This week we’ve gathered three generations of hosts to unpack the highly-requested Hereditary (2018). We delve into its jaw-dropping story beats, unravel its depiction of strained family relationships, and dig deep into its nuanced take on mourning....

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This week we’ve gathered three generations of hosts to unpack the highly-requested Hereditary (2018). We delve into its jaw-dropping story beats, unravel its depiction of strained family relationships, and dig deep into its nuanced take on mourning. In this episode's b-side, we reflect on the gang finally meeting in person, question the existence of the movie’s family dog, and learn Binx can see sound. This episode contains spoilers, beginning at 52:37.


Mentioned in the Episode

Watch the Movie

Hereditary (2018)

Spooky Season Essentials

(New) Blood Drive

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Main Episode

Hereditary (2018) - Discussion Forum

102: Midsommar (2019)

Hereditary Ending Explained

Female madness, decapitation, and cults in Hereditary

Hereditary Taps Into the Unique Terror of Inherited Mental Illness

Reddit: Schizophrenia/DID Theory

B-side

Everyday fantasia: The world of synesthesia


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Music Credits

"Hack or Slash" by Daniel Stapleton

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Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

SPEAKER_07

Come on Charlie, let's go party. Oh, uh, oh, yikes. Spooky season greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. It's heartening to see so many strange new faces here today. 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_03

Totally killer, pun intended.

SPEAKER_07

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with a perspective we've 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, and this week I'm joined across the table by the Superfly Space Guy Mac, the classic horror connoisseur Sean, the paranormal paramour Binx, the cowardly creeper Ryan, and the Scream Queen Paris. This week we're delivering a long-awaited episode on an A24 film that explores the unsettling terrain of a family grappling with profound loss. The film serves as Ariaster's feature directorial debut and was produced on a budget of $10 million, which went on to gross more than $82 million worldwide. Its box office success made it A24's highest grossing film of all time until it was just unseated by Everything Everywhere All At Wants just last year. The film introduces us to a family consumed by grief, navigating a series of increasingly unsettling and inexplicable events. The end result is a relentless spiral where reality skews, and it becomes difficult to separate emotional hardship from psychological anguish. This week we're talking about hereditary. Who's seen this one before?

SPEAKER_00

So I saw this movie a few years ago. I didn't see it in theaters, I saw it at home, but I only saw it one time. And unfortunately, I think this movie all has a reputation that precedes itself. And I went into it the first time without knowing any of that, so it was good.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I also have only seen this movie once, and I feel like I've purposely tried to wait a good amount of time before I were to re-watch it. So this kind of worked out perfectly.

SPEAKER_02

That's that's interesting because this is one that I've seen like a good handful of times by now, which I think is crazy because it really hasn't been out that long when you think about it. Like, what's it been out? Five, six years, something like that, 2018. But I've seen it like a good handful of times, and I I agree, Ryan. It has a reputation that precedes itself. I think a lot of people say this is one of the scariest movies they've watched, or modern scary movies, whatever. But I just remember when this came out, just really just messing with friends and family. Like we were just talking about that, Binx, right? The whole right? I just did that and messed with friends, family in the dark while they were asleep. Oh man, I just went to town. I went to town and it was a good time.

SPEAKER_03

I've I've definitely seen it before, I think maybe twice total, though. Although the second time was plenty of like rewinding and re-watching. I don't know why, but I like had to see things over and over again. But I think everyone I know that's talked about it has always commented on how messed up that they find it. They think it's truly screwed up or strange or or twisted in some way. But I never really found it that. It was just, oh, we'll get into it later, but it's it's it's different.

SPEAKER_11

So I definitely also saw this before. I actually saw it in theaters with my cousin, who I actually have not seen since, I don't think. Like in person, he's still alive. I was gonna ask. But I remember the commercial, like the previews and trailers for this movie, like really laid into like the of it all. Like that was like a heavy element in the trailers. And I remember being like, this movie looks kind of generic and kind of boring. Um, but I'll go see it because my cousin's here anyway. So it's something to do.

SPEAKER_00

If I if I could have made a bet, I would have bet a million dollars that you saw this in the theater. It's so predictable.

SPEAKER_11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07

Well, I think I'm the only one here who hasn't seen this movie before. What? Yes, Paris. I hadn't seen it.

SPEAKER_11

I think I've yelled at you for this before.

SPEAKER_07

You have, and let me tell you fucking why I haven't seen it. Because when it came out, no one could stop talking about it, no one could shut the fuck up about it. And so everything in this movie was spoiled for me. Everything was spoiled for me. So this is one of those that I needed to give it time and space, and I was trying to just forget it because the way that the experience of this movie was described and how fucked up some of it can be, I was like, man, this sounds like it'd be so cool to watch, and I feel like I would really like it, but it was impossible to separate what I had heard from almost having like the wind being taken for my sails, right? This is one of those that I had to wait a very, very long time for it to come up on the podcast so I could like, at least in my opinion, give it a fair shake, so I wouldn't just be immediately underwhelmed by it. So I went into this hoping that I would be able to appreciate it for what it was, versus recalling the many things that I've heard and the many moments that are spoiled, because there's some shocking times in this movie, and I saw every one of them coming because somebody had fucking ruined it for me.

SPEAKER_04

That's unfortunate because to me I'm thinking if this had been like your first generic watch through, it would have been interesting to see how you would have thought about the movie and its themes having been what you've been through this year. Because mm, for me, what I was expecting is to see how this movie explores grief, and obviously we've shared on the podcast before we've we've lost, you know, our grandparents this year. So it's like I've I've found it so interesting how it affected me, I guess, having not experienced that when I first watched it. And it's unfortunate for you that you already had that spoiled for you. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, no, 100%. Like this is one that I you know, a big fuck you to everybody who spoiled this movie for me over the last however many years, because that shit is rough. But here's the thing. Okay, so was it spoiled for you like right when the movie came out? That's right when the movie came out, and then every fucking time after that. Because it occasionally I'd go a couple months without hearing about it, and then oh, you do a horror movie review podcast? What'd you think about hereditary when blint happens? I'm like, fuck you, man. Like, stop, just stop, just fucking stop talking about this.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, I don't I don't remember exactly the first time I saw it. I think, you know, one a movie that I had seen in theater that people I think tried to compare it to was Mother, just in terms of how outrageous that they found it. The two are very different films, but they they definitely described it to me as just being out there and kind of crazy and wild stuff happening. And I hadn't I had no idea specifically what to expect about it. I think the trailer paints somewhat of a picture of some things that are going to happen, but it's thankfully it wasn't clear enough where it didn't like it didn't ruin the movie for me at all. I wasn't really prepared. I do enjoy a lot of modern folklore. I think we get a lot of crazy stuff these days, thanks to it. Um, but this time, of course, re-watching it, really what I was looking forward to, what I was expecting to see here was all of your reactions. You know, when you watch it alone, um you sit there silently for the most part, and that's kind of boring. But this time we actually got to watch it together for the most part, in a in a private theater, if you will, in a home theater room. And uh amazing experience, but it was nice to hear you chuckle or snort at the same times that I would as well. And so I think going into it, that was the biggest thing I expected was just like a different viewing experience thanks to the audience I was with.

SPEAKER_00

I would like to note that I wasn't really here for the viewing, and you're gonna want to be thankful for that because literally I I watched this on the plane on the way here, which was a great situation. It was uh fortunately nobody sitting next to me, so no one had to watch the odd things on my screen. But I would have been commentating absolute nonsense the whole time, and you guys would have hated it. I I stopped in for like the last 30 minutes of this movie while y'all were watching, and I was like, oh, I'm annoying. And I was like reducing my jokes. Like I wanted to say so much more. The whole time, all I did was take notes of like absolute nonsense comments that I had. But to your point, Mac, watching this movie together is definitely, I think with other people is part of the experience. I y'all know I hate trailers. I didn't go into it initially really expecting much. I'd seen the the trailer with the sound. But this time I was interested to see how the shocking bits affected me now that I know that they were happening. Unfortunately, like you, Chris, having it spoiled. It's a weird thing. This is one of those movies I think is really weird to re-watch. And I think it does matter how your emotional state is, like how you accept this movie or how you receive this movie.

SPEAKER_02

For me, I've seen it so many times. So, like thinking of what I would be expecting from the movie is hard to say. I think there's nothing like watching it for the first time. So it does suck that it got spoiled, Chris, for you, and and I hate that. However, I still have a good time even when I know it's coming, because I I almost have more fun with the movie. So, like, you're talking about laughing and chuckling, right? And I probably wouldn't be laughing or chuckling if it was my first watch, but because it's like my fifth, sixth, or whatever watch, I'm just having a good time with the movie and I know what's happening, but I don't know. There's just something about it that just makes it more fun. I can just react in a in a more heartfelt way than but you know, I think one of the things to expect overall from this movie, not having seen it a bunch, is it's just an unrelenting, unnerving experience, which I think is is is something you have to be in the mood for. It's very moody, this type of horror.

SPEAKER_11

Yeah, it's definitely a very like dramatic take on horror for sure. I do remember seeing this in theaters was a very specific experience. I think it was like the opening week, so it was a pretty packed theater. And it's sort of something that we all experienced together as a group in that room. I think the first time you watch this movie is very singular in how it unfolds for you. And I'm realizing that I have watched the first, we'll say, like, act of this movie maybe five times, and I figured out that this is actually the first time I ever finished it since seeing it in theaters. And a lot of things I picked up on that I think I might have just been like too shocked to have really processed the first time around. Because I actually remember the first time around, I like left being a little bit confused by like a lot of like the resolutions, the ending, and I was like kind of like, wait, what happened actually? Like, I I like, and I'm not the dumbest bitch on earth, but I think because it was such like an intense experience, by the time we got to the end, I was like, wait, what? And watching it this time, I was like, Okay, got it.

SPEAKER_07

That's a fascinating take. And you see, here's the thing, let me set the stage for you. Obviously, knowing what is coming in this movie, I watched this one not alone, but maybe alone physically in my room, but virtually as a watch party with our community. And man, arguably, the only way that that experience could be taunt would be if my first viewing was here tonight in the home theater. I will say this though. For everything that was taken from me in terms of just being able to enjoy it as a movie for the first time as a fresh slate, put all that aside, this movie fucked me up. Because Bing says you were talking about going through as much loss as we have gone through this year and being in such a raw emotional state. There are four things that really stood out in this movie where it felt like Ariaster was reaching through the screen, down my throat, taking everything in my insides and twisting it and then like shoving it up where my heart is supposed to be. And it was so hard to watch. Usually I'm like cutting it up, talking shit in the watch party, and I was just like, man, this is a real rough time. And they're like, it's gonna be okay, Chris. And thankfully, there was that like layer of support. So I think it says something to how impactful this movie is, right? But this was not a fun time. Like I longed for the day that I couldn't watch this and it'd be fun. Maybe if I had had it spoiled less and I could have watched it a few years ago before shit got real this year in my family, then maybe it would have been a more fun time. But this was not a single ounce of it was fun. It was just like real bad time, not a Baja blast.

SPEAKER_04

I think it's interesting because I appreciated this movie a lot even before everything happened for it exploring grief. Not because it's new to me by any means. By the time that this movie came out, both of my grandparents on my dad's side had already passed away. One of my grandmother's like my role model, so it definitely hit very hard. But I think it's interesting because I said what I said earlier because people associate this movie so much with the grief and the family aspects and how it affects the family from the inside. It's one of those movies where it's like if you've experienced loss and you have this complicated relationship with your mother that people will be like, ugh, be careful. And I have to say, watching this movie again, like I said, having gone through what I've gone through, it didn't make me feel as sad, but I think it's because we were watching it together and I could like we could make jokes together a little bit or laugh at the same time. It does lighten the mood. So just kind of trying to dispel this idea that watching this movie means you're gonna be very emo. Like, not not necessarily, not every time. It does get better. How cute. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Yeah, yeah. She's never watching it again.

SPEAKER_07

No, probably not. No, but okay, but that okay, so let me just say this. I think just to set the stage, because I do agree with you that maybe most people will watch this, and yes, it's a sad time, but it's fine. I'm just like, if I'm sad, I listen to sad music, I let myself feel that shit intensely, and I feel it almost too intensely. So watching this kind of movie, while cathartic in some ways, it has enough where it was just like, oh god, now I'm really having to confront literally everything. I've been bottling up inside me. Who is this man who directed this movie? And who are these writers that wrote this dialogue that feels like it's directly relevant to my life right now? Terrible experience for me, but not in a bad way. Like it's an effective movie, it's a compliment to the movie. I'm just sad and it's okay.

SPEAKER_00

Listen, I'm famously heartless when it comes to things like this, okay? I wouldn't say I felt no emotion during this movie, but it just feels like it wants me to feel something that I don't feel. I don't know. I'm not a person that listens to sad music, I'm not a person that watches sad movies. I just don't want to feel sad things when I watch like I'm watching this for entertainment. Why are you making me miserable? However, like I definitely didn't feel what y'all felt, but I also like just want to be clear, even if you don't feel what you feel, like this movie's not fun. You said fun, Sean. What the fuck are you talking about? Like nothing is fun here. It's not fun because it's it's not even oh, it's emotional, so it's not fun. For me, it's not, it's just like I I can't think of anything less fun, really. Honestly, it's fun if we watched it together and I could talk funny things about what's going on and make fun of noises and faces and naked bodies or something, but like it's not fun. Nothing about fun.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, well, here's the thing. I famously don't have very many emotions in movies either. So I just have a good time with it. So it could be super emotional. My wife can be bawling her eyes out, and I'm just sitting there like, what? What is happening? What did I miss? I don't get the feeling. So I I have fun with it. Maybe not because the grief gets me or like that topic gets me, right? I just think it's I don't know, like I know I it's hard to explain, and and I don't want to give any pieces of the movie away to give examples, but I just think I react in in ways that are meant to maybe like get a different reaction out of you, but I just react, and maybe it's like a laugh in an uncomfortable moment kind of thing. But I have a good time with it either way. I I think one of the things that this movie does is I don't know if it's necessarily making or wanting you to get the feeling of the family trauma or the grief necessarily, but what I think it's aiming to do is exactly what you were explaining, Chris. It's supposed to grab you and hold on to you and make you feel never truly comfortable while you're sitting and watching this movie. You're never supposed to sit there and feel comfortable. So what it's just that's the biggest feeling. It's it's unsettling, it's unnerving, it's unrelentless. It just in every different way of its approach, that's the feeling that it has. Like it just never wants you to sit still. And that's the best way I can describe it. But this but this film is a lot, it's a lot to take in. So it's not something that I feel like you can watch back to back to back to back. In fact, the amount of times I've already seen it, I think is a lot. But um, that being said, it also feels like an old-fashioned horror movie in a way. It kind of does. Think about it. Like it starts off slow, it's very dramatic, right? It's a drama in essence, and then it builds into something that it, you know, it builds into something else. It builds into something far more sinister, but it's it gets there in this kind of subtle way with undertones. I I think of like the delivery of Rosemary's Baby or the delivery of the Exorcist, and those are two movies. I'm not saying it's up there in that caliber. Maybe it is to some, but it feels like that kind of movie.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, I was I was straight up thinking of Rosemary's Baby as we're getting that build happening throughout the movie with with the story. And it's not that the stories are similar in any way. This it's kind of that part's unimportant. I think the way that they build the tension towards something bigger, like there's a ledge basically that they're moving towards that you once you cross over that, you're you can't come, you can't go back up. Like once you fall off that cliff, it's game over. And I think that this movie builds you steadily towards that and just pushes you right off that ledge, and then the movie's not over. You still then have to deal with the consequences of crossing some sort of line, and it just gets kind of crazier at that point. I think when you're watching this, no matter which way you react, you're going to react. No matter what. You're gonna feel something. I don't think, I don't think you can necessarily watch this and feel apathy towards towards the film. Um, I don't think you necessarily will hate or love it right away. You're just going to, you're just gonna be affected in some way. You might be bored, and that's that's okay, but I think the events of the story are going to either make you grimace or make you squirm, make you feel uncomfortable, um, make you have a good time. Like something's going to happen while you're watching this, and there are like sporadic moments scattered throughout. And we literally saw it happen in real life today. But if you for some reason fall into that moment where it's a little bit slower, it is going to wake you up. It is going to throw an event out there. It's going to do something wild to where it says, no, no, we're not done yet. Like we're going to throttle you just a little bit more.

SPEAKER_11

I think as far as surprises go, when I first watched this in theaters, obviously this movie has its fair share of like literal surprises, jump scares, what have you. But just like the emotional burden and how heavy the movie was, I definitely was not expecting. But I think the biggest surprise for me, like since that, is really how many memes have come from this movie, despite how emotionally heavy and burdensome the content is. Like there are several memes that stemmed from this film. And Ryan, as you were kind of talking about how like it's crazy for Sean to describe this movie as fun, I was thinking about it. I was like, when I wanted to re-watch this, it was coming from a place of fun. And what was that about? Because this is the full first time I've fully re-watched it. And I think there are those moments that have inspired memes, that have featured famed actress talents that are fun, despite like how and like weighed down this movie can make you feel sometimes. So I can kind of see how it can be fun, but also like uh an exhausting burden.

SPEAKER_07

I think an exhausting burden is such a good way to put this movie. And again, I that makes it sound like it's a bad thing. It is a good thing. I think I was surprised that I was able to still, despite sifting through all the muck of just heartache in this movie, that I was still able to appreciate how fucking stunning the cinematography is. How much that despite being a completely unrelatable family in terms of their relationship with each other, I still found a lot of their pain relatable. And I think that's a really interesting thing to do because sometimes these people and the decisions they they make and the things that they say to each other, I'm like, who the fuck would say that? But then they just hit you with a couple lines, and you know, one of those, like, I don't want to put any more stress on my family. I'm not even sure they could give me that support. And I'm like, fuck, you're just reading me for filth right now. And I think that's the biggest shock to me, right? Like, how can you have this? It's not it's not dystopian, but how can you have such an extreme caricature of like what a fam what family grief looks like while also still feeling so real? That's a very delicate balance to strike, I think.

SPEAKER_00

I think my biggest disappointment was with the the rewatchability of the shocking moments. I just think they fall flat for me on a second watch. And I was hoping they wouldn't. I I was hoping I'd like get something different or fun from it, but it's just like, oh yeah, I know what's happening, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_04

And meanwhile, for me, the most shocking part of this movie was remembering once again that Anne Dowd was in this movie. I out loud was like, holy shit, she's in this movie. And we just did Exodus Believer. I had the same reaction when she was in that movie. God bless her. In every movie. What a great surprise, every single time for me.

SPEAKER_03

I think I'm gonna go back to the emotional response that you guys had to it because I think the thing that surprised me was, you know, I think there's like a lot of great aspects to this film visuals, story, script, everything, right? But I think I never truly paid attention to some of the deliveries that the actors give us. And this time I had a little bit more leeway to do that. And so I think some people think of this movie and think of screaming. There's a lot of screaming that happens, but even in those moments when you're watching the actors' faces as they're screaming, um, when you're watching them in moments of silence to see them flip through so many different expressions as they're trying to show that their characters are working through emotions, it it is so insanely effective. And each member of the family is able to deliver that. And there's moments I think in the past where I kind of wrote off the dad, and I was just kind of like, he's there, he kind of does somewhat of a job. But they I was able to pay attention to a f a few moments here where he says literally nothing in a scene or in a moment during a scene, but his face is doing all the work. And so it's really impressive to see them do a lot of that nonverbal work here. And when you can take the time to slow it down and actually pay attention to it, it's like they put in so Much effort into this film, and it's incredibly impressive.

SPEAKER_02

That is really true. I think it's a really good point, but I think it's it's that that surprises me, along with how many other elements. Like this movie really gives you a lot, but it doesn't give you a lot at the same time. It's really everything is so intentional in this movie, which I think gives you that feeling that evokes something out of you, whether it's grief, trauma, fun, like unnerving, whatever. It could be anything, but I think it's just the way that the angles are, the camera shots, the score, the acting, the focus on the facial expressions, the all the different things, and there's so many different things happening, and it's not showing you a lot, but what it does show you is big, right? Like it really grasps you, and that's always surprising for me.

SPEAKER_07

You know what is also surprising for me is so many people told me that this is the scariest movie they've ever seen, and I wasn't scared by it. However, maybe that's because of the spoiling, maybe that's just what it is for me. But this was nothing in here gave me like horror movie fear. What I did fear though was this reality of like fuck, I I don't want to face that ever. There are things that are said in this movie, there are questions that are asked, there are circumstances that you're placed into that inevitably we're all going to be. Even to some measure, I was earlier this year, Binx was earlier this year. And it just sent me back to driving my mom to the hospital, finding out my grandma passed away, and the guttural fucking like pain in her voice when she learned that. And I'm like, man, that is like a blinding fear that I don't want to experience ever again. That move that is what this movie unlocks for me. But like the things that like everybody's saying, Oh, this is the scary shit ever. No, I got none of it. None of it.

SPEAKER_03

There's moments that are literally designed to freak you out and be scary and be creepy and stuff, and those moments, especially in the final third of the film, always crack me up. They I find them to be ridiculous and kind of hilarious and honestly kind of campy. And I don't know if I'm alone there, but like I I don't I don't think that the scary, like jump-inducing things are scary or jump inducing to me. I think it's like you said earlier, like it's the it's the moments that are dark and make you think after you've watched the movie that are more effective in terms of fear.

SPEAKER_00

Okay, not campy, but it's just weird. They just don't feel authentic. The things that you're talking about just don't feel authentic because the feelings of the movie are so authentic. So when we get to the end and there's like some creepy imagery, it's like, all right, I guess it that I think that's like the thing. It's like what you're showing me doesn't make sense in this scenario. I'm not well, I don't think things make sense, but I'm just saying stuff just kind of comes out of nowhere and it just kind of feels like it diminishes all the feeling of the rest of the movie in a way. It definitely isn't scary. The things that we see are definitely not scary. This movie is like a tense feeling, not scary.

SPEAKER_04

Why is it that I always find myself in the scenario where I'm trying to defend the people that don't even watch horror con constantly? I don't know. This is exactly why I think this movie was extremely successful because this is the movie that so many people, whether they consume horror or not, they all went to the theater to see, they all watched because everyone can relate to some degree grief and mental illness, two themes that are basically this whole movie. So when you explore things that are extremely heavy, on top of the fact that the third act is pretty like intense and maybe weird to us that we watch horror movies and obviously we're part of this podcast. I I mean there was a there was a jump scare moment that I was like, fuck no. But then I didn't find it as scary until I saw it with you and Ryan, and you were making that comment. And then I was like, yeah, actually, this is really funny. But it's right, so I think of that, but again, removing myself, thinking of the bigger picture here. Most people are gonna find this scary because of the themes that are explored, on top of the fact that they probably don't see certain things happen in certain movies that they're watching in their day-to-day often. But I do want to take it back to what you said, Chris. For me personally, what I thought I was gonna be scared of was those jump scare moments. Wasn't as much this time around because of Ryan's amazing jokes. For me, it was like going back to the the triggering. There's like a guttural scream that was like, oh, that was me literally in March. Fun. That I think is like not pleasant to watch. So shout out to anyone, like I said earlier, that has like gone through some heavier stuff and sees this movie, just brace yourself. I would say like borderline trigger warning for that kind of screaming that we all probably have experienced in some case or another, because that I think is what's frightening is reliving that or relating a little too much to that.

SPEAKER_07

Oh, yeah. To the certain degree that I don't know if I would make it through this episode if we weren't just all here hanging out together. Because this shit is rough.

SPEAKER_04

And that's fair. I think I I think that's super fair. I said it earlier. I've definitely enjoyed this rewatch a lot more because we were able to see it together and laugh and have the jokes, but I think not to be that that serious bitch, right? But like someone's gotta say, you just gotta, for those listeners that have gone through something and maybe have been told, hey, be careful to watch this movie. I think there is a rationale behind that. There's a reason behind that. So just caution to those that are listening.

SPEAKER_11

I feel like as far as the fright factor goes here, I remember this film being much scarier than it was. And hearing everybody talk about it, I feel like what happened is when this movie came out, and this can kind of explain why so many people are like, oh, it's such a scary movie, a sequence of events unfolds that are both insane and impactful. And it really disarms you in such a way that allows the subsequent scares to feel more intense and feel more frightening and scary because you're in a specific emotional or mental state as a result of sort of the preamble. And I think that without that same effect, because really you can't get it twice, the scares afterwards seem kind of flat and they seem kind of like, oh, what? And like Ryan's saying, like if you really kind of look too much at it, it's kind of like, oh, that's a little stupid, or like that's a little like, what are we doing here? So I think you can get scares out of this, but it's a it's a very specific experience you kind of have to be able to have. And I don't know that many people can still have that experience unless like you just woke up from a coma that was like eight years long, and nobody's brought this up yet.

SPEAKER_00

And you wake up and you're like, damn, I need to see hereditary.

SPEAKER_02

You wake up and you say, What has Tony Collette been up to? I agree, but I think Tony Colette is probably her facial expressions are probably the most frightening part of this entire film. They were intense, and those facial expressions are sometimes the moments that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Because I don't think this movie is super frightening. I don't think the things they bring forward, especially towards the end, that are meant to be super frightening are super effective. I think they can be creepy. I think you can have fun with it at the end, but I I don't know. Man, something about the acting, the facial expressions, what they give you on screen is so unsettling and so intense. That's the biggest sprite factor in this movie. Man, hats off to the performances.

SPEAKER_00

The performances are great, and I do think they make a big impact. However, I'm gonna go on the record by saying I think this movie is incredibly unoriginal. I I thought of so many other things in different pieces. It's not exactly like anything I've seen before, but to me, maybe the cinematography is original. I don't know. Maybe how it's done is original, but this to me, the story and how things come together does not feel original at all.

SPEAKER_07

Okay, that is an a bold and interesting take. That's what I'm here for. Wow, I'm I want to say a little bit floored. Seriously. I'm not gonna say it's unoriginal, but I will say that there are moments that did make me pause and think, oh, like Midsommar. Obviously, still by Ariaster. Obviously, this movie came first, but I I I think that we've seen grief, we've seen pain. So maybe the exploration of that, and then maybe the twist that he puts on these kind of things. Yes, we have seen these things before, but no, there's no fucking way I've seen anything like this movie.

SPEAKER_03

I would disagree somewhat, and I think you have seen some things, specifically 70s horror. I think this has many callbacks of 70s horror. We've mentioned Rosemary's Baby, which is technically 60s horror, but close enough. I think you could take away some moments from like Suspiria, for instance. There's just like there's a lot that it pulls from. Obviously, it came after them, but I will agree in that I do think it's original. So I I think there are things that are out there that like you can clearly point to, but just not there's just nothing quite like this. I I don't understand how films like this can get made that like stick with you and that feel so independent of everything else, whereas everything else in Hollywood is just rehashed and rebooted and regurgitated. So yeah, I I think you watch this, and everyone who's watched it remembers watching hereditary.

SPEAKER_07

Okay. Yes, to the notes that you've had about 70s horror, 60s horror. None of those fucking things even come close to make me feel what this movie did, though. And there is literally only one other movie on this planet that has ever made me feel this way, and that is the movie Boys Don't Cry. But Boys Don't Cry was one of those movies that, like, when I watched it, I was like, oh my god. And it just like shook me. And I could not stop thinking about that movie for fucking months. And it was an emotional devastation in every fucking sense of the word. This is the only horror movie that's ever made me feel that.

SPEAKER_04

And that's what I'm saying about why it was so successful. Because I feel like a lot of people feel that way. If they don't consume this kind of genre often, they're not gonna know that it's very similar to 70s horror, right? So to them, it's gonna feel like, whoa, this was so intense. And now, pull the streets, you say Ariaster, they are gonna say hereditary. That's why they went to see Midsummer. And that, I mean, Ariaster and A24 is synonymous at this point, and it's because of this film. Granted, a lot of the things that he's explored in this movie, I've said it time and time again, yeah, of course. That's a if anything, grief and mental illness is a crux of horror. A lot of horror movies are exploring those things. And then the twists that he applies to it, without a doubt, of course. So I can see how it's not original. I think I'm just thinking of the lens of everyone else outside of this genre that thinks this is like the most incredible thing that they've ever seen, which is impressive to me, at least. That's a great point.

SPEAKER_00

It it it it does have that effect because people aren't used to watching as many scary movies as us.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I think that's that's the tough part, right? Because the film obviously is gonna draw inspiration from other films. Almost every film does at this point, right? Like it's it's it's we've I think I've said this a number of times. Like it's almost impossible to be completely original anymore. I think what this film draws from inspiration, it gives in its delivery, that's the originality. The originality in its delivery, in what it does with cinematography, what it does with the storyline, with the acting, and all of those things, right? Like, I just think that it maybe in some of the concepts or formulas, it's not original, but it's original in its creative exploration of delivering this film. And so that that's what's tough. I think that's what sticks in people's minds. So it's hard. It gets originality, I think. I think it deserves some.

SPEAKER_11

I remember at the time this movie felt very original upon a second watch. I think it did some things in a very original way that is memorable and forever kind of changed, or at least like made a mark on horror. Ryan, I found it interesting that you said maybe the cinematography is original because I felt like that was one of the least original parts. I was like, it's very Wes Anderson, it's very other things like that that I don't have reference points for.

SPEAKER_00

I was being nice.

SPEAKER_11

I thought I thought that might be the case. But I think like a lot of this movie felt unoriginal this time around, mainly the, let's say, second half of the film. I think they kind of touched on some interesting like culture, which I'm not sure if it's real or fabricated. So maybe that's original because I don't know that I've ever seen anything referencing these specific things before. But Banks, you have to remind me to ask in the spoiler section how this movie tackles mental illness. Because I feel like I don't know if anybody in this was mentally ill, and if that just means I'm mentally ill for not recognizing it. I'm at peace with that, but I'm very curious to hear you talk a little bit more about that part. Because grief, absolutely, I got that. But the mental illness, I'm like, who?

SPEAKER_04

Happily, happily, happily. I support you pairs. Happily. Actually, if I may, talking a little bit about that and thinking of who I'm thinking of, this movie also explores the concepts of matriarchy and motherhood, another thing that every other, well, Rosemary's baby, every other horror movie also explores. But I do want to shout out to something that you said earlier, Sean. What I think is maybe it's not original, maybe it is, or what will be considered original moving forward in cinema is the dialogue that is said and written and the monologue specifically that Tony Colette gives. That shit is maybe not original anymore or to us, but it is going to be considered original moving forward. Because I now think of any other movie that's come out since Hereditary that tries to deliver that same kind of moment, and I will compare it to this movie time and time again. That might be a stretch, that might be a hot take, but it's just a fact.

SPEAKER_03

And I think one of the things that helps this movie stand out to pretty much everyone who watches it is the way it wraps stuff up because when it finally builds all that tension and pushes you right over the cliff, it goes a little bit too zany for me. I I kind of don't take it that seriously, but it's incredibly memorable and it's very I just honestly it makes the movie singular in my mind. Like there's there's other things that might do things that are kind of like this. We've talked about Rosemary's Baby, you know, that's it's kind of similar in how it delivers the ending, but like this one just says, okay, Rosemary's Baby is like a five, let's go to 11. And it just gets so amped up that like whether or not I enjoy the ending, honestly, I don't think it even matters because I I think the ending's effectiveness is just so high.

SPEAKER_00

The first time I saw this movie, the only thing I can remember is at the end I was like, what the heck are we talking about? It goes a little too heavy-handed for me in the ending. It just feels like the nuance and like care that we got through the whole rest of the story is just kind of lost, and they're like, We're gonna wrap it up like this. And I understand that's what we're getting at the whole time, but I don't know, for me, it just doesn't do it, but not for nothing. It's not forgettable. It's a memorable ending, but I don't like it. But you know, it's there. You'll never forget that you saw it because at the end you will say, What the hell? One way or another, maybe positive or negative.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, it's one of those tough ones because do I appreciate where the story goes? Yeah, I think it delivers on several promises that it makes. I think, wow, it's fucking cool to look at. Some parts. Some parts where I'm like, I could have done without that. I think overall it's a net positive, but somehow it still ends up being the worst part of the movie for me.

SPEAKER_11

Yeah, I successfully did forget the ending. Obviously, the first time I saw it, I told you I didn't like fully understand it, but I remember feeling like it didn't quite stick the landing. And even this time, I'm like, I I definitely got it this time. Like, thank God. Imagine if I still didn't. I feel like the ending gives a little flop. It's kind of like it feels like a fizzle. It's like uh, we built up to this, and now it's over.

SPEAKER_02

Credits. Yeah, I think one, I definitely forgot about the ending after the first time I watched it. So I don't know what that says about the film. I I think that I agree. It is a what the hell moment. I think if you didn't say what the hell, what the fuck, whatever, like it is like what's wrong with you? Because that that ending was bizarre. It was absolutely bizarre. It was a wild ending, it was an and again ad nauseum. I'm talking about it, it's unsettling and unnerving from start to finish, and it really ended on a high note. I I don't know if I love the ending, I don't know if I hate the ending. It was something, it definitely made you feel something, which I think is really good. But I think that the problem is that it doesn't dive into that topic enough for you to fully grasp or understand why it's ending there. And so it leaves you with a lot of what the hell, what's going on, why, which I guess gets you thinking about the film afterwards. So, did it do its job? Was it intended that way? Maybe it's tough.

SPEAKER_00

I also felt like I was getting recruited slightly. Like I felt like I was a part of what was happening, you know?

SPEAKER_11

I could feel that, Ryan.

SPEAKER_00

I was like, can we cut it?

SPEAKER_11

And to touch on what you're saying, Sean, like I feel like this movie simultaneously, specifically with the ending, it both over-explained and under-explained in a way that I was just kind of like, huh? Sure.

SPEAKER_04

I was gonna say that there's a particular moment in the ending where they try to make sure that you understand just a little bit of what happens in like maybe a run-on sentence that I had forgotten about, and hearing it again, I was like, uh, yeah. People are still gonna want to Wikipedia this afterwards, so you didn't really do a great job. However, to me, I I actually love this ending. I think I remember it the most, but I would agree that maybe unless you are a particular fan of the subgenre that will be explored in this film, you can catch on to things maybe a little easier, perhaps. Nonetheless, you definitely have to be paying attention in order to do so. And even then, I feel like with Ariaster specifically, it's like, but I was paying attention. What were you trying to tell me? You'd have to re-watch it again, and then this movie's hard as fuck to rewatch again. It's just a whole thing. So a little too difficult, I would say.

SPEAKER_07

Well, I think the general consensus on ending is giving mixed bag at best. So let's see how it shakes out for the rest of our ratings. Now, before we start scoring this movie, Sean, how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, you're not getting like a ton of gore in this movie. Like you get some interesting stuff, right? You get some, I mean, it's got some, you know, charred flesh, some neck floss, you get some really interesting stuff, but it's not like overbearing. I think it's still gonna land itself like a medium. I can't find anything that really breaks into high these days. It's really tough.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, you know what? Here's what I'm gonna say. I'm gonna say this is me going to a restaurant asking for medium, and it's a little well done.

SPEAKER_00

I think this movie is like you don't drink often, but every time you drink, you are blacked out and sleep on the side of the road. You know, you drink like once a month, but ever once a month you're on the side of the road and people have to like call the police and check on you, you know, like people are checking hospitals for you. That's what this movie gives.

SPEAKER_04

I just wish that listeners could see my reaction as I'm across the table from Sean giving this medium gore score, like, Jesus, the bar is is something else, huh? It's giving a Lexus.

SPEAKER_06

You know, but hold on. Sean has consistent standards.

SPEAKER_04

No, for no, for sure. And every time I'm surprised, I'm just a little bitch. And what about the animal report? Well, not a little bitch about this part because I'll tell you one thing. Two animals are brutally fucked. So, Pita, don't watch this. Really don't.

SPEAKER_07

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings then. Hereditary from 2018. Was it a hacker or slash?

SPEAKER_04

So there are three things that I love about this movie. One that I haven't mentioned yet, which is the score. I think the score is incredible. One of my favorite songs is in the ending. I'd say also the exploration of grief in the family and what how it affects everyone and how it affects, particularly a matriarch. And then also the incredible acting from Alex Wolfe and Tony Collette. And I think that's the consensus among many people that watch this movie and have seen this movie that those are their favorite things for sure. I think that even in this rewatch, it still hit me, but luckily not as deep in the feels, which is good. It doesn't make me not want to see this movie again, right? Like I I can see myself re-watching it, but definitely in a few years' time. And I think that's a good sign for me. I think I I still want to be able to preserve how much I liked this movie when I first watched it, what it means to me, the things it makes me feel, and like the thoughts that I have about families. I love movies that explore family themes and how it affects a mother's relationship with their mom and just that whole dynamic. So I really think that this movie does a great job at that while still kind of being creepy and doing that whole horror thing. So for me, it's definitely a slash.

SPEAKER_07

I'm just gonna follow this up because to be the other side of your coin, you love a good family theme, you love a good mother relationship situation. I don't. It's something that I find very difficult to tackle or confront in film. I love my mom so much, and I am just terrified of the day that she's no longer with me. And that is something that I just cannot handle. I don't there's a song by Elvis Presley called Don't Cry Daddy. As soon as that shit plays, I'm immediately fucking bawling. I hear the song Open Arms, because my mom loves that song, I immediately start fucking bawling. I'm a fucking little bitch when it comes to moms. This movie is intense. This movie is effective, and for the opposite reasons of why it's a slash for you, it is still a slash for me. It's like no matter how how you fuck up the math, you still get to the same result. This movie absolutely was not a fun time watching it, and I still give a big fuck you to everyone who spoiled it for me, but I think the experience of watching this film and the moment at which it arrived in my life, I will say this. I'm gonna quote the movie directly. It doesn't make it easier, obviously, but sometimes it makes it less lonely. And I think the experience of watching this with a community and having that cathartic release and knowing that there was a tribe of people who fucking came together to make this movie, and Tony Collette, bless your heart, you gave the fucking performance of a lifetime that shits a slash.

SPEAKER_00

Well, on that note, here I am, Chris R. Are you happy I'm here? Always. Okay. Well, I don't like this movie. I'm sure it's not a surprise. I know that for y'all who have been around with me for the last couple hours and heard me talking about it, you know I was trash talking it. I'm not saying it's a bad movie necessarily. I just don't like it. I don't enjoy watching it. I think this movie relies too much on really shocking visuals that don't hit for me. Mm-hmm. I never have since I saw it the first time. And the other thing is it relies on a lot of really heavy emotional feelings. And unfortunately, that's just not what I'm here for. I want to see a fun movie. And if it's not fun, it's okay. Like his house is one of my favorite movies, and it's not fun at all. But it's a completely different thing. I prefer the way something like that handles grief and emotion a lot more. This movie just doesn't do it for me. And I'm sorry, but it's a it's a hack for me.

SPEAKER_07

It is very on brand for Ryan to come back and hack a popular movie. This is good. For sure.

SPEAKER_11

It feels good, honestly, Ryan. I wouldn't have wanted it any other way. This film, though, I could have wanted a couple different ways, but I will say ultimately, the moment I saw the moment in theaters, I said, oh, this movie is instantly iconic. This will be talked about for years to come. This has, I didn't know who the fuck Ari Aster was, but he clearly made his mark on the genre. This movie has so many things that I love. White women acting, Tony Collette, like we've said, performance of a lifetime. Binks, you were referring to her monologue being so good. Which one? There's several, and they're all incredible. And as you were saying, like we're gonna compare all of them to that. I don't think it's been even gotten close to except for Pearl in Mia Goth. Like that's the only thing I can think of that's like on the same caliber. And like these are the kinds of performances where I'm like, horror needs to be like seriously considered for award season. Like Tony Collette deserves an Oscar for that performance. It's better than whatever the fuck won that year. And it's sort of upsetting that like we're still not getting the respect for the genre that it really deserves because like so much talent and art and incredible work is put into these movies. Ultimately, yeah, it's a slash for me for sure. I would tweak a couple things about maybe the third act that kind of gave fizzle, gave flop for me. I liked the ending a little bit more this time around, and I also loved Alex Wolf's performance a lot more this time around. I feel like his subtlety and nuance was lost on me maybe the first time because I was going through such an emotional experience. But this time around I was like, oh damn, he's like really killing it. Also fully thought he was Dave Patel for the first six years after seeing this. Uh, it wasn't until you said Alex Wolf where I was like, wait, who's that? And why was his performance good? Googled it and was like, oh, I'm an idiot. So all of that to say, this is a slash for me. Great film. Hard to watch, but if you can watch this for the first time without any spoilers, do it alone and feel it.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, there isn't a whole lot more to say that hasn't been said already. I feel like this movie, I've already been saying it. I think this movie is really out here doing the most and not really at the same time giving you a lot to go off of, right? It's just what it does and how it delivers it. I think it's this emotion that's running through the film. It's this cinematography with, you know, backed by this really unsettling score. And I think it evokes reactions from people of all different kinds, like different types of emotions. You can get it from grief, trauma, whatever it is. I think it's just no matter how you look at it, it makes you feel something. And for a movie to build tension the way that it does and never let you really feel comfortable, it has to get a slash because of that, because it did something. It evoked something, and it was very effective in that.

SPEAKER_03

It it definitely does evoke something from the viewer. And I think when I watched it the first time, I was kind of kind of off put by how grotesque the movie really is. It truly is grotesque. You talked about those shocking moments earlier, Ryan, and how it's almost it's almost too much, right? But I think it it really tries to push, push the limits for for a reason because it's trying to break down your walls as you're as you're watching it. And I think if we just had some really good emotional dramatic acting, I think you would think, wow, they did a great job, and I can understand the themes that they're trying to talk about, but it is forcing you to be vulnerable while you watch this movie. It's trying to catch you off guard and in in those moments then connect with you on a deeper level. The final act of the film is strange. It truly is strange. I'm not a fan of it. I think visually there are some moments that are I I find absolutely hilarious, even though that they're you know they're gross, but I find them I find them hilarious. So I think that's my own issue, however. I don't I don't have to enjoy that. Story-wise, that part is a little rushed, I think, as well, how it wraps up stuff that's sprinkled throughout the film. But it's almost it's almost unimportant, really. I think the rest of the film is what is what it should be judged by. And I think the first time I watched it, I I wasn't able to judge it off of just two-thirds of the film, but this time I am. I think it's not an enjoyable watch necessarily, unless you enjoy somebody punching you in the gut. But sometimes you might need that. I think it's an enjoyable watch to see the actors do amazing work, to see the rest of the cast and the crew really like just deliver something that is astounding. Like cinematography-wise, we've mentioned it all day long. Some some of you don't like it, but I I think it actually really is impressive. I also happen to love Wes Anderson and the look of sixties and seventies movies as well. There's just something timeless about it. They could have set this movie in the 60s or 70s, and I would have believed it. I think it would have worked almost even better than it than it does as a modern film. But yeah, I mean, things to things to look at here are gonna shock you, things to look at here are going to pluck at your heartstrings, but overall, it's a slash.

SPEAKER_00

Thank God I'm here.

SPEAKER_11

Mac, I just want to set the record straight. I did not hate the cinematography. I also love the Wes Anderson look. I just didn't think it was original. Still stunning.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_07

Well, there you have it, folks, on this what might be the largest panel episode of Hackerslash, Hereditary managed to escape not with a universal slash, but instead five slashes, which normally is enough, and one hack. Now you can't find this movie streaming online. Check the link in our show notes to see where you can find it right now. Then join us in the second half so we can actually spoil this shit together. We'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_03

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SPEAKER_02

There's six deaths in this movie. Two are off screen. So I'm putting them in there because I just want to have six deaths to talk about. And I put them in there because specifically, all of these deaths are heavy as fuck. All of them are heavy. Like they're intense. So I'm excited to talk about them. But what were your favorite kills?

SPEAKER_07

The death of this family. This sense of family, really.

SPEAKER_02

The collective death of this entire family. Boo.

SPEAKER_07

Not like them literally dying. I mean the death of like the family spirit and loving between them. Yes.

SPEAKER_02

Oh. Because they all did die as well, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, sure. But I mean the way that that sense of family was lost as soon as Tony Colette's character fucking finds the headless body in the backseat and is screaming. That moment, you're just never gonna be the same.

SPEAKER_11

We have to all agree Charlie's death is the best, right? Like the way that was done, the way it built up and unfolded. And then for me, it's the silence that lasts for like three full minutes while he's just in shock, goes back into the house, wakes up still in shock.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_11

And then you hear Tony Caleb be like, I'm going out to get some balsa wood. Do you need anything? Back in 20. And then the revelation and the realization into the screaming. Like that sequence will go down in cinematic history, at least in my mind. And I feel like it should be in like the Library of Congress or something. If Alien is in the Library of Congress, that five to seven minutes of film needs to be in there too.

SPEAKER_07

No, I 100% agree. The silence there, this moment where we think about how many moments in our lives do we think we're just doing the normal everyday shit, and we never really know that this is the last time that's gonna happen when everything feels the same to us. And in this moment, she's just going out to get some balsa wood, having no ab no nowhere near the fucking wherewithal or like the ability to understand or comprehend what she's about to see in the backseat of that car. That is a fucking shocking moment.

SPEAKER_03

I don't want to spoil something that we haven't just watched, but if you've seen the center, there is a death in the center that hits you with such a level of shock and emotion. So if you've seen it, you'll get it. But I feel like Charlie's death is right up there with it, and probably m just more powerful to be honest, because in in in the film here we see so much. Like in the moment that it happens, you see you see enough to know exactly what happened, but it's followed up with an actual severed head with ants and the damage to the face. And I don't know that I needed all that, to be honest. I think it was like a little bit of it was a lot of it across the line for me. It was a it was very heavy. But wow, you're not there's just like no way to forget that. This was the thing that everyone spoiled for everyone else for like you know, three years after the movie came out. They were t they would just talk about it because it's so insane. The other deaths, sure, like they're they're interesting, right? But Char Charlie's death is just there's nothing, there's nothing else out there like it. And the and the the kill from the sinner is like, you know, it's it's a seven out of ten, whereas this is an eleven out of ten.

SPEAKER_00

My favorite kill is definitely dad Steve. I think the unexpected nature of him catching on fire, like I don't think that's what most of us were expecting because it should have been her. And I was completely surprised. And poor little Steve, he's just just such a he's just trying so hard to help his wife. He was he was just doing everything he could, and I felt like he really deserved a different fate. But unfortunately, this house is full of insane people, and so that that is how he ended, sadly. But that was probably my favorite one because of the surprise.

SPEAKER_02

Dude, poor Steve. I feel so bad for this dad in this movie.

SPEAKER_00

I feel like Steve. When I'm watching this, I'm like, what the fuck's happening?

SPEAKER_02

He's just really trying to keep everyone together, really. Like, he wasn't a bad dude, he was really trying to keep everyone together, and he like was breaking down himself, but to have to go down like that, man, that's rough.

SPEAKER_04

And even at the very end where he's seen something horrific, is still trying to grapple everything, but he's just exhausted at this point and is trying to understand what the fuck is happening, and still is like inching towards the fireplace where he still, at the even after everything he's just seen, still wants to try to be there for his wife, to try to repair or make sense of what is happening to his family, and that gets sets ablaze. That guy. And he just he I loved, I thought it was so beautiful and like sad when he was trying to tell Peter, like, hey, what about your SAT prep despite everything? Oh, it's just unfortunate. But one thing I wanted to bring up in terms of kills was the off-screen kills. You asked me Paris about the mental illness stuff. So in one of her many amazing monologues, when she is at the grief group, she's talking about the things that have happened to her dad and her older brother.

SPEAKER_11

Oh.

SPEAKER_04

And she addresses, and obviously her mom, and she addresses all the mental illnesses that they have. And I think it's very interesting because what it basically is saying is that yes, these mental illnesses that she's referring to can also manifest themselves in hallucinations where these people that suffer from these illnesses may think that they are being possessed or they may have these illusions of demons that are affecting them or worshiping them, all of these things that are that are in their mind, right? But ultimately what we learn is that they are actually true. It's it's actually real. And so it begs to question like the especially the brother, her older brother, obviously was supposed to be the original vessel for Payman, and it didn't work. So that's why he was saying, like, my mom is trying to put people in me, and it was it was the Paymon, the the god. And then also makes you think, okay, well, the father was starving himself. Was it that he was trying to make obviously learning that his wife was involved in this cult, was it that he was trying to make sure that his vessel wasn't well suited for payment because he needs to be in a healthy male body, as it's explained in the book. So this is the things that although when you go back, you're like, oh shit, this is what was really happening. But when you get back, like when you think of reality, the mental illnesses that they are diagnosed with, unfortunately, those are things that can manifest in those thought processes that can manifest in those in those patients.

unknown

Dang.

SPEAKER_11

And mental illness is famously hereditary.

SPEAKER_04

Exactly. And that's exactly why that's why the movie's called Hereditary. You said the thing.

SPEAKER_00

You said the thing. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_08

Dang.

SPEAKER_00

Not for nothing. I got a lot more of this movie this time than the first time I watched it. I still didn't make that link with her, like her other family members and everything that already had already passed.

SPEAKER_02

It's because it happens like it just happens in that moment where she's just going in on her family history, which is just a lot to take in at one time. So you're trying to process everything that she's saying. So it's hard to link all that stuff. So kudos to you, because I didn't grasp all of that either. But what a what an like unlock that was.

SPEAKER_04

And then the son suffers from depression uh severe depression, so it's like all of them, it's mental illness from the top all the way down.

SPEAKER_07

Sean can famously spot an age inaccurate Bon Jovi in a fucking movie on like a three-second frame on a TV.

SPEAKER_05

I know. But he will ignore the bigger, the bigger, more emotional things.

SPEAKER_03

Too many words. Too many words. Too many words. Well, she she legitimately calls out her her mom's illnesses and mentions that she suffered from DID.

SPEAKER_11

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03

So it's interesting, right? Because you're just like, ooh, how much how much of this film was that for her? You know? Was it just her mom, or did she also suffer from it? Yeah. Was she actually sleepwalking or was she dissociated?

SPEAKER_04

Thank you so much for bringing up DID. So DID is diagnosed in only in children in children. You had to have suffered severe trauma as a child to have been diagnosed with DID. So if this mom was diagnosed with DID, she must have suffered some trauma as a child. So now I'm thinking, well, let's roll this tape way the fuck back. How hereditary is this cult that she or this religion that she's a part of? Was this something that her gr her like Annie's grandmother was a part of? Like, how far does this roll back that then affected her mom that then was for her to have been diagnosed with DID in that way? That's not something that like you just get diagnosed because you're that's that's schizophrenia, right? Which the brother had. But yeah, it's all jam-packed in that fantastic monologue.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. We need a prequel. We do. We need a prequel now. That's for sure.

SPEAKER_11

Trace the family tree.

SPEAKER_02

Just a graphic novel.

SPEAKER_07

I love a good flow chart.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, but speaking of Annie, Annie's death was intense, right? Like just seeing her up, like I don't know, floating, floating in the in the air and just flossing her neck off with the piano wire. Like, that's a that's a lot. That's crazy. And the look she had, just looking down at him with the wide eyes, like, I'm just not okay after that. If I see that, I'm not okay. I will now have an inherited mental health issue because that's fucked up.

SPEAKER_00

Why was she floating? Why did she fly? There can be miracles when you believe. Yeah, she believed. But why? Not that this movie gives an answer to any of those questions. Everything's a dream in this movie. I just don't I just don't understand why we that's part of sorry to move into that ending stuff, but that's part of like where the ending started to fall apart. Is like all of a sudden, like, okay, we're just levitating, flying through windows. Like, what are we doing? What uh why are we doing that? We could have had that same visual, maybe not as intense if she wasn't floating in the air, but cutting your own head off is like enough, I think.

SPEAKER_04

Also makes me think like when we see the Annie's body just floating up into the tr tree house, you either find that very creepy or like what's happening here? It was so goofy. Yeah, I think we laughed a little bit. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07

You know, it was giving it giving Ebonese or Scrooge flying around. You know? Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Absolutely it was.

SPEAKER_11

To me, it gave Coraline when like the doll floats out the window. I was like, it because it almost looked like stop motion or like a miniature or something. It just looks so goofy, I think is the best word, right?

SPEAKER_04

I don't know if you're about to say this, Chris, but I I think he has or Ariaster has used miniatures in filming before. I could be wrong.

SPEAKER_11

They were all over this one.

SPEAKER_07

I don't know about that, but what that did remind me of was my absolute favorite visual element of this movie, and that was how it moves between scenes with its transitions. First of all, when we transition into Peter's room from the dollhouse. So fucking pristine. That was the moment that I knew it was gonna be a slash.

SPEAKER_00

I think that's so funny because several transitions in this movie, I was like, okay, crossfade. They didn't hit for me. I don't know, maybe something's wrong with me. I might have the problem here. But I do have a favorite visual element, and that is how some of the shots, because of the miniatures in the in the story, obviously, some of the shots are made to look like miniatures. So there's a shot over Charlie's head when she's in her room. And if you it it just sits there for a second, and it I don't know, I guess I could be making it all up, but it didn't seem unintentional. And it seems like she's a she's one of the models, and then it keeps going and she's not. And then there's another one of the house and the woods and everything, and it again looks like it's a miniature, but it's not. And it's such a cool thing, assuming it was intentional, to tie those together and really use those like miniatures are creepy, and it's a good thing to use in a movie that's as creepy as this one.

SPEAKER_02

I got that same feeling though, in a in a couple of different instances throughout the movie, so maybe it was intentional.

SPEAKER_00

I think it had to be. I it would be really weird. I I didn't make it up. Yeah, I you know, it I didn't hear somebody else say it, it's just what I felt. So I would hope so. Especially since there's miniatures in the movie, it would make sense. Yeah, it's a smart little cinematographer thing to do.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. So I think that's one aspect, but overall, I'll just lump it to the cinematography as a whole because I think that there's moments that make you feel that way. The transitions, yes, are amazing, but I also feel like there's moments where everything just feels a little bit off, and it's just that seems really intentional, even if the camera is just a little bit slanted to the right or to the left just a little bit, so you're just not feeling a hundred percent like focused in the right, like in this perfect frame of view. And then there's also moments where it kind of blends that reality as well, where you've in at least in my opinion or in my eyes, I felt like I was looking into one of those doll houses or looking into one of that's what the camera view kind of reminded me of. If I was peeping into one of these replica houses and watching this scene unfold, even though it was live action, that could be part of that as well.

SPEAKER_04

I mentioned it in my scoring. My favorite is the score. And specifically the last song, it's called Reborn when the whole ending is happening. I don't know. I feel like that's like just like a climax of a song that you just can't anymore, you can't handle it. So I think it was really, really well done.

SPEAKER_11

As far as visuals, there is no shortage of things to Enjoy about this film off the top of my head, the scene where Charlie's p powder blue casket gets like lowered into the ground while Tony Collette wails in front of what I can only assume was a sound of music backdrop. That was stunning. I feel like my favorite, I want it to just be Little Diva Head pop off, like the telephone poll of it all. It was so nice to see the log from Final Destination get a new job. I think we kind of get overshadowed in that regard. People don't talk about that enough. But she's still working and she's still talented.

SPEAKER_06

In this economy, it's important to find new employment.

SPEAKER_11

A serious visual element that I don't think I picked up on the first time. And correct me if I'm like maybe reading too much into it. But realizing that Peter's broken nose bandage was supposed to like visually emulate a beak, because that's like a bird-headed god with a crown. I was like, oh, I thought that was a really nice touch. And am I crazy for thinking that was a thing, or do we feel like that was a thing?

SPEAKER_04

That's definitely a thing because that's also why they why Charlie cuts off the head of this pigeon, unfortunately. Yeah. For that pigeon or bird.

SPEAKER_11

Because I was like, oh, he's the pigeon head.

SPEAKER_03

My favorite visual has to do with Charlie, or or at least Charlie as part of it, because we've mentioned some of the transitions earlier. I think something else that was like pretty smooth and different from every other film that handles apparitions of any kind is the way we handled apparitions in this movie. So typically when you see a ghost, an apparition, a demon, something, they have a hue that's different, they have a glow that's different. You see them, you turn the light on, maybe they they like whisk away. I loved having these visions of dead people or whatever just standing there, like fully in the frame, fully easy to see. And then a perfect cut, I guess, is how they do it. But like flip of the light switch and then they just instantaneously disappear was so perfect. I love that. Like I think they did it three or four times, and it looks good every time because when people see their their loved ones in their house, they don't see them as like a ghostly apparition that are partially blue and semi-transparent or something like that. They see their face, they see them as a person as if they were in the room with them in most cases. And so I think using that here was perfect.

SPEAKER_00

I I see what you're saying with that, Mac, but I have to bring up something else in that realm, which is like the silvery lines traveling towards objects that was like were seen. I I thought that they were like too sci-fi feeling, directing their, you know, kind of gaze towards things and stuff. Like I got the concept, but I didn't feel like visually they felt right in this movie. And I I thought that's what you're about to say that you loved. I don't know, they were just weird, they felt odd to me.

SPEAKER_03

I think it was something where they're they're probably playing off the way that real people have described situations like that. I've really never heard many things like that. I like the idea of it. I think in cases like you mentioned, it does seem kind of more sci-fi fantasy than it does horror, which is why I think it was more effective when they simply showed a human person, especially in the shadows.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I don't know about the sci-fi bit of it. I mean, I think the the leading lines of it all is something that I'm kind of like torn on, you know, going one way or another. But Mac, I want to go back to what you said about the way that we see people who we've lost, and we the way that we see uh their faces in the shadows, just out of the corner of our eye. We turn, we do a double take, and suddenly they're not there. I'm thinking about that moment, and it's the first time I think we see this where she sees her mother in the shadows, and the figure disappears as soon as the light comes on. And this is like as she's like you know, working on her miniature set, and that comes in the wake of what is my favorite scene. And again, this is totally fucked because why would this be my favorite scene? But it's the one that made me feel the most, and it was the actual like opening scene of the funeral, and just thinking about like we get this moment where we we see her mother's funeral, we get a shot of the casket, immediately fucking destroyed me, completely wrecked my soul. But then we have her giving a eulogy, and that was just a wild experience within itself. When we think about the privacy of those moments, and she was like, you know, uh she makes a joke about how her mother would be a little bit suspicious of everybody that shows up. It I think was a very cathartic moment for me, despite how painful it was, because it was like one of the only moments within that eulogy I was able to laugh a little bit, and I mean that was like the only moment of laughter throughout the whole fucking movie for me. It's a little wild.

SPEAKER_11

That's interesting, Chris, because I also laughed at the eulogy, but mostly because it was her kind of just being like, Yeah, my mom was a bitch, and these are all the things that she did. And I was like, you know, I feel you, girl. I feel ya.

SPEAKER_07

Well, she talks about like private rituals, private friends, private anxieties, and just like the whole privacy of that moment and just what her mom was. But the other thing that fucked me up with this is like in the moments after that scene and we get through the funeral, Charlie is asking, Who will take care of me? And then her mom says, I'll take care of you. And she goes, But what about when you die? And that is the fucking shit that like gutted my soul. Because I think, like, in the wake of my grandmother passing, it was a lot of like, okay, you're not only passing, you're not only dealing with the the passing of a loved one, but you're also then contending with your own mortality. But what has been the scariest thing for me, which is my parents' mortality, and so like that layer of things and that exchange between the two of them, that's where I saw myself the most in this movie.

SPEAKER_11

I love that. I think I saw myself the most in this movie during the sleepwalking scene where we have Tony Colette going into her son's room and kind of, you know, being like, oh my gosh, there's like bugs on his face, or like his face is running, whatever. Uh, and then him waking up and her realizing she was sleepwalking. And then they have this exchange where they just kind of say, like, what's really on their minds. He's like, Why are you afraid of me? She's like, I never wanted, I never wanted to be your mother, and then immediately regret saying that. And I have had many dreams where I say things to my mom that I don't think I could ever say to her in person, uh, but they're very like intensely emotional dreams. And then for them to cut back and forth between the characters and suddenly they're both drenched in paint thinner. I love the story that she had told earlier. And then she's holding a match and then realizes actually she still hasn't woken up dream within a dream inception moment. I was like, damn, like that exchange for me was like probably the most emotional, uh, at least as far as I could relate to.

SPEAKER_00

I really enjoyed that dialogue, but it it was something that becomes a thing in this movie that I really don't like, which is that so many scenes that have interesting things happening and really like important, meaningful conversations and stuff like that, are dreams and it bothers me. Like one of the movies that it made me think of that I think did it in a way that I preferred, which is his house, where they have a constant back and forth between what's reality and what's not necessarily dreams, but kind of like um hallucinations and stuff like that. But for me, every single time something important happened in this movie, it was a dream, or it was someone getting their head cut off. They did a lot of decapitation here and then sleeping. And that was something that like just bothered me. Like this cool moment, like it was so intense when she was like, I never wanted to be your mother. Like, that's so interesting. And then they just like wake up. And I think there's like an illusion of maybe them kind of like both being asleep and like kind of both experiencing that dream and whatever, but like it's a dream, it it bothers me. I don't know. Those things feel like weak points for this movie because to me, that whole scene's a write-off because you woke up. Like, I don't know, it just happens too often. A couple times I'm fine with it. Happens like 10 times in this movie. There's a lot of dreaming.

SPEAKER_03

It's funny because we have we have that contrast with those moments that we know or eventually know are not real, and it makes you question the actual moments that we assume are real. But I think the best moments that are truly real, where characters get to be themselves, are really interesting. Like when she starts talking about not wanting to be a mother to her son, like that was real, and then we find out of course it wasn't. But when she goes off at the dinner table, that was such a great scene. I love I just I like love the way that she was able to just like let it out because she had been holding it in for so long. And then, of course, like any teenage son, he has to like continue, right? You gotta you gotta instigate a little bit more until it goes too far, and then dad's gotta step in apparently and tell them both to stop. But before it it went off the rails, she just it just like came flowing out of her. And that was one, I think, uh, one of those scenes where you see a lot of emotion from from an actor and you really connect. And if this were a drama and there's no horror attached, whatever, I'd be happy with it because they just she just truly delivered in that moment. And I and I really enjoyed it. I think part of the reason she's so good in this movie is we can feel her frustration, we can feel her exhaustion, and she seems like a real mom in this movie. Not at every moment when she's trying to burn people with paint thinner, but like in moments like that where she's giving us real emotion. All of the fake moments do make me question what was actually real and what wasn't in some of the stuff, but I think that kind of a moment guaranteed to be real.

SPEAKER_04

That's definitely my favorite scene because of course I can picture a very frustrated, grieving mother screaming, don't you fucking swear at me, you little shit. And I certainly would love to yell at someone saying some I think she said something like, Um, and all I get is that fucking face on your face. God.

SPEAKER_11

That felt so real.

SPEAKER_04

It felt so real. It felt so real. You said it earlier, Paris. That's I I think of people that really, really enjoy this movie, we can all ban her on the fact that she deserved that Oscar. And you were wondering, Paris, who got the Oscar that year is actually Francis McDormant for three billboards on E-bring, I think it's called, or something like that.

SPEAKER_08

Boo.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. Well, that one, not for anything. She also, Francis McDormant slayed that movie as well, and it's a very tough one, extremely tough one to watch. So I get it. However, we know that horror is never really seen in the Oscars. So there's that. I still think that that that monologue. Actually, you another thing you mentioned, Paris. I love you. You're just so great. You mentioned earlier how this movie's also like in memes and things like that. That monologue I've seen on t-shirts, like literally printed out on t-shirts. Everyone's got like her screaming, that's a meme. It's one of the most memorable, I think, moments, not just of this movie, but I think in the most recent couple years for sure.

SPEAKER_07

My favorite meme of hereditary is seeing the hot pizza rolls in her mouth.

SPEAKER_04

My favorite meme of Hereditary as of recent, which is extremely fucked up, is Charlie in the backseat of uh Barbie's car. Yeah, that's a good one. That's a dark one. Come on, Charlie.

SPEAKER_07

Let's go party.

SPEAKER_06

Oh, uh-huh, oh, yikes!

SPEAKER_11

Oh, geez. But also, we can't forget the Yassified Tony Colette after she like screams, looks so demonic, and then immediately is possessed, and her facial expression changes, but then they just put the Yassify filter on her, and then she looks like a fake CGI supermodel.

SPEAKER_04

It's incredible. It's incredible.

SPEAKER_02

I I think you all picked really great scenes. I I think I'm gonna pick something that was a little bit maybe less popular, I guess. It it's really like a series of scenes, maybe two or three that follow Charlie's immediate death. When Peter is like trying, he it happens, right? And he's just like, man, it's sinking in. You can only imagine what would be going through your head at that moment, right? You're just sitting there like, holy shit, like I just killed my sister. Like, that's insane, right? But then his foot slowly lifts off the gas, and the car starts moving forward, and he drives home and he parks and he gets out and he slowly walks back into his house and he goes to bed and he lays on the bed. And if he slept, I don't know. But then you get also the shot of his head on the pillow awake, listening to his mom leave the house, come back, and the reaction of everything that was happening really powerful. I think it's really intense. I don't know if anyone would react that way in real life, but it it just seems so crazy, and that series of scenes was intense. I don't know. It was really crazy.

SPEAKER_04

I I think you mentioned it earlier, Chris. Like, imagine in any case, like you just witnessing something like that, just trying to go to the car. And and then going back to what you and I were talking about, Mac with that dinner scene, because then the son, Peter, he like takes it a step further because you can never get the last word when it's your mother yelling at you. You're just like, Well, you're the one that made her get go to the party. Sir, your mother just witnessed something that you did. Sorry, but taking accountability, like she's saying in that monologue, taking accountability, she opens a door, she just witnessed her child beheaded in the backseat.

SPEAKER_07

Something he didn't even have the courage to see. Right.

SPEAKER_02

He also told her to eat the cake.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah. I don't think it's important to blame people for accidents. Hold on a second, because really what Sean just did was take a page out of the book of Ryan to be fair from oh.

SPEAKER_00

Like, that's what he just did. To be fair, he made her eat the cake. It is true, but when they were arguing and like going back and forth, I was like, let's not be blaming here. I don't know. Sometimes I'm very rational about blame. I don't think blame is as important as people think it is.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I don't disagree with you. I think it's just a fucking sad situation all around. And like I feel really terribly for Charlie, who, you know, didn't really want to be there in the first place, and then is just like uncomfortable looking for her brother, suffering an allergic reaction, then is just like freaking out in the backseat only to be beheaded. Then to just have this on both sides of things, like, you know, as soon as shit goes off, obviously knowing what's gonna fucking happen, and short my notes, fuck man, real really sucks for this mom, huh? That she's like creating the situation and kind of getting her um kid out the door and making him take her. And you know, with good intention, sure, but there's no way, even Peter he he never had to say that. He never had to say it, and she would feel it every fucking second.

SPEAKER_04

If we remove ourselves from the situation. In reality, the one that is to blame is this cult because they planned that thing all along.

SPEAKER_00

That's what I'm saying. Also, it sounds like she was gonna well okay, so there's two things. One is she was gonna probably die from the allergic reaction anyway, first, but then second, yeah, it all seems like somehow, in a way that wasn't explained properly during by this movie, it was all part of a plan somehow. Like she had to die. I don't understand how that ended up being the case. Maybe it was gonna be a future plan.

SPEAKER_04

Payman is already in Charlie the whole time that we've seen her.

SPEAKER_00

Right, right.

SPEAKER_04

I know that, but so that what basically what they were doing, so when that that light pole has this side the symbol on it, because what what Payman can technically do is like manipulate situations. And so in order to get to a male host, Charlie needed to die. So they it's very fucked, but they were like, Well, and Peter had to be vulnerable.

SPEAKER_11

Peter, Peter had to be a vulnerable it's a trans narrative, right? Had to be a vulnerable vulnerable Payman was trapped in a female body and was like, No, get me right. And in the end, that's what happened.

SPEAKER_00

In the end, they were like, We're so sorry we put you in a woman. We've we fixed it.

SPEAKER_11

We fixed it, please. So they're like, We fixed that. Sorry about that.

SPEAKER_00

Sorry, you desired man.

SPEAKER_11

If only it was this easy.

SPEAKER_01

This wasn't easy.

SPEAKER_07

Famed trans allies, cult of fame.

SPEAKER_03

That's exactly the narrative we need. I do have a question though. So this is this is the thing that like I think I know the answer to, but like, so Charlie's consciousness, we don't know much about Charlie doesn't say really much of anything, but like, are you telling me that that entire time before any of the bad stuff happened, Charlie was already a king of hell, but but didn't know it?

SPEAKER_04

No, knew it. It's shared. So those little orb things is tech this is the part that I def I'm not necessarily the biggest fan of either. Those little orb things that we're seeing is Charlie and Payman. When Peter f leaves and like jumps out of that friggin' window, that is technically Charlie in his body that has carried Payman with her. So now it's Charlie and Payman in Peter, and that's why Joni addresses Peter as Charlie.

SPEAKER_07

All I'm saying is through the crowd. A bit too much. For sure.

SPEAKER_03

That's D.I.D. So there is a Charlie and a Payman. Yes. Like it wasn't, you know, in most, in most things, it's like a demon or or the devil is born into a human body, and but their consciousness is them. In this case, there's two consciousnesses residing in the same body. That's D.I.D. Mac.

SPEAKER_00

I do need to say my opinion of how all of the ending of this came together, as far as like all the I almost said extraterrestrial, the uh the cultisms. It felt like asking Chat GPD for like how Satan cults work and like a a vague description. Not that it didn't like all match up completely, but it was just like they're like, oh, the conjurer gets rich, and then it's just like a picture of the mom, the grandma, Annie's mom, with like money and stuff, like being showered in gold coins with all her friends, yeah, with like coins and stuff. And I don't know, it just felt that I think we all kind of said that we didn't love the ending, but it just that's like part of the things that are just like, what's the point? Like, what are we here for? But I guess that's just what cults do, they just get bored and worship things, I guess.

SPEAKER_03

Famously. So this it does raise in my mind another point of curiosity, which was there is the switch, right? So first it's hey, husband, we need to like talk about this thing, we need to figure this out, we need to burn this book because I realize that these people knew my mom, and you know, it's all coming together, right? And he's like, bruh, you need some help. And then she's like, Okay, I'm gonna throw this book in the fire, and then he burns, and then she starts floating, flying around and cutting her head off. When what like what was there in that moment that made her switch and suddenly start banging her head into a door and then cut her head off with a piano wire? There wasn't like a moment of possession or anything that I could see unless I missed it. There was where where where was that?

SPEAKER_11

So a little bit before that, she literally like screams, looks so disgusting and monstrous, and then her facial expression goes, oh, and like she she makes like a dramatic facial switch, and then from that point forward she's fully possessed by who I assumed was Payman, but it's not hopping in there for a minute to cause mayhem.

SPEAKER_04

Come you see what I'm saying? It's all the orb, you just have to it's so annoying. And I I I'm gonna say it again, don't love it. If you follow the orb, you'll see that Payman is jumping follow the bouncing ball. Right. So the goal is to get him to Peter. So he just jumps through the hereditary, jumps through the fam the bloodline of this of this family. And can only affect the bloodline, it could only go through the bell, which is why he never possesses the husband.

SPEAKER_11

It's convoluted.

SPEAKER_00

But also, Mac, I think the whole idea is just that like the door was opened when they did the seance. And so from that point forward, uh everyone's involved, basically. Except Steve. Good old Steve. God, I love him. I know that we're gonna talk about characters, and you guys are gonna say a bunch of really sweet things. So I just want to get a couple things off my chest because the characters and the acting in this movie is incredible, but the amount of wailing in this movie is truly almost unbearable for me. It's too much for me and crying. I understand the point, I get it, it's emotional. It just did it, it just did too much for me, and I just I just don't want to hear people scream ever, much less on a movie when I'm watching it, and much less like with noise cancellation, headphones on. That was a rough one for me, and I think that's gonna be my last gripe that I that I rest on for this, for this movie.

SPEAKER_04

I know that we talked about Peter just a smidge when it came to the monologue. I just want to give a shout out to his attempt at game and Riz when he was at the party trying to approach his girl. That was sweet. I think he said like a whoa, hi, or like something awkward like that. That was like, hmm, yikes. But it times are tough, you know.

SPEAKER_00

He was so sweet though.

SPEAKER_11

He was super sweet, and he had a big bag of weed.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Also, the girl he was talking to had jokes. He was like, How's the party? She was like, Wait, you want to see if you want to come? I was like, yo, that's hilarious. Love that.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, I I would say with Peter and Annie, I think they both did incredible jobs just in the emotion that both of them were able to portray. Even in the non, like you were talking about wailing and screaming, like even in Annie's silent screams, and you just have to have that expression that also makes you uncomfortable, and you're like, oh my god, like I don't want to look at this, but I'm looking at this, but I don't really want to see it for that much longer. You know what I mean? Like, and that was a lot, and I think I think to an extent, you know, it's hard to compete with Annie, but Peter does have moments that I think are really good. Hard to compete next to Annie, but they both brought a lot to this film.

SPEAKER_00

I actually appreciated Peter's emotion a little bit more just because it felt so raw and like authentic. Not that, not that Annie's didn't, but it just felt so like intense and like like he was so out of control of everything. And it, you know, as much as he was like kind of rude to his mom, I still felt like he felt so bad about what happened. It was just a very interesting dynamic watching their two emotions be very different, but also like very intense at the same time.

SPEAKER_04

And can I just say I f when I first saw this movie and I saw Alex Wolf, I was like, this is Naked Brothers Band. This is the little boy. I don't know if you guys ever saw that show. I it's a Nickelodeon show, was m very, very young. And him and his older brother are brothers in this band called The Naked Brothers Band. And I was like, I haven't seen this kid since I was like maybe 10 years old. At best, and all of a sudden he's acting incredibly. If you look, if you Google him right now as a kid, he's so adorable. His older brother is the one that's in like Faulton or Stars and has done other things. He's a little more popular in the industry. So it was like really nice to see something that intense coming from him. And since then, he's done other movies. He's in Oppenheimer. He's done other like smaller side roles. And so it's nice to see that someone from like Nickelodeon could do such an impactful performance alongside Tony Colette's pretty it's nice.

SPEAKER_03

But Tony Collette's performance floating up into the treehouse worst part of the movie for me. Not her performance, but that segment of her floating. That weird, out-of-place floating. The the red hue shining through loved it, right? Even the ceremony afterwards gave me Rosemary's Baby. I I kind of enjoyed that stuff. I get we get to see what happens when evil wins, and it's intriguing. But there is something so just wrong about the cartoonish float that that bothered me and stuck with me. It made me dislike the stuff that surrounded it. Like it made me dislike other parts of the ending that initially didn't even bother me.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I'm gonna go a step backwards from that. And it's not even the float that bothered me so much as it was just the experience of getting to that ending and for it being what it was. Again, I like the idea of evil winning, like you said. I like the idea of they weren't able to stop this thing, this whole family got wrecked, and it all went according to plan in a way. But there's something about the extreme of the cultiness of it, of the supernatural of it, where I think the movie shined the most in the very real pain that existed in this family. And so it's just it's two things. It's like sweet and savory, and normally I don't like sweet. And so for me, let's say like the ending was like the sweet part that I was like, could have done without this. Could have stopped a few minutes beforehand, and just like as soon as like maybe the fucking dad died, or she's like fucking cutting her head off with a piano wire. Maybe around then I could have been like, All right, yeah, cool, we're done.

SPEAKER_02

It's the amount of old nudity for me. That's the worst part of this film.

SPEAKER_06

Also, this, yes. It's worse than X.

SPEAKER_02

It's a lot, it's a lot and unnecessary. I don't think it added a whole lot of value to this film at all. I mean, even to the point of like there's the moment somewhere in the movie where you see the dollhouse replica, whatever, of the breastfeeding in the bed, and then the old lady mom, whoever, with her old titty out. Like, what's the point of that? I don't need to see any of that. She wanted to breastfeed that baby so bad.

SPEAKER_11

Oh, God.

SPEAKER_07

Okay, I think at this point in the end of your episode, we can officially have a breastfeeding segment. Like we've had so much of it.

SPEAKER_02

I think so. I think we're there.

SPEAKER_00

One thing that tickled me about the naked people was you know, they were all like kneeled down, right? And there's one guy, like the like the main guy that you could see when you come up, he's like a pretty chunky guy. And like, because they were in like a pretty awkward pose, like his just butthole would have been out. So they just put a sheet over the back of him just to like cover the bum a bit. I mean, we would have never seen it, but it was just so funny. Everybody's like butt naked. A couple people had like full robes on, but he just had like a little like cover my bum.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, ass cheeks would have been a little spread for sure.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, like men with their ass up in the air, just like don't need to defeat it.

SPEAKER_04

I was gonna say something else as the worst part, but yeah, maybe that is the worst part, actually. So I've I think I might have changed my mind. Although I don't necessarily think it's unnecessary, I think it's pretty realistic when we're talking about like cults and that kind of you know ritual stuff. But the fear of maybe seeing an asshole would have been probably scarier than some of the things I saw.

SPEAKER_06

Just a spread open 60-year-old man's asshole. The fear of assholes compels you.

SPEAKER_11

Um, worst part for me, I have a specific and a general. Specifically, and this is the first time I noticed this: the scene where Steve dies, right before he goes up in flames, a very bad CGI face is put on to that stunt actor that you see for just a glimpse, but it was a glimpse too long for my liking. And I said, that was lazily done. It was poorly blended, it did it barely looked like Steve, even, but you could tell that they did a lot to try and make that stunt actor look like Steve with the CGI of it all. Um, but I think generally worst part for this movie is that it just peaks too early. Like the peak of this film is girl's head popping off, and everything after that is lesser than. And of course, you're supposed to like feel the aftermath of something so devastating in your life, and like that's maybe part of it, but you kind of get past that part, and there's a reason why I've only watched like the first 25 minutes of this movie about a dozen times and never actually finished it until today for the second time. Uh, because that's like the best part.

SPEAKER_00

It does go very long after that scene. I was like, How much is left? An hour and a half. Oh, what are we doing?

SPEAKER_11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

My best part of this movie is gonna be the clarity that Binx has given to the linkage of things here. Because I I don't think this movie does a good enough job laying it out nicely. I watched most of this movie twice today, and I'm not an idiot. I am blonde, but I generally get it. Like I get what we're doing. Binx showed a lot shine a lot more light on things than before, and I'm not unhacking it, don't get it twisted. But those links are so important, and I think so much of this movie that I don't enjoy is like if we're talking about grief and all this stuff, what is this stuff at the end to have anything to do with anything? And some of those points about how it travels through the family are a lot more interesting than than not realizing that.

SPEAKER_10

Thinks links.

SPEAKER_00

I love it. There's a lot of decapitation in this movie. I don't know if any of it's necessarily warranted, but there's a moment where Annie wakes up Peter genuinely three inches from his face. And if ever I was gonna decapitate somebody, that would be my moment. That that scene was horrifying. I was like, please, I if I opened my eyeballs and saw your irises, like I would die. I it would be the end of me.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, you're getting punched for sure.

SPEAKER_00

Literally, like, never talk to me again. I now hate you. Whoever you are, mom.

SPEAKER_07

Damn, that's intense. But honestly, I understand it. And I hope you'll understand me when I say that I don't plan on never fucking watching this movie again. It's just too much. It's good. I'm glad I saw it the once, but it's too much. I can't handle that again.

SPEAKER_00

Yep, I'm good. Never again. This is solidified that I didn't miss anything the first time.

SPEAKER_03

I've it's well, it's probably uh I probably won't see it again, right? But uh what I will say is I have not yet seen Minsumar, and I cannot wait to watch it. I've been waiting to watch. I don't know why, but after watching this again recently, I'm like, I need to get more of this vibe of this skill when making films. And so yeah, this film, if I see it again, whatever, I need to move on to the next one though.

SPEAKER_11

Y'all are a little wacky. This movie, I feel like, was designed to be rewatched a bunch of times because it's so like riddled with Easter eggs and little connections and things and Binks links. And I will happily watch this again. I actually enjoyed it a little bit more this time because I feel like I caught more and I understood more specifically with the ending. And you'll never get that first watch head pop-off kill feeling. You'll never get that again. But I think there's still more to be gleaned from a multiple watching storyline here.

SPEAKER_00

They could have made it fun. If I was supposed to watch it a bunch of times, they could have like gave me a little bit of joy.

SPEAKER_11

Watching Tony Collette, Tony Collette about that's fun to me.

SPEAKER_00

That was stressful.

SPEAKER_02

I had fun.

SPEAKER_01

I'm happy for you.

SPEAKER_02

I agree that this movie also has rewatch value. It is a lot, it is really heavy. I don't think it's something that you could just like want to watch often, but I think you know, I've watched it like five or six times now. I've watched it twice in the last like couple months, so I think that's enough for a long time. But there is a lot to gain from re-watching this movie and a lot to appreciate by watching the little details in this movie. So never say never. I'm sure I'll watch it again.

SPEAKER_04

And I'm right there with you. I definitely will watch this again. Maybe not in the near future, but definitely we'll watch it again.

SPEAKER_07

Well, I can't wait to see how that goes for you. But for now, there you have the folks. Hereditary from 2018 has earned five slashes, still not universal because it's still got a six, and that was a hack. Now we've certainly had a robust discussion here, but it doesn't end here by any means. We want to know what you think.

SPEAKER_04

Thoughts on the movie's ending, perhaps the nudity, because we certainly have opinions on it. But you can let us know. You can join in on the conversation by hanging out with us for free in our Discord. Click the link in our show notes to sign up.

SPEAKER_03

If you've enjoyed listening to this episode, consider becoming one of our patrons. Visit patreon.com slash hacker slash to enjoy more of the show with early access, extended episodes, bonus content, and live shows.

SPEAKER_07

We'll see you next time, folks. And remember, it doesn't make it easier, obviously, but sometimes it makes it less lonely.

SPEAKER_02

Come, stay, whatever you want. I don't really give a shit.

SPEAKER_07

Well, here we are. Three generations of hosts under one roof. How does it feel to be part of the fucking matriarchy? Matriarchy. I'm the matriarchy. Okay, go off.

SPEAKER_04

It's more like how does it feel to be a matriarch?

SPEAKER_06

Not as cool as I thought it'd feel.

SPEAKER_07

You gave yourself the title. Yeah, I know. I just thought it'd be fun. But I mean, it what happens to the matriarch in this movie? Starts off dead. Okay. Gets beheaded at some point.

SPEAKER_11

Well, but then, you know, things turn around.

SPEAKER_00

A queen. I personally feel so happy to have all of us together. I've I have always I mean I've recorded with Binks and Sean before, but I've just enjoyed it every time. And I feel like Paris hasn't been around for enough of it, and then I haven't been around for more of it. And it's I think it's just so cool that we're all together. Yeah.

SPEAKER_11

The stars have really aligned in a beautiful and powerful way here tonight.

SPEAKER_06

And literally across oceans of time and time zones.

SPEAKER_11

And space.

SPEAKER_06

It's only oceans if you go the wrong way. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

It is kind of funny. One, two, three, four, five out of the six of us are under one roof, literally sleeping in the same house tonight.

SPEAKER_00

Oh.

SPEAKER_03

Right? That's kind of that's kind of wild. That's new. That's a new one for us.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, the most we've ever recorded all together is back when we used to do it all at Alexis's house, and it was me, Mac, Chris, and Alexis. And I guess Parker was there for a little bit, but he didn't have a ton of overlap with us. Only about 30 days. Yeah. And then since then, like Binks and John always record by themselves. You guys are living the life of luxury. We are. That's true.

SPEAKER_11

Whose house is this?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, we're at an Airbnb, babe.

SPEAKER_11

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_07

We're living large. Paris, there's a theater room.

SPEAKER_11

Oh, cute. So you're gonna play bodies, bodies, bodies, and one of you's gonna die. Nice.

SPEAKER_00

Brilliant fucking idea, actually. All I can say is if anyone starts doing any like shenanigans or like I feel like Veto might show up with like a freaking Ouija board, I'm out. The fun will me and Vicks are on the same page. The fun will not be had with me, okay? I know where my exits are.

SPEAKER_07

That's right. Sean, we should probably go check your trunk.

SPEAKER_02

Hey, listen, you know, there may or may not well, my car's not here. My car's not here, so then that's okay.

SPEAKER_04

Did you bring this Ouija board?

SPEAKER_02

No. My car's not here. Ari's car is here, and she does not have Ouija boards in her trunk.

SPEAKER_04

Thank God.

SPEAKER_02

But you do? Sean does. Well, I mean, depends on the situation. Of course. But it's always good to have some kind of form of communication, even with the dead, you know?

SPEAKER_06

Okay. That communicates effectively to a D.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. Absolutely. I will say though, this is pretty crazy for me. I don't know about you, Binx, but it's pretty it's crazy for me. One, that we're all doing this episode together, two, that I'm actually in the same room as Ryan and Mac because I spent a long time just listening to all of you banter about movies for hours and hours on end. So it's really just wild to me. Never did I think I would be like in the same room doing a podcast about horror movies with you all. So it's it's a pleasure, it's an honor. But it's just really cool. I'm just kind of geeking out about it right now.

SPEAKER_01

I forgot about that part.

SPEAKER_02

That's cute.

SPEAKER_04

That is true, that is true. Because now that I think about it, yeah, I I met Paris before she moved, luckily. But I I guess I just didn't think that I would ever like meet at least you, Ryan, in person, or when was that gonna occur? You know what I mean? I figured at least, Mac, at some point, if the stars aligned, like they have this evening, which is so beautiful, so poetic.

SPEAKER_00

It's so funny because like 10 minutes ago, not it was actually probably 45 minutes ago. Solid hour. I was like saying, Paris is so tall, and I was like, in my head, I was going on about like when Binx meets Paris, it's gonna it's gonna be a thing.

SPEAKER_11

Because you were shook, right?

SPEAKER_00

What an idiot. I didn't think about it. I met Paris and we were both in costume.

SPEAKER_11

I was in the radius blonde bar.

SPEAKER_07

You rocked the fuck out of it. Paris was dressed as Casey Becker from Scream for horror trivia.

SPEAKER_11

And we won points for that, didn't we?

SPEAKER_00

Oh yeah, that makes sense. It's so funny. I was like, oh my god, you're gonna like Paris is like the same thickness as you, but 10 feet tall. Yes. So funny. Okay, well, I'm an idiot. To be fair, I'm happy to be here. I'm glad I get to meet all you guys. But you all are the difference is I was shook when I met Paris. Like, I was like, what the fuck? Why are you so tall? But Binx and Sean are exactly what I thought. Like, literally, I hugged them and I was like, You're exactly how I thought you would feel. That is my arms. That's very true. That is a direct quote. You're the right shape in my mind. I said the least weird version of that, by the way. There were more weird ways for me to say it.

SPEAKER_03

I still have not met Paris in person, though.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, to this day. So that's sad. So I can't actually understand physically in real life the tallness. I was not prepared for how tall Sean is. So I I I know that Sean is tall. Like I understand that logically. And then walking into the room, it was like, oh, okay. I did not understand fully exactly how tall Sean is. And so when you're telling me that Paris is tall, I I can I can I can understand that, but like I, you know, I don't understand the physicality of it.

SPEAKER_11

How tall is Sean?

SPEAKER_03

Are you both the same height? That's what I want to know.

SPEAKER_04

I was just gonna say, I'm pretty sure.

SPEAKER_02

It's possible. I'm like 6'1. Oh no, I'm six three, six four, six three. Ooh.

SPEAKER_00

Paris feels so tall. I don't know how to explain it.

SPEAKER_11

Because I'm so thin.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_11

I'm like Slender Man.

SPEAKER_00

It's not about the height, it's not about the number. It's not like Paris is like seven two.

SPEAKER_11

It's a very like Jack Skellington effect.

SPEAKER_00

She's not playing basketball.

SPEAKER_11

She's not playing basketball.

SPEAKER_00

But Paris feels like the tallest person I've ever met.

SPEAKER_11

Because she's felt. Because I have a twig body and a big old bobblehead.

SPEAKER_00

Also, I do feel like you were wearing like plat platform boots.

SPEAKER_11

I also love a big shoe. Go off, Queen. Can't resist. I like to go full Amazon, you know?

SPEAKER_03

I mean, you're you're both fairly slender, but you're telling me that Paris is the same size as Banks, like thickness-wise, I guess, girthiness. Um not girthiness.

SPEAKER_00

I can't speak to Paris' girth. I can just say Paris is not not skinny, you know?

SPEAKER_03

So like a tall petite. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

I think that's part of the height feeling is like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. It helps elongate. It gives bean pole.

SPEAKER_04

The after dark sub subcontext is just racking up. It's racking up high. Oh, what's wrong? No, never anything wrong with Girth. What? What? Oh no.

SPEAKER_07

What are we talking about? I don't like this. Feeling just as heterosexual as it did back in the day when Alexis was here and we just talked about dick all the time.

SPEAKER_06

No.

SPEAKER_00

No one can be Alexis.

SPEAKER_11

Bring Alexis back. And here she is.

SPEAKER_00

Love of my life. No one will ever talk about dicks as much as Alexis, unironically.

SPEAKER_01

Literally not. Or about their dicks.

SPEAKER_03

I think that I feel like Bingx is getting close in real life. You missed it today. In real life.

SPEAKER_04

In real life. What dick am I getting in real life?

SPEAKER_03

In real life, there was I feel like there was plenty of conversations today, just alone. That referenced that, you know.

SPEAKER_04

Can't help it. Vero says it's because I was born in the 90s, like early 90s in 92 specifically.

SPEAKER_02

Yes. And the 90s were horny, so we've established that.

SPEAKER_04

That doesn't faded. I don't know. It's what she says.

SPEAKER_02

You had to be there, I guess. I don't know. It was it it it was an interesting explanation, but the nineties is just a horny time, you know?

SPEAKER_00

I think it's just because we're 30.

SPEAKER_04

That could be that too.

SPEAKER_00

Okay. Could be that too. We're just explaining that all the people from the nineties are horny. Like, what are we talking about?

SPEAKER_03

30, flirty, and thriving. And horny as fuck. This actually sounds like a new, like a new uh like Blumhouse movie with this this description. It's accurate, you know?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_11

Yeah. And Justin Long's in this one too.

SPEAKER_01

Ryan, you're not 30 yet. I'm close enough.

SPEAKER_04

She rounded up. Six months.

SPEAKER_11

Oh, close.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. Round it up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_11

29 and three quarters.

SPEAKER_04

Thanks, but I love it.

SPEAKER_11

Actually, one half. I can't math. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_01

That's right. It is exactly six months. Is that is that girl math?

SPEAKER_03

See, that's okay though, because like when you when you're 28, 29, you can basically say, Yeah, I'm 30. When you're like 35 and above, you just get to go, yeah, I'm 40.

SPEAKER_02

That's true.

SPEAKER_04

Didn't this happen to you, Sean? Didn't you forget your own age?

SPEAKER_02

I I yeah, I famously thought I was going to be turning 37 this whole year. And I just like found out days before my birthday that I was turning 36. So it was a it was a nice surprise.

SPEAKER_07

And I like that it's I found out.

SPEAKER_02

Not that who told you? I was sitting there talking- look, so I was sitting there in the room. I was talking to my my mom was over at my house. I was talking to my mom and my wife, and we're talking about it was like weeks before my birthday, maybe a week before my birthday, and we're talking about, you know, what if we're gonna go out to dinner or whatever. And and I was like, I don't know. I just mentioned, I was like, man, I'm turning 37, it's fucking crazy. And my mom's like, no, you're not, you're turning 36, and I had to think about it for a moment. I had to do math, and I was like, man, that's you're you're fucking right. I'm turning 36. This is crazy. I'm actually getting younger. This is great.

SPEAKER_07

Oh my god. Getting younger.

SPEAKER_02

Wow, a whole year back. Yeah, that was that's wonderful.

SPEAKER_07

And that is the immortal Sean. That's that's Kenan.

SPEAKER_02

That's key. Just always think you're gonna be older than you are, and then surprise yourself, and then you're young forever.

SPEAKER_07

Genius. How old are you? 17. How long have you been 17? For a while.

SPEAKER_02

There it is. There it is. Hell yeah. Found the secret to eternal youth.

SPEAKER_07

Wow. I'm just like completely geeking out over here because I was just uh I was sending a text to one of my friends earlier, and I'm just so blown away by the fact that like excluding Paris, right? Almost all my favorite people are under one roof tonight, and that's just a crazy like world's collide moment.

SPEAKER_03

Oh, it's awesome.

SPEAKER_07

Even as immortal as you are.

SPEAKER_03

Well, she's under the roof just digitally.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03

And this is all a simulation anyway, so that still counts.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I am just imagining you.

SPEAKER_11

That's true. I've missed Mac.

SPEAKER_03

I've missed you and your beautiful eyeshadow.

SPEAKER_01

That's what I said. Paris.

SPEAKER_11

It's literally like all worn down from having hooded lids, oily skin, and 12 days of labor.

SPEAKER_04

The labor. Thank you. I wasn't expecting the 12 days of labor.

SPEAKER_11

With more contractions. First day of labor. Shoveling.

SPEAKER_00

Shoveling would definitely be the first day of labor. Not making license plates? No, I'm thinking like shoveling, laying concrete, framing houses.

SPEAKER_01

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_11

Lifting boxes.

SPEAKER_01

Hmm. That's a good one. Lifting boxes is a good one.

SPEAKER_11

Like helping someone move specifically.

SPEAKER_01

Random ladders. Okay. This is dumb.

SPEAKER_02

I just want to say framing houses and lifting boxes are way on opposite ends of the spectrum there.

SPEAKER_01

It depends what's in the box. Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Boxes are heavy sometimes, Sean.

SPEAKER_07

For those bird-like arms.

SPEAKER_03

Refrigerators come in boxes. Okay, yeah. And those are heavy. That's true. That's true. It's also kind of wild if you think about that that we're hitting six years, right? And just four years ago, right around four years ago, plus a couple weeks, I guess, completely different crew.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Right. And so it was like the crew that I listened to and that Ryan would have listened to that was making the podcast. And now six years later, the third generation of hosts are now here. I'm still I'm still stuck. But you know, it's good.

SPEAKER_11

That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_07

No, it's good. You're the older brother.

SPEAKER_03

I'm the older, I'm the older brother, but not from the Amadeval Horror.

SPEAKER_07

No, not that one.

SPEAKER_02

Important.

SPEAKER_07

Famed shitty brother, Ronald DeFeo Jr.

SPEAKER_02

Thank goodness.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah. But it's it's wild though. Like I'm now I'm now graying with as long as I've been doing this shit. And I remember we're looking at we're at a pizza place earlier in Paris, and uh Sean hadn't joined us yet. He and his wife had just gotten to the Airbnb. But I was trying to explain the um memories of Page, who used to be with us, and I was looking for videos and I was stumbling up across all this archival footage of the podcast, and I was like, man, that Chris has no idea what's coming. Like to imagine like just where I was in life and to think about A, how different the show is, B, how different all of you are, but then like just to have like I never thought I'd be at a horror trivia in Miami and meet Binks or that I'd meet Sean at you know, finally getting to where I wanted to be at work, and then actually meet a cool fucking rad human that I could be friends with. It's just wild. It's just wild. Had no idea what was coming, or even Paris, who famously, fresh words to me, what's your sign? It's a great intro line. No, it's not.

SPEAKER_04

It said it is.

SPEAKER_11

I'm nothing if not consistent. It is when the answer is Capricorn.

SPEAKER_04

No, it's not. And also, yeah.

SPEAKER_11

And so am I. And then it was like, oh, perfect. Let's begin. Let's begin. Because we have work to do here.

SPEAKER_06

Y'all are annoying. And we did.

SPEAKER_03

We really are.

SPEAKER_06

We did have work to do there. We've done so much work.

SPEAKER_03

Why is it not like that for Geminis, though? Because if you're a Gemini like me and then somebody else is a Gemini, you're like, we will we will friction. Each other.

SPEAKER_11

There can be only one.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. Or three Geminis in a room. That's just danger. It's like someone's gonna be someone's gonna be in pain after that.

SPEAKER_00

It's because three Geminis is really six.

SPEAKER_03

That's because Capricorns are like Legos. Oh, Legos. Okay.

SPEAKER_11

We're like Legos. On our own, we can only do so much. But together, we can build anything.

SPEAKER_07

Honestly. I have no rebuttal. Honestly, though, it's true. Because one of my favorite co-workers is a Capricorn, and we're just fucking out here getting shit done.

SPEAKER_06

We're a great tag team. But Geminis are two-faced.

SPEAKER_00

So there's double of you.

SPEAKER_11

Geminis are adaptable.

SPEAKER_00

They're yeah.

SPEAKER_03

I figured it out. So it's like a Gemini, two Geminis in a room would be like two putting two mirrors facing each other. Right. What is there to reflect? It's just gonna narcissism. The void.

SPEAKER_00

Okay. It's all made up, but the points don't matter.

SPEAKER_11

Infinite nothingness. Exactly.

SPEAKER_07

Well, here we are. Three generations of hosts in one house.

SPEAKER_00

Wait a minute. Pause for a second. You said it twice. Paris, did you say something?

SPEAKER_11

I said it. I think I said it at the same time as well. Okay.

SPEAKER_07

Sean said it at the same time Paris did. That's why I asked Sean to do it one more time. Okay, sorry. I just had to clear the air so we can restart.

SPEAKER_11

And that's three generations of Hackerslash.

SPEAKER_07

It feels just as chaotic. Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_11

All right.

SPEAKER_07

The cowardly Cooper Ryan. A little commotion. I hit that shit.

SPEAKER_04

Leave it to the girls to get really in the mic.

SPEAKER_11

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04

Paris her, chugs her drink. Let's go, Paris, for the ladies. Let's go.

SPEAKER_01

Get in there. And the Scream Queen Paris. That might be the best one, actually.

SPEAKER_11

I got a fat tongue. Girthy.

SPEAKER_01

Holy shit.

SPEAKER_06

Okay.

SPEAKER_11

We are never going to make it to the end of this episode.

SPEAKER_04

No. Watching this movie, we've mentioned it already. It did help me a lot.

SPEAKER_00

This bitch still hitting the microphone.

SPEAKER_08

Not long hands. I do.

SPEAKER_04

Watching this movie again.

SPEAKER_00

I can't. If somebody told you this is the scariest movie they've ever seen in their life, they suck.

SPEAKER_06

Shout out to literally everybody who fucking told me that and recommended this movie. Sorry. I stand by the comment regardless of who they were.

SPEAKER_07

I won't say that it is unoriginal, but I will say that there is a moment where it really interesting to watch this post-watching Midsommar. Because this movie came out first, then Mid-Samar. And I was like, damn, Army Astra really loves some naked old people, huh?

SPEAKER_00

Which is funny because I haven't seen that. So that's not even what I referenced. That's not even like what came to mind for me.

SPEAKER_07

And there is literally only one other movie on this planet that has ever made me feel this way. And that is Boys Don't Cry.

SPEAKER_00

Oh fucking. God damn it. That's not what I was saying.

SPEAKER_07

What did you think I was gonna say? That was awkward.

SPEAKER_06

What did you think I was gonna say? It's the Baba Duke. Oh no. It literally is.

SPEAKER_04

No. It literally is. No. There's no way on this planet that the Bobaduke makes you feel the same way that this movie makes you feel. Apples and fucking acorns. I'd like to run back the episode. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Apples and acorns.

SPEAKER_04

Okay.

SPEAKER_06

Why are you giggling so hard? She says brutally fucked. Are they not? In this movie, they literally could be. They literally could be.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah. It's like you say brutally fucked, and I immediately go, the chicken fucking chicken fucking.

SPEAKER_04

Well, that was probably my best animal report for sure.

SPEAKER_11

Wait, real quick, who were the two? The bird. The bird and the dog?

SPEAKER_00

The dog that came out of nowhere and then all of a sudden was just dead. Yep. The family dog. The family dog that showed up two hours into the movie. That's a lie. Isn't that the first moment in the maybe I didn't see the first moment of the movie?

SPEAKER_11

I didn't see a single dog. I remember hearing a dog barking at one point because I was headphones. And I was like, where's this dog?

SPEAKER_04

The dog greets them at the beginning.

SPEAKER_00

It's their family dog. Okay, the dog's out of the movie for an hour and 45 minutes. Probably for then die.

SPEAKER_11

For the bet yeah, well. Do we see the dog die?

SPEAKER_00

We see the dog, the dog's dead body, right?

SPEAKER_04

On the side. So the door slams on the dog when it's like freaking out a little bit at the doorway and it yelps. Next thing you know, later on, you see the dog's body dead in the yard.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. When he falls out the window, there's like a lump on the side, and you're uh to presume it is the animal that their dog has no name or concern in this family.

SPEAKER_04

Wow.

SPEAKER_11

No idea how I missed it.

SPEAKER_04

Well I mentioned it in my scoring. My favorite visual element is the score. And specifically the last song, it's called Reborn when the whole ending is happening. I don't know. I feel like that's like just like a climax of a song. You just can't anymore, you can't handle it. So I think it was really, really well done. Can you see sound?

SPEAKER_01

Not Paris being the one to say it.

SPEAKER_06

What C sound? This is the this is the bit. This is the bit.

SPEAKER_03

Oh, I don't care. This is this is the guy who thinks. Okay. I don't care.

SPEAKER_04

Well, then okay. It does add to the visuals. It does. To me, it does. It makes the whole scene.

SPEAKER_07

Maybe the timing.

SPEAKER_11

I mean, maybe you have synesthesia, though. That's a thing.

SPEAKER_04

That's a thing. Go off queen. That's fine. No, okay. So if we want to say like visual, visual, visual, fine. Tony Collette's face. That's a visual.

SPEAKER_11

That's a good one.

SPEAKER_04

I think you just leave in the audio bit.

SPEAKER_01

I think that's so much better.

SPEAKER_00

The score does slap, so no one can really be mad.

SPEAKER_01

It is good.

SPEAKER_00

Eventually people will pick up on the fun of it.

SPEAKER_04

You know what? And here's here's my thing. Now this makes me think. If we don't have a section for appreciating the music of it, then where would it go?

SPEAKER_00

Well, it did used to have a section that was like favorite bit and bob, basically.

SPEAKER_02

Favorite bit and bob.

SPEAKER_06

The things that fell away after six years.

SPEAKER_01

It has a lot less sections than it used to. Anyway, I I think that the score is a great visual element.

SPEAKER_11

I guess I just like missed the gag. I was like, wait.

SPEAKER_07

Also, idea here, sponsor, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Oh I'm looking it up right now. I have Chat GBT on the case. The concept of satanic cults is often a subject of controversy and sensationalism.

SPEAKER_00

No, you have to ask like how a like a ritual would go. And just talk like this.

SPEAKER_06

I don't think you should do that. I don't think I should do that. I didn't tell you to do that.

SPEAKER_00

I think you should keep that to yourself.

SPEAKER_04

If you follow the orb, you'll see that Payman is jumping. Follow the bouncing ball. Right. So the goal is to get him to Peter. So he just jumps through the hereditary, jumps through the fam the bloodline of this of this family.

SPEAKER_11

And can only affect the bloodline.

SPEAKER_04

It can only go through the bloodline, which is why he never possesses the husband.

SPEAKER_11

It's convoluted.

SPEAKER_06

What in the Disney singalong bullshit are we talking about? Following the bouncing balls? The orb.

SPEAKER_07

I would love to give a real-time update here because I think technically our podcast recordings could be considered a satanic ritual. Part one, preparation. The setting, the dress, the participants, maybe you dress in robe. Part two, the opening the ritual, the invocation of the infernal names, the statement of intent. It's giving the beginning of a spooky season greetings and salutations episode. The main ritual, the ritual act, psychodrama, magical working, closing out the ritual, thanks and farewell, closing statement, banishing. Then there's the cleanup, disassembling the altar and breaking the circle. Either way, there's a lot of details on here. Maybe I'll share this on a on a post and link it in the show notes. But uh, I think our podcast is a satanic ritual.

SPEAKER_04

One of my friends is a is a Satanist, so you could just ask him. I could text him and ask him.

SPEAKER_07

Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Fuck. Why the hell did I do this? I didn't want to interrupt. Isn't that just like a description of like any ritual though?

SPEAKER_04

Pretty much. Pretty much.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Well, it says infernal names.

SPEAKER_06

Yes, infernal names. That part.

SPEAKER_00

It's giving specifics. What even language? Dang it. How did he say it? What even language is that?

SPEAKER_11

What language is even that?

SPEAKER_00

What language is even that? See, parents you got it.

SPEAKER_11

Mac, I sent you the gif of when she gets possessed, and then also it's a meme. Yeah, the meme is hilarious.

SPEAKER_10

Bink slings.

SPEAKER_07

I love it. Bink slings. What a fucking why why did we not think of that before?

SPEAKER_04

Have I really like explained many things before? I don't think so.

SPEAKER_07

You'd be explaining some fucking Easter eggs and pop culture moments like nobody's business.

SPEAKER_10

Lynx by Bing.

SPEAKER_00

It's so weird not being a part of like the thing. Like reads. Like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah. Like earlier when I mean, not that this is even the first time, but when Sean said a total joke, a waste of time, I was like, what's happening?

SPEAKER_11

Ryan had a visible reaction.

SPEAKER_00

I literally, I just made a frown for like 10 minutes. But again, I've I've heard it before. It's not my first recording. It's just funny.