he comes home to that hotness, and she's like wearing super hot clothes and not covered in and you know, and the the the demon is taking a shit in the corner, and he's all like, You cook the cat. You can't. We we gotta sort this out.

SPEAKER_01

I'm sorry, baby. I'm sorry, ah, okay, all right. It's just weird.

SPEAKER_04

This whole thing's we should we should remake this movie, but have it a demon, it'd be fun.

SPEAKER_01

It would be fun, because there's there's a lot of create if you make it so it is a demon or a monster that has no idea how to be human, you can have a lot of fun with it, right? You just have to have you have to have rules.

SPEAKER_04

So we get to the party, there's all these mostly dudes, but there's a few women to make sure that it's not a boy's night. It is almost a guy night, you know? Except like the three or four women. Yeah, okay. It's almost true. And the one does have a short haircut, so who knows? Dan, you love those haircuts.

SPEAKER_01

You love that pixie cut.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. Stupid Nikki. Um bar. Stupid Nikki with her long hair. Um, okay. So they play Jenga with stuff you gotta do.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I think there's like a truth or dare Jenga that you you can get where like it has dares on it, but it this game doesn't make no sense.

SPEAKER_04

So one of them leads to Nikki like doing a poem or a work in like her work in progress story.

SPEAKER_01

Don't say that like that makes sense. It doesn't make any sense. The guy before it got one that's like switch places with somebody, and then the other one's kiss the person on your left. Somehow hers is read a creepy story from your phone. That doesn't make any sense. That's so stupid. You have to motivate, you have to, at the very least, have her read her Jenga thing so I know that she's just making shit up. You know what I mean? Like it says here take a drink. But instead, how would I uh spin you a tail? It just it's so stupid, and they just they won't take responsibility, they don't say what her Jenga piece says, and that pisses me off.

SPEAKER_04

That writer is so proud of that piece of you know, Hansel and Gretel retelling. I mean, it's it's hot, you know what I mean. Okay, so then bear pulse his, and it's like kiss the person next to you. The person next to him is Sarah. So then here comes Nikki, she pulls the chair out. Great scene. Yeah, it's nice.

SPEAKER_01

This is this is nice, and if it wasn't surrounded by the nonsense, I would like this scene a lot, but I don't. He has to kiss her. Yeah, it's great. And then she has one of my other biggest laughs of the movie. She says something to the effect of everyone here will die not knowing the love that I have for Bear. And then there's dead silence. She goes, I'm just kidding. And then she waits again and goes, I'm not kidding, deal with it. The deal with it is so funny, it's so good. Uh, 10 out of 10. Then she freaks out and bangs her face a bunch of times for no reason. Because into the There's no trigger. There's no nothing even happens. She's just standing there, Dan. There's no trigger. Um and then everyone just kind of stands and watches her bleed, by the way.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and then they're like, You gotta take her to the emergency room. And so they kind of do, and they kind of do.

SPEAKER_01

They kind of skip over the part where they go into the emergency room and the emergency attendant's like, hey, what happened? And then they have to explain what happened, where she stabbed her own face, and then they're like, Oh, we should put her in the psych ward.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I think I don't think I think the emergency room, they go there and there's they talk to a guy, and the guy's like, no. No, get out of here. That's I that's what I think happens. It's this this it's this long, not long, long, what's sort of long, but not medium. What's in between long and medium? Not a long shot, but it's not a medium shot either.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_04

It's like, you know, they're like little people.

Billion Dollars Wish And Emotional Shortcuts

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. And you're like, so they just go home and sh her face is fine.

SPEAKER_01

It's still covered in blood, though, right? Yeah, yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

So sh this is the one you like, though. He's like, I gotta go to the bathroom, and she's like, Can I stand outside?

SPEAKER_01

I did, I do laugh at that a lot as well. You're right. Very funny.

SPEAKER_04

Um, and she's like, You know, I know Sarah likes you. And then she's like, Do you like me? And then he's like, Yeah, but I don't like freaky Nikki. I like you, right? Not freaky Nikki. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Tell me you love me. This is all I ever wanted. We need space, crying, just be Nikki, it's not real. Then she does rewind Nikki.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_01

And why? Why is that there? Because it looked good, right? Sure. Yeah, looked cool, doesn't really make any sense. Uh, there's nothing in the scene, like, she's not rewinding the night. You know what I mean? Like if she did the ace ventura thing where she like and then pretends they just got home again or something, that's fun. I like that. But she just walks backwards and then comes back. I I don't know. I don't get it.

SPEAKER_04

So he's like, I'm gonna go sleep at Ians, and she's like, No, you're not.

SPEAKER_01

Well, she doesn't say no, you're not, but he she does a great, a really long speech about how she'll basically kill herself when she leaves. Yeah, and she gives the whole speech, and then she's like something about, and then there's darkness, and then there's a beat, and she goes, or you could stay.

SPEAKER_04

It's very I think that's why people like this movie, is because they bought into it at this point, and so like I don't know how you did, though.

SPEAKER_01

That's my I it's impossible to me. I I did not buy into it, and so if it made sense, then sure, I'm in fully, but it none of it makes any sense. So it's just random shit that you thought would look cool on screen.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and that's what people like. They don't they no, they I refuse. They don't really care, they're just like, ah, she says that whole thing, and then she says, Or you can stay very funny.

SPEAKER_01

I get that. So here's here's my actual what I actually think is happening. And I I hope this isn't offensive. I have no idea. What's actually happening? So the people that go to see this are the TikTok generation. Yes, right? They don't need a movie to make sense. Nope. They like little bits, one minute, one-minute bits, and there are tons of those in this movie. The whole movie's the whole movie. They don't connect, none of them connect, they don't make a movie, but there are moments that you can enjoy. Yeah, and I guess if that's all you're looking for, then sure, this could be entertaining, I guess, but it's not a movie. None of it, none of it goes together to make a full picture. It is a vine.

SPEAKER_04

It's like a bunch of vines all glued together, it's a bunch of TikToks all glued together.

SPEAKER_01

Compilation, right? I or whatever they uh do. I don't know. Yeah. Um, but I hate that. I agree. I hate it.

SPEAKER_04

I think you've cracked it. Um, okay. Uh boom. He stays. Sarah texts them at 242, and she's like, You gotta come meet me. All right.

SPEAKER_01

Dan, we gotta just real quickly talk. You just went to a party. Yes. Where the girl who's dating the guy that you like, removed your chair, slid you back, stole your spot, and then stabbed herself in the face. Yes. And you're gonna text him and be like, hey, sneak out and meet me. Yes. Nope. No, you're just no offense, we shouldn't victim blame, but this is entirely her fault.

SPEAKER_04

Well, she's she's dead because she's an idiot. See, I think you're looking at this movie as if the movie has a history and the characters have an understanding of what's happened in the history of the movie. But that's not what happens. That's what never happens. No, that's what that's the thing that never happens, and not to any of the characters. That's correct.

SPEAKER_01

You're right about that.

SPEAKER_04

If it is a TikTok thing, she's she's acting on the information that she has, which is she's in love with this. Available right now, and she's not gonna think about what any consequences of anything. Yeah, it doesn't make any sense. And I mean, it's kind of true. This is kind of a consequenceless movie, right? It posits what if you lived each moment of your life not considering the consequences thereof?

SPEAKER_01

Not thinking about what came before or after?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I mean it's true, and that's we're gonna get to the one scene in here that that that does that to me the most. Makes okay, probably I don't know if it makes me the angriest, but it just doesn't make any sense. So this is when then he talks to Nikki, and it's the the evil Nikki's freaky Nikki's asleep, and real Nikki's like, uh doesn't make any sense. She's like, kill me, please. And then he's like, What would be so bad about being with me? And she's like, You've never been with me.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_04

I'm like, that's a good line. That's a great line.

SPEAKER_01

So, but that needs to be the crux of the movie, right? Yeah, like this is you just gave me the entire plot of your movie. He's fucking a demon.

SPEAKER_04

Right. And she she breaks out a little bit occasionally, but the demon's like, I'm gonna manipulate you to make you know to to make this all happen.

SPEAKER_01

But that's not really what this movie is. Like, that's not really what the movie does. But you he knows, not that I'm pretending to know Curry, but he knows what this movie, like the colonel, but he wrote that down. He's like, That's my movie. This is my movie right here. But then doesn't do it.

SPEAKER_04

He does, I mean, yes, he doesn't have the skills to write that movie or know what that movie is, and can't and doesn't have he has the skills to make and I mean that's what gives us hope for the dude, is because he does know how to write he does know how to write bits. A scene?

SPEAKER_01

Not even a scene, but yeah, you're right, you're right, yeah, a bit. Moments. Moments.

SPEAKER_04

He knows how to write moments that are that are reflective of the world we're living in right

Ending Chaos And The Suicide Escape Hatch

SPEAKER_04

now. Yeah, but it's not a movie.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's not, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_04

Um boom, they go, they park in the car, there's Sarah. Uh he lies to Sarah about what's going on with the girl, of course, because all he does is lie. All this guy does is lie. She's taking advantage of you. Let's open the letter together. I need to tell you these things. Ian and Nikki have been hooking up. You need to be someone like me. Boom, we see Nikki coming in the window. Did you like that you could see her coming?

SPEAKER_01

I did, although it feels pretty clear she's like wearing a helmet because her head is too big. I don't know if you noticed that. No, I did not notice that. Um, yeah, that I watched it. Nikki.

SPEAKER_04

Nikki's wearing a helmet. Oh.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so I'm pretty sure I mean I'll have to look it up. I'm pretty sure she, it's probably sugar glass or something, because she really uses her head to break that window, which is cool. Oh, wow. It's cool, but it looks it looks weird, which is fine. I as a practical effect, I was like, I like it. I didn't see it I think it's cool.

SPEAKER_04

I just I just saw her and I was like, why are they letting us see her? Because don't we have that same sort of shot in in weapons where we we break open a window and we're not ready for it? And I I I fucking use I was like killing me.

SPEAKER_01

And in this one, I was like, oh, here comes Nikki. So well, so what's interesting is this one is not a jump scare. Yeah, right. I think that's the difference. This one's more like, oh fuck. But I think that's the vibe they're going on. But it's more wrong enough. Agreed.

SPEAKER_04

Because they do that in weapons too, where we see where we see things happening like that, and you're like, oh no, oh no.

SPEAKER_01

I think it's one of the Friday the 13th where there's a girl sitting in front of a window, and you see him like from a distance in the woods, like just coming, coming, coming, coming, coming, and then he breaks through and grabs her. And that's great, because you're just like, fuck, move, move. Oh my god, move, move. Um, but yeah, it's it's too quick to be uh tense, but too short to be a jump scare, so it's it's just yeah, it's middle ground. It's almost like it's a but I thought visually it was a half measure. It's dick. You got it, Dan.

SPEAKER_04

That's the movie, half measures, and then I guess somehow she puts a brick in there and then smashes her head against the room.

SPEAKER_01

That part was very confusing. I didn't understand what was happening. Wow, she's it's cool, yeah. I need so this is this is where this movie need to me needed to get to earlier because I love this scene and then the following scene, or even the continuation where she's like, You need you need me to I need you to help me move her body now. This is your fault. Sarah's your fault. All of that is great, yeah. But it just means nothing because the last hour and a half meant nothing to me. Yeah, it's a real bummer. Because if you liked Sarah, which I'm indifferent to Sarah because she's not a real character. I didn't care. I didn't care what she did. Right. That's the thing. Like, if you cared, this would be tough. This would be a hard thing to watch. And then they have to manipulate her body. Like, I should we should see a little bit of him having to deal with her corpse because this is what he deserves. But we don't.

SPEAKER_04

We skip all that. Well, we skip the we skip all the real, and I think that's probably why the kids like it is we skip all the real emotional parts.

SPEAKER_01

Yes, we do. Yeah, the human parts of it.

SPEAKER_04

Um uh did he open the letter and see that she got into art school, or does she get it?

SPEAKER_01

He opens it later. He does that later by himself in the car when he's like all say out. Okay.

SPEAKER_04

Uh he goes to the thing and we do the willow sticks again, and he buys like three to five more.

SPEAKER_01

Now, again, this is very funny, but I think it does ruin the like you you finally found some tension in your movie, and then you immediately take it away by making this guy jokey. Super jokey. You can't come in here with that energy, bro. You can't come in here, it's a lot, it's early. Like, no, shit's he's covered in blood. This guy comes into your store covered in blood, you're not gonna just tease him. It's so weird and out of place, it's a bummer.

SPEAKER_04

And another thing is he's like, I did my wish and it was great, or something. You're just like something like that.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's like, okay, fuck you. Stupid. I'm sorry. Tell me what you wished for then.

SPEAKER_02

I'm sorry, but wishes can't go right. They cannot go right. Correct.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Ever. Period.

SPEAKER_01

Um, and the and a second. Yeah, I wish to be on a hit podcast, and this is all they gave me.

SPEAKER_04

So um he goes to see Ian, and so his so he tries to break one, he can't break it, so he's gonna go to Ian, he's gonna get Ian to use a wish, and now he's you know, he's like, uh he's freaking out. And Ian's like, here, give me that, and he makes his wish, he wishes for a billion dollars, and then a billion dollars rains out of the sky.

SPEAKER_01

And then you have this great moment where Bear is like getting super angry that Ian was selfish with his wish, and you see him getting angrier as the money falls, and and then and then you cut away. Instead of dealing with any sort of emotion there.

SPEAKER_04

Okay. Ian just witnessed a miracle. He witnessed a wish and a miracle. You and I will never witness a wish or a miracle in our entire lives, but likely.

SPEAKER_02

Unfortunately, that is likely.

SPEAKER_04

Um you're gonna have to deal with that. Do we deal with that at all?

unknown

Nope.

SPEAKER_04

No cut away, we go back to the weird movie that we're doing, and we ignore this miracle that has happened.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Money is falling from his ceiling, by the way. Like that's wild stuff.

SPEAKER_04

First of all, you can't do that in a movie. You can't. You can't do that in your movie, period. Everyone should have said, no, you can't do it like that. You can have him

What The Movie Could Have Been

SPEAKER_04

get a call.

unknown

Sure.

SPEAKER_04

You can have either doesn't fall from the sky. It just it can't fall from the sky. That doesn't make any that doesn't make any sense. His phone could go. But it's but it's funny. His phone could go on. Wouldn't that be funny? Sorry. It doesn't make any sense. No, it doesn't. And then you have two characters that have to deal with this. You know, he's gotta say, No, see, it's real. I wish for Nikki love me. And then the two of them have to go, what the fuck are we gonna do about this?

SPEAKER_01

Or counter pitch, we cut away, and then the next scene, Ian's gonna show up at the door and be like, dude, I've got a billion dollars, it's real. As if he wasn't there when that happened. Very strange.

SPEAKER_04

Wait, what?

SPEAKER_01

So when Ian shows up at the door in the next scene, he's banging outside, and Bear and what's her name are in here yelling at each other. Outside, Ian is like, Bear, I've got like a billion dollars out here. It's real. As if he just realized it was real, but Bear was there when it happened. He knows he has a billion dollars and then left at some point. So they've already had that conversation. It's just doesn't make any sense, man.

SPEAKER_04

So we're back at home. I thought it was Nikki that was naked in the chair, but I guess it's Sarah's dead body that they've stripped naked and put in a chair. Why is that? Why is it in the chair? We thought they took care of the body.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, apparently when they said take care of it, they're just gonna strap it out in public and show everybody. You know, take care of it. I didn't understand that. I have no idea, Dan. I have no idea. It doesn't make the the ending of this movie makes literally zero sense.

SPEAKER_04

And then it just everything goes crazy. I like couldn't follow what was happening. She's got a gun, she's gonna kill herself.

SPEAKER_01

So she basically first she tattooed herself like Sarah. She's trying to become Sarah. So she's smoking like Sarah does, and she's covered in her tattoos, and she's like, Do you love me now or something? Because she thinks it's just not done very well. Because this is the right move because it's a jealousy thing. So she's trying to become the person he thinks that she liked. It's just not done right. I guess she's wearing Sarah's dress. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_04

I thought that it was like they were imitating falling asleep drunk somewhere where people draw on you. That's that was all I took from all that.

SPEAKER_01

A little dick on her head. Yeah, yeah, you get it.

SPEAKER_04

So Ian busts in for some reason, and then she kills Ian, and you can't. I couldn't even tell it was Ian. I was like, I guess it's fair. I I don't know.

SPEAKER_01

Low budget, man. It's hard to make gunshots look good. So yeah, you gotta be real quick with it.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, so they just, you know, you can make this work. He hides in the bathroom and he has the gun.

SPEAKER_01

So it's it's another very funny moment, which is super inappropriate. But he calms her down and is like, I love you. We just need to freshen up. And she goes, I know what you need. And it's a direct cut to him shutting her out and her screaming, fuck you! It's so funny to me. It's so jarring. Um, it shouldn't be funny, but it is very funny.

SPEAKER_04

So he tries to shoot himself, but instead takes pills. But he can't, because he's a chicken shit.

SPEAKER_01

So it's just coward to the end.

SPEAKER_04

So he takes pills to kill himself, and then she uses a wish in the other room.

SPEAKER_01

But before he's about to throw up, he starts putting his fingers down his throat and then stops.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Because he again. Or so he's putting his fingers down his throat because he's gonna throw them back up because he again is too cowardly to actually kill himself, and then you hear the wish snap, and he takes his fingers out of his mouth and comes goes back to her. Goes back to her. Doesn't make any sense though, Daniel.

SPEAKER_04

Then he dies, and then the real Nikki comes back into right.

SPEAKER_01

So let's let's just talk about this real quickly. So he's he's about to stop himself from killing himself once again. She makes a wish. What is her wish? I wish you would come out of there and be with me. Do you think that's all it is? That's all it is. You don't think it's like you I want him to love me back? It's just come out of the bathroom. Just come out of the bathroom, because it's stupid. It is stupid. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

And what they should have done was she should have he should have killed himself. She should have butt oh no, but then she comes back, doesn't she? I guess it doesn't work. My my way is she needs to use her wish to to bring him back and love her for and to bring so that he he can ever die. Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Yes, that's exactly. Yeah, like she needs or just the same wish of like I wish he loved me as much as I loved him.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

But that's clearly not what it is either, because then the first move would oh, I gotta stop myself from dying so I can love her forever.

SPEAKER_04

She just switched him out of the bathroom. That's it.

SPEAKER_01

Which is really

What We Watched This Week Instead

SPEAKER_01

stupid. That's really dumb. Um, and then so then he dies and she's crying. She comes back.

SPEAKER_04

The real Nikki comes back.

SPEAKER_01

She comes back. So the entity just leaves, it just doesn't matter. Because the wish is over. Because he died. Right. Right. So it does, yeah. It doesn't really matter. I can't tell if she's aware of what's happening or not.

SPEAKER_04

So does that mean the billion dollars disappears from Ian's house?

SPEAKER_01

Gotta, right? I don't know. Well, I guess I don't know because he it's a separate wish. It's because that's that wish probably ended as soon as he died. Ian died. When he got shot in the head, the money probably disappeared. Because your wish ends when you die, I guess. Which I guess is interesting. Like, what if he had set up an account for his children and was like, this is your inheritance, but then he dies and then all that money disappears? Deposit that shit in the bank. Doesn't make any sense, guys. Um, I just I can't tell if she was aware of everything when she comes to. You know what I mean? Because she's she cries and she's like, What have you done? But I'm like, I don't just I don't know. Yeah, I think she was backseat to it all. Yeah. I I I guess I don't know. Yeah, that's what I think, Tony. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And I that's the right move, right? Like that's that's what makes it horrifying, right? Is that she was a passenger in her own body, but it's just I don't know. The rules, man. Doesn't make any it it loses to me, it loses all of its effectiveness when it doesn't make any sense, and I don't I don't understand how it works.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know. I don't know. So anyhow, it's a it's a it's a well-made film, beautiful, a lot of there's a lot of strong stuff in there, and I think he, you know, he's gonna have a really nice career, I think. We don't we don't hate him. No, for sure not. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02

I I did not think I thought it was gonna be very much you know, there was gonna be a lot of politics to the sexual politics of insult and all that was gonna be way murkier on that. It's not too murky on that stuff.

SPEAKER_01

No, no, I yeah. I think I think we can all agree that he's a terrible guy and it was all pretty bad.

SPEAKER_04

All pretty bad.

SPEAKER_01

Um I will say I like this more than like the monkey paw movie we watched. What was that one called? Talk to me. We didn't do the monkey paw movie. You watched it. What? Oh, for real? Yeah, you we didn't do talk to me.

SPEAKER_04

You watched it and then I think disallowed it.

SPEAKER_01

Maybe. I hate oh, because it's like very sad. But yeah, I didn't like that movie at all.

SPEAKER_04

You did not enjoy the act act of watching the movie, and so I'm not gonna make you watch a movie.

SPEAKER_01

Horrible. It's probably an awful movie. Uh but this one's you know, it's it's totally watchable. It's just I mean, if you like it, you like it, that's fine. But it's I guess it's fine. You're wrong, and it should be way better than it is.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, but it's this is not weapons. This is not a movie that you know you watch and go, Jesus Christ, somebody somebody put the thought into the structure of this thing, and that's what I love.

SPEAKER_01

94%, Dan. 94%. Anywho, thanks for watching. I appreciate you watching it with me, Dan. That was fun. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Uh now we talk about something we like. Yeah, I I enjoyed watching it. I mean, I I thought it was it's a good it's a movie you should watch if you're into horror-ish movies and this kind of movie. It's a lot a lot to think about. Like on my morning walk today, I thought all about this movie. Not not in like a great way where I was like, oh wow, I gotta think about all that stuff. It's like, why did this not work as it should?

SPEAKER_01

More more like that thinking. 100%.

SPEAKER_04

Um but still, yeah. Now we talk about something we like. A couple of quick things. I tried the Hawk, the new um series with Will Farrell where he plays a golfer.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, yeah, is it not good? Yeah, it's on my list. It seems super unpretty necessary.

SPEAKER_04

I watched Ready or Not 2.

SPEAKER_01

How's that?

SPEAKER_04

It's okay. It's worth watching. It's it's worth watching, but that first movie So good. It's one of those 10 out of 10 movies for me personally. Yeah, and then I rewatched The Hunt, which is a movie that I watched many times. Yeah, and I was like, I need to watch a movie that I really like to watch all the scenes and see how they work and how things are written and how things all tie together at the end, and it's like, yep, love everything about this movie. You don't the the the main character does not speak a word until minute 26. This is how this is how we make a movie.

SPEAKER_01

Wow, okay. Um I still have to see that, I still haven't gotten around to it. I believe.

SPEAKER_04

And then the thing I like this week, well, I like the hunt, but that doesn't count because I've I've done it before.

SPEAKER_01

You already like it.

SPEAKER_04

But there's like this guy on like Instagram, I'm sure she's probably on TikTok, and he has this little cattle dog named Sidney, and uh it's this little girl cattle dog, she's so cute, and she doesn't have a tail because she's cattle dog, she just wiggles her butt. Her little butt yeah every time she gets excited, and she gets excited constantly, and it's just like and her smile is like it's just she's such a little weirdo, and and it's so great because he has two cattle dogs. Sydney's in love with him, and then their other one, which is a boy cattle dog, is in love with his wife, but it's his dog, and it's just like the their connection of her coming in to see him and put her little head up. Oh god, it kills me every time.

SPEAKER_01

That's so cute. Animals are the best.

SPEAKER_04

Animals are the best. Tony, what do you got for us?

SPEAKER_01

Uh, well, it's a bit of a roller coaster. So we started though, we finished Love Island USA because that is done now, and then we started Love Island UK, because we always watch UK second because it's always better. Um, it's just more fun. Love Island UK is what Love Island should be, and then Love Island USA is like Americanized trashy bullshit. Does that make sense? Uh, both fun in their own way. But the this year's been pretty bad. There's been a lot of uh online cyberbullying of the cast of uh USA, which is a bummer, but ruins the show for me. Love it. Uh no, not good, it's bad. Attack these trash people. Um, but then we're watching UK, and it's like, this is this is what it's supposed to feel like. It's just supposed to be silly, fun. You watch people do stupid things and you just laugh at them, and it's great. Uh, so we're having a real treat. We're already there's like 33 episodes, and we're already on like 14, and we've all been watching for like two and a half days. So it's going well. Vacation is vacationing, damn.

SPEAKER_04

Uh, we need a movie. Yeah, we need a movie. What do you want to do? I've got a movie. I have my look, my super secret list where I've uh this list in the past month and a half,

Next Pick The Astronaut And Budget Controversy

SPEAKER_04

I've added one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Oh my gosh. That's a lot.

SPEAKER_01

What a treat.

SPEAKER_04

Well, actually, eight, nine, ten, eleven. Two of them we did, and then one of them I crossed off because when I read the reviews of it, I was like, oh, this doesn't sound like a terrible movie at all. Well one is that's because you crossed it off. I wonder. It's called Redux, Redux. Which is I think it's like a groundhog day science fiction-y kind of movie. Sure. Yeah. 2025. Sounded kind of interesting. Okay. So we're not doing that. Yeah, yeah, fair. Maybe I should watch it. So instead, I will do the second one on my list. It is a Kate Mara movie. I think it is from last year or the year before. Okay. It's called The Astronaut.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know what this is.

SPEAKER_04

Neither do I.

SPEAKER_01

I love it. I love it when I don't know what things are. Oh, the poster is her with like a broken face shield. That can't be good. You need that to breathe, guys.

SPEAKER_04

All right. I don't know what this movie is, but people didn't seem to like it.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, there you go. I love it. When an astronaut crash lands back to Earth. Back to Earth. That's what that's where we live. A genera puts her in quarantine for rehabilitation and testing. Is it okay? Yeah. All right, great. This is gonna be great.

SPEAKER_04

I'm really no high concept. Is she is she possessed? Isn't she possessed? What's happening? Who's a sh who's a piece of shit? Who's not a piece of shit? What's happening? No, you know, these lines are great, but they only work in these very, you know. No, this is gonna be like bad script, bad lighting, bad this, bad.

SPEAKER_01

Back to classic bad movies.

SPEAKER_04

Somebody wasted 25 million dollars on a pile of shit. You know, that's the thing about this movie. Whatever money they make. Okay, now what wait, we didn't talk about this. What was the thing about the money in this movie?

SPEAKER_01

Or something? What's the thing about the money? Oh, I don't remember what we were talking about.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I said it cost them $750,000 to make, but then you were like, there's a controversy that says something, something, something.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, uh so basically it it uh didn't cost very much money to make because everyone was kind of working for cheaper than they should cost. Yes. And then they they were all like a little upset that they weren't getting a cut of it. And I was and my whole take on that is I mean, I'm gonna come off as a bad guy, but you signed a contract and you did the work, like you don't you know necessarily get a bonus. But if you were gonna get a bonus, it would come from Curry, not from the studio that bought the picture. Everyone's complaining that they didn't get a cut of the back end once this once the film was sold, but it's like that's not that's not how it should work. The studio shouldn't be paying you for the work you already did. Curry should be paying you out of his cut to be like, hey, here's a bonus because you guys did such a good job. That's my that's just my two cents. Um but Naomi got real mad at me when I said that.

SPEAKER_04

So I mean, uh you know, you'd have to look at how much money and where the money was and all that, but for sure. Certainly seem like you should if if he ends up with a check that's astronomical, right? It would be fair to kick some money to those people that that worked for minimum wage.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. It needs to come from the guy who employed you, in my opinion. But yeah, who knows?

SPEAKER_04

Anyhow, yeah, yeah. Okay, next week the astronaut, and uh we'll be back to talk about it next week. Kate Mara. Goodbye, everybody.