369: Y2K (2024)

SPEAKER_03 0:04

Speaking of fucks, someone's gonna bring up the blender dick, right?

SPEAKER_04 0:11

Greetings and salutations, happy new year, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. You've got mail. 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 slash.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

Totally killer. Unintended.

SPEAKER_04 0:32

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. This week I'm joined by the Superfly Space Guy Mac.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

Nice costume poser. The classic horror connoisseur Sean. Your mom taught me in college.

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And the paranormal paramour, Binx.

SPEAKER_03 0:55

A girl that knows computers, my ass.

SPEAKER_04 0:57

This week we're ringing in the new year with a new film that looks back on the turn of the millennium scare.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

And if you're a patron, you'll also get to hear our B side at the end of this episode where we talk about what we were doing for Y2K and whether or not we thought the world was going to end, as well as some of that turn of the century nostalgic gold.

SPEAKER_04 1:16

Before we start our countdown, though, we've got some follow-up.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

Let's follow up on some stuff. First of all, I want to say thank you and welcome to a new patron, Devin. You're now part of the family, your fresh meat, your new blood. And speaking of new blood, look, it's the new year, right? We want to kick off 2025 with a killer deal for our listeners. So for this month, from January 1st to January 31st, we have our first ever New Year, New Blood campaign. Hell yeah. Perfect. You know, if you're new, you want to sink your teeth into all the bonus content that we have. This is for you, right? So here's the deal: you sign up as a patron during this month of January, you get 25% off your first year or month of membership. So this goes for both of our membership tiers. So you get access to things like exclusive B-sides, watch-alongs, rewinds, even the chance to nominate and vote on movie picks for our lineup. You know, and if you're feeling a little spicy here, our Slasher 4 tier unlocks the crypt, where we're digging out up to 132 episodes from our archives. What? This video series is going to dive into the history of our show. We've got new insights and behind-the-scenes reflections as we reintroduce these once lost episodes. So, look, this offer the perfect way to join our horror community. Let's start the year off right together. So, mark your calendars, get ready, and slash into 2025 with us.

SPEAKER_04 2:37

Ooh, I also just want to say Sean and I were cooking up some stuff for the new year. You can get some extra content right out of the gate.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Oh, yeah, some fun stuff. I'll tell you though, the crypt is really fun as well. You know, the podcast has evolved with different co-hosts throughout the years, and uh this stuff was not even available when I was listening and not even on the show. So it's a fucking good time to go back and listen to some of these early episodes and just see how it has evolved.

SPEAKER_03 3:04

I definitely agree. I just listened to the first episode ever that we had, which was it. That was a wild ride, and I loved the intro.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Right.

SPEAKER_03 3:13

Nathan is so good at asking good questions. It's like the format's great, so it's really worth it, guys. I loved it.

SPEAKER_02 3:20

That's our follow-up.

SPEAKER_04 3:22

Well, in the late 1990s, the world was gripped by fear of the millennium bug. And experts warned that the switch from 1999 to 2000 could wreak havoc on everything from bank accounts to air traffic control. While some dismissed the panic as overblown. Others stockpiled supplies and prepared for the worst. As the clock ticked closer to midnight on December 31st, 1999, the world held its breath to see if the new millennium would bring disaster. But this week's film taps into the chaos of that moment, but instead follows the path of a disaster comedy treatment to explore what might have happened if the global fears were actualized. The film follows two high school juniors determined to crash the biggest high school bash of the century. But what begins as a night of rebellion turns into a desperate fight for survival because technology seemingly turns against them as the clock strikes midnight. This week we're talking about Y2K. What were you all expecting going into this?

SPEAKER_02 4:17

I'm gonna reference a movie, I think, of the time, you could say, but I was expecting small soldiers turned into a scary movie targeted to Zoomers and Gen Alpha. That's kind of the most I expected from it.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

What a great call out. Man, what a hidden gem, small soldiers. What a good I I feel like I need to go back and watch that movie. I didn't hear much about this one before we discussed getting into it for the lineup in the pod. I feel like had no idea. Maybe I saw a trailer and forgot about it, had no idea this was coming out. And I think because of this, I really knew nothing about this movie. So as I was getting ready to watch this one, you know, the title Y2K, reading the brief synopsis. I guess I'm just expecting this one to be just a fun horror comedy filled with nostalgia from a very unique time in our lives.

SPEAKER_03 5:09

I had seen the trailer a few times while I'd been in the theater. It did not catch my interest at all. So much so that one of my best friends had asked me if I wanted to go see it, because he usually buys the tickets for us in advance for all of the new releases that come out. And I was like, you know, Jonathan, to be honest, I have no interest whatsoever until I saw that it was on the lineup and I had to send a quick text that was something along the lines of, hey, I hope you got those tickets because I actually have to go see this movie now. So it worked out.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Remember when you said uh you did you want to see this? And you're like, nah, actually.

SPEAKER_03 5:44

Actually, JK, a lol, lol, actually. So I naturally went into the theater a little reluctant. And the biggest reason I was like that was because we've had two movies this year that cover this like 2000s nostalgia. And I feel like it's either done really well or not. One of them is actually one of my favorite films of the year. It's called Didi, not horror-related, but would recommend. And the other one is a horror film, Netflix, straight to streaming type film. It's called Time Cut. It's honestly a totally killer wannabe, and it did it extremely wrong. So, two different spectrums of this 2000s nostalgia reflection that when I saw this film, I was like, I just really don't want to toss that coin. I don't want to make take my chances. I just don't feel like this is gonna land very, very well. But it's also because I had no idea that A24 was distributing it or had anything to do with this film. And that's not to say that every single film that A24 comes out with is a hit, because that's not true. But at least I could have felt a bit more confident about the production, about the budget, you know, like everything else that goes into the film would have probably made me feel a little bit better about it.

SPEAKER_04 6:55

Yeah, I knew very little going into this film. The first time I actually heard about it was our patron Chell helping us out during our content meeting and we were starting to think about the roadmap of what we would do for the rest of the year. That was the first I ever heard of it. But knowing that after looking at a little bit more, this is A24, knowing that it's Y2K, I have fond memories of Y2K. I walked into this with a very open mind. I was getting the sense that it was probably gonna be similar to bodies, bodies, bodies, but looking at the cast, I had more optimism for what that would be like. And let me just say, I love it when a movie takes place on my birthday. This movie's a Capricorn, and I dig it. I don't care if it actually came out December 6th. It's fine. It's a Capricorn by my stretch. Now, I will say though, I had so much fun watching this. I was actually legitimately laughing out loud, which is rare for me in movies. Usually, if I'm laughing out loud, it's I'm laughing out loud because maybe commentary. Being so I remember when we went to go see In a Violet Nature, Allie said, get out of my swamp, and I was like fucking dying forever. But this, oh man, this one got me. I'm more of like a LOL laughing internally because I'm tickled and I do think it's funny, but I'm not gonna emote. This shit had me rolling. And this shit was 90 minutes of ho ho ho, remember that? Yes, Kyle Mooney, I do. Thank you for thinking of me. I do remember this.

SPEAKER_01 8:23

It's so true. I did find myself laughing out loud a good number of times. When Ari and I went to go see this, we were the only ones in the theater, and we were just having a good time because no one to bother, you know what I mean? So we were laughing, we were talking, like it was a good time. And I think this one just really hits with the major nostalgia feels, just like I thought it was going to. I think everything about this movie brought me back to high school, it brought me back to those times. I feel like everything from the video stores to AOL instant messenger and that fucking dial up internet sound when you first log on, absolutely nostalgic. It just brings you right back to that time when the internet was young and pro wrestling was at its fucking peak.

SPEAKER_03 9:09

Amen. Absolutely. Yeah, there's so many moments here that transformed me back to 1999. I was a young kid, sure, but I remember so much. And ultimately it's the early 2000s, too, that blends into this whole film. You know, a lot of the things that happened exactly in 1999 obviously stick stuck around. And I found it so funny. I'm so glad that I ended up going to see it because there's if I had to summarize this film, it really does subvert your expectations. For me, it was not only just the humor, but also what they do with certain characters. At one point I was so stunned that I truly wasn't sure where the movie was gonna go. And it continued this fun ride. I didn't know what turn was gonna happen next, what jokes they were gonna pull out of the bag, what nostalgia cameos or Easter eggs they were gonna do. And it felt like a really long SNL skit in a good way. I mean that in a good way. And it doesn't really shock me because Kyle Mooney, the director, is a writer and SNL cast member. So of course it's gonna feel that way, but it was so many like little sketches throughout the film that hit one after the other after the other that just had me like at the edge of my seat laughing, looking at my friends. I haven't felt that kind of theater experience in a bit, you know, where everyone in the theater is having a good time. And I saw this with two of my friends. One is my age, the other one is three years older than me, and then his little sister, who was born in 1999. So she was watching this, not really remembering obviously a lot of these things. Like there are certain characters or certain moments that she just didn't understand. There were others that she could remember because she has older siblings, and so again, it stuck out throughout the 2000s. But even that moment between the people I went to see this movie with, it was like a whole bonding experience trying to go back in time and reliving these things.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

God, reliving. I think the only thing it missed out on was maybe some Shannon Elizabeth. That would have made it even more 1999. It is pretty wild to imagine that six months before this movie is set, American Pie came out. That's if you're thinking '99, that's a prime cut of the culture right there. I think they they really hit the nostalgia pin on the head. They didn't go too heavy, but they didn't leave you wanting. They made sure that they had their digs at the past, and I found that really enjoyable. I think it was just like a really good blend of character work and action and comedy. It feels like a solid teen action, thriller, adventure, horror kind of movie. It's like all over the place, so there's a lot for anyone to get into. And it just didn't waste time. We have that character work, sure, but it moves with the right speed so that that enjoyment, that comedy, that action, it's not lost. It doesn't just disappear at some point. You just kind of get to enjoy the ride.

SPEAKER_04 11:57

Yeah, I do wonder how much of this can be attributed to our placement in the millennial generation. Because I almost wonder.

SPEAKER_01 12:05

This is like totally boring for everyone else, and just our unique time period. This generation is like, fuck yeah, Y2K, so fun. Everyone else is like, what the fuck? This movie sucks.

SPEAKER_04 12:17

Yeah, okay. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. We get it now. Everybody has been ablaze with 80s fucking throwbacks. Everybody's reliving the 80s nostalgia, the 70s nostalgia. This is our moment. This is our realization of holy fuck, we're old. We're here. We now have a period piece from a significant portion of our lives. But I do wonder, for example, I have a brother born in 1983. I wonder if he would find this as funny. He is the exact age that these kids are in this movie. So it does make me wonder, okay, does it go too hard? Mac, you said it doesn't go too heavy. I know a lot of people do think it goes pretty fucking heavy, but I loved it. I ate it up every fucking second of it. And I think that's one of the things, one of the two things really that surprised me. I shouldn't have been surprised by this at all, but I'm amazed by how much they packed in without me being like, okay, guys, this is enough now. Uh I I was shocked by how much 90s culture was unlocked from the archive of my mind. I feel like one of those characters in a video game who has her memories wiped, I'm I guess I'm realizing I'm talking about Baldur's Gate 3 now. I'm you have your memories wiped and then you're rediscovering who you are along the way. Because let's be real, a lot of my memory pre-2008, pre-boot camp, it feels like an empty void. There are significant things like a snapshot milestone or significant event that I can remember, but the every day feels absent because I dissociated so fucking hard when I got to the Navy, and the last 10 years since getting out has felt like a rediscovery of myself, and this movie feels like it unlocked a whole fucking chamber, like a whole library of like, hey, this is what life used to be like. God damn. Yeah, that shit was wild.

SPEAKER_02 14:12

Dude, it brings the memories back, and I think the difference between this and a lot of other movies that try to go for that nostalgia thing is that you feel like you're in on the joke, you don't feel like you are the joke itself, right? We understand why it's funny because we live through it, and the younger folks who are gonna be watching this might be like, Oh, I've heard about this from my parents, which is weird to imagine. Our like fashion sense from back then is now cool, sudden, suddenly. 25 years later, it's cool again. And we learned that lesson. Don't repeat after us, you know.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

It's getting there, it's getting there. There's baggy ass jeans everyone's wearing again, these borderline Jenko jeans things that people are wearing again, and there's fucking affliction shirts, Ed Hardy shirts. It's all coming back.

SPEAKER_04 14:55

I see it was people that I interact with on a daily basis, and I'm like, don't do that. I didn't even like it when it was a thing.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 15:02

But it's very much a thing. Look at me right now. I'm wearing a little like heart-shaped clock as a necklace, and I remember this being very much a thing in the 2000s, having like weird quirky accessories and wearing different the butterfly clips in her hair, the main character's hair, sent me because that's definitely a trend that's happening right now. So many pieces that are very much what's going on in in today's pop culture and and society and what we're wearing, and it just ages you. It really does. But going back to what you were saying, Chris, I would a thousand percent agree. I was stunned by how many references they were able to kind of integrate into this film in the most subtle way. There are some deep cuts here that I cannot wait to get into and I don't want to reveal because I feel like the best part to me was seeing it firsthand and screaming. So I don't even want to, if you could avoid any spoilers at all, even in terms of cast, please do just go in a little bit blindly so that you can really just have a good time. Because that's the one thing I didn't look into. I saw the trailer and maybe I forgot if this particular cast members were in it, but there were certain people that I did not see in the trailer, I did not remember in this film, that just hits and there's lore that's attached to that. So I thought it was if it was heavy-handed, I interpreted it as like an SNL skit again, like a it's making light, it's a parody, it's having a good time of comedy. But at the same time, just a lot of subtle things that will fly over your head that you would enjoy even upon a rewatch.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

Yeah. The movie really just like from the get-go, just slaps you right in the face with some of this nostalgia, and it just hits you all at once. Like that, there's we're gonna get into it, but there's like an opening montage of shit that just hits you, and you're just like, holy shit, and you're just enthralled with it, and you're just observing everything, and it's all just coming back to you, memories and different things, and it's a really interesting way to open the show. I'm sure we'll talk about it a little bit more, but I think, yeah, just what we've been saying, the fun of it all, I think that's what surprised me the most is I went into this thinking that this is gonna be kind of whatever, and it ended up being super, super fun. You just have a really good time with these characters, with the silliness of the plot, the nostalgia of it all. But I think there is also a disappointing aspect of this film because I know we're hyping this up quite a bit, but I do think that the disappointing aspect is probably also the result of it being really fun because the nostalgic, fun comedy of it all really took away from the horror elements in I think a pretty big way. Like I think there it's there, but there's so much silliness and so much nostalgic comedy that it felt like a sandwich. It felt like this sandwich of comedy on both ends and a thin layer of horror in the middle. And so it kind of I don't know, it that was a little bit disappointing. I was here for a little bit more of the horror comedy. You know me, we get into these horror comedies, I struggle to really find the right balance.

SPEAKER_04 18:06

Yeah, I feel like for me, a horror comedy just has a couple people getting murked, and it's checked the horror box, and I can enjoy the comedy now. I want my comedy a little bloody. That's really what I'm here for. I don't often like straight comedies, it's not a thing for me. But what I also was surprised by, I mentioned there was a couple of things. We get a lot of that comedy, we get a little slice of horror, but I was surprised that this movie actually managed to tuck on my heartstrings a little bit. There's a couple moments where I was like, oh, am I am I stinging? What is this? This is crazy. I have feelings again. None of those feelings were scary, but you know, hey.

SPEAKER_02 18:42

It's because it has that balance so that it's able to do that. It's able to be like, you're supposed to feel something right now. Okay, the next thing though is we're gonna make you laugh. And then the next thing is we're gonna show you some silly stuff. And I think that balance is what lets them achieve that to where you're like, oh my god, I'm feeling a little bit. And lol, okay, now I'm I'm actually laughing because of what you just said following up. And I think that's good when you're able to keep the emotions rolling from one scene to another. That's effective.

SPEAKER_03 19:08

Yeah, absolutely. And the the premise is not scary, therefore, nothing about this is scary or horror to a degree. I think that maybe some of the kills are a lot of fun, might get you, I don't know, might make you feel some type of way if you're a little screamish to s to some of them, not all of them. Maybe like what, 15%. Obviously, I'll leave that to Sean's discretion. But it's kind of nice to be able to approach a horror comedy every now and then and not feel like you have to be weary of whether it's scary. So great opportunity for people that are not dabbling in this genre very often to be able to watch something and kind of dip their toes, like we often try to find, right? We try to find those films for those kinds of listeners that we have.

SPEAKER_01 19:57

It's true. I think this movie has definite horror elements to it. Like there's kills, we'll get into it, all of that stuff. But even with that, it in certain aspects barely felt like a horror movie, let alone be scary, I think, in any way. There wasn't really any jump scares. There's some gruesome stuff, there's some action-packed moments of gore, but nothing I think that really stood out as scary or frightening. And I don't think even if we're gonna get into it, I don't think even the essence of this story, just the backbone of this story, feels super original. I feel like we've definitely the concept or or the plot of this story we has been shown across many different movies in many different forms. You know, this whole disaster type movie trope or whatever, but I think that they did a really good job depicting one period of time to go with this, and with a really kind of fun idea that I don't think we've really gotten a lot of. And so for that, I feel like it feels original, even though we've seen a lot of disaster movies.

SPEAKER_03 21:01

Well, I think there's like an intersection between disaster films and this like doomsdayslash conspiracy, because we also have gotten plenty of those films in particular. We were talking about 2012 and our B-sides, you know. There's a couple of those films, but have we gotten one about Y2K? That's what I'm saying. No, it's so it's that's what's fun.

SPEAKER_04 21:26

I hate to be the person to say this, but there are actually a few Y2K horror movies already. There's a couple of Y2K movies, and then I think there's a couple that are actually Y2K horror movies. I remember Googling it because I was trying to see any of it. When is Y2K streaming? And listen, I think this is like a great step forward. I'm not saying they're great or well known. I think this is a great step forward, but there are a couple movies at least that are called Y2K, or Y2K is a portion of the title and it's themed around Y2K. But let me just say this. Yes, I get it. We've got this is the end. We've gotten horror comedies. We've gotten disaster comedies. This didn't have to be different. It didn't have to be. It just had to be fun. And my God, it was fun. And that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

Yeah, you know, I think the what we're looking at here is if, you know, a company sells a suit, right? And they and let's say they put out 10,000 suits, and 9,999 people can just wear it right off the rack. Fine. They all look the same, right? This is one that had it tailored. It had it taken in, it had it personalized. And so it does look different. It does feel different. It is original in its execution of this sub-sub sub-genre. Even though the premise itself might not be, right? Technology is scary. We get a lot of those kind of movies right now. But I think here is the tailoring is what makes it feel really unique to me. The execution, the actual comedy part of the horror comedy here. It's different. It it hits a little bit different, you know. I think it's got its own, it's got its own feeling now because of how how hard they went into like making this its own thing.

SPEAKER_03 23:03

It just hit me now that The Matrix. Have we mentioned this? We haven't even mentioned The Matrix came out in 1999. Yeah. Right before this whole thing happened. Because I was just looking up the Y2K films as well, and I and the first one that came up was The Matrix. So it's like, okay, yeah, I can now definitely understand how we've gotten some films that planted the seeds, not only for the whole conspiracy in and of itself, but definitely a good foundation and building block for this film in particular.

SPEAKER_01 23:30

I'm sure there's movies out there, but I haven't watched any of them. And I feel like this one, because of that, is the best one that I've seen. So I think though, the ending, as fun as this movie is, the ending, I think maybe even the movie itself is pretty predictable. I think you kind of know. I think, although I don't think we're looking for anyone to really reinvent the wheel in these types of movies, you have the love story, you have this third act coming to the climax, you have the struggle, the final showdown leading to the ending that I feel like we all know and love. And there's nothing wrong with that, but it is super predictable.

SPEAKER_03 24:05

Yeah, I mentioned earlier I didn't know which way the movie was gonna go next. And I think that happens very much in the first act. But once you're in the last 20 minutes or so, maybe even the last 30, like you definitely have an idea. Still maybe not entirely. I don't know. Maybe we're gonna disagree in the spoiler zone because there were some kills that I still didn't anticipate, or some decisions that were made that I didn't quite anticipate. Some references. I'm telling you, the deep cuts are crazy. I just wasn't expecting it. And I think that's great because what happens is that a film like this can stick the landing if it commits to the bit. As long as it commits to the bit all the way through with the cheesiness, with the making fun of itself almost, bringing up all of these references in a really ridiculous way, then it's gonna stick that landing because I want to continue to laugh. I want to continue to have a good time and not take the film so seriously if that's the kind of film that it wants to be.

SPEAKER_02 25:02

Yeah, I love the ending here. I think it was a good fit for the rest of the film. I think a lot of times you'll get to the end and they'll be like, ah, we don't really know what to do. And they'll jump off the wrong diving board. And I think they leaned in, like you said, Banks here in the right direction. And I think the end result was satisfying, yet it leaves the possibility of more. Not saying that it's necessarily sequel baiting. I'm just saying if they want to make a follow-up film, it's gonna work and it's gonna be interesting, depending on the era that they go after next, because we already know this is a couple of years later, so anything's possible. But I left the theater not upset. I left being like, okay, cool. They wrapped it up well.

SPEAKER_04 25:38

Yeah, you left feeling that way because it's a satisfying ending. When you have nothing but laughs the whole way through, and then a little bit of the emotional stuff that I was prone to. I think to get an ending like this, it's the perfect emotional send-off and to just bring things down a notch and just exhale from the experience. Sometimes if you laugh so hard, your ribs hurt. And I'm not saying that this movie is that funny. I found it very funny. I'm not saying you will, but you know the feeling of when you are just laughing non-stop and your sides hurt and you can barely grab air, you can barely breathe. You need to just have a second to just like, ugh, just let it go. And that's his ending for me. I felt like it was a great way to wrap it up, and I can't wait to see how our thoughts on the ending actually impact your ratings. But before we even get there, Sean, how would you describe the gore score for Y2K?

SPEAKER_01 26:32

Yeah, the gore in this movie felt non-existent the first like maybe 20 minutes or so, and then we got this incredible montage of death in the middle of the movie, bringing this into medium gore score territory. However, most of the deaths in this movie are also pretty silly, and you can tell that they were made for comedic gore value, nostalgic comedic gore value, and we don't get much after this main segment. So, all in all, I feel like I would probably give this movie a humorously low gore score despite the stuff we do see, because it's not taken all that seriously.

SPEAKER_04 27:10

And what about the animal report?

SPEAKER_03 27:12

The animals were safe during Y2K.

SPEAKER_04 27:14

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings then. Y2K from 2024. Was it a hack or a slash? And since we're in Capricorn season, I'm gonna just get this out of the way. Listen, three years before this movie was set, Celine Dion had a seminal hit release. Don't know if you know which one I'm talking about, because obviously she had nothing but bangers in the 90s. But this song in particular is the perfect precursor for how this movie made me feel. And I quote, it was dead long ago, but it's all coming back to me. It's so hard to resist and it's all coming back to me. I can barely recall, but it's all coming back to me now. Chills. This movie is cute, this movie is fucking fun, and it's pandering, but it's pandering in the best way possible. Listen, were they the good old days because everything has gotten worse since then? Were they the good old days because we existed in this time without responsibility and burden? Who's to say? Maybe it's simpler times, but it's not really simpler times. And the nineties were a great time, and also for a lot of people, they were a fucking terrible time. But this movie captures the charm of the decade. This movie captures the charm of the moment, and I finally get now what my older siblings must be feeling watching movies set in the eighties when I was born, literally the last few minutes of the eighties. This is such a great way to shut your mind off of all the bullshit happening in modern present day, disconnect for a little bit from the distressors of the present, any of the news cycle, just let it go and travel back to a simpler time for a disaster comedy. And I'm gonna bring one more quote in here for the rap or for the wrap-up of this film. I want to throw it back to my friend Andy Bernard from The Office. I wish there was a way to know you're in the good old days before you've actually left them. And this movie is a dose of the good old days. So it's undoubtedly a slash.

SPEAKER_03 29:18

I could not agree more. That last quote is definitely the case here. So many moments watching this film where I was like, man, I miss AIM. Some of the music that was integrated in the film, etc., etc. Look, ultimately, it's such a great feeling when you go into a film expecting it to be terrible and you come out extremely surprised. I live for that. I like to be proven wrong. I like my expectations to be subverted and for me to end up really loving a film that I was dead set thinking was going to be a disaster. And I have reason to believe that because there definitely have been several films that have tried to recreate this magic of the early 2000s and 90s and has failed. It's half-assed, they don't reference a lot of things correctly, they try their best to, but they just don't do it, or they'll throw in a sidekick and that's it. Like a teamable sidekick, or maybe a little bit of decor in a room and make me believe that this is the 2000s and it's it's more than that. The 90s and the 2000s is more than that. And I think this film really did that, nailed it, and was so successful at being hilarious. Even removing the 2000s part from it, a lot of the dialogue, the one-liners, the comedy, the riffing that was happening between these characters, the performances were just fantastic. And I said this earlier, just because it's an A24 film does not mean that it would be an automatic slash. Okay. Sorry to break it to y'all. They are capable of flopping just as much as any other distributing studio. And again, I've got reason to believe that with other films that have recreated this year in particular, but I had such a good time laughing. I loved every bit of it. I was at the edge of my seat, couldn't even believe what was going on. And I haven't felt like that from a horror comedy in a long while, it feels like, in this particular way. So I would recommend don't take this film seriously. Let it wash over you. Have a quick laugh, have a good time. If you really need something to pick you up, you know, and kind of just decompress and feel silly. This is the one for it because the 2000s were a slash. And so this one is ultimately also a slash.

SPEAKER_02 31:34

I'm gonna hop on this train too, because I had a blast watching Y2K. I winced a few times, you know, at some overused millennial tropes, but for the other 99% of the time, it was just all good fun. We have comedy, we have action, constant silliness, and some solid kills smashed in there too. And in a few places, it honestly just took me back to being a teenager. You know, in others it reminded me, man, what a weird time, right? That was strange. Sometimes you don't want to think about those days. And in other, in other cases, here it was just fun to poke fun at uh a time we once lived. And all in all, I just left the theater feeling happy after watching it. So it's slash.

SPEAKER_01 32:12

Yeah, this is really an interesting one because I think you can have a lot of fun with this movie. I think I could see this one going either way, depending on who's watching it. We talked about is this one that only our generation is really gonna like, or is this one that other generations are just gonna be like, what the fuck? This movie sucks. And when you think about it, it's not like some mind-blowing movie. It's not like some really great movie, but it's not a terrible movie. This movie I think is hilarious, it's fun, it's a total joke, but I don't think it's a waste of time. I think it's a total joke in the kind of way that's really just fun. And I think I just vibed with this movie. I think the nostalgia in this movie was meant for our exact generation. It really just brings us home, you know what I mean? And I think everything just hit. We've all been talking about it. The choices it made, the things it chose to show, the things it brought back or brought you back to, I think it just hit. And I think we're gonna talk about it soon when we get into the spoiler zone, but even just the kills hit with the nostalgia. And is the story great? Is the acting great? No, right? It's not some mind-blowing film, but it is kind of fucking fun, and I enjoyed watching this merry band of idiots fight their way to survival in this fun tale of bringing in the new millennium. And I think we're all just here to party like it's 19 fucking ninety-nine, and who would have thought that this movie would probably be in universal slash territory? But I think that I just felt entertained enough. Do I wish there was more focus on kills and more of that fun campy slasher energy? Sure, I want that in almost every fucking comedy horror that I watch, but I felt entertained enough to give this one a slash. I had a good time.

SPEAKER_04 33:58

Well, with that, we're rounding out 2024 with the universal slash for Y2K. But there's a lot more to discuss when we return from break. You can join the conversation about this movie for free in our Discord server. You can find the link to join that in our show notes. But if you haven't seen it yet, you can also follow the link in our show notes to see where you can watch it right now if it's Post's Theatrical Run. When we return from our break, we'll dive deep into the spoiler territory, unpack those kills, and dive into more of that 90s nostalgia. I'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_00 34:41

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SPEAKER_01 36:34

There was kills just flying across the screen, and it was just hard to follow. But I feel like we have a solid 16 kills. Not including, I'm not including robot deaths, I'm not including the mention of some members of Limp Biscuit dying. I'm not including the two planes that crashed that we know hundreds of people probably fucking died on, and probably a fuck ton more. But 16, I think, is a solid number, and these kills were laced with just as much nostalgia as the rest of the movie. So I gotta know which one of these New Year's Eve bashes were your favorites.

SPEAKER_04 37:12

Okay. Listen, there's a lot to choose from here, and I have a few more up the sleeve, but I gotta just say it the funniest moment in the movie shouldn't have been the funniest moment in the movie, Farkas trying to fucking grind. Right? Why? And how? And is just gone.

SPEAKER_00 37:31

Why and how? How did that happen?

SPEAKER_04 37:33

Bro, how embarrassing to die on Y2K, not even because Y2K. Just because you're a clumsy motherfucker. Listen, I love this guy in Stranger Things, but I hate this fucking character. And I don't hate him. It's like a you love to hate him. He's actually very funny. But especially with the more that you get to learn about his dynamic with Ash and some of the shit he says and what you see on the video camera. Fuck that guy. So glad he died. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

There was a lot of those dudes.

SPEAKER_03 38:02

They were a lot of assholes for sure. I was stunned by his kill. Actually, it was the Danny and Fargus combo kill, essentially, one after the other. That was what completely stunned me. That I was like, wait a minute, where the fuck is this movie going?

SPEAKER_01 38:19

All the characters are dying.

SPEAKER_03 38:21

Yeah, and they were the two funniest people thus far, in my opinion. And I was like, wait, they're clearly gonna be like the pillar of comedy in this film, they're gonna be the hilarious one-liners are coming from them, and then they kill Danny off, which I was like, damn, but then okay, we've seen this, you know, this is what's gonna motivate the main character to persevere, blah blah blah. And then Farkas too, get out of here.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

I know. Did anyone think that Danny was gonna actually come back and not actually be dead later on somehow?

SPEAKER_03 38:52

I thought this was gonna be a tarot situation. I thought they were gonna do the same thing in tarot. They were gonna bring him back for some miraculous reason, make him a robot. I don't know what they were gonna do.

SPEAKER_04 39:01

I would have hoped because Danny, honestly, what a star. The Thong song performance, 10 out of 10. You can tell this guy fucks.

SPEAKER_03 39:10

Oh, for sure. But speaking of fucks, someone's gonna bring up the blender dick, right? That was crazy. I wasn't ready for that. I it was very apparent that this was gonna be very silly, but that was tough. That blender really just did a number.

SPEAKER_01 39:26

Dude, how the fuck does that even happen? That thing just came to life and flew right onto him and just blended his dick into oblivion. That was just absolutely crazy.

SPEAKER_04 39:37

Yeah. One of the best blender kills in a horror movie, right up there with your next.

SPEAKER_01 39:42

Oh my god, it was just absolutely crazy. There was a lot of crazy moments. I mean, the dick in the blender, CJ with the flying CDs to the face. Come on. CJ, CD, CD, CJ dead by CDs.

SPEAKER_02 39:57

But my favorite, which was the most ridiculous, I think, of all the kills, was Garrett's. Just the bravery leading to that moment, the setup for it. And then we all, I think, thought it was inevitable that this dude was gonna get got immediately, and it was so instantaneous, and his demeanor changed so instantaneously as well. And I just I love everything about that whole setup, the kill itself. It was utterly ridiculous and fun.

SPEAKER_01 40:22

It's hilarious. What did he think was gonna happen? This guy out of nowhere just charges this fucking giant robot, and this arm gets sliced off and then just nicely decapitated, had no chance at all. That was a super good kill. I think another one of the more brutal kills was uh Raleigh's kill because it was just, I don't know, there was something about this kill that just lingered a little bit longer than a lot of the other kills. You know, you had the evil Tamagotchi just rolling up and just shanking her in the legs or whatever to bring her down, and then as she hit the floor, it just slowly drills into her head through the brain, through the temple, through the brain, like what the fuck? This fucking Tamagotchi came out of fucking nowhere.

SPEAKER_04 41:03

Yeah, honestly, it was really trying to tunnel its way to China. But seeing a Tamagotchi controlling and think about how many Tamagotchis die every day. It's a real fucking epidemic. It is for the Tamagotchi to get its revenge, the Tamagotchi strikes back.

SPEAKER_01 41:19

Yeah, how many Tamagotchis died before this one Tamagotchi got its revenge, you know?

SPEAKER_04 41:25

Yeah, that Tamagotchi spoke for all the other Tamagotchi. A real fucking hero, some might say.

SPEAKER_02 41:32

It is wild that there's no Furby involved here as well. Maybe behind the scenes the Furby is integrated into the big supercomputer.

SPEAKER_04 41:39

Yeah, where's the Furby? Oh, they probably got turned upside down.

SPEAKER_03 41:43

Or remember the rope, the little dogs, like the silver with the different colored ears. Those and the Furbies r ran my life.

SPEAKER_01 41:52

Damn. Damn. But I think that's what I really enjoyed the most out of this movie is all these little things. It's just the nostalgia of it all. It's hard to lump it into one specific thing. I think that they just captured everything so well. Even just the internet itself, for example, everything about that, from the AOL dial-up login and the sounds to the instant messenger windows, and everything just really brought you back. And then it's that opening segment that just drills you with like logging into AOL and all of the the sounds and all the windows and the chats popping up and the page with all the news articles. It was just like, whoa, man, this is a lot to take in.

SPEAKER_03 42:34

That particular moment wasn't as impactful for me because that movie I mentioned earlier, DD, that's like fantastic, did a very similar thing. But I wasn't mad by the delivery. It's something that I'm more than happy to relive and watch again on screen because we're never gonna have that again. And seeing the old AOL and the aim messages and the fact that you used to put these very starkly different colors as your background and then font color for your away message or whatever. Like that was so fun to relive that even though I had seen it again similarly in another film earlier this year, I was okay with that because it was so correct, it was good and it was thorough.

SPEAKER_04 43:18

And in general, I think also I just we gotta stop forgetting Fear Street 1996.

SPEAKER_03 43:23

I mean, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 43:24

Fear Street really brought that game.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

It yes, okay. But yes, sure. But I'm talking maybe because we are talking about 1999 going into the early 2000s, when I'm talking about like the whole world of it, I'm not talking mid nineties and early nineties. I'm already crossing into 2002, 2003 era. Maybe I'm jumping ahead of myself, so it could be that. That's fair. Justice for Fear Street.

SPEAKER_04 43:48

Justice for Fear Street, Great 90s nostalgia.

SPEAKER_03 43:51

Great nineties nostalgia, but the difference here I would debate this one hit. I remember more for its kills and the supplements. Than the nostalgia. I'm remembering this movie for the nostalgia. Yes, some of the kills, but the balance is very different, like the very opposite in terms of what I'm gonna remember it for. For sure. This one in particular, I'm gonna remember it for also, it's just practical effects. There was a little bit of stop motion here with the chords and the use of the computer robots that I thought was really, really funny. It reminded me of those old YouTube videos that people would make at home just fucking around. It was very much a little bit of like tech monster Elisu or whatever from the substance. It was a good time, it was really fun to watch.

SPEAKER_04 44:35

Yeah, I was a big fan of honestly every little ounce of 90s that we got here. And I know that there are some concerns about this movie for a perhaps notable lack of grunge. But listen, I was not around 90s grunge. This was more the 90s that I remember. Again, I have an older brother named Danny who was this age and in this year, and I remember again like the bagger khakis or like the button-up with an undershirt. This feels very authentic for the 90s, at least that I remember. So I just cannot get over how incredible the costuming in the wardrobe was for this one, especially when we get down into that party. And I'm thinking about, and I know we moved on from the kills, soccer Chris with his fucking puka shells and his little tracksuit jacket.

SPEAKER_01 45:28

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 45:29

He looks like every douchebag you saw in a Freddie Prince Jr. 90s movie. Amen. I'm thinking about Shizola.

SPEAKER_01 45:38

Oh my god. Yes, it's so crazy. But there was a lot of grunge in the 90s. I think specifically when we get to this time period in this movie, 99 going into 2000, right? It was very different. Like you had it was this transition from like this we went from like hair metal to the early stages of what death metal is now, like early, early death metal slayer things like that that were transitioning into that era, obituary things like that. And then you had the grunge in there that was just so anti-pop, but then in '99 was like the huge wave of new metal. Like new metal was this thing where people, it was just this blend of metal and alternative and hip-hop, and everyone was just like, Why do we have to have separate shit? Why don't we just blend all this shit together? And we just created this culture, and people wore the weirdest fucking shit baggy, raver type shit, mix of like emo, goth, metal, bullshit. Like it was just a crazy time. So I think this is what this movie really depicted that specific time period. So there's a grittiness to it, yes, but the grunge I think was fading out.

SPEAKER_04 46:47

For sure. I just remember hearing that that was a big criticism of this movie, and almost to say that perhaps this movie is Gen Z pretending to be millennial, but they don't know what they're doing. I'm like, okay, well, easy. No, they're wrong.

SPEAKER_01 46:59

They just don't remember 1999. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 47:01

Correct. But also, Sean, for some reason, as you're describing that, that makes me think of, and I probably shouldn't be thinking of this movie in particular. I don't know why this just came up in my fucking brain. Melissa Joan Hart drive me crazy.

SPEAKER_03 47:16

Whoa.

SPEAKER_04 47:16

What the fuck, right?

SPEAKER_02 47:18

Wow. Well, well. It is interesting to see the different filters we all take because yeah, I think anytime you have a movie that's set in the past, it's gonna be too shiny, it's gonna be too modern family to feel legit, but that's every movie ever. You see movies these days about poor people and they live in five-bedroom houses. It doesn't make sense. So yeah, the movies they're always gonna be a little bit too polished to feel real, but I love that the way stuff looks. I think they really did nail it as best you could 25 years later. I mean, from 1999 going into 2000, I'm thinking of Jennifer Lopez. I'm thinking of the offspring. I mean, at the time I was listening to things like, I don't know, No FX, Bad Religion. I was listening to more punk stuff at the time. And so, yeah, when I'm seeing like the skater culture being shown in this movie, it just cracks me up with how silly it all was, but it does feel like okay, they kind of got it.

SPEAKER_04 48:12

Speaking of looking like shit, speaking of 25 years later, Fred Dirsk playing Fred Durst.

SPEAKER_02 48:18

Wow, dude. That was a choice. That was a great choice.

SPEAKER_04 48:20

Specific choice just like himself in present day.

SPEAKER_02 48:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:24

But supposed to be 1999, Fred Durst.

SPEAKER_01 48:26

I love that part.

SPEAKER_04 48:27

Fucking hilarious.

SPEAKER_01 48:29

I loved it. I love that they didn't do some weird CGI bullshit over his face. I love that it was just like I mean, makeup and stuff, they cleaned him up. He's obviously not looking like the white-haired granddad that he's doing on tours and shit like that. You know what I mean? He's he definitely shaped himself up in this movie to look like his image was, but I love that he still looked older than he should have been.

SPEAKER_03 48:50

Listen, when that scene came up and I heard his voice, my best friend Jonathan and I looked at each other. We almost fell off our chairs because we were like already shimming up. What do you mean right now? And when his face came out from the that hallway, we wanted to scream so bad because it's not even that I was entirely shocked, because I I was it it's more than just being shocked that they brought him into this film. It's the fact that we have now seen Fred Durst twice in films. We just reviewed, I saw the TV glow, in which he was there. And when I discovered that that was him after the fact, I was stunned because I couldn't even believe it. But then we're seeing him again, but him playing himself and the lore about Lim Biscuit continues on throughout this film. When I saw Wes Borland's cameo, I really lost my mind. At that point, I was like, this is a rap. This is a slash. It has to be because that's deep cut right there. The real ones know. The real ones know that the two of them on screen is a big moment and a lot of healing for the millennials. It's it's very healing. They had a huge feud. They were like, I feel like Limp Biscuit in general, like you think of Fred Durst and West Borland, that was like me and my cousin, you know? That's how we growing up. Like we were those two because they were just besties when they feuded, we were heartbroken. That scene was so layered, beautiful, and fantastic. That was a good integration and a deep cut.

SPEAKER_04 50:10

Yeah, it really built him up quite a bit, right? Think about like Superman with his cape, Thor with his hammer, Spider-Man with his mask, and his fucking web slingers. He felt like a superhero moment for 90s culture when he puts on that fucking hat. And I specifically remember, because listen, I was younger at this point, I didn't ever really get into Limp Biscuit. I know about Faith, I know about the Nookie. That's about it. My brother was heavily into corn, to Limp Biscuit. He they ran that whole gamut in MTV's era. So I remember hearing a lot of Limp Biscuit, and I remember seeing a lot of Limp Biscuit. I'm gonna be honest with you. The reason why I never got into them, it's because I imagined what chocolate, starfish, and hot dog flavored water must taste like. And I was like, nah, never doing that.

SPEAKER_01 51:04

Well, yeah, no one wants to taste what that exactly.

SPEAKER_04 51:08

It sounded gross, so I thought, never will I ever.

SPEAKER_01 51:11

Well, yeah, what it what the metaphor is is even grosser, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 51:15

Yeah, I'm assuming it's like dicks and butts, probably.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

Yep, yep. More or less. Yep. More or less. That's what we're that's what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_04 51:23

Listen, did young me know that? No, but as soon as I got a little bit older, I'm like, well, so it is.

SPEAKER_01 51:28

You're like, what's a chocolate star fish?

SPEAKER_04 51:30

So I wasn't wrong. It is gross.

SPEAKER_01 51:32

It just brings you back to like the old family values tours with corn and limp biscuit. Oh, what great times.

SPEAKER_03 51:38

Those were the floor representation is great.

SPEAKER_04 51:41

I do want to give it up though for Alicia Silverstone coming back again. And not only is she back in a movie, okay, a 90s icon, but she's in this movie. We last saw her in the lodge for movies that we covered on this podcast, and she was also Jaden Martel's mom.

SPEAKER_01 51:58

Yeah. Interesting.

SPEAKER_04 52:00

Mother and son yet again.

SPEAKER_01 52:01

Yeah, that's interesting. They work together well.

SPEAKER_03 52:05

But also, now here's what I'll admit. I didn't watch this show in the early 2000s. I recently found out about this show. Certainly went over my head. Tim Heidecker, which I know he's very popular in a couple things, but him also being in this film was kind of great because my other friend that I went to see this movie with was a huge Tim and Eric fan. I know that's like 2001, but him also being in this was like a really nice little nod to the early 2000s for him in particular, not necessarily for me because I didn't watch it, but I think even the casting choice is not just Alicia Silverstone and Fred Dursa, it's a little bit further than that, that I thought was really fun and a good time.

SPEAKER_02 52:41

I think you make a great point here. The casting really makes this movie. I think Kyle Mooney, for me, it's like the comedy's there, but sometimes the silliness can get a bit too much. I think here it was like just restrained just enough to be silly, to be funny, to really land. But everybody else that shows up who's, you know, somebody who's not 12, 13, 14 years old, I think really kind of like nails it. Sure, the teen actors, they're all like what, like actually 25, I'm sure, at this point, but they do fine. But all the people who are a bit older in their 30s, 40s, 50s, maybe 60s, some of these folks now, I can't even tell. But I think that really helped kind of shape this film because again, we're in on the joke with them, which really made it land for me. One of the things I liked though, one of the things I liked though visually in this film are the sentient tech robot android things here. Yeah. Because at the time, this isn't what they would have looked like in movies to us back then, right? They would have looked like Terminator, right, most likely, or something even sillier, depending on the budget of the movie. But what we got here was just so out of the blue that it really worked because they look ridiculous. They're very silly. And when we get to the VR looking kind of stuff, that reminds me of the show Reboot. It all just meshed together really well. And sure, it doesn't feel like 99 going in 2000 in terms of their aesthetic, but I think it works even better than trying to emulate that.

SPEAKER_04 54:01

Yeah, it's as if these computer overlords were just the summation of internet culture and our wildest imaginations, as they were limited in the 90s. It felt appropriate.

SPEAKER_02 54:13

It really did feel appropriate, even though like they're put together in a way that is obviously in 2024, but who cares? It just worked.

SPEAKER_01 54:20

I loved it. I loved as the robot kept absorbing things and just got bigger and bigger. And Binks, you mentioned the stop motion of the wires coming out as like little feelers to grab things and bring it in and absorb whatever tech was involved with that thing. I think Yeah. Super fun look. It didn't have to be this clean robot-looking killer, it it just looked like a pile of junk that just happened to mash up together and become fucking cool. Yeah, it was a good time.

SPEAKER_04 54:50

For sure. And you know what? I love, especially as we get more of the singularity, and you have this entire domination of all these different computers. When we get to that final scene and shit goes down, Limp Biscuit is having a moment, right? Fred Durst is singing faith with all these fucking adults who don't give a shit about Limp Biscuit, and then we get these kids putting on a fucking condom to stop electricuting themselves to be able to.

SPEAKER_01 55:19

That fucking condom.

SPEAKER_04 55:20

Yeah, honestly, that entire third act was just fucking funny, right? But I want to point out, because Mac, you mentioned how we have the older actors in this movie that help shape it. But again, going back to a lot of the heartfelt moments that you get, Eli reuniting with Danny's mom. This should not have been my favorite scene in the movie, but god Danny got me. When last we saw her, she was doing Taibo with her son to an exercise tape. She loves Eli, right? He's like another son to her. So for her to have this emotional confrontation and realizing that Danny isn't with him and Danny's not okay, oh man, it fucking gave me the perfect amount of balance to cut all the laughs, but not go so hard or so deep into it that it ruined the experience. It was just a great sentimental moment.

SPEAKER_03 56:18

Can I tell you a funny bit about that? So unfortunately, I didn't we did something very naughty, we'll say. I did not get to see the first 12 minutes of this movie because we were, of course, late. So that was annoying. So I may or may not have found a way to see the first 12 minutes of the film a different way. We'll leave it at that. But the point is that as I saw the movie, I did not know that Danny's mom had made an appearance in the film. So when that time came when they reunited, or when he's giving the speech and she does that little gasp, I actually laughed. Like my friends and I laughed because we thought it was like a funny moment. We're like just, oh, this awkward lady's just gasping, like reacting to the loss of this person. Like, who is she? Who is this lady? Why would she just be reacting that way? So then when I ended up watching the intro and realized, oh wait, duh, that's the mom. I was like, oh, that makes more sense. That was a sad moment, wasn't it? Wow. Packer things very unwell of me. But speaking speaking of Danny, though, I the thong song music video at the end credits. That's it. That's the moment. That's the time.

SPEAKER_04 57:27

Honestly, the thong song the first time was also the time.

SPEAKER_01 57:30

Also both times. Fair.

SPEAKER_03 57:32

Fair.

SPEAKER_04 57:32

Yeah, I want the Danny cover of the thong song. I want the soundtrack of this movie because I want that too.

SPEAKER_02 57:39

Somebody will make it. Oh, you know, people are just like Chris and demanding it. Yeah. You know it's gonna it's gotta hit at some point. But I think there's so much about that party that's good. Just walking into the party and cycling through the clicks. So good. Having different music accompanying them, talking about corn, that was fun. That was a fun nostalgia jab because some people had the different clicks. I'm my high school, we had like 60 of us. There was no clicks like that. But we had the people, we had the groups who kind of like moved within them. There was no Bloodhound Gang, though. I'm surprised there wasn't like young horny perverts who were listening to Bloodhound Gang at the time. Yeah, you gotta go all the way back. Come on. But that was all leading up to the thong song. And so this whole sequence was fantastic because you're hit with the, oh, you guys remember all this? You guys remember life back then? And then boom, thong song.

SPEAKER_01 58:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 58:25

Because you should never forget, apparently.

SPEAKER_01 58:27

Never, never. And that scene you just mentioned of walking into the party was one of the many instances of this movie that I feel like just really hit like a major nostalgic moment because we did have those clicks in school and in our friend groups. Like we had preppy people, we had new metal people, we had like goths, we had punks, like we had all those people. And sometimes they mingled, sometimes they didn't. You know what I mean? Sometimes there were fights and sometimes there wasn't, but it brought me back. Another moment that oddly brought me back, and I'll explain, is there's the video store scene when they all get high in the adult video section. What do they call it? They call it the champagne room or something like that. Yes. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 59:13

The fucking 70s show of it all.

SPEAKER_01 59:16

Yeah, it has nothing to do with the video store or the champagne room, but it's the moment that they smoke the pot and and he's like tripping out. Like you could tell he's in a very uncomfortable moment of being way too high and in a place that he's not like super comfortable in. And man, I have fucking been there. I have been there a lot of times in my youth. And I feel like one moment that immediately came to my head was a moment that I left after school with some friends, went to some friend of a friend's house, didn't really know him too well. These were older kids, they were like old school, like death metal heads. And I was like, oh man, this is cool. Like I'm with some OG death metal heads, you know. This is some some Hesher shit. This is cool. And the guy's like, hey man, you want to you want to rip some of this, you want to rip some some of this purple weed out of my fucking six-footer? And I'm like, oh hell yeah, man. And I ripped this fat, fat fucking bowl out of a six-foot bong, and I fucking just died. It was the most uncomfortable three hours of my entire life. And I just brought me right back because that's exactly the feeling. That segment of him tripping out was it like evoked the exact feeling that I had in that moment.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:34

The fact that I'm visualizing that tall of a bong, considering how tall you are, is crazy.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:39

Yeah. Somebody has to light that shit for you.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:41

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:43

You don't understand the logistics of that, but it sounds stressful.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:47

It's not an Eric Costin shoes shit, man. The whole poser thing, the whole like, it wasn't even just Eric Costins. It was the whole poser remark, right? That's just another thing that just hits home. There was so much of that shit when we were going to school of like, oh man, you're such a poser. You're wearing this, and you don't even, you're not even about that. You know what I mean? Like, what the fuck? What a time. A bunch of haters.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:10

Speaking of haters, not that we hate him, but when you see her ex-boyfriend, and it's Mason Gooding from Scream, famed son of Cuba Gooden Jr.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:22

You gotta love it.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:23

Yeah, he's so annoying, but also there's nothing wrong with him. He's fine. And also it's like that's why you hate him even more.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:31

Yeah. He plays those characters too well. I don't know why, but it's just it's a feeling.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:38

I did love the whole setup though. You mentioned the attire earlier, the wardrobe, but to see his hair when he shows up, that just gave me giggles.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:46

The TBT for sure. But it's so much like Soccer Chris as well. That Puka Shells thing. I'm still thinking about it. It's ridiculous. Also, it was just like funnier moments like when Eli is challenging, or rather, it's actually vice versa. Soccer Chris is challenging Eli because he was talking to his girlfriend, Laura. He has like this awkward face, like this reaction. And I'm like, what's wrong with this guy? What's he just staring? Like, what are you what's up with you? He's just so funny. I don't know who that actor is or that person. I think he's actually a rapper or something, but who knows? Somebody's a TikTok rapper.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:20

I have no clue. But he was really funny in that movie. For the small bit that he was in it, I I actually enjoyed his performance of being a very annoying boyfriend.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:28

The Puka Shells were a time, man. I had some Puka Shells back in the day. I think we have Puka Shells lying around this house somewhere, but they really dig out a Puka Shell necklace if I had to. You know what I mean? I have I'll have it on hand sometime. But Puka Shells were a thing, man. The whole skater, surfer, skater, pop punks, puka shell, bleach blonde spikes vibe, that was a fucking moment in life right there. May have only lasted a year or two, but it was a fun time. Did you pop your collars? I didn't pop collars. I didn't wear collars. Wasn't into the collar situation. I was into the Hurley T's, the Dickies, you know, the oversized Osiris' DCs. Yeah, all that shit.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:11

Unsurprisingly. I definitely layered polos for sure. I layered the polos, I layered the tank tops, the shirts in fucking 90 degree weather in Miami. What's wrong with me? Dying.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:23

You were a scene girl.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:25

I was a scene. Yeah, I was a scene girl without committing for the hair part. Like the hair bit was not that's where I was not it for the hair got out of control with the scene kids. It's too much. It was way too much for me.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:37

They didn't really show us too much of that here. I think they really focused on the kids who were into corn and limp biscuit. Yeah. Even though I didn't hear too much about Lincoln Park and back in the day. Yeah. And I feel like these days it was definitely more popular, at least amongst the people I knew.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:52

Yeah, for sure. For sure. I will say, because we mentioned it earlier, Chris, you mentioned it earlier. You mentioned one of your favorite parts towards the end with the whole like putting the condom on the hand. And I honestly think that the condom was a character in its own right, man. The journey that this condom had, the sentimental value that it had between these two friends, and how it came full circle at the end to be like the thing that saved them. Come on.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:16

It's the fact that the condom was found in a copy of The Giver.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:23

We read The Giver in what year in school? I mean, I think it was like middle school for me. So these kids have been holding on to it, passing it back and forth years. I'm surprised it wasn't just complete dust when it came out. Oh no.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:37

It definitely probably expired somehow.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:40

No, it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:40

It looks like it. It looks like dust. The lube was gone.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:43

Oh no. She didn't need it.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:45

But that whole setup of them like passing it back and forth and and not caring about the fact that it's most likely expired and whatever, it just felt very real for kids of that age of that time.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:57

You know, you watch a lot of like 80s movies and you see how teenagers act back then, and it's basically like 40-year-olds now. But back in the late 90s, going into the early 2000s, you know, it was American pie, effectively. That was for 13 to 15-year-old boys, that was real life. And that was a documentary almost. So it's nice that they kind of threw that in a little bit here with the back and forth between these two best buds.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:19

Look at that. 1990s men, boys, actually, fucking pies and passing condoms.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:26

Fucking pies. I don't know how many pies were fucked in the 90s, but honestly. At least one.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:33

Well, we would think one, but you know how people fucking recreate the movies whenever they can. I think Cornhub would tell you that it's been more than one pie.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:42

More corn. Or some pumpkins too, probably. Give you the facts. If I'm not mistaken, Laura's character was actually originally going to be Jenna or Tega, but there was some scheduling conflicts that got in the way of that. And I think hey.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:56

Rachel Ziggler. It worked close enough.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:58

It worked out. I think it worked out. I feel like Jenna Ortega's just in so much shit that she really did not need to be in this movie at all. But I don't know. You never know.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:08

I feel like the casting was great in the sense that they seem to be all in this even playing field of where they're at, celebrity status-wise, you know, like Rachel Zegler sounds like a good pairing for the actor that plays Eli because although he's in a lot of horror films, obviously it, duh, and a couple others, I just feel like regardless, the fandom and the knowing of where he's from matches Rachel Zegler's vibe. And then when you go a tier lower than that, it's like I'm not super familiar with the actor that plays Danny, and I like that I don't necessarily know him too well because it's like now I want to. Like he really just shines because he's someone new to me, someone fresh. Eduardo Franco, I believe that's his name, the one that plays I was gonna say Argyle, because of course I think of Stranger Things First. But but anyways, yes, the Stranger Things guy. Because now I've already said it. We know who I'm talking about. We know him from that. And he's in so many other good things. I don't know. I I love that there were a lot of what would we even call them? Is it C-less celebrities or whatever? I don't mean that in a bad way. It's just like I like fresh faces for something new.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:15

Yeah, I was gonna say, I like to think of them as up and coming, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:18

Up and coming, exactly. Yeah. I didn't mean it in a bad way. I meant like I'd rather have that than if we were to have Jenna Ortega, I feel like already she's so famous and like so oversaturated in a lot of these films that I I wouldn't have found it as funny for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:34

I'm with you. I don't think it I think it benefited without her in it in a positive way.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:38

Not anything against either person, but if you're not familiar with Julian Dennison, you need to watch Hunt for the Wilder People. Okay. Just throwing that out there. It's so good. Okay, he's so good. I started Deadpool 2.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:49

That's right. I started watching the Hunt for the Wilder people uh people a couple years ago on a date, and I was told it was gonna be like a light-hearted movie, and it got real not fun, and I started crying a little bit. I'm like, we can't watch this shit right now. This is embarrassing.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:07

It's good, it hits, you know, it really does work work it.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:11

Uh but also I just want to shout out Lachlan Watson who was in the Chucky TV series. They play Ash in this movie, but I mean, even Ash's character was so interesting for me because you have the classic trope of a woman surrounded by male friends, but like the way they talked to Ash? What the fuck was that? That's why, again, fuck that guy. Glad he broke his neck or cracked his fucking skull.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:36

Yeah. It was very heavy, like slut shaming, and I mean, but that was the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:41

Like, I'm not saying it was good, but that was how people acted back then. There was a lot of crude jokes like that flying around, and people treated people like that. We gotta actually think about like even 25 years ago, the like the social norm that we had and what is and what isn't accepted today is pretty fucking drastic if you really think about it.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:02

Yeah. This is why I'm just in this okay. We talk a lot about if you could be raised in any other generation, what would it be? Listen, I love swing music. Would I like the aesthetic of the 50s? Yeah, I would be fucking persecuted, so no thanks. I honestly I feel like I really kind of hit the sweet spot and the bubble of being able to come out. I had to go through a little bit of the struggle and the pain of that, right? Serving under Don't Ask Hotel, all that stuff. But if I was in high school age instead of elementary school age around this time, fuck that would have been fucking terrible. It already sucked in like 2004 to 2008. That was already shitty. I could not have fucking survived earlier than that.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:44

Which reminds me, like I was thinking of Laura as a character in general. I did have a good laugh when they were mentioning to her, like, you got some corny ass problems. It's just the things that she was talking about in and of itself were I guess were perceived as just like ridiculous and like, oh please. But I do appreciate as we're talking about like that era and how the crude jokes were being made and the stereotypes of particular like women and just in general. I feel like it was very cool to still have a very popular girl, but also be a woman in STEM. And that's a big trope that we see, sure, in a lot of horror comedies are in horror in general or whatever, right? Yes, I get that. But they could have been very stereotypical, as they had already been, with having a Ditzy girl who was a part of that clique and then had a woman in STEM separately, like just expand the gang a little bit more. But to integrate the two of them together was fun because it's still it then made sense with the chemistry with Eli. Like I actually did buy into their pairing and like their chemistry and all that because of it.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:50

I do want to go back to talking about Ash for a minute because I just want to throw out that the rap battle in the swing set was so cheesy and so cringe.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:00

Yeah. A friend of mine, a friend of mine does that sometimes. Just like randomly, like we'll start rap for fun.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:07

But not like seriously thinking it's No, no, no, no, never serious, never serious.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:11

But it was hilarious when and again, we're joking about the fact that he would never make it A, serious, but B, like the things that he was saying, like very poetic like that. No, he's not like that. But the random rapping and just riffing and stuff, he does it sometimes. So when it that scene came up, him, myself, him, and his sister, we all looked at each other like that you or Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:34

The intellectual rap shit though was a thing, man. Like there were those people that were like, Oh, like I'm into like the mainstream rap, and then there was the people that were like, I'm into that underground, like poetic hip-hop. You know what I mean? Like that was a divider right there.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:50

And it's what's funny in particular because my friend is like this, it's because he's making fun of that, right? He's making fun of how prevalent that was. And especially with New Metal and going, like just what, a year or two later, like I instantly thought of POD. I love POD. Yeah, you know, and and I'm thinking of not that they're like that with their rap, but it's just an example of the people that were created as a result of this kind of music that were really introspective and really like deep and profound with their words and stuff. It's just so funny when you see it on screen.

SPEAKER_05 1:12:24

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:25

So good. And then ultimately for this demise when he's like, I never thought I'd die next to a rap rocker.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:33

I'm gonna be honest with you. Again, I thought this movie was a lot of lighthearted fun, so a lot of good things happening here. I think the rapping might have been the worst part of it for me. And I don't mean that in a way that's like, wow, I actually hated this, but it did give you the intended like a second-hand cringe and like fuck, this is embarrassing, but that's why it's so good. But if that's the worst thing that this movie has, again, great fucking time.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

Well, I'll give it knocks for something else, and that is I can never imagine anyone I know back in 1999, going into 2000, walking down the street, singing tub thumping as their rallying song stuff.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:12

It's 2024, and I get knocked down, but I get up again. You're never gonna keep me down.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:18

That was in like every roller skating rink or ice skating rink ever, I feel like, in the 90s.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:24

Yeah. I get knocked down and I get up again. Yeah, there's that, and then there's a sugar, there's a sugar ray song that I'm thinking of.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:31

Sugar Ray. Yeah, sugar ray was big. Just the one like album, though, right? Just the one album.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:37

No, there so surprisingly, that album wasn't even like their biggest album. It was all the soft rock that came afterwards when they wanted to make money.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:46

Every morning is the song that I'm thinking of for Sugar Ray.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:49

Isn't that just one album though? Or is it spread across multiple albums?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:53

You're probably thinking of that one album that everyone like remembers boring soft rock songs.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:58

I don't know anything about their albums. I'm just gonna put this in one side. Oh boy.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:04

No, a different song. That's fly. I know.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:06

And there's a halo hanging from the corner of my girlfriend's four-post bed. I remember sitting in my brother's bedroom in fucking Texas, the bedroom window open, overlooking a pasture. I had my fucking Super Nintendo controller and I was playing Super Mario World, listening to that song on the radio. That is the kind of deep-seated memory that this fucking movie has unlocked.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:29

Yeah, it hits. It hits. It definitely follow-up.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:33

I think you're talking about 1459.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:35

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:35

I always think of Floored, which is back when they still did some thrash stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:38

Ah, okay. So no, yeah. I don't know, man. I'm thinking of the poppy shit that they put out.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:43

Okay, but I feel like sugary is such a perfect way to like talk about this film. It just goes right back to the time. Like, let me hear some lit. Let's put on TRL. Yeah. I think it is hard to pick box 20. Pick apart stuff. And even when they do stuff like play Tup Thumping way too long, it's like, you know, that's your worst offense is driving something into the ground a little bit when that's what we did 25 years ago was play the wrong songs 15,000 times too many.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:10

Drops a Jupiter in her head. Yeah. Max said, that's your worst offense, spreading joy.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:17

I will say some of you know, you have music that you listen to to feel better, just like pick up your your mood. Usually for me, that's a playlist of songs that were popular between 1996 and 2002. That's what does it.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:28

And there's a lot of that in this film, obviously, and some like really great songs that you probably haven't heard since. There's one in particular that they play from Filter, Take a Picture, that my best friend and I will sing every now and then. And the fact that it was referenced here, I was like, oh, I feel seen because it's I I feel less weird and crazy that I still sing that song even so many years later. So that's always nice. And it's tough because there's I feel like there's so many great parts to highlight of this film. So to think of a worse part sometimes, maybe it is the cringe, you know, it's a little tough. And I would say, if anything, we obviously had a blast, but earlier we talked about how if you weren't maybe a part of this particular niche generation, you're probably gonna find this film to be extremely cheesy. This is the kind of film that you've gotta be in the right mood for, because it is over-the-top dramatic and ridiculous from start to finish. It's a parody of the year, of the era, of films and and music and people of that time. So if you're not wanting that, then I don't know if this film is for you ever, because it's just a good time, a good laugh. It reminds me a lot of like a scary movie and not another teenage movie. You know what I mean? Those kinds of films that are just constantly riffing one bit after the other after the other. So you can kind of get tired of that comedy quick if it's not your cup of tea.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:59

So true. And I think I'm gonna keep on going with some of the more serious annotations on what might be the worst part of the film. And I think that this movie could have benefited from a slight uptick in the kills and gore and action. It's not that we don't get it, because we get a healthy kill count. It's just that I want to see a little bit more. The kills we get, I want to linger a little bit more. I want to see a little bit more of the gore, and I want to see some more action. And I think that if we got some more of that throughout the movie and leaned a little heavier into the horror side, this movie for me would be one of the better horror comedies out there.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:38

You know, I think you have a fair point there. I think if I were to rank horror comedies, this is high up there, but it's still not unseating Tucker and Dale versus Evil. But despite that, I cannot wait to watch this again. I'm gonna catch it again before it goes out of theaters. I'm gonna take Allie to go see it with me. I just want to sit back and really soak it in. I think this time I'm going to listen to a list of hits from 1999 and just really get myself worked up. Maybe, Sean, I'll drive up to Port St. Lucie, grab that Puka Shell from you. Who knows? Who knows? Maybe I'll get a little handicam. It's in the audience, vlog the whole thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:19

Vlog the whole thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:20

I'm here for that. I'm here for that. This is definitely one that's gonna be in the December rotation. Watch it on New Year's Eve if I can in the morning as I'm prepping. I don't know, just try to integrate it in one way or another because it's really fun. It's also just a quick watch. You're not there for too long either, you know, and it's well paced. And I'm excited to see what else Kyle Mooney comes out of this. We didn't talk too much about Garrett, his character in this film, because to also just have the gall to be directing it, but also be starring in it and be play the character that he does. It's just real good. And I think I hope to see more comedy like this in the future for for horror, just to balance out the real dark shit we've had to watch this year, too.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:02

Yeah. I think that's you're right. This is just a fun movie that can be rewatched. I think it's got a lot of little pieces in it that you probably miss on the first watch. I'm sure there's a lot of little things that you can re-watch and find out of this movie that's really fun, and it's just a good time, it's nostalgic, it's fun, it's funny, doesn't take itself too seriously, it's got some kills in there. It's definitely something that's meant to be re-watched.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:26

Agreed, and I can't wait to re-watch it when it eventually hits streaming. I'm not gonna head to the theater again because anytime I can choose to be at home, that's what I want to do. So, yeah, the second hit streaming, my wife hasn't seen it, I went and saw this alone. Definitely want her to watch it with me. It's just too good.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:41

Yeah, now I'm thinking about this matched up with New Year's Evil, matched up with the original Terror Train, matched up with the substance to round it out for New Year's films. I think that's a pretty solid lineup. But for now, there you have it, folks. Y2K in 2024 has earned a universal slash. We certainly had a robust discussion here, but the conversation about this mayhem doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:06

If you want to party like it's 1999 with us and go further than this episode, consider supporting the show by visiting patreon.com/slash hackerslash where you can enjoy even more of the show, including bonus content with early access, extended episodes with our B-sides, movie nominations, and live shows.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:26

And if you loved listening to us reminisce on the Y2K days, leave us a five-star review wherever you get your podcasts. This helps us continue to deliver great content for all you horror fiends out there.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:36

We'll see you next time, folks. And remember, in a few hours, you'll have an excuse to kiss the girl of your dreams.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:43

Spitting game with a full on boner.