SPEAKER_00 0:04

Every day you wake up and live the same life.

SPEAKER_01 0:09

Greetings and salutations, and welcome to HackerSlash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. I think something like this is bound to have some pretty serious consequences. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie review podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack, a total joke, a waste of time, or a slash.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Totally killer. Fun intended.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with a perspective we've all gained from our varying walks of life and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris, I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast. This week I'm joined by the super fly space guy Mac.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Hola Muchachos.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

The gore lover Alexis. Hey everyone. The cowardly creeper Ryan. I'm actually happy to be here doing this again. Ah, and the Scream Queen Ferris.

SPEAKER_04 0:52

I'm the so-called fine vagine.

SPEAKER_01 0:54

For nearly a year now, the world's been carrying on in a period where the concept of time might seem fluid to some. Perhaps it might be hard to tell where one day stops and another begins. Or maybe, just maybe, it feels like we're living the same day, day in and day out. Well, if that applies to you, whew, boy, do we have just the film. Now, before we get down to business, we have some follow-up.

SPEAKER_04 1:18

We recently reviewed a film that I personally love called Oculus. Now, it was remarkably a universal slash among our team, but what were the odds that it would fare so well amongst our listeners?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Well, it's not wrong turn, so it's not wrong turn.

SPEAKER_04 1:32

Uh actually, it wasn't too bad. 15% of listeners gave it a hack and 85% gave it a slash, which I think is a solid score.

SPEAKER_03 1:39

Way to go. I would like to know. I'm actually still surprised that we gave it a universal slash. So I'm I'm those numbers feel good.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

Yeah, someone asked me the other day, you haven't gave any like a universal slash in a while. I was like, but we have, but I can't remember what it was. Because this it feels wrong.

SPEAKER_04 1:55

We actually had a lot of engagement around this movie. So I think I think we inspired a lot of people to watch it, which is one of the more fun elements of our podcast. Alan on Instagram said, definitely enjoyed this movie and the twist at the end. And for me, if a house comes with a fancy antique mirror, get rid of the whole house. Solid recommendation.

SPEAKER_03 2:11

I would keep it. Antique mirrors are really cool. Ryan would agree. I would, but I don't want a house that comes with one.

SPEAKER_00 2:17

Well, when we you know, when we go to your house and we start seeing like a woman in the mirror, I'm out. Okay? I'm out instantly.

SPEAKER_04 2:23

It's just me. We have some comments from our patrons as well, including my two favorite Brittany's. Brittany P had this to say. Loved this film the first time I saw it, and it holds up pretty well on Rewatch. The ending annoyed me a little more the second time around, but I'd still give it a slash.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

I'm glad I wasn't the only one who had feelings about the ending. I feel validated. Thank you, Brittany.

SPEAKER_04 2:42

And then Brittany R, she actually watched this movie as a result of us reviewing it, which I love. She said, I love this film. I watched it for the first time when I saw it on the schedule. Huge slash over here. I felt every emotion in the best way. It is hard to keep my attention, and I was glued to the screen the entire time. Thanks to Paris for this great pick. You're welcome, Brittany R. You're so cheesy.

unknown 3:02

I know.

SPEAKER_04 3:03

And that's our follow-up, everyone.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

Well, speaking of cheesy, last week on our show we saw one babyface killer in Valentine, and this week we're actually continuing the theme. Now in 2017, Blumhouse gave us a film featuring a hooded slasher wearing a baby mask, a costume designed by Tony Gardner, who designed the ghost face mask from Scream. This jolly face proves to be vicious, though, for one young college student in particular, who's stalked by the killer on the night of her birthday. But when she dies, the day resets, and she's trapped in a vicious cycle of her own demise. This week, we're talking about Happy Death Day.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Now, who's seen this one before? Well, I thought I saw it with Chris, but uh we've decided collectively, like I didn't know her then. Yeah, we dug up the receipts. Yeah. So I went through photos to see where I was at in 2017, and that was a really kind of messed up part of my life. So I've decided I actually never watched it then. Yeah, I watched it like a year later, and I think I watched it closer to when like Happy Death Day 2 came out, and I was like, oh hell, I have to watch the first one. So um, it's fairly recent.

SPEAKER_03 4:07

Yeah, for me, I fully remember this movie coming out and seeing the trailer and you know, understanding the concept of it, but I never watched it, I never got around to it, even though it's something that it would have been on my plate at the perfect time uh when I would have enjoyed movies like this, I think. But I I I don't know, I never got around to it, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

I I'm in a similar boat. So when this came out, I saw the trailer and I was like, oh, this looks like something I'm going to enjoy, but I just don't want to watch it in theater. I want to watch this at home. And I kind of put it off. And honestly, I can't believe it's been as long as it has been. I thought this was like, I don't know, maybe a year or two old, and now it's 2021, and we're like three and a half years in, and I feel really bad about that.

SPEAKER_03 4:47

Basically, since it's 2021, anything that you think was like a few years old, you just have to add like two years. That's how long it really was. Because of COVID. Yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 4:56

Yeah, same, same here. I saw the trailer. I was like, oh, that looks interesting. I might see that. Never did. Uh eventually I watched it, I think it was streaming somewhere. Uh so I have seen this before a few years ago. Actually, it this came out a few years ago. So I probably saw it like maybe a year after it came out.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

This movie is as old as our podcast, as it came out on the exact same day. Our podcast was born, figuratively speaking, of course, not literally. So exciting.

SPEAKER_04 5:19

Happy Death Day to us.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Indeed. Happy life day to the podcast. Okay. There we go. I didn't see this movie in theaters either, but I did see it soon after it came out, and I remember really enjoying it aside from one of one aspect of the ending. It stuck out as like a sore thumb for me. But I haven't seen it since, and I was curious to see how it holds up on a rewatch. But since this is a number of yours first time watching this, what were you folks expecting beyond the obvious of the premise?

SPEAKER_03 5:46

Yeah, I I think this is one when you know the premise of it, it's really hard to to see what could come from it. And for me, I was expecting a really surprising ending in some way. I d I I I'm not really sure what that could have been. I spent a lot of this movie trying to figure out what the ending would be because so much of it is revealed with the concept of the movie. I I just went in expecting a good catch at the end, I think.

SPEAKER_02 6:15

Yeah, I'm trying to recall what I thought about the movie before I watched it the first time, but um I think I was expecting less comedy for sure. I think I was expecting something more like realistic or not real uh essentially, this isn't really realistic, but maybe like I don't know, not grounded in comedy per se. So yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_04 6:35

That's funny, Alexis. I remember seeing the trailer and thinking this was actually gonna be just like a dark comedy and not even really a horror movie. Uh, I wasn't expecting it to actually like give us those horror movie kills. I was just like, oh, this is gonna be like a fun, like, you know, a spooky comedy about a girl in college, you know, one of those like like she's the man kind of movies, except that she dies all the time.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

With Amanda Binds.

SPEAKER_04 6:58

Yeah, like that kind of thing. Something really light.

SPEAKER_03 7:00

I actually love that movie. Aren't all movies about women in college spooky in one way or another?

SPEAKER_00 7:05

I was kind of expecting something along the same lines, Paris. Like I was expecting Groundhog Day meets I Know Who Killed Me. Kind of like that 50-50 mix of college kids slash teens, whatever they were in I Know Who Killed Me, plus the Groundhog Day like premise, maybe a little, you know, Tucker and Dale kind of comedy. Who knows? The trailer does make it look kind of comical though. So I think you have to give it credit for that.

SPEAKER_04 7:25

Can I pose a question? Who among us has actually seen Groundhog Day? Not I.

SPEAKER_02 7:30

Yes. Nope. I feel like I still have seen bits and pieces noted to pal, but I don't think I've seen like this. Yeah. I got the concept.

SPEAKER_03 7:38

You should know me well enough to know I haven't seen that. But I am I'm familiar.

SPEAKER_00 7:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:42

At least.

SPEAKER_00 7:43

I watch it every morning when I wake up. You know, that way like every day is consistent in some way, and I kind of question reality. Just kidding. I I have, of course, have seen it several times.

SPEAKER_01 7:51

What we get in this movie, I think, differs a little bit from what you guys were looking for and going into it. And one of the biggest things for me was having experienced this once already. It's very much not a movie that I think you can watch the same way twice. The good news is I was just as entertained this time as I was the first time watching it. Not blown away, not shocked by any means, but the laughs were still as good. The deaths were just as fun, and the heartfelt moments still punched just the right way. So it felt like a good time. How were you folks feeling?

SPEAKER_02 8:21

I couldn't say it better. I think because I've seen this, and even like going into the first like scene of the movie or the first few scenes, I was like, oh, I remember everything. But I was like, okay, cool. Yeah. And I picked up a lot on more of the comedy of it and more of the character development than I had before. I think more I was in the first watch, um, I was concentrated more on the um mystery of it all and like the who-done it. And I knew going into it this time, who done it. So I was paying attention to all the other stuff. But yeah, the heartfelt parts really got me. I cried during this movie. So it was a little bit of emotion. During the first watch or this watch?

SPEAKER_01 8:59

This watch I cried. Okay. Well, I got inspired to watch the sequel right after it, and I fucking balled.

SPEAKER_03 9:07

Aww. The thing I find most interesting about you as a person, Chris Rojas, is that you seem to be someone that lacks emotion and yet so full of it. And I, on the other hand, seem like I would be full of emotion, and I lack so much of it. And that is the balance that I appreciate in this friendship. Yeah. This movie did, however, make me feel a small thing. There was a moment where I felt a thing about something, which is, you know, kind of revolutionary because I generally show up to movies to feel little to nothing.

SPEAKER_01 9:37

Except for Oculus, right?

SPEAKER_03 9:38

Yes, except Oculus. But I I don't know. I think I spent so much of this movie waiting to see what would be at the end that I don't know. I'd be interested to see how I feel about it a second time because I didn't feel much during this movie, aside from the one moment that I think would make anyone feel something, generally speaking, even if you don't care about somebody like you care about you know their family relations and stuff. So my feelings were muted.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

I didn't have any emotional style feelings, but I did feel entertained while watching the movie.

SPEAKER_02 10:09

I like that emotional style feelings. I'm gonna totally use that line. He's a robot, so he says very coded language like this.

SPEAKER_00 10:17

Right.

SPEAKER_02 10:17

It's not human, the emotional style.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

Yeah, but no, I was entertained. I feel like it it had the same feeling of other kind of like hit blockbuster horror movies made for younger crowds. Like if you would go to the movie theater to watch Scream with Your Friends or something along those lines. I'm trying to think what else people go to the theater together with friends to watch.

SPEAKER_03 10:37

But Final Destination was a big theater hit.

SPEAKER_00 10:40

Yes, it's it's got that feeling of like a final destination of like, let's go watch that together on Friday. Like, yeah, why not eat all the popcorn and stuff?

SPEAKER_03 10:46

God, rest in peace, times like that.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

I know. Now you have to sit in your couch and get popcorn everywhere.

SPEAKER_03 10:51

But HBO Max, you know, free, free releases. It's something.

SPEAKER_04 10:55

Yeah, I agree, Mac. I was pretty entertained throughout this movie. Um, mostly it just felt fun, you know. There were a lot of uh comedy beats that I really enjoyed. Um, I laughed quite a bit during this movie, even though I'd seen it before. The thing I like most is like I love a Wodun It and I love a Who Done It with like a few red herrings, and this one had like so many, and each one seemed like equally plausible until you found out it wasn't.

SPEAKER_01 11:19

Yeah, this is like a compare and contrast in a tale of two herrings in last week's episode versus this week's. And I love that you say that it was it was a fun time because I think that's just like the very definition of this movie. It has a lot of fun surprises. Again, if you've seen it once before, it may not be as surprising. I think a big question for me was whether or not I was still gonna be disappointed in the ending the same way I was, and I'm sad to report, I was a little bit more disappointed in this element of the ending this time around.

SPEAKER_04 11:49

I wonder what that is. That's gonna be fun to talk about.

SPEAKER_01 11:51

It's gonna feel real obvious when I say it later.

SPEAKER_04 11:54

Yeah, probably. I remember when I watched this the first time, I was surprised with how kind of cerebral it is, for how it also doesn't really take itself too seriously. The whole like time loop quantum physics of it all is something that they played with in such a way that was really surprising. I was like, oh, this is gonna be something stupid, and I was like, Oh, it's actually a little bit smart.

SPEAKER_02 12:12

Is it quantum physics? I don't know. Watch number two and you'll find out.

SPEAKER_04 12:15

It gets really quantum in the sequel.

SPEAKER_03 12:18

Okay, but see, you guys have feelings about things based on the sequel, and I'm only reviewing the first one because you guys know I'm not watching that movie by choice.

SPEAKER_04 12:26

I mean, anytime time loops, anytime time is nonlinear, you're you're talking quantum physics.

SPEAKER_03 12:31

This is true. Yeah, but in this movie, there is not a single ounce of quantum physics.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

It's there written into the background. There are a lot of clues pointing to it in the DNA of the film, but it's very intentionally something that they didn't focus on heavily, so they wouldn't bash you over the head with science.

SPEAKER_00 12:46

I think you need to watch Donnie Darko and then watch this film.

SPEAKER_02 12:49

Oh lord. Favorite, one of my favorite movies just because Jay Gyllenhaal.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

That's one of my girlfriend's favorite movies, and I was not really impressed. It was a fine movie. Are you kidding me? But I don't get what the big deal is.

SPEAKER_02 13:01

Oh my god, it's cult classing.

SPEAKER_04 13:03

I've never seen it, but it seems like everybody that's emo at one point loves that movie. That's true. I've never even heard of it.

SPEAKER_02 13:08

Were you ever emo? No. Okay, then there you go.

SPEAKER_03 13:12

I went a very different direction in my life.

SPEAKER_00 13:15

But if you get down with the whole quantum physics thing and like the nature of reality or in perception or whatever, like I think it's one of those films that ties in well, but it takes it obviously on a much more serious kind of route. This one takes it on a more fun route. And honestly, that's what surprised me was that mostly time loops can be really boring, and I think it actually was kind of fun. And they use it a ton in in every form of sci-fi. Like Star Trek has done this, of course, multiple times, and sometimes it gets really boring. This I I think the whole time loop thing was actually fun to watch.

SPEAKER_02 13:47

Well, um, if you know me, you know my disappointment already. I just wish there was more like blood in this, like a little bit more. I think a little bit would have done great. And they try to do it at the end. I'm like, you can't just start showing bodies at the end.

SPEAKER_03 14:01

Like, do you think you might be a little desensitized, Alexis?

SPEAKER_02 14:05

Possibly. Possibly might be a little desensitized, but I wish there was a little bit more gore. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:10

I feel like that's fair.

SPEAKER_02 14:11

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 14:12

A little more blood wouldn't have hurt anybody.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

You think this would have been better rated R instead of PG 13?

SPEAKER_04 14:16

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:17

I think it's good as is. Isn't everything better rated R, to be honest?

SPEAKER_00 14:21

For the language. Because then you can say fuck more. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 14:25

Yeah, her saying fuck more, she would be me. I think the language is my least favorite part of a rated R film, but I don't know. For me, I feel exactly the opposite of you, Mac. I was so disappointed by how much I hated watching the same day over and over again. And it it it wasn't fun to me. And I have more feelings about that, but I am down for like nonlinear time. Everything is fake, nothing makes sense, it's all unreal, you know? I'm really down for the hippie life. Not really, but uh conceptually I'm down for it. But in this instance, watching someone live through the same day over and over again, truly miserable.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yeah, nothing's real except for the reality you manifest for yourself in your imaginary mind because we're all insignificant little specks of dust.

SPEAKER_03 15:12

Yeah, dude. Everything's made up, and also every word that you know for everything that exists in this world was made up by some other person that doesn't deserve your power.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Okay, so you remember how Ryan just said she didn't have an emo phase? Locked and loaded right now. Walking into it.

SPEAKER_04 15:27

Seriously. Commence existentialism.

SPEAKER_03 15:29

Yes, the existentialism has been there, but I didn't go the dark path, she says in her black hoodie.

SPEAKER_00 15:34

Ryan's truly a nihilist.

SPEAKER_01 15:36

I'm sorry, what'd you call me? I'm curious to hear now, given Ryan's just her take on the disappointment of this movie. I'm curious to see what she felt about the end. I'm gonna give you guys a little taste of what my qualm was about that ending. My issue is there's so much building in this movie for the characters in it, more specifically the main character, and there's just a lot that is achieved, but then there's a crucial moment and some dialogue that's just haphazardly thrown in there at the end. It just makes the third act feel silly. It's not enough to wreck the whole ending because I love the way everything else is buttoned up, but the motivations there piss me off.

SPEAKER_03 16:10

I think I fully agree with you. There's kind of like an ending to the story, and then of course there's like an end bit. The end bit I'm totally cool with, but like the the wrap-up of the story, the resolution of the story. I'm just like, eh, like, is that what we needed to do? Does that make any sense? I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 16:32

Chris, I feel like I know exactly what you're talking about and obviously feel the complete opposite.

SPEAKER_03 16:37

Of course.

SPEAKER_04 16:38

I don't think there was anything haphazard about some of that dialogue and explanation that went into it. Actually, I I just remembered the reason I watched this movie is because uh one of my best friends, Lou, who whose recommendations I take to heart, he was like, Hey, I just watched this movie and you have to watch it, and then let me know what you think about the part at the end. And when I watched it, I knew exactly what part he was talking about, and I was like, Okay, this was a good watch. So I liked the ending.

SPEAKER_02 17:03

I like the ending. I clearly remember this ending pretty perfectly that in the first few scenes I still remember it. So to me, it's a memorable ending.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

You just wish it was bloodier.

SPEAKER_02 17:13

Well, yeah, the bloodiest you get is at the end.

SPEAKER_03 17:15

Sorry, she wants the whole movie covered in blood, not just the ending. That's not the order. Don't get the order wrong.

SPEAKER_01 17:21

Yeah, let's take Dead Alive, Level of Blood, put on Happy Death Day. Eh, maybe not that much.

SPEAKER_00 17:27

I'll take it. Basically, at the end of the movie, she time loops into Saul. That's what she wants.

SPEAKER_03 17:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:33

Imagine dramatic a little bit. Here's the solution. You're in a game.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Every day you wake up and live the same life.

SPEAKER_02 17:39

And you're repeating the same day over again until you fucking get your shit together. As if it wasn't bad enough already.

SPEAKER_00 17:45

I did not have problems with the ending because I just like, I don't know, I was kind of apathetic. I mean, there's one component to it that I found a bit weak, and it just has to do with one of the characters feeling a bit extraneous. But the ending in general, I just kind of breezed through and didn't really think twice about. Parts of the movie are like kind of cheese tastic, but it's it's not it's not cheesy as in like bad effects or bad dialogue for me. It's just like cheesy as in like too sentimental, maybe. It seems fine, like I didn't even notice it. I was like, okay, this one character I feel like is extra, but but you know, aside from that, I'm I'm cool with the way it ends. And uh actually I wanted to watch the second one, I didn't watch it afterwards, and I I kind of planned to do so, but after finishing it, it did make me want to continue watching.

SPEAKER_02 18:29

But you know what's really crazy? To me, deja vu is very similar to like repeating your day the same way or just from thinking you you were you did that same thing. And I'm gonna tell you, deja vu is terrifying. The idea of living the same day every day is terrifying, but obviously this movie was not scary at all.

SPEAKER_01 18:46

Yeah, I completely agree with you, Alexis. This movie isn't scary, but it's a comedy, right? So it's not gonna, it's not intended to spook you too badly, but I will say I'm very happy that they still managed to maintain some classic tense slasher moments.

SPEAKER_03 19:01

As far as like, you know, seeing somebody in the background and random shapes appearing. I'm on board with that. I was a little perturbed by the number of audible jump scares they were going for. I don't is that a thing? You know, the like scene where you know you kind of know someone's gonna appear and they hit you with a very loud tune out of nowhere. Those kind of stood out to me, and I think it's because I didn't expect any real horror from this movie. So then when you're like trying to force me into a jump scare, I'm like, mmm, no, thanks for trying though.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

Yeah, I mean, you're riding in a car that has like a horror sticker on the bump on the bumper in this movie. Like we know it's playing with horror themes, but it's not trying to be Halloween or anything. It's got a killer, the killer shows up in really predictable ways, and I think that's part of the film. Like when you get to kill scenes, you know what's coming and you're expecting it because you've seen this day after day and you know what to expect. And so I don't I don't know that they wanted you to be surprised by any of that like you typically would in other slasher films. Um and I I kind of got down with that because it took that whole part out of the equation. I didn't have to worry about like, oh no, is it that them around the corner, or is it like somebody else that's just no, it's like whatever, dude. You know the killer's gonna show up. You know it's gonna be when they're looking the wrong way, or when you hear a weird sound, or when something is in the scene, and who cares? Like, that's not the important part. It's the mystery that's the important part.

SPEAKER_04 20:25

I totally agree. I feel like Chris described it really well. This definitely honors some of the like the classic horror slasher kill moments and uh builds suspense in those scenes, um, but not enough that you're like actually afraid because you're kind of informed early on that there's like not a lot of consequences when the killer comes around because everything's just gonna start over, um, which kind of allows you to have more fun with those moments.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

Yeah. It like does just enough of what slashers usually do where the movie won't scare you, but if you were to see familiar scenery and you're walking alone late at night, you might think, oh shit, this is like out of happy death day.

SPEAKER_04 21:02

Like being in a tunnel in a park?

SPEAKER_01 21:03

Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 21:05

As if I would ever walk through a tunnel in a park at night with those stupid caution lights. No. And it's my birthday and something's playing happy birthday? Nah.

unknown 21:15

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

You wouldn't think it's some elaborate moves that we're pulling over on you? No, I would dip.

SPEAKER_03 21:20

And if y'all are, you've made a mistake. I don't care enough. I will dip, and you can be like, dude, we did this thing for your birthday. Like, all right, well, it was dumb.

SPEAKER_01 21:28

You shouldn't have done that.

SPEAKER_03 21:29

I left.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

I'll keep that in mind for future birthday surprises. Now, it's no secret, right, that this movie borrows a lot from other movies. It admits to it itself when it compares itself to Groundhog Day at one point. But what this does though was perfectly blend horror comedy and then familiar bits of other movies to feel fresh. It still felt not an entirely new or original idea, but it felt like a fresh experience that I think horror needed at that time.

SPEAKER_02 21:56

Yeah, I completely agree, and I love Carter's statement at the end on Groundhog's Daily. Like, you haven't seen that movie? Like, oh. And I was I just thought that was like the nice, uh nice tidbit to leave at the end of the movie.

SPEAKER_04 22:07

I do agree that this felt familiar and yet original. I talk about this all the time, but it took a new approach to something that we've seen before. I don't know if there's anything else like this where it's like horror movie slasher, but it's in a time loop. I think that's a fun, like random combination of ideas that that made for something that felt fresh.

SPEAKER_03 22:27

Yeah, I feel like fresh is a good way to describe this movie, but I'm gonna I'm gonna step out here and say that we give movies a little bit too much credit for originality sometimes. I don't think this is original. There it there's almost nothing original about it. Sure, we you know bring some ingredients together to make something that hasn't been, but I think fresh is a good way to describe it. Not so much original to me.

SPEAKER_00 22:51

I don't think it needs to be original. You know, I mean we've mentioned obviously it's got parts of other films or other stories in it to make its own thing, and I think that's the whole point is that you don't want it to be completely removed from everything else because that familiarity is what makes the movie successful. And it kind of reminds me of a 2020 film that's on Hulu Palm Springs, another great take on time loops, really fun to watch, very entertaining. Little bit of death in there, not really like a murder mystery kind of situation, but uh I I like the fact that it feels familiar. I think that's an important part of it.

SPEAKER_01 23:24

Original, fresh, who's to say? We'll see how all these opinions weigh out in terms of an actual score. Place your bets now, folks, on how this movie's gonna end up being rated. But before we get into the actual scoring, Alexis. How many people died in this movie?

SPEAKER_02 23:38

I'm happy to say, even though I wish there was more gore, surprisingly, there's 20 deaths in this movie.

SPEAKER_05 23:44

Hmm.

SPEAKER_02 23:45

A little asterisk, and I can explain later in the second half. But 20 deaths. Solid 20.

SPEAKER_03 23:50

But did any animals die in this time loop? Ooh, I'm so thankful that there were no animal deaths because if you kept showing me the same thing over and over, we would have had some problems. So everything is good to go this week.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

Alright, then let's see how this shakes out. Happy death day from 2017. Is it a hack or a slash?

SPEAKER_00 24:07

I'll go first on this one because I found it just easily entertaining. It was just an easy movie to watch. It felt fresh, like everyone has said. It's not something I'd seen before. I wasn't bored by it. It just felt like a good, easy thing to put on the TV and like tune out. And I didn't have to pull up my phone and browse Instagram or anything. It wasn't boring, it wasn't too easy. It was like right um the right amount of entertainment. So I really enjoyed it. I think it's a great one to throw on the TV at home and sit on the couch. Um, and I honestly don't have much else to say. No complaints, it was a good ride.

SPEAKER_02 24:41

Yeah, definitely. I feel how you feel. I was excited to watch this again. I was like, oh my gosh, I remember loving this movie, and I remember super excited when Happy Death Day 2 came out. I was like, oh my gosh, I have to watch this as soon as I can. And I'm giving this a slash for many reasons, but mostly because if you guys know me, um, I don't know if I've recently divulged that I've been kind of binging teen mom lately.

SPEAKER_04 25:05

I did think of you when I saw teen mom.

SPEAKER_02 25:07

I literally put it on the background, just and Janelle is my favorite trash person. So I've been binging this lately, and the fact that this is featured in this movie, I've never been so excited in my life. I'm like, okay, someone's obsessed with it just as much as me. Plus, I'm gonna take a note from Paris' book, love the fashion in this, loved her outfit, and it was cool watching it in a new way. I I was watching her character development, I was watching Tree just, you know, go throughout life and go through living her death every day. I liked it. I loved it. It's one of my top 15 probably movies easily.

SPEAKER_04 25:44

I don't think there's anything wrong with that, Alexis. This too quickly climbed the charts into some of my top favorite horror movies. Like we've said, it's fun, it's entertaining. I really personally love what it does, how it like plays with the format in a way that gives you something that we've said is fresh because I can't think of anything else like this. I also, of course, love a story that's mostly focused on a female character who honestly gets a lot of development throughout this. I think both her and the movie start in a really shallow place and end somewhere that has like a surprising level of depth, which I wasn't expecting when I first saw this. Um, and I feel like it mixes that depth with enough like superficial dumb bitch dialogue to keep me like very happy because that's my happy place, as we know. Um so this is absolutely a slash for me. I love this movie, and I've actually seen it like six times and happily saw the sequel in theaters.

SPEAKER_03 26:33

Yeah, Paris, you know, we really align on many things. And this is not one of them. Okay, so a little a little random tidbit about my life. I got a DVD player, our family got one at some point in life, and Freaky Friday was one of the only DVDs we've ever owned.

SPEAKER_04 26:50

That's a good one.

SPEAKER_03 26:51

Yeah, sure. It's great. I think I watched it a billion times. I could recite every single word from it, and and this movie is is Freaky Friday, but horror in a way, right? It's the same, same but different. I think that all the things you appreciate about this movie are the things that I truly don't care about. It's weird because I am, if our listeners don't know, I'm a woman in college. I've been in college for a long time. I'm working on a lot of things, and I could not care less about women in college. And every time you hit me with like a a frat party or like a sorority in a movie or something like that, I just don't care. And I think a part of it is because I don't relate to it, because it it doesn't feel like the real experience to me. It doesn't feel like real life, it feels like a movie. I just don't care. I don't care about like showing up to your house and having fake friendships with other people that live in your house and they, you know, talk trash and you know, there's just a just this whole thing that just doesn't connect to me at all. And this movie has almost every single bit of it. In watching this movie, I found that watching someone live through the same day over and over and over again is almost as bad as actually doing it yourself. And I was just like, I saw the trailer to this movie, I didn't need to see any more of it because it was the trailer. It just didn't do it for me. I wanted like this really rich ending, and then they gave it to us and then took it away from us. And it was like, hey, this is what you thought you would get. It's really great. This is a lovely, you know, meaningful story. And then they just kind of like went back on their word and just turned it back into the same thing that it already was, that I already didn't care about. I'm kind of going hard about this, but I just could not have cared less about this movie, and so obviously it's a hack for me, and I feel like I shouldn't have to be the one balancing this team all the time. I don't know why y'all keep slashing stuff like this.

SPEAKER_04 28:40

Because it's it's entertaining.

SPEAKER_01 28:42

Yeah, I would say Happy Death Day was generally loved uh and well received by audiences. It's just me here complaining then, and I'm fine with that.

SPEAKER_00 28:51

Somebody has to be the cranky old man.

SPEAKER_03 28:53

I do be the cranky old man sometimes. I do have a bad hit. I'd rather be friends with your grandpa than this girl in college. So there's that.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Ryan, I think you actually said it perfectly when you mentioned that this movie gives you a great ending and then takes it away at the same time. I totally agree with you there. But I also think that might be all we see eye to eye on. So I'm I'm curious to see how this discussion unfolds in the second half. This movie is funny, it's emotional, it's semi-tense, and it's got an unconventional final girl you can't help but fall in love with as her character molds. Or at least I couldn't. I think a lot of people couldn't. I do see your point on the classic tropey college campus frat party situations. I think I maybe I've grown desensitized to it because that's just all you see of college in these movies. So I just stopped caring. It's like no longer a box that can be checked for me. But apart from that, this movie is just simply a good ride. It's a slash. And with that, Happy Death Day is a mostly happy slash day, earning four slashes in one hack. Now you can find this movie streaming on FX if it's included on your cable plan. Otherwise, it is available for rent or purchase. Check it out, then join us in the second half so we can continue to unpack Ryan's distaste for this movie. See you in a bit.

SPEAKER_00 30:13

You had fun the night before. On the couch and on the floor. You thought you met a winner after a lengthy, liquid dinner. But now that night is gone and you awaken to the dawn, your vision's restored, it's apparent you scored, and your new friends a creepy grinner. Nobody wants to hit a 10 a.m. class wearing shoes meant for the club, last night's makeup, and a stranger's underpants, because yours are who knows where. Call Print My Ride. Our mobile priming service shows up to escort you to your next destination with all the amenities you need to feel ready to go for the day. Toothbrush, toothpaste, endless mouthwash, dry shampoo, black tea, black jeans, and Chelsea boots, so you can fit in wherever you're headed. Each Print My Ride van includes staff to speedily freshen up your makeup and hair, and yes, even a pair of fresh underwear. Don't keep stressing about dressing. Print My Ride is there for you as soon as you wake up in Orando's Twin XL.

SPEAKER_01 31:09

Welcome back, folks. You are now entering the spoiler zone for Happy Death Day, which has had a pretty good day so far. It's earned four slashes and only one hack. Now we have a lot to unpack here, but before we get into the specifics of our ratings and our scores and unpacking the love and the hate we have for this movie, we have the matter of gore to attend to. Alexis, what's the gore score for this movie?

SPEAKER_02 31:28

The gore score this week is gonna be low, and it's so surprising because there's 20 deaths in this movie. But you get those 20 from tree dying like one too many times. I don't know. It's exciting. It's fun to have yourself die in so many different ways. She does get stabbed a lot. Um, I wish there was more, a little bit more of that. But for me, I think Carter's death was kind of my favorite essentially because I think it was most shocking for me. I didn't necessarily think um the killer was going to snap his neck. So when it happened, I think I was very taken back and been like, and that was the only death that I was really like about until it was Laurie's, but uh but definitely Carter's death. Because I was like, Oh, poor Carter, he's just being this like cute guy.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

I rather enjoyed Danielle getting hit by a bus. That was a good one, Mac. But like you knew what's coming. They're in the road, you're like, oh, what if uh and then it boom, it hits, and you're it was just really satisfying. I liked it. It was it was a good one.

SPEAKER_03 32:26

Mac, that's actually also my favorite, and it's because you kind of don't expect w it to happen to both of them. Yeah. You know, of course, we know she's gonna die at some point, but you don't expect it to happen exactly the way it does. And so that was the one that stood out to me as well.

SPEAKER_04 32:41

I guess I will go for my backup uh because that was also on my list. Um, I'm gonna give it to the time tree gets killed by being absolutely nailed in the head with a baseball bat. And I really like that one because of the way it frames that shot. You kind of just follow her head being knocked sideways uh with the baseball bat into her head landing on the pillow and then waking up again. So I thought that transition was really nicely done.

SPEAKER_01 33:04

Well, that's a bummer. That was actually my favorite shot of the whole damn movie.

SPEAKER_04 33:07

Wasn't it good?

SPEAKER_01 33:09

But it wasn't my favorite death. It was actually Lori's not the aftermath of her body, but just her splatting and then the blood shooting up subtly from the bottom of the phrase. The only gore I got. It was the only gore I needed.

SPEAKER_02 33:21

Speaking of that, so um, the original script written by Scott Lobdel included material that was supposed to make this movie rated R, which I essentially probably would have liked that. It included some grislier deaths, and very surprisingly, he went ahead and altered those to make it the rating it was and took those out.

SPEAKER_04 33:38

You hate to see it.

SPEAKER_02 33:39

I hate to see that too. And it's so crazy because this movie, when you think about it, the first death is in within 14 minutes, and then you have another break and you have 14 minutes, and that's like the longest you have between deaths in this movie. Mostly it ranges from five to seven, um, sometimes 10. So you're like, okay, consistently, like there's death in this movie. I would want it to be just a tad bit grislier, but I feel like if you mess with that a little bit, there's a good balance that with the comedy, it's gonna look kind of crazy and it'll be kind of weird. But yeah, Chris mentioned also that I thought was super neat because you guys know I love Scream. The Bayfield University baby killer mask was designed by Tony Gardner, who also designed the Scream franchise's ghost face. So the director was testing it out, walking around in the office, and actually scared a worker. So clearly it was a good choice. I don't know, a baby with a little like tooth sticking out.

SPEAKER_01 34:35

You don't like snaggle tooth scary baby?

SPEAKER_03 34:37

Little bucktooth baby is actually really horrific in this movie. I think if I if I was in my room and turned around and saw this, I'd lose it.

SPEAKER_04 34:46

Do we like the baby mask though? Because I honestly I feel like it was kind of lame. And I've only recently started to like come around on it because of just it's been around so long.

SPEAKER_03 34:55

I would like to say I think it has like the right amount of comedy to it where it's like cute and really creepy. So it's like comical, although I will say, as like a mascot for a school, no.

SPEAKER_04 35:07

Yeah, what a baby mascot?

SPEAKER_03 35:09

Yeah, uh the babies, uh hard no.

SPEAKER_02 35:12

But as a killer, I'm not mad at it. And I don't think I'm mad at it because I didn't even realize we did two baby face killers back to back. Like I didn't even remember. Boom.

SPEAKER_04 35:22

I didn't either until Chris said it. And I was like, oh yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_01 35:25

There it is. Every movie is slightly obscurely connected to the last.

SPEAKER_04 35:29

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 35:30

In a way, I hate it, it creeps me out.

SPEAKER_03 35:32

Well, to go from the gore, you know, I think there's some interesting visual elements in this movie. There's one that really particularly stood out to me. I know we were talking about like the mask and everything. For me, um, the killer standing at the police car window, looking into the window. So we're actually getting a shot of tree. And in the reflection, you can see the cop lights flashing against the mask in the reflection of the window. So, so, so good as far as like visually this movie. That was the thing that stood out to me the most. And it was one of those things where I know they set it up very intentionally, it wasn't on accident. The eyes of the two characters almost matched up perfectly, but I just loved it. It was it was one of those things where I'm like, I'm thankful that they did it, and it it made me excited in the middle of a movie that I wasn't excited about.

SPEAKER_02 36:25

Interesting. So, my favorite, like I have two. One is like so superficial, and I know everyone's gonna like laugh at me, but was the opening credits when you have Universal up there, and then it was also rewinding. I was like, damn, this is smart.

SPEAKER_04 36:39

Yeah, that was fun, that was good.

SPEAKER_02 36:42

I was like, I love this too on the nose. I'm not sure, but I did like it. Um, I've also mentioned this. I appreciated Tree's wardrobe beyond belief. And usually I'm not one person to like pone in on something like that. Usually I'm like, it is what it is, but I think it just made her so relatable. You do own the same jacket, I do, and the same boots.

SPEAKER_01 37:01

Really?

SPEAKER_02 37:02

Yeah. I don't know. I just I think that helps her character, and I know we'll talk about that later, but um, I think that helped me relate to her. I was like, oh my gosh, like she has this cool wardrobe, but it's not like something crazy I wouldn't see in a store. It's like she was just very relatable in that sort of sense.

SPEAKER_04 37:17

And she definitely rocked that graphic tea.

SPEAKER_02 37:19

Uh yes. Also my fave. Day after day after day after day.

SPEAKER_03 37:24

That's cool wearing your dude's shirt, right? No? I don't know. At one point she won it for she wore it for like three days, and I'm not so sure. Well, she didn't wear it with pants one time, so that's true. Ooh, but walking through campus butt naked, not a bad experience. I feel like it would be exciting. If I was her, I would have done that.

SPEAKER_02 37:41

I would have done some crazy shit if I knew no one knew the next day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:44

Although I would like to know she kind of didn't know that no one would know the next day. She just knew she wouldn't be there the next day. But like people do remember things. She was walking, I was like, I mean, maybe maybe a thong, you know, you could go for something.

SPEAKER_01 37:58

You want to go full naked, you know. I actually really love it's not that that's my favorite scene by any means, but it's just really cool to hear about filming that scene from her perspective because all the members of the crew who were women actually protected her and then hyped her up and just helped her be more confident and free. And nobody wanted anyone like passing by to take pictures of her and stuff. So they all like got jackets and blankets, and just immediately as soon as they were done filming for that take, they all swarmed in on her to protect her. And it was just it's just such a cute moment.

SPEAKER_04 38:29

That gives me the warm fuzzies.

SPEAKER_01 38:31

She seemed like a very proud being in that scene, so I'm happy for that. Paris mentioned earlier just how absolutely incredible this shot is for the baseball bat when it's cracking into her head and she's cracking onto the pillow. And that's actually such a great theme in this movie visually, and then it even carries into the sequel really uh really beautifully as well. Beyond that, visually, I just love the way they play with the shadows in this movie. The way all these, you know, all these shots are composed, and again, this is just my poor little slasher heart, right? Having tree in the foreground with the killer lurking in the background in the shadows, just coming in, or seeing Nick being murdered in the background with the lights flashing all around. I just fucking loved it.

SPEAKER_04 39:15

Chris, I feel like we've gone tit for tat because you've just now taken my favorite visual element, which was tree texting while Nick's getting killed in the background. I love the way they set up that juxtaposition. I there's something about like texting while someone's being murdered that like really makes me laugh because it's so like flippant while also so grave.

SPEAKER_02 39:35

Also so true. I feel like some people like people now are so invested in their phones that they don't pay attention to anything.

SPEAKER_04 39:40

Yeah. To like not even notice a murder's happening because you're like texting somebody. And the conversation was so petty. They were like fighting with Danielle over a boy.

SPEAKER_01 39:48

Yeah, honestly, though, if that dude if us just seen a room where a guy was dancing really shittily to shitty music in what he has described as the pleasure dome, I wouldn't give a shit about him either.

SPEAKER_04 39:58

Oh my god, I know.

SPEAKER_03 40:00

Thank you. I was literally gonna say he deserves it. Absolutely, and he deserves no attention during this death because that was horrific. That was maybe the scariest part of this entire movie, you know?

SPEAKER_02 40:12

And then you're followed it by the best line, and it she's like when they're texting Paris. I'm I know I'm sure you probably caught that, but it was like, I hope you both die. Like from Danielle, and I was like, oh shit.

SPEAKER_03 40:24

Which is what we would say to each other if we were in friends in this situation, right? Like, that's that's like the classic like girl thing to say is like, I hope you both die. I would absolutely say that to somebody as a joke, of course.

SPEAKER_04 40:36

But also, somebody I hope died was the frat dude who came in and like saw her being attacked on that bed and was just like, yeah, party and left.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

I was like, no, yeah, piece of shit.

SPEAKER_04 40:45

You garbage person. But also, I was like, true and accurate.

SPEAKER_03 40:48

Not unrealistic, and that's what's hateful about it. Not that that far from reality, right? For a random drunk person to show up and not care about what's going on.

SPEAKER_01 40:56

Yeah, like, oh shit, you guys think you just got a comedy here? No, we're gonna just fucking make this real dark real fast.

SPEAKER_03 41:02

Yeah, for a very brief moment.

SPEAKER_00 41:04

It's hard to describe what I liked about the movie visually because there's just like a certain feel to it. I don't know if it's like color grading or the cameras that they use, but it has a very like kind of polished feel, but this the but it works because like the setting is so lived in the college campus and the dorm rooms and everything, like feel kind of real. But watching the film, it doesn't seem grungy, it doesn't seem like a soap opera though. It's just kind of like going to Target. It's in the Goldilocks zone where like everything just kind of like seems nicer, even though you know there's the smell of popcorn at the uh at the entrance. And I don't know why that is. It's just like a magic, there's just like a good, clean feeling to it visually. So I don't know what they did, but that's what I appreciate is like looking at the film, looking at the colors, looking at the depth of field that they that they bring in so many shots, like it just like feels good to watch.

SPEAKER_03 41:51

The thing about Target though is that everything is cheap and costs a little bit more than it should. I don't know how that applies to this movie, but I just wanted to throw it out there.

SPEAKER_01 42:00

So it's the price that you have to pay for this Target movie, uh, the time that you'll never get back because you had such a shitty time with it.

SPEAKER_03 42:06

In a way, yes, you could have gone to Walmart for the same thing, but you felt a little too good for Walmart, so you showed up to Target.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

Yeah, you know it. I go to Target like two to three times a week, so I can't help it.

SPEAKER_03 42:16

Pay 20 bucks for what you get at Walmart for five bucks. Come on.

SPEAKER_00 42:18

Yeah, but I feel better about it. That's the thing, is like while watching this, I could have watched other movies that are similar, but like looking at this movie is more enjoyable. I just, it's a better situation. I don't know why.

SPEAKER_04 42:29

You're also like not scared going to Target in the way you are sometimes when you go into a Walmart.

SPEAKER_02 42:33

I'm more annoyed. Like I just get annoyed as soon as I park in Walmart.

SPEAKER_03 42:37

What's life if not a little bit of roughing up, you know?

SPEAKER_00 42:40

Okay, so one of the things like that I just don't know why I like it, but I but I do, is the scene where she like wakes up and makes her way into the quad and walks through, and just like the sequence of events like continually happening. I know you hated seeing it over and over again, but that scene of like her making her path through the quad to get back to like her place, I just like really liked it. It felt like there was so much going on, but it didn't feel too messy. It obviously was very deliberate, uh, but it was kind of enjoyable and really silly. Each character felt like an actual character that she was interacting with in some way, showing us who she was as a person at that time or in that loop. But that like whole segment, each time they did it, Ryan. I know you hated it, but each time they did it, I actually really enjoyed it kind of more and more.

SPEAKER_02 43:24

Yeah, you know what that segment is called? Um, it's called the walk of shame. Um, and let me give you a brief history. No, I'm kidding. I don't need to give you history. It's shitty, and even in your 30s, it's even shittier.

SPEAKER_03 43:36

The nicer you look the night before, the worse the walk of shame is the way. It really is.

SPEAKER_02 43:41

The worst part is when you do it from someone you know and you're just doing it a very short time frame, or like if you're on a college campus, everyone's doing it. But if you're like in a neighborhood, you're like, what is wrong with my freaking life? But I I as much as I love that scene, I think my second favorite is um when she has her lunch with her dad. And I think it's where you see kind of this character development for her, and like you see it like progressing um throughout this one life that day she has where she's like being nice to everyone. And I'm like, oh wow, she's turning over a new leaf. She's not like that much of a bitch. And I'm not even talking about sororities. But I love that. And actually, like when she was talking, it made me cry because you kind of knew what was going on during that point. You knew like at that point, her mom and her shared a birthday, and then the dad just wanted to connect, and you know, there wasn't any like sort of like struggle. And I was like, I need to text my parents more. That's what I thought about after this. I was like, I need to be in contact with my parents more. Maybe they're going through more things than I know. And I don't know, cried for sure.

SPEAKER_01 44:45

That part made me emotional, but the part where I really cried was when we see her watching the video and just like kind of dwelling in these memories of her mother when she's in her room. The only thing I'm like actually afraid of in life, I know I'm like, yeah, I joke about like being afraid of water and heights. The only thing that I truly unquestionably fear is the crippling reality that if everything works out as it's intended to, I'm the youngest in my family and I technically should outlive everyone. And I can't imagine a world without my mom. And that is devastating. And I love that this movie, I don't love it. That's hard, right? Like I don't want to feel that, but I love that this movie, as funny as it is and as light as it is, can make you feel so much for someone else. That being said, putting those feelings back in a box, tucking them away in the closet, my actual favorite scene is Tree's first death. And it's not that it's my favorite death, but collectively, it's this first uh run-in with the killer, it's the music box in the tunnel, it's her being skeptical, then her being fearful, and the killer jumping up out of nowhere. The tension in that scene, I absolutely love. And I think at that point, she has already listened to the voicemail for her dad, and you get these like little bits of complexity there. And I think the reason why that's my favorite is because it gives you so much feeling early on before it whacks you over the head with the mom being dead, the damaged relationship with the father. It gives you this p this place of she's about to die and she has no idea. Look at the state that her life is in right now, and the status of her relationships. That's not a way that you want to leave business unfinished and unsettled. So deep.

SPEAKER_04 46:27

You know, Chris, I love how deep you went with that. My favorite scene could not be more shallow. It is the montage that occurs with Demi Lovato's confident playing. One, because you get a bunch of deaths, rapid fire back to back. You kind of see her going through a checklist of like who she thinks the killer might be and like crossing off those suspects. And I've actually never really cared for that song until I saw this movie for like the third or fourth time, and I was like, you know what? This is a good song to like walk naked through a quad too.

SPEAKER_03 46:54

Yeah, definitely a great song for walking naked in public. Yeah, exactly. If only there were a playlist.

SPEAKER_04 47:00

What's wrong with being confident? Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 47:03

Can we do a playlist for if you are walking naked in a quad?

SPEAKER_03 47:08

I I'm gonna go back to some things that Alexis and Chris both touched on, and it is those very touching moments that we get with Tree and her father and stuff like that. I, you know, didn't really care about this character, but then when it comes down to her and her father and her mother and the things that have gone on in life, because I think we we all go through things, right? And so it's it's really difficult to go to college and be like the person that has like already lost their mother or something like that, right? So we we've all had those struggles in our own ways. Those were the moments where I cared about these characters. Those are the moments where I'm like, wow, you know, when when she, you know, goes through what seems like it's gonna be the last death, and she seems like she's really figured it out and she has to be a better person, and she does all these things and talks to all these people in the way that she should. That's something that did it for me. However, it's like prefaced by this, by this moment of like, I just don't care about people that treat people horribly. I don't I don't feel any sympathy or empathy, I suppose, for you. If you're the kind of person that treats someone that you go home with like trash when you chose to go home with them when you were drunk. I just don't care about people that act the way Tree did at the beginning of this movie. And so I didn't get invested in it, but I will say the way she grew through this and figured out, like, oh, I need to treat people better, I need to talk to my roommate about why I behave the way I behave, and those types of things, those were really valuable to me. I did feel disrespected when they just threw it out the window for a story that kind of was just like nonsense, again, like fluffy, baloney, there's no point to this really story. But in that moment where we had that like really meaningful dialogue between her and her roommate, her and her friends, and the person that's sitting outside her sorority house that's really excited to see her and says hello, you know, like those moments are meaningful and made her important to me. And I just hate that they threw it away. But her growth there was so good in this movie.

SPEAKER_00 49:13

Okay, so I'm glad that you enjoyed her character. I thought she was great to watch on on film, seeing her story progress, seeing her change and grow like a beautiful tree or whatever. But there was a character that was so extra that I truly hated them, and that was the the killer that was locked up in the hospital.

SPEAKER_03 49:32

Oh, yes.

SPEAKER_00 49:33

Why did that even happen?

SPEAKER_03 49:35

I don't know. There's many things. It was to throw you off, okay?

SPEAKER_00 49:39

I know it was supposed to be a red herring and all that kind of stuff, but like every interaction with him, I guess there were two time loops that they were involved in. I just like I don't know, I didn't want to hear him speak. Step one, I I thought that was completely unnecessary uh and boring. Uh, but like also just like why was that in the equation? I feel like there's better ways to deal with this possibility. Show that as a red herring, but don't let us like see her interact with him because those interactions were just like taking away from the film. And then when we find out that it was all BS anyway, that he it was like a setup made by her friend. Like, what who has who thinks about that? Who's like there's a killer in the hospital? I'm gonna set it up so that somehow he kills her.

SPEAKER_03 50:24

What? It's the most like meta horror movie thing ever. And it it was just like when they introduced it, it was just like, okay, so this random guy's in the hospital and he's gonna escape and stalk you. And sure, maybe that's what they were going for, but I also hated it.

SPEAKER_02 50:38

I mean, it threw me off. It it was it was effective for me. That's unfortunate. True.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

They truly they diluted to it, they had the clips of the news in the background, like the first couple times, where like she obviously wasn't paying attention to it really.

SPEAKER_02 50:50

And I wasn't either.

SPEAKER_00 50:51

Right. And and I guess that's the point where you're like, oh my gosh, that was on a TV or some something in the background, and now the picture is complete. But in the end, it wasn't truly complete anyway. It was just like, no, it was all set up somehow, oddly enough. I don't know. It just was like kind of a waste.

SPEAKER_04 51:08

That's very funny. I asked none of these questions when it was revealed any of the times. I was like, oh yeah, that makes sense. That was a pretty convenient thing for Lori to have access to, sure.

SPEAKER_02 51:18

Yeah, it was a little far-fetched. I mean, I don't know. He's a far fetched for sure. Charles Manson slash Bert from the Used, if anyone knows that guy. But um, I don't know. I enjoyed it. I I I like the cat and mouse, I like the, you know, I like my datelines, I like my you know, dateline 2020s, I like all my, you know, who done it. So this is cool. It's just like another thing to add to the book.

SPEAKER_04 51:43

And also, like by the time you get to that point, you've watched a girl go through a time loop about 15 times. So your disbelief and your suspension of it should be well established when you get there.

SPEAKER_02 51:55

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 51:55

Exactly. Mine wasn't that's the problem. I was like, Well, there's no way in physics that this keeps happening, you know? I you know me, I'm always stuck in reality, god forbid.

SPEAKER_00 52:06

So speaking about reality though, the entire time I assumed it was someone that she knew personally behind that mask, and when they gave us the reality that it wasn't, and that it was just like this random dude that somehow got a hold of the mask of the school and what? Makes no sense. Yeah, some of the time it was Lori. Yeah, I guess that's true, but then like because it was like planted in his room or whatever, that was pretty lame too. I really hoped it was her new boyfriend the whole time.

SPEAKER_04 52:33

Oh.

SPEAKER_03 52:34

I honestly I I would have enjoyed that so much more than what we got. It would have been really exciting if he was like a secretly nice guy, but also a killer, you know?

SPEAKER_01 52:45

I like I like the purity of Carter. I'm not mad at it. The angle about Lori is an interesting one because it wasn't until this watch picking up on when it was Laurie and when it wasn't Lori. First off, Lori had some feminine curves. I don't I didn't see any curves on the killer at any point. So that's a bummer. They should have been a little bit more consistent with that. However, you know, the killer taunting with the music box or happy birthday, or using the birthday candle from the cupcake to light the gasoline to cause the explosion. It was really cool trying to decipher that. Kind of like how when you watch Scream and try to figure out which killer it is at which point for which victim. And the reveal of it being Lori felt really good the first time, and it still feels good now. I feel like it's a good surprise, especially since she seems so inconsequential. But the worst part of this movie for me is undoubtedly her fucking motivation because you have this incredible arc for tree building, and Lori seems to be a girl with a a decent head on her shoulder. She seems like advising, like, hey, this is gonna have some serious consequences. So it seems like, okay, there's one stable woman in this world who's not tree's mother, who's also a decent human, revealed to be the killer. Okay, cool, I get with that. But then just to reduce her down to killing Tree over a dude, but then when Tree calls her out on that, she's like, No, you're also a dumb bitch. What the fuck? Like, what happened to anything about you?

SPEAKER_04 54:12

And here we are.

SPEAKER_01 54:13

It felt reductive and so frustrating to me. And I hated that the crux of this movie was based on someone being petty and catty, and I fucking hate that. And that's why I love Black Christmas so much because it counteracts all the bullshit, like the stereotypical tropes of sorority girls are just bitchy catty women. I hate it so much.

SPEAKER_03 54:34

I would like to 100% agree, and I want to note every single person right now is leaning into their mics trying to speak, and I won this, I won this competition here. But yes, it gave into that sorority, stupid thing of women just hating on other women, and I hate that. I hate that for this movie.

SPEAKER_00 54:52

They could have taken it uh to a really easy way and just when it was her turn to speak, she she could have just said, like, you know, I have lived with you every day for however long. You are the worst person I've ever met, and I hate you so much. That like could have been the explanation she needed.

SPEAKER_01 55:06

I would have loved that.

SPEAKER_00 55:08

Okay, listen.

SPEAKER_04 55:09

This was one of my favorite moments in the whole thing. Of course it was. When she says, Because you're you're also a dumb bitch. Because in that one line, she said all those things, Max. She said, You are a miserable roommate.

SPEAKER_05 55:22

No.

SPEAKER_04 55:23

I hate you so much. You are a rotted person. No, you're mean to everybody. No, you're horrible, and I'm the one that's had to deal with it more than anyone. I'm fed up.

SPEAKER_01 55:31

That's not what she said.

SPEAKER_03 55:32

She's part of the sorority, so she's also horrible.

SPEAKER_04 55:35

That's what I heard.

SPEAKER_01 55:36

It's because you happen to be a person who says dumb bitch all the time.

SPEAKER_04 55:39

No, but but the way she said it, the delivery. This is the thing my friend Lou was like, you're gonna love. Because like the potency behind that specific dumb bitch said everything about what Lori had been dealing with. Because Tree starts out as like the most miserable person. Could you imagine living with her? You'd probably kill her too. And Lori's also not privy to any of Tree's growth. She's still stuck on that one same day. She doesn't know she's a better person, even though she kind of comes to her and says, I'm sorry I've been a bad roommate. Like, well, uh, I'm still gonna kill you.

SPEAKER_03 56:06

Yeah, that what do you mean? There's no redemption here? She can't she can't own up to her mistakes and say, Oh, I'm so sorry that I've been this way. I'll be better. I mean, what are we talking about? This person can't be forgiven for any of the mistakes that they've made.

SPEAKER_04 56:18

Too little, too late.

SPEAKER_03 56:19

No, it's ridiculous because she was in the same sorority, so they're the same way. They're ridiculous altogether.

SPEAKER_04 56:25

She already baked the cupcake. And she's committed to this. A little apology is not gonna turn her back.

SPEAKER_01 56:31

It's so frustrating because you already get the oh, you dumb hose, oh you dumb bitch. Like you get a line from Danielle where she's like, oh, earth to space bitch. Like, it's just you you get that, right? You get that all throughout the movie. It's there, you take it for what it is. Lori's the one chance of being escape from that, and then nope, she's just like everyone else. And it is the negative stereotype of women in higher education in a sorority that is so fucking damaging. And look, it's not enough to sync the movie for me at all, but it it leaves such a bitter taste in my mouth, and I can't stand it.

SPEAKER_04 57:04

That's so funny. Once again, Chris, here we are.

SPEAKER_01 57:06

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 57:07

On the opposite sides of the same thing.

SPEAKER_02 57:09

We knew what this would be.

SPEAKER_04 57:10

I know. I love you so much.

SPEAKER_02 57:12

I agree with like that damaging part, and I thought there were a few other like um points in the movie. Like, you know, I don't know. I guess being on this podcast has like opened up my eyes, and when Chris speaks about things, I like, well, obviously I listen, but like I think I like start analyzing things more, and like I don't know, I just wasn't a fan. You know, we talked about the whole frat guy coming in and not doing anything. Um, we've talked about this whole like sorority complex that's in this movie, but then there's also like her when she goes and like hangs herself that I was like, but did we need that? Like, I didn't think it was just like maybe because I mean I I don't know how to put this in a lighter way than other than like I've had people in my family who have done that. So like it was just like very too on the nose. And I was like, okay, but do we have there's like other ways like she could chase he's chasing her, there's other ways for her to like get him to kill her. She could also just lay there. I know that's probably too on the nose, too, but I don't know. I just thought like there was just like some dark scenes and they were a little too dark for me. If I had to pick a worse part, that would be the worst part.

SPEAKER_04 58:17

Yes. Speaking of a little too much, Alexis, I love that you said that because while Danielle was obviously one of my favorite characters, there were a few times where she went a little too far. Specifically, she was a little too mean to Becky. And every time it happened, I was like, uh, you can do mean girl in a way that's fun, and you can do a mean girl in a way that you're like body shaming and a little bit racist at the same time, and it's not a good look.

SPEAKER_02 58:41

Yes, agree.

SPEAKER_03 58:42

It was a little racist. You know, it's one of those things, and I I know it's like the 2020 in us, but you you feel it and you're like, you know, maybe not.

SPEAKER_04 58:53

It's like, yeah, even though it was like still pretty recent, she was one of two black girls in that sorority, and it it didn't feel good, you know. I was like, no, Danielle, don't do this because I like you as a character, and this is making me not like you. So that's definitely my worst part. But also, I feel like Mac was kind of alluding to this earlier. I feel like the romance at the end got a little bit schmaltzy, and I was kind of like, okay, I don't really care about you two. Like, let's not get carried away. He wanted to have his babies, she said.

SPEAKER_00 59:19

So Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:20

Okay, but I would like to note, you know, man tries to save me from a killer, you know, maybe he deserves a little extra romance than what you would normally expect in a college situation, you know. I feel like I feel a little bit differently. I really liked the the little sweet romance that we get at the end of this movie, you know, like she deserves a sweet man, and hopefully he is that because there was a significant part of this movie where I thought he was the killer. And and I actually really enjoyed that little bit of like mush, you know, that got added in. It was cute. He's kind of cute too. He's like a nerdy cute. Yeah, he wasn't like ugly, you know.

SPEAKER_04 59:58

He was cute enough.

SPEAKER_03 59:59

He was cute, he wasn't hot, but you know, sororities take things very seriously. I know they wouldn't approve, but in real life, he's an attractive person, and I appreciated like how he treated her and stuff like that. I think aside from that, that was something I enjoyed. But the the best part of this movie for me is the way the killer behaves and the way the killer shows up in certain scenarios. I think it's super interesting, even from the very first kill with the tunnel and everything like that, all the way into the end where we get, you know, different killers introduced or who we might think is a different killer. Um, I think that this killer had a certain energy about them, you know, the all black with the babyface. It was very interesting. That is maybe the only thing that I cared about in this movie for a significant portion of it. And maybe, maybe I'm wrong for that, but I did enjoy that little babyface killer, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:52

I don't have many complaints about the movie. I don't know if I could pick a worse part. I think one of the things that was kind of annoying was the whole like save the environment like person standing with the clipboard and everything. That I thought was kind of annoying because everyone knows that they're out there and everyone like has learned coping mechanisms for dealing with that. And I guess that's whole part of the thing is that like, you know, she was being mean to her, at least for the first couple go-rounds. But I feel like by the age that they're supposed to be in this movie, you learn to say, like, oh my gosh, like, no thanks, I'm in a hurry, instead of yeah, just being a jerk.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:24

You would also for sure be out there with an iPad or other electronic device if you cared about paper.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:29

Definitely.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:30

Can I just say how surprised I am that Mac slashed this movie? This is one uh, you know, I was talking to Mac earlier today and just kind of like making small remarks. I try not to reveal what I'm gonna say about the podcast beforehand, but I was making small remarks to Mac, and I kind of realized he was gonna slash it, and then he did. And I'm surprised by this, but evidently I'm very wrong about people's perception of this movie, and I'm okay with that.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:57

I figured this movie wasn't offensive enough in any way for Mac to give it a hack. That's true. He's pretty gentle.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:02

He is slash until proven otherwise, where I is I am hack until proven otherwise.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:09

And I appreciate things about this that I think Paris also mentioned earlier, having the strong female lead, and in the end, the complete transformation of the character to an actually semi-decent human being, I found really important because we didn't just get you know a basic bitch the whole movie.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:25

But then it devolves, it goes forward.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:28

Yeah, we get the little bit of cheddar, but that's that part's okay, that's fine. That's the happy ending of the movie, and I'm okay with that part. It is a it's cheesy, but who cares? But you know, when we when we get that like character transformation of, you know, this girl who's listened to Taylor Swift every day of her life, to this girl at the end who can like see other human beings and the fact that they exist in the world, like that's that's cool. And she like now realizes she can be both a sorority girl and a decent human being. And having dated a sorority girl, many of them are decent human beings, and so like the character we get in the beginning is kind of annoying to watch because that's the trope that we always see in movies. But now, you know, at the end of the movie, it's like, oh, you're a productive member of society. Welcome.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:08

Is the dichotomy listens to Taylor Swift or is a good human being, but no in between?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:15

No, of course not. I love Taylor Swift too, but I think the whole point is that in the beginning of the movie, she's like two-dimensional, super duper basic, right? Like has no personality except for mayonnaise and mean. And at the end of the movie, she's now, you know, an actual human who like cares about other people and decides that they exist and that she can treat them with respect.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:34

Hurt people, hurt people. And then the roommates kill them. It happens.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:39

I will say, I won't re-watch this movie, but I am interested in the sequel, and I I would like to actually watch it pretty soon because it seems like something every person that I've mentioned this movie to has said, Did you watch the sequel? So I feel like I should.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:53

Yeah, I'm I'm the in the same boat. I was really considering watching them back to back, except for the fact that it was super late at night and I needed to work the next day. But now it's, you know, something that I I want to watch again. I don't know about like maybe I'd watch this with friends or or with my fiance because she hasn't seen it yet. So, you know, I it's something I would re-watch with company because I find it enjoyable.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:12

As much as I like this, I think I need to be a little just like it needs to have some time because I literally watched this and still remember who the killer was. I still had fun, but I think I've picked up on all I needed to pick up in two rounds in like three years. So I think I'm just gonna wait a little bit before I watch this again.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:31

Oh, I've watched this like probably six times by now, and I will continue to watch it on a regular basis. It's a fun movie to watch with somebody who hasn't seen it before. Um, and it does seem like every time I watch it I pick up on something I didn't pick up on originally. This time I actually noticed that all of the kills that had like a birthday tie-in were alluding to the fact that Lori is the only one that knew it was Tree's birthday. Because like a psycho roommate, she found her driver's license.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:58

Exactly. That is kind of like psyched.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:00

I mean, I've done it, but well, similarly to Alexis, I would definitely watch it again, but I do need some time. And I also think that I would need to watch it with someone who hasn't seen it before, but I don't think I could watch it with someone who's not a fan of horror movies. Or if they're not a fan of horror movies, totally cool. Because I think this is like a good you know part of the starter kit. I cannot watch it with someone who wants to be smarter than the quantum physics that go into the movie or is just gonna not have a good time. So many stipulations to that. I just have to mention.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:33

Basically, she can't watch it with Ryan. Yeah, is what she's saying.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:37

Obviously, we we've had a lot to talk about here. We've learned a lot about the gore, we've learned a lot about the production of the film with Tree's character strutting around naked on campus. But let's see what Mac has up his sleeve for factor fiction.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:49

Spoiler alert, there's nothing up my sleeve.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:51

It's because you only wear short sleeves.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:53

Okay, anyway, let's talk about factor fiction. Number one, the scenes in which Tree wakes up in the dorm room and then walks through the quads, some of my favorite. Favorite scenes, of course. Who wants to repeat that walk though? Um it it took a whopping week to film over and over and over again with minor variations.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:09

Fact. Fact.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:10

I'm saying fiction. I feel like, and I thought about this while I was watching it, I feel like they filmed all of that like in quick succession to get it right and keep it keep continuity on check.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:19

Well the truth is going with Paris in this case. It's actually fiction. The scenes took a bit less, you know, somewhere around like two days to film. Uh, but at one point the sprinkler system got stuck on and cost a crew a whole hour of trying to figure that out.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:31

That means someone had squishy butt when they were laying on wet grass.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:35

And speaking of soggy bottoms, let's move on to number two. If you watched the trailer, you may have noticed that Tree's ringtone was 50 cents in a club. Obviously, in the actual film, it's whatever that annoying ringtone was that they ended up with. Because after seeing the trailer, 50 Cent, of course, reached out and petitioned the filmmakers to remove the track from the film.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:54

Fiction. 50 Cent seems that petty because he wants to be a dollar. So fact.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:59

Wow. I think it came in after the fact. The trailer is so much after the production of the film. I'm not worried about it.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:06

Oh, damn. I'm actually so torn because that's a really good point, Ryan. I want to say fact, because that ringtone feels cheap and like made up last minute.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:13

Honestly, 50 Cent probably paid to have his song put in there. Let's be real. Let's be real. It was like 20 years after anybody cared about that song.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:20

He didn't have money to pay for it. Yeah, he's got 50 Cent.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:24

What is the truth, Mac? Oh goodness. The truth here is that this is fiction. So they did try to get their rights to that track, but they were ultimately unsuccessful, and so they had made that custom horrible ringtone that we got to hear over and over. It's your birthday. Numero trace. Jessica Roth has some zingers. Director Christopher Landon stated she ad libbed the line, Who Takes Their First Day at the Subway? It's not like you have a foot long. This girl knows how to shoot dudes down.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:48

I I want it to be a fact. I want it to be a fact, and it is a fact.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:52

I want it to be a fact, and the three of us together will manifest it into a fact.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:55

We will. I feel manifest.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:58

So you just experienced some quantum physics stuff going on because it's it's actually a fact. So credit where credit's due.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:05

Who takes their first day to Subway? It's not like he got a foot long.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:09

Like what a burn. You need a 12-day course of antibiotics for that burn. Number four, bad boy director Christopher Landon did us dirty. If I remember correctly, we were all fans of Tucker and Dale versus Evil. He, however, was not calling it a piss poor attempt at slapstick hillbillies.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:27

I feel like there was no comparison to the two, so I'm going to say fiction.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:31

I kind of don't understand the question, so I'm gonna say fiction also.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:35

Fiction, this feels like it was made by somebody who also enjoyed that.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:40

You are so correct. It is a fiction, and he did so enjoy that. He's actually stated this movie sort of came out of nowhere for me, and I love it. Big laughs and genuine heart. I always recommend this one to fans of horror comedy. So yeah, he was a fan. Obviously, it like affected the comedy in this film, at least that's in my mind how it works. But yeah, everyone loves that movie because it's amazing. Which takes us to number five. Ryan absolutely loves time loops, especially in this film, right? She's so much, she just loves them. Yep. Anyway, Christopher Lannon stated he went with a time loop for Happy Death Day because of the day in, day out, depressing experience he went through in university, making each day feel like groundhog day until the semester ended.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:17

Oh, fact kind of true. Yep, facts. Fact.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:20

That feels yeah, facty.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:22

I feel uncomfortable about how many of these we've agreed to.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:25

Yeah, so this was totally as I made it up. So it's not a fact, it's fiction. But he did say the answer to why she's literally stuck in a time loop. It's something I have the answer to. It's in my back pocket. Because knock on wood, you never know how things are going to go, and we're not counting our chickens, but if I'm lucky enough to have the opportunity to make a sequel, the answer to that question's it's it's the premise to my sequel. And of course, we know that they made a sequel that I haven't seen yet, so I can't wait to see.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:50

I would like to admit I'm gonna try to watch the sequel today or tomorrow because it feels necessary. And maybe this is meant to be a one one-bit unit, you know, one and two together. But in this sense, it's it's not.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:03

Be warned though, it has like 100% more science.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:06

Yeah, like a hundred percent more. I'm literally down for more science because here we got none, and the whole time I was like, okay, sure, she's the killer, but like how? You know, I need more.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:17

And that concludes Mac Lies to you or Factor Fiction.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:20

Well, thank you so much, Mac, for that arousing factor fiction. And with that, there you have it. Happy Death Day has earned four slashes and one hack. Now, we certainly have a lot to talk about here, and we know that conversation never ends here. We want to know what you think. We want to know if you hated it as much as Ryan did. Now keep in mind there are a number of ways you can reach out to us, starting with our website, hackerslash.com, and on our social media accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:44

And if you feel bad for me for being the only hack amongst all these slashes lately, you can reach out to our Hackerslash Hotline. You can leave us a voicemail at 757-606-0128, or visit hackerslash.com slash contact to send us an audio message, especially if you're international.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:00

Or if this is the tenth time you've listened to this because you're stuck in a time loop, you can send us an email to feedback at hackerslash.com.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:06

If you've enjoyed listening to this episode, consider becoming one of our patrons. You can visit patreon.com slash hacker slash to earn cool perks for as low as $1 a month. But also, there's another tier. For $3 a month, you get access to B-Sides, where you can listen to all the ridiculous outtakes that didn't make it into this episode, as well as unrelated shenanigans that we just get into somehow. So give it a thought. Oh, yeah, that part.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:34

And on that note, bye.