370: 2024 Slasher's Choice Awards

SPEAKER_05 0:10

I really don't hope you say Not Soratus fuckable. Greetings and salutations, Happy New Year, and welcome to the 2024 Slash's Choice Awards with Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. Ladies and gentlemen, please stay tuned for live television first as we attempt to commune with the devil. 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_02 0:44

Totally killer pun intended.

SPEAKER_05 0:46

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we rate movies for the 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 slash enthusiast. This week I'm joined by the Superfly Space Guy Mac. Hola muchachos, the classic horror connoisseur Sean. Alive! It's alive! And the paranormal paramour, Vinks. Hola. Normally we're here to review movies, but this is our very last episode of 2024. And in true hacker slash tradition, it's time for us to look back on the year, reflect on what we accomplished, and set our course for 2025.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

In this episode, we'll go through some of the best and worst in show. From survivors to villains to kills and overall films. We each gave our nomination for each category, and our listeners voted to decide each winner.

SPEAKER_05 1:38

First up, we're gonna see what 2024 looked like for us by the numbers. Courtesy of Mac.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

Let's see how we did. Drum roll, please. This year, we had 64 total episodes.

SPEAKER_01 1:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:52

We did so much this year. And that's still less than last year.

SPEAKER_02 1:55

But it still blows my mind. Mm-hmm. People putting in work.

SPEAKER_00 1:58

It's a good number. Now, those episodes led to 208,587 downloads. Whoa.

SPEAKER_05 2:06

And that's just downloads like the old school podcast metric. That's not streams, that's not plays on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. That is just the most conservative metric.

SPEAKER_02 2:17

Incredible. Taking up people's internal storage. That's what we do.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Now we watch 66 movies this year in order to record those 64 episodes.

SPEAKER_02 2:27

Is that like 1% of Bink's total watches this year? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:31

I was gonna say I'm looking at that number, I'm like 66, and I'm like, I've watched almost 400 movies this year. 66 of them were for this podcast.

SPEAKER_05 2:41

This bitch just said amateurs.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

We spent a total of 100 hours watching those movies. And then we spent 192 hours recording our thoughts on those movies.

SPEAKER_04 2:51

Those are all my lucky numbers. That's so cute.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

Now all those hours spent watching and then recording our thoughts about those movies led to 512 hours editing the episodes. Yeah, lots of editing.

SPEAKER_05 3:05

This time it's split between me and Sean.

SPEAKER_04 3:07

I was gonna say, round of applause to the two of you.

SPEAKER_05 3:10

Some work. Because, whoa. That's not even the highest number we've had for editing.

SPEAKER_02 3:15

No.

SPEAKER_05 3:16

Back in the day, it it's taken in like the seven to eight hundreds before.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

Ooh, that's rough.

SPEAKER_04 3:20

I like to believe that's because maybe we're refined as a unit, you know? We're doing a little better. I like to believe, hopefully.

SPEAKER_02 3:29

Incremental growth.

SPEAKER_05 3:30

I have to restructure sentences from scratch less.

SPEAKER_02 3:34

Oh, those are fun though, you know? Frankensteining paragraphs. Yeah. It's the best.

SPEAKER_05 3:39

Yikes.

SPEAKER_00 3:39

But you could just make us say anything you wanted us to. That's true power. Ooh, the power.

SPEAKER_05 3:44

Yeah. If I asked you for a specific recording sample to put into the script so that we can overdub whenever you fuck up, maybe then I can make you say anything we want.

SPEAKER_00 3:53

Now, for those patrons, we've had 32 hours of B-side content.

SPEAKER_05 3:58

Wow, we talk a lot of shit, huh? Yeah. 32 hours of it.

SPEAKER_00 4:01

Not bad.

SPEAKER_04 4:02

Not bad. Honestly, I expected that to be much larger.

SPEAKER_05 4:06

More than there are hours in the day. I think it averages out because sometimes the patrons are well fed with like 30 to 40 minute B-sides, and sometimes it's like a few minutes, like 15, 10 minutes. So it works out.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Alright, so we talked a lot of smack uh this past year. We've watched a lot of movies. We've recorded a lot of our thoughts. But how did the movies do? We gave out 56 total hacks this entire year.

SPEAKER_02 4:29

It felt like a slashy kind of year.

SPEAKER_05 4:31

We had a great year. This is a great year for horror.

SPEAKER_02 4:34

This was a great year for horror.

SPEAKER_05 4:36

A lot of new releases.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

A lot of great new releases.

SPEAKER_05 4:39

A lot of times we watch bad movies and Binx happen to not be available.

SPEAKER_02 4:43

True.

SPEAKER_03 4:44

I Fair enough.

SPEAKER_05 4:46

There's an inherent bias here because when the episode misses, an episode misses, but you're not exactly heartbroken about missing an episode that for a movie that you think sucks, right? And that's not just a Binx thing. This is a everybody thing.

SPEAKER_02 4:58

That's true. The ones you don't want to be on are generally the ones you think are gonna suck or already know suck.

SPEAKER_04 5:05

Listen, I know what we're talking about. It's probably and most likely Friday the 13th episodes. I know, I know, and I recognize that a little bit. And I will do better. I will challenge myself more. It's also Halloween. Oh, and the one Halloween.

SPEAKER_05 5:20

It's also the one episode you committed to being on.

SPEAKER_04 5:22

Yes, which had Paul Rudd. And that I actually have a very, very solid reason as to why I've missed it, and I am still a little sad about it. I'm gonna be real. I'm sad about it. I'm not sorry about the Jason ones. I'm sorry. But the good news is that I will be doing the next one because the next one is actually one that I really want to see. So Okay, yay.

SPEAKER_05 5:44

That's H2O.

SPEAKER_04 5:45

Hold me to it.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

So we have 64 episodes. We gave out 56 hacks. Five out of the 64 episodes, we had universal hacks.

SPEAKER_05 5:53

There should have been more. No, no, absolutely not.

SPEAKER_02 5:56

Universal hacks would be like, yeah. I mean, the way I look at it is it has to be like really fucking bad if we all hack it. So I think that's fair. And there's a lot of one slash, almost universal hacks in there, you know?

SPEAKER_05 6:10

Yeah, I think maybe that's something we'll tell you next year as well. How many did we the one just got away.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah. But we were pretty generous this year as well. We gave out 147 slashes. Mm-hmm. See?

SPEAKER_05 6:22

It was just a great content lineup, that's all.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

We chose well because we had 26 universal slashes.

SPEAKER_05 6:29

Yeah, this is us making great decisions and being good horror fans.

SPEAKER_02 6:33

Yeah, we definitely loved a lot of movies.

SPEAKER_05 6:36

We said enough of that bullshit, and I thought subconsciously, I'm sad enough as it is. Let's watch good movies.

SPEAKER_04 6:42

Yeah. I wanna say very briefly that I'm quickly glancing here at those one one-offs that were so close to being universal slashes, and I'm the reason for like six of them.

SPEAKER_05 6:55

Yeah. That things were being close to universal slash.

SPEAKER_04 6:58

I kept them from being a universal slash, yes. You are actually the reason that Donnie Darko wasn't a universal slash, so also I'm calling you out.

SPEAKER_05 7:04

Yeah, well, I fucking did my duty.

SPEAKER_02 7:07

Oh yeah. See, there's some ones in there that should have gone through.

SPEAKER_05 7:13

But here's what I want to know. I want to know about the episodes where it was a universal slash between Sean Mac and I, and you were not on, but had you been on, it would have been a non-universal slash.

SPEAKER_04 7:25

Oh, I'll tell you with my full chest. At the time, I don't feel this way now, but it probably would have been Smile 2.

unknown 7:31

What?

SPEAKER_05 7:32

That's fucking crazy.

SPEAKER_02 7:33

That would have had to have been documented.

SPEAKER_04 7:35

That would have been an upset for sure. That take has changed, you know.

SPEAKER_05 7:39

Bro, I took a hamster to see that movie.

SPEAKER_04 7:41

Uncle Sam? Are you kidding me? I don't even need to watch that movie to tell you I would have hacked it.

SPEAKER_01 7:46

It's American made.

SPEAKER_04 7:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 7:48

I think you should watch it to understand why I fucking slashed it.

SPEAKER_01 7:52

Uncle Sam is just a good time.

SPEAKER_05 7:54

There's a deeper meeting.

SPEAKER_04 7:56

Okay. Whatever y'all say. We'll look at it, but I can definitely tell that I would have changed some of these.

SPEAKER_05 8:01

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, you could have, you should have, but you didn't. And now obviously Mac mentioned that we had over 208,000 total downloads this year, but we wanted to dive in a little bit more to our performance over on Spotify.

SPEAKER_04 8:15

So you can listen to us on many platforms, but here are some stats just from our listeners over on Spotify. Top episode. I don't think this is going to be a surprise to many people because I expected this to be the top episode. I don't know about y'all, but it was episode 339, and that was the one and only long legs. This episode, just to briefly tell you guys, this episode performed so well. It was our top, top episode. It was listened to probably like over a thousand times more than our average episode. So it was extremely popular, and I'm so happy about it.

SPEAKER_05 8:48

It's crazy because that movie I feel like still wasn't as good as I expected it to be. Great movie. There's a lot to unpack in the movie, so I understand why people are going to the episode. That movie also did get a lot of a hype, so I can imagine a lot of people probably searched for an episode or a spoiler-free review before going to see it for themselves. But man, when I think about long legs, I think it's like I still wish that I got a little bit more.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

I think I'm with you on that, but it's still great.

SPEAKER_04 9:15

I think we could maybe all agree because I also I feel the same way, although I thought that movie was incredible. I think as time has gone by, we've gotten so many other horror movies this year that have been so exceptional too that I feel like in general people were feeling like either this is gonna be the best thing I've ever seen and still feel that way, or they were a little disappointed. And I think that's what really generated such high. It was the marketing, and they did it. But speaking of marketing and general growth, I would say our listener growth has increased in a few different ways here on Spotify. 33% increase in listeners, 19% increase in streams, 73% increase in followers, and 72% new listeners.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

Look at how many new listeners. 72% listening to us on Spotify and you're new around here.

SPEAKER_05 10:08

Welcome. It's good to have you.

SPEAKER_04 10:10

I love it. And the top spot in Spotify charts, friends, number nine. My lucky number. I'm happy about it. Nine is my lucky number. Nine, two, and one. So I know it's multiple, but it's because it's my entire birthday. Anyways, that's not the point. The point is number nine? Guys, that's incredible. That's pretty sick. And we reached 80 countries. Wow. I couldn't even name 80 countries right now. Could I name maybe 20?

SPEAKER_05 10:37

You clearly didn't watch fucking Animaniacs enough. They have a whole game about doing the countries. All of them in almost every fucking country. It's kind of crazy.

SPEAKER_04 10:45

All right, I'll listen to it after this. I'll give it a shot. Well, although we reached 80 countries, I want to talk about the top podcast ranking that they do for their like wrapped, which I think is so fun. We were the top podcast for 366 fans. That's awesome. That's really sweet. Nice number one fans. Love them. Appreciate you. Now for top five, we were the top five show for 2.14,000 fans.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

That's MySpace numbers right there.

SPEAKER_04 11:16

Oh, MySpace Numbers. That's MySpace Numbers. And then top 10 show for 4.13,000 fans.

SPEAKER_02 11:24

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 11:25

Over 4,000 fans. We made it to their top 10 show. How cool. I bet we're in fucking great company. Oh, I I believe it. I absolutely believe it. And my favorite stat out of this is that I was looking at how we compared to last year, and that's an increase in over a thousand fans in both spots. So in both the top five show and the top ten show, we increased over a thousand fans in rankings.

SPEAKER_05 11:48

So I think it's because we've been talking about some fucking great movies. So next time y'all get all concerned about how many hacks we're giving out, remember the slash is what people bring people together.

SPEAKER_04 11:58

Absolutely. That's right. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 12:00

Well, we've obviously had a great time here, but we would we wouldn't have a show if we didn't talk about all the blood, gorn carnage. So, Sean, what was our 2024 body count?

SPEAKER_02 12:12

Oh man, this body count was pretty fucking high. I would say we had some iconic kills throughout this year. We have a good amount of just super memorable kills. It's just the sheer amount of kills that we got. And we had some movies with in the hundreds, we had some really healthy kill counts in the 50s, 30s, 20s. We even had movies with just one and some 0.5s. Shout out to all the fetuses out there. But we landed on 1,502 total kills this year.

SPEAKER_05 12:44

I'd like to point out that that should have been some 0.5s, like you said, Sean. And we had to basically combine multiple fetuses to get a one, a single unit. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

So true.

SPEAKER_05 12:57

Oh, that's hacker math right there.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

Gotta love it.

SPEAKER_05 13:00

But the real question is were any of those kills animals?

SPEAKER_04 13:04

Oh, well, unfortunately there were.

SPEAKER_05 13:07

One point.

SPEAKER_04 13:07

But I want to start with maybe a positive, and that would be that we had 34 episodes that were completely safe.

SPEAKER_05 13:14

Would you say that was a positive?

SPEAKER_04 13:16

A positive.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

Oh no.

SPEAKER_04 13:19

I love her.

SPEAKER_02 13:21

That was good. You know, I think everyone always looks at me weird when I'm like, listen, kill as many people as you want. Just don't touch the animals. And people are like, what's wrong with you? It's like, what's wrong with you, man? These poor, helpless, innocent animals.

SPEAKER_05 13:36

Those animals ain't do shit. Even Cujo, the very violent dog that murdered people, he was still a good boy who didn't deserve it. He just got hurt at the beginning of the movie. Misunderstood. He needed medical reports.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

Totally, totally misunderstood.

SPEAKER_04 13:50

Bless his heart. But speaking to that, by the way, the episodes with the worst animal report, just so that everyone knows and they're aware, if they go ahead and watch it or rewatch, we've got Sting, which if you know about that movie, you can assume that, well, the animal report probably isn't gonna be great because it's literally about a s evil spider, planet terror. Terror Fire 3 with its rats.

SPEAKER_05 14:14

Oh my god, I have a thing about the rats.

SPEAKER_01 14:16

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_05 14:17

Continue though. I'll wait until you're done.

SPEAKER_04 14:19

Oh, I can't wait. Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey 2. Fuck yeah. As one could assume. And then last but not least, my personal favorite and probably the most gruesome, When Evil Lurks.

SPEAKER_02 14:33

Of course.

SPEAKER_04 14:34

Wow. Very tough. That's a tough one.

SPEAKER_05 14:36

Okay, I gotta tell you about the fucking Terrifier 3 rats. I d uh We just told Sean this earlier today. Allie was following a Instagram page, or maybe this was like served to her on her Instagram. A exotic pet store in New Jersey. The pet store owner, I think, is friends with the woman who bred the rats that were in Terrifier 3. So they had the rats in the store, but they also were selling the offspring. So you could get the lineage of Terrifier 3 rats. You know, it's fucking incredible.

SPEAKER_00 15:10

That's fandom right there. If you go looking for that, you're a fan. That's great.

SPEAKER_05 15:14

Listen, I'd be down to have a little art the rat.

SPEAKER_02 15:17

I feel like you gotta get a little art the clown costume that you can put on him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:23

Hear me out. What if imagine this? Imagine I'm in the new space, and in my video background is an enclosure for a rat, but in that enclosure is a mock-up of the fucking tube and throat slit scene. You know what I mean? Like that'd be fucking sick to have in a background.

SPEAKER_02 15:41

That would be cool, actually.

SPEAKER_04 15:43

I don't know if Pito wouldn't entirely agree and love that.

SPEAKER_05 15:47

You just make it like a scarecrow. You know what I mean? Whatever like pet friendly supplies.

SPEAKER_04 15:51

But why would you want to scare the rat?

SPEAKER_05 15:53

You wouldn't. Those rats were fine in that movie. Okay. That's neither here nor there.

SPEAKER_04 15:57

I don't know if I approve of you having rats in your house to begin with, but you know what?

SPEAKER_05 16:00

Listen, I've already had to deal with it. I might as well have a fucking one that's related to a movie star.

SPEAKER_01 16:04

That's true. You might as well domesticate them.

SPEAKER_05 16:07

Yeah. Well, listen, it's now time to move in to our 2024 Slasher's Choice Awards. Now, folks, for a refresher on how this works, our Slasher's Choice Awards actually cover the movies that we reviewed this year. It's not just the movies that released this year, it's everything from our content lineup. We all made our pick, and then our listeners voted on the winners. And we're gonna start things off with the slash awards. So thinking about the best of, the best in show. And first, we're going to talk about our best survivor. In the category of best survivor, the nominees are Sienna Shaw, Terrifier 3, 2024, Margaret, the First Omen, 2024. Andy, Alien Romulus, 2024. Lee, Long Legs, 2024. RIP to all those spoilers. And the winner for the 2024 Best Survivor is Sienna Shaw, Terrifier 3, 2024.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

I mean, well deserved. Everyone on this list is well deserved, but you gotta give it up for Sienna.

SPEAKER_05 17:14

Yeah, she was basically Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 17:16

Seriously.

SPEAKER_05 17:17

Quite literally.

SPEAKER_00 17:18

We had some good survivors in 2024, both in our episodes and releases. Nothing wrong with that.

SPEAKER_05 17:24

Mm-hmm. We really did. Also, I just realized now, looking at this, even though the voting's been open forever, that we all picked someone from the new release.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

Yeah. Yep. We did. It just goes to show you how good the movies were this year.

SPEAKER_06 17:37

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 17:38

We've also had some pretty nasty people this year who had quite a few antagonists. But the best villain, the absolute best villain of this year. We've got a couple good nominees here. We've got The Angel from It's a Wonderful Knife, 2023. Art the Clown from Terrifier 3, 2024, Long Legs from Long Legs, 2024, and The Babysitter from The Babysitter 2017. So the winner for the 2024 best villain is, of course, Art the Clown Terrifier 3, 2024.

SPEAKER_05 18:08

I only picked the Angel because Art the Clown was already taken. And to be fair, Long Legs was already taken.

SPEAKER_02 18:15

Yep, there were some good ones.

SPEAKER_05 18:16

There were some good ones.

SPEAKER_04 18:18

And I figured that Art the Clown was gonna win because I mean he's now Santa, so of course. But I thought that maybe Long Legs stood a chance. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

I think Long Legs stood a chance.

SPEAKER_05 18:29

I think he would have stood a chance had he been in the movie more. Maybe if he looked a little less like botched work.

SPEAKER_04 18:35

No, I think people love the botched work.

SPEAKER_02 18:37

I like the look. I like the look. Maybe we need a little bit more, like you said.

SPEAKER_04 18:41

They needed more Nick Cage singing.

SPEAKER_02 18:43

Maybe.

SPEAKER_04 18:43

Well, we're talking about the best survivors, the best villains, but let's talk a little bit more about origin stories, right? Where it all starts. So, in the category of best origin story, the nominees are Hellhouse LLC Origins, The Carmichael Manor, 2023, A Quiet Place Day One, 2024, The First Omen, 2024, and Frankenstein, 1931. The winner for the 2024 Best Origin Story is the First Omen, 2024.

SPEAKER_05 19:13

Listen, shout out to this movie for making me give a fuck about movies I didn't give a fuck about previously. This movie was absolutely fucking incredible.

SPEAKER_02 19:22

It is actually true. I think that's a lot of people's sentiments, is like no one really was here for the omen to begin with, and then this came along and they're like maybe, and then it turned out to be fucking killer.

SPEAKER_04 19:33

Really, I feel like I have championed this movie since it came out, and I have not stopped thinking about it, talking about it. It is the visibility of possession that I feel seen by this win. I feel seen.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

It is a good one, and I feel like, man, the first omen can be plugged into a lot of these categories, but with every good villain, we have a really good fucking kill. And some of these nominations, I mean, this is just speaking to the iconic kills that we got this year. So let's just get to them. In the category of best kill, the nominees are Chainsaw Enema from Terrifier 3, 2024, the Yoga Kill in a Violent Nature, 2024, of course, the Tanning Bed scene in Final Destination 3, 2006, and man, that's a tough one to choose from, but the winner for the 2024 Best Kill is Chainsaw Enema Terrifier 3 2024.

SPEAKER_05 20:34

I want to first give some attribution here and some credit. I nominated the Chainsaw Enema. However, the term Chainsaw Enema comes from our patron Drew Drew Bacca in our Discord server. And he was the first one I saw coin the term. So shout out to him. This one's for you, bud.

SPEAKER_04 20:52

He's hilarious because when I saw Chainsaw Enema, I was like, well, that's just gonna win, just from the sheer laughter of it all. That's incredible. That's incredible. Yeah. I mean, I do I agree entirely? No, because I still stand by the tanning bed scene. But quite frankly, all three of these options are all great.

SPEAKER_05 21:14

The tanning bed scene is fantastic. It's iconic, but I think when you look at the scale of the fucking yoga kill and the chainsaw enema, I mean, listen, we've been there, we've seen it, we've done that, you know? We almost had another tanning bed in. I still know what you did last summer. However, that's true. Were it not for Terrifier 3, I think the Yoga Kill would have won this year because that was the only fucking thing that movie had going on.

SPEAKER_04 21:39

Also agree. Also agree.

SPEAKER_02 21:41

But it was a great kill. I I mean, damn.

SPEAKER_05 21:44

Yeah. Listen, as much as I can give that movie some high praise, I think we need to refocus here on some different franchises. Obviously, we've done a lot of sequels, we've done a lot of remakes, we've even done some prequels here. So let's talk about our best sequel or remake and the category of best sequel. Or remake. The nominees are Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, 2024, Alien Romulus, 2024, Smile 2, 2024, Young Frankenstein, 1974. And the winner for the 2024 Best Sequel or Rake is Alien Romulus 2024. This movie deserved its flowers. There's so much fucking good horror this year. I get that not everybody can win anything, but this movie is fucking great.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

It's well deserved for sure. And I nominated it, but Smile 2, I'm surprised, did not win. I'm really surprised.

SPEAKER_05 22:38

Because people are fucking torn about this movie.

SPEAKER_02 22:40

Yeah, I guess. But it is better than the first one.

SPEAKER_05 22:44

It is.

SPEAKER_04 22:45

It absolutely is. Okay. Well, I don't know about all that. I nominated it thinking that it would win. So I really was playing a strategy game, not because I actually agreed with it, because I would have picked Alien Romulus. And hey, I love Beetlejuice. We all know this immensely, actually. But Alien Romulus is something else. Although, Mac, you're very clever with that young Frankenstein.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

Yeah, I know. I saw him slip that in there.

SPEAKER_05 23:09

Yeah, best quality.

SPEAKER_02 23:10

Right? Yeah. But they're all great contenders. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice was a fantastic.

SPEAKER_05 23:15

It really was. But you know what? Even looking at this, I think where I landed with Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, because I would have said Smile 2 hadn't it not already been nominated before I cast my vote. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice had so much fucking room to fail miserably because of how iconic that movie is. And it did really well.

SPEAKER_00 23:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 23:35

It did a really nice job of not completely ruining our childhoods.

SPEAKER_00 23:39

Totally agreed. I think it did a lot of really good stuff. You guys made it hard to actually make some choices because I would go in to put my nominations in and you'd already pick some great ones. I think I just had to agree with you on one of them. I just couldn't find something better than the yoga kill. But we had a lot of good stuff this year to look at plot-wise. We had some good stories going on. So in the category of best plot, the nominees are The First Omen, 2024, The Substance, 2024, I Saw the TV Glow, 2024, and Maxine, 2024. But the winner for the 2024 Best Plot is the Substance.

SPEAKER_05 24:12

Because how could it not be? Yeah, I mean it was just such a great plot.

SPEAKER_02 24:18

But all four of these, again, movies we got this year, and it just goes to show you the caliber that we're working with. And I'm really hoping because it looks like we're getting some releases in 2025 that may shape up to hopefully get close, if not match, or maybe even surprise us this next year. But this is a solid year for horror.

SPEAKER_05 24:39

Now, as solid as this year was, it's time to get into the hack awards. So think of this as among the worst of the worst.

SPEAKER_04 24:49

In the category of worst antagonist, because of course, you know, we always think we're talking about the best, but really there are some really terrible villains, okay?

SPEAKER_05 24:58

Typically, this is like the shitty ones. Not like, ooh, you so bad.

SPEAKER_02 25:04

Yeah, not that you're so bad. No, like that you're really just shitty.

SPEAKER_05 25:09

This is the stalk of shame.

SPEAKER_02 25:11

The stalk of shame.

SPEAKER_04 25:12

The stalk of shame. I I love that. So we've got Andrew Tully, Hellhouse LLC3, Lake of Fire, 2019. We have the Supernatural Pool Entity from Night Swim, 2024. I actually can't believe I wrote this. We have Winnie the Pooh from Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey, 2023. And the Devil from Late Night with the Devil, 2024.

SPEAKER_05 25:37

You have such fucking nerve, but continue.

SPEAKER_04 25:39

I sure do. I have the audacity and the gall. But the winner for the 2024 worst antagonist, the stalk of shame, as we like to call it, is the supernatural pull entity from Night Swim 2024.

SPEAKER_05 25:52

Which is crazy because it started out so promising and then it got real fucking bad.

SPEAKER_00 25:57

Real bad real fast. It was terrible. This makes me so happy. I ripped that movie a new one. I was not on the episode for reasons, and I ripped that movie a new one, and the stars just aligned. It was just a bad time.

SPEAKER_04 26:10

The listeners had your back.

SPEAKER_02 26:12

We have worst antagonist, but we also want to go over some of the worst survivors that we got to see this year. So in the category of absolute worst survivor, the nominees are Steven from Jason Goes to Hell, The Final Friday, 1993, Lee Harker, Long Legs, 2024, Jack Delroy, Late Night with the Devil, 2024, and David Drayton, The Mist, 2007.

SPEAKER_05 26:41

Did we all define Worst Survivor differently?

SPEAKER_04 26:44

I have a speech prepared, so please, I will.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

The winner for the 2024 Worst Survivor is Steven, Jason Goes to Hell, the Final Friday, 1992.

SPEAKER_05 26:54

Okay, so my point here is that I think each of these are worst by like a different definition. Probably. And I thought the universally agreed upon definition is which survivor is definitely a little bitch who didn't deserve to make it to the end of the movie. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 27:10

And did Jack Delroy deserve to make it to the end of the movie? Is he not a little bitch?

SPEAKER_05 27:14

Yeah, no, you're not wrong. But also, Steven was also a little bitch. You know what I mean? Like it's like a a worse little bitch.

SPEAKER_04 27:20

I could and I should give a whole presentation as to why Jack Delroy is the worst survivor, but who I really want to hear from is Sean with Lee. Because that caused a reaction. David Draden from The Mist, I could maybe understand because damn, that ending was rough.

SPEAKER_06 27:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 27:39

And probably doesn't want to survive.

SPEAKER_05 27:42

I mean, we had some great survivors, so maybe just comparatively.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

Yeah, maybe.

SPEAKER_05 27:45

Maybe comparatively. Yeah. Okay, so when I say Jack, it's not that he's not a little bitch, but I guess Steven is I wouldn't say innocent, but he is supposed to be the hero and he's supposed to be the survivor. Whereas Jack, in a lot of ways, is his own fucking antagonist. So like I would think of him as the worst as an oh yeah, you did fucking sacrifice your wife. You're a little piece of shit, so you're worse in like a nefarious way. I see. Whereas Steven was just like, how the fuck did you stumble your way to the end of this movie when Jason should have crushed your fucking skull?

SPEAKER_04 28:18

But I don't even know if we got a lot of those kinds of survivors this year. I think we got a lot more of Jack Delroys this year.

SPEAKER_05 28:26

Yeah. Jack Delroys are just very pervasive in society, so.

SPEAKER_04 28:29

Everyone knows a Jack, unfortunately. This is also a Jason movie that I did not see. There's that. Oh, what the fuck? You haven't seen this movie? Oh, no, I don't think so. Sorry. Guys, the cover. Does it look pretty?

SPEAKER_05 28:43

This movie is worth watching for the last second alone.

SPEAKER_02 28:46

That's true.

SPEAKER_05 28:47

Alright. Well, worst survivor aside, let's go in to the worst, the most underwhelming kill. In the category of worst kill, the nominees are. Binks and I agreed on this one. The big murder scene at the bar, if you can call it that, I guess. Hellhouse LLC3, Lake of Fire, 2019. Roger Evans, It's a Wonderful Knife, 2023. Julius, Decapitation Via Knockout. Friday the 13th, Part 8. Jason Takes Manhattan, 1989. And the winner for the 2024 Worst Kill is the big murder scene at the bar, if you can call it that, I guess. Hellhouse LLC3, Lake of Fire, affectionately known as Lake of Bullshit, 2019.

SPEAKER_02 29:34

It was a terrible little montage.

SPEAKER_05 29:37

Yeah. I think the worst death in that whole thing was my fucking dignity having to watch that movie.

SPEAKER_04 29:45

My time. My dignity and my time.

SPEAKER_05 29:47

There was someone twirling in that scene.

SPEAKER_04 29:50

Yeah. They thought they did something real cool. They did not. But hey, shout out to the Jason movie that I did see. Cause that Julius one, yeah, that that was a that was a ridiculous one.

SPEAKER_02 30:00

It was fun.

SPEAKER_04 30:01

Oh, yeah. It was iconically terrible.

unknown 30:05

No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_05 30:07

A little Mortal Kombat, a little uppercut, a little backpack A, forward, forward, B.

SPEAKER_00 30:11

When boxers threatened the other boxer with taking their head off, this is what they mean. Is that movie? Except this movie took it a little too literally. Now it is one of several entrances into franchises that we viewed this year. So in the category of least improved franchise, the nominees are Friday the 13th, Final Friday, Jason Goes to Hell, 1993, Hellhouse LLC3, Lake of Fire, 2019, and Maxine from 2024. But the winner for the 2024 Least Improved Franchise is Friday the 13th, Final Friday, Jason Goes to Hell, 1993.

SPEAKER_04 30:44

I haven't even seen that movie, and I can tell you I'm not shocked.

unknown 30:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 30:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 30:48

It just wasn't good.

SPEAKER_02 30:49

True. True. But Hell House was a gotta be a major contender.

SPEAKER_05 30:53

Hell House would have been my pick had you not already picked it. And if Mac had picked something for this category, I would have abstained and just gone with the three. But I felt like leaving it as two nominees would have been two fifty-fifty, you know?

SPEAKER_04 31:06

Yeah, so I went in there and I plugged in my hot take that I knew was not gonna win whatsoever. But I thought, why not? Let me be spicy.

SPEAKER_00 31:15

I'll be honest, I couldn't decide. This is the issue. I couldn't decide between Jason Goes to Hell and Halloween. I really I was torn for least improved in a franchise.

SPEAKER_04 31:25

You should have done Halloween just to get her upset.

SPEAKER_00 31:27

I just abstained instead of having to choose between them.

SPEAKER_05 31:30

You chose right once again. Oh boy.

SPEAKER_04 31:32

Well, you mentioned that I should watch the last second of Jason Goes to Hell. So let's talk about the next award, which is the most disappointing ending, because according to you, it's not a disappointing ending, I suppose, of the last second, but in this case, in this category, we definitely have some. So in the category of most disappointing ending, the nominees are In a Violent Nature, 2024, Night Swim, 2024, The Substance, 2024, and Stop Motion, 2023. And the winner for the 2024 most disappointing ending is In a Violent Nature. And here's the thing is it the most disappointing ending or really just the whole fucking movie, you know?

SPEAKER_05 32:14

Exactly. Oof. And really, the movie is ending as soon as it begins.

SPEAKER_02 32:18

Hold on, it wasn't that bad. It was good. Let's not totally trash in a violent nature.

SPEAKER_05 32:27

You win some, you lose some. That movie was a total loss.

SPEAKER_02 32:29

No way.

SPEAKER_00 32:30

Oh. Oh my gosh. It was the best Jason movie we watched this year.

SPEAKER_02 32:33

That actually might be a fact.

SPEAKER_04 32:35

You know, wait a minute. Let me cook on that because that might actually be true. But hold on. And that's concerning.

SPEAKER_05 32:42

Hold on. Jason kicking a boombox in Times Square is better than this fucking guy playing with a fake card in the woods. Never mind.

SPEAKER_04 32:48

I'm back. Everything's fine.

SPEAKER_02 32:50

I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 32:51

I'm back. You almost had me. You almost had me.

SPEAKER_05 32:54

Count on me to bring you back around.

SPEAKER_02 32:56

I feel like there's always one that I die on the hill for. Every year. Yeah. Every year.

SPEAKER_05 33:01

Skin of a rink last year is this year's skin of a rink.

SPEAKER_02 33:05

Exactly. We'll see what 2025 has in store.

SPEAKER_05 33:08

But God, I hope it's not Wolfman.

SPEAKER_02 33:10

You never know. But you know, with every disappointing ending, there is some form of rebirth, and that could be a sequel. It could be a remake. We're here to talk about the worst of them all. And in the category of worst sequel or remake, the nominees are Hellhouse LLC3, Lake of Fire, 2019, Speak No Evil, 2024, Strangers Chapter 1, 2024, and Jason Goes to Hell, the Final Friday, 1993. And the winner for the 2024 worst sequel or remake is again Jason Goes to Hell the Final Friday. Sounds like it should have been the final Friday.

SPEAKER_05 33:54

Yeah. I mean, they should have let the final chapter be the Final Friday, but Hellhouse LLC 3, Lake of Fire, I'd argue, is worse for me than Final Friday.

SPEAKER_03 34:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:06

People really dislike Final Friday.

SPEAKER_05 34:08

They do. And I get it because it's like a moral opposition, but for some reason, Lake of Fire just like fucking squee screams inept.

SPEAKER_06 34:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 34:17

I feel really passionately about how bad Lake of Fire is that I would almost argue or challenge our listeners that how many of you voted on this and haven't seen Lake of Fire to know. You know what I mean? Because you might be thinking, oh, but Hellhouse LLC, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

That's a good point.

SPEAKER_04 34:35

You know what I'm saying? Like, no, guys, this it gets so bad, it gets real fucking bad.

SPEAKER_05 34:40

I guarantee if we pull a clip of the big murder scene at the bar versus any of the Final Friday kills, everybody would know exactly which one was worse.

SPEAKER_00 34:50

I I will give you this, and I think the only reason I nominated it was because Hellhouse had already been chosen, if I remember correctly.

SPEAKER_02 34:56

It sounds like we're all unanimous in a lot of these categories. We just wanted to make sure we nominated enough choices.

SPEAKER_05 35:02

Yeah, that's great. We get some runner-ups.

SPEAKER_04 35:05

But I will say, look, we've got two new releases in this mix here. And Strangers Chapter 1, I mean, that was pretty rough, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 35:13

It is actually interesting that in a lot of the best and worst categories, we have 2024 movies.

SPEAKER_05 35:20

Yeah, we actually have 2024 movies in our next category, which we'll see how this one goes, Sean. In the category of worst plot, the nominees are Get them a ring, 2020. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. In the category of worst plot, the nominees are In a Violent Nature, 2024. Night Swim 2024. Friday the 13th, part 8. Jason takes Manhattan, 1989. Halloween, The Curse of Michael Myers, 1995. And the winner for the 2024 worst plot is Night Swim 2024. Get wet, get dead.

SPEAKER_02 36:02

Thank you. Because that shit's just sucked.

SPEAKER_04 36:05

Look, in solidarity, I think we can also all agree on this one as well, right? Because yes. However, I know that I nominated a Jason movie. I feel like this whole episode is me like shitting on this franchise. But that's what I'm kind of known for. But I do want to remind everyone that this movie says Jason takes Manhattan, and I sorry to break it to you. He doesn't take Manhattan for very long. It's like 10 minutes at best.

SPEAKER_05 36:31

He takes a trip adjacent to Manhattan.

SPEAKER_02 36:33

Don't take it so literally. He's not taking Manhattan. He's just taking a takes Manhattan in as he walks. Taking a stroll through Manhattan, you know, briefly.

SPEAKER_00 36:43

He took Manhattan just as much as he did Dallas. Oh man. Oh goodness. I'm so happy that that movie showed up as a worst for something because that movie angered me. Night Swim, you just you pissed me off. That's all it was. But we've talked about a lot of worsts. What was the worst movie of this year? Well, the nominees are In a Violent Nature 2024. Cube 1997. Lover's Lane 2000. And Hellhouse LLC Origins, The Carmichael Manner, 2023. The winner for the 2024 worst movie of the year is Lover's Lane from 2000.

SPEAKER_04 37:18

Cube vindicated by Dashboard Confessional.

SPEAKER_05 37:21

I I have a prediction as to why this is. I think it's because A, Lover's Lane is forgettable. I think not a lot of people have seen it. And I think by the rest of these Cube, Sean, we know that we have super fans of Cube out there. In a violent nature, I think it's pretty. I fucking think it was awful, but I think it's pretty and it has some like standout moments. Hellhouse LC Origins of Carmichael Manor is objectively like a good movie. It's fun. So I feel like people just pick this as like a throwaway. Like Lover's Lane, that sounds bad.

SPEAKER_02 37:52

Yeah, Origins was better than Lake of Fire.

SPEAKER_04 37:55

Okay. But that bar and that comparison is not even fair. For sure, for sure. There's that. We do have some diehard Origins fans, and like even the Rotten Tomato score on this is very deceiving. I will say that. But here's the thing about Lover's Lane, okay? I picked it because if you want to run the tape back, I literally had to like change the playback speed on this movie because I couldn't stand it. And I've only done that once. Right. I I put it on two speed.

SPEAKER_02 38:25

Two speed. Because I couldn't take it anymore.

SPEAKER_04 38:28

Not even Anna Ferris could save this movie.

SPEAKER_02 38:31

That's crazy. See, I don't know about that, but I am happy that there's enough people that enjoyed In a Violent Nature just a little bit more. You know, that warms my heart. Cube, no hope for you all. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_05 38:43

Yeah. Listen, we've talked about the best in show, we've talked about the worst in show, but there's a lot more to our reviews over at Hackerslash, and we have a few more awards to hand out.

SPEAKER_04 38:52

This one is a very popular one, a famous one on our show. And so sometimes, you know, in horror, of course, there is gonna be some nudity. But is there always a necessary time to show the nip? You know, like is it always necessary to give us that kind of nudity? I don't know. So in this category, we're gonna be talking about the nominees for most unnecessary nudity in our world. We call it didn't need to see the nip. So our nominees are specifically the titty getting hacked up by Monstro LSU The Substance 2024, like as a whole, right? Not just not specifically the titty, but just really the whole monster. And then Leprechaun in disguise, Leprechaun 3, 1995. The winner for 2024's most unnecessary nudity is Leprechaun in disguise, Leprechaun 3, 1995.

SPEAKER_05 39:43

Because at least the monstro had a purpose. That's true. That's fair.

SPEAKER_00 39:48

That is true. I think what happened though is that you all split the vote between two similar sounding options. So Leprechaun had to win.

SPEAKER_02 39:56

We should have colluded. It was so worth it. We didn't get a lot of nasty nip this year. We got a handful of it, but not a lot of it, you know?

SPEAKER_06 40:08

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

Just a handful. Yes. We definitely got some nip. We also got some really awful wigs. And in the category of what we call the wiggiest wig, the nominees are The Bird Bitch from Cuckoo 2024. Henry Waters, It's a Wonderful Knife, 2023. You know the one, Silent Hill, 2006. And the winner for 2024's Wiggiest Wig is You Know the One, Silent Hill 2006, and I don't know if I know the one, to be honest with you, so I'm hoping you can elaborate a little bit on this.

SPEAKER_04 40:48

Do we know the one?

SPEAKER_01 40:49

The one on Wiggy Lane?

SPEAKER_04 40:51

This is exactly what this tells me.

SPEAKER_03 40:52

Listeners thought everyone's wig in Silent Hill was trash. That was the experiment that I wanted to provide. I wanted to provide some kind of curiosity. Like, do they agree?

SPEAKER_04 41:03

Do they think that everyone's wig was just wrecked in that movie? And they said yes. Am I shocked? Absolutely, because the Bird Bitch and Henry Waters were real fucking bad.

SPEAKER_03 41:15

Okay. So if a whole movies wig department is worse than those, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 41:20

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 41:21

That's wild.

SPEAKER_05 41:22

I mean, it is an accomplishment for sure.

SPEAKER_04 41:25

It is an accomplishment for sure. And I still it's almost I'd have to do a little bit more research, but wouldn't it be even crazier if there weren't that many wigs in Silent Hill?

SPEAKER_05 41:34

Then that's just even worse. Well, I can't wait for you to do that research and get back to us. In the meantime, though, let's move on to Biggest Surprise. The movie that maybe we didn't expect much. Maybe we expected too much. And we're proven wrong the other way. In the category of biggest surprise, the nominees are Salem's Lot, 2024. Smile 2, 2024. Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey 2, 2024. When Evil Lurks, 2023. And the winner for 2024's biggest surprise is Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey 2 2024. Motherfuckers!

SPEAKER_02 42:11

Ah, you know it was better than the original. Better than the original.

SPEAKER_04 42:15

I had to be honest and I had to nominate it because here's the thing. We all know I've become a little popular when it comes to this franchise. And I gotta be real, I left that theater with one of my closest friends, and I was like, wait a minute, was that movie actually good? And that's saying something.

SPEAKER_05 42:32

Yeah. I remember your voice note that night that you saw it. And I think we actually were voice noting each other. Because holy shit, to have a movie as fucking silly goose as Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey, and then to do what they did, to pivot so effectively in a different direction and say, Oh, that crazy thing you watched, that's crazy. That was a fictional movie that takes place in the world of our movie. What the fuck?

SPEAKER_02 42:59

Great. That's an amazing way to do it.

SPEAKER_05 43:02

The Pooniverse is nigh.

SPEAKER_02 43:04

The Puneverse is strong. Man, it is crazy, but there are some good ones in here. I I'll give it up for Ruinie the Pooh, Blood and Honey 2, but Salem's Lot could have easily been bad, so it was surprising that they can take a story that's been adapted into multi-hour long adaptations and bring it into like a feature film length and still give us a good time. And uh gotta be honest, Smile 2. I think most of us went into that thinking might be kind of generic based off of the first one, right? Like, what can you continue to do with this story? And they really set the bar.

SPEAKER_05 43:38

They could just do better because they did. That's right. Smile 2 was the only smile movie that should have been made.

SPEAKER_00 43:43

I'm with you. Oh wow, these are some serious words here. It sounds like it brought you a lot of pleasure. Now, some movies you'll really enjoy and you kind of feel a little bit guilty about it. So, in the category of guilty pleasure, the nominees are Wendy the Pooh, Blood and Honey, 2023, Halloween, The Curse of Michael. Myers 1995, Paranormal Activity 2007, and It's a Wonderful Knife 2023. But the winner of 2024's guilty pleasure is Halloween, The Curse of Michael Myers, 1995. I think I'm judging. What do you mean?

SPEAKER_02 44:14

It's a great guilty pleasure movie. It's a great movie that you get to get some weird feels. It's a little bit different. You know what I mean? It's a little kooky, but it's still kind of a good time.

SPEAKER_05 44:23

I agree with this take because it's better than I remembered it being. And I have newfound appreciation for it this year. But I still can admit I'm a little guilty about Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey, the first one.

SPEAKER_02 44:36

The OG.

SPEAKER_05 44:37

That shit really got me in the feelings.

SPEAKER_04 44:38

So here's my curiosity though, because like, is Halloween the Curse of Michael Myers that bad of a movie that it'd be considered a guilty pleasure? Because like paranormal activity, as an example, I feel like that as time has gone by, people think paranormal activity is like a joke. Why? I know, especially found especially found footage.

SPEAKER_02 44:56

Nah.

SPEAKER_05 44:57

Let me tell you why I feel guilty having pleasure from Halloween the curse of Michael Myers. No. I feel guilty because I do not like what this production did to Danielle Harris and why she did not return. So ethically I'm against it. I also do not like what is revealed in the producer's cut about what happens to Jamie and the origins of a baby in that movie. So I'll leave it there because Binx hasn't fucking seen it yet. But I feel guilty liking that movie because of that.

SPEAKER_02 45:29

I mean, I know it counts. It won and I put it in there.

SPEAKER_04 45:32

That's fair. Winning the Pooh, Blood and Honey is definitely like if I had to go back and change my nomination, it definitely would be the that one. Just because of like how shocked I'm about that sequel, still to this day. But what I'm not shocked about is this next category because we have had some iconic moms in horror this year, I would say, in general, from the ones that we've reviewed, some notable ones. So in the category of best mom, the nominees are credited as the woman with kids at home, The Mist, 2007, Ruth Longlegs, 2024. What the fuck? And Rose, Silent Hill, 2006. The winner in our 2024 Mom of the Year is Ruth Longlegs 2024. Why? At this moment, I will now give my dissertation.

SPEAKER_02 46:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 46:19

You know, Ruth is a complicated woman. Oh my god. Okay. She's a complicated woman.

SPEAKER_02 46:23

Are you defending this lady?

SPEAKER_04 46:25

Well, I nominated her, so I'm not defending, but here's what I will say that she deserves to be in this category because sometimes you do real terrible things for your loved ones. And I'm not saying that it's ethically correct, but did what she had to for her little girl in her.

SPEAKER_05 46:44

She really just said she is the Anakin Skywalker of long legs.

SPEAKER_04 46:48

What the fuck? That's actually a great comparison. She is.

SPEAKER_05 46:51

Why do you sound surprised that I can make a good comparison?

SPEAKER_04 46:54

And but here's what I am also surprised about. This is another moment where I said, I feel this way, but I'm gonna get roasted or get a someone's gonna get mad at me for nominating this. I never thought that people would get in on the joke and actually vote and agree with me though. So that's kind of that's fun.

SPEAKER_02 47:11

That's wild.

SPEAKER_04 47:12

That's fun. I feel though, that if I were to go back in time as well, like Sean, you nominating the woman with kids at home, the miss, like that's she went out there knowing that she was probably gonna die just to go find her kids, and she found them and survived. And the look on her face when she's on that truck looking at our boy.

SPEAKER_01 47:35

Come on. It's a toughie.

SPEAKER_00 47:37

Well, did she know what was to happen in her future, though? Gosh, not the character, the actress's care characters later on. Oh, so I'm just thinking of The Walking Dead.

SPEAKER_02 47:47

Well, with every great mom, there's a trash dad. And in the category of worst dad, the nominees are Jon Strode from Halloween, The Curse of Michael Myers, 1995, The Devil, The First Omen, 2024, John Coleman from Orphan, 2009, Ernest Miller from Maxine, 2024, and the winner of our 2024 Trash Dad of the Year is John Strode, Halloween, The Curse of Michael Myers, 1995.

SPEAKER_04 48:24

Things why are you surprised? I don't know, because I know I haven't seen this, but there's no way.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

Oh, he's bad.

SPEAKER_04 48:29

Yeah. John Coleman, are we forgetting that this man, like, was getting a little inappropriate with his orphans or rather, his his adopted daughter?

SPEAKER_05 48:40

Yeah, I promise you this guy's worse.

SPEAKER_02 48:42

This guy is pretty. I mean, I I get what you're saying. I'm with you.

SPEAKER_05 48:46

And say what you will about the devil, but the devil was trying to provide for Damien, and John Strode is just an asshole. Although, R.I.P. to the actor who plays him, Bradford English, because he actually just passed away this year, October 25th, 2024, in Pasadena, California. This isn't about you, Bradford, but holy shit, Jon Strode was hateable.

SPEAKER_04 49:06

I mean, John Coleman is definitely hateable, but they're both heavy kintore. I do love though that you're trying to make us like trying to defend the devil from the first omen by saying that he wasn't an absentee follower.

SPEAKER_05 49:18

Yeah, devil, great dad for Damien, for sure. Honestly, got like a whole nanny situation for him, got him some good placement. The devil was trying to come through.

SPEAKER_00 49:29

Well, I'm gonna go out there and say Ernest Miller from Maxine wasn't necessarily the worst compared to that, but was pretty trash.

SPEAKER_02 49:35

That is true. And pretty bad.

SPEAKER_00 49:36

It was kind of like an inverted play on Pink Pony Club, you know, in a way, which was hot this year.

SPEAKER_05 49:41

Yes, although shout out to Ernest Miller because I was just working on my annual theme for next year personally, and I would not accept the life I do not deserve is definitely chief among those things. Yeah. Nice.

SPEAKER_04 49:53

And that's why he wa he wasn't picked the worst dad, right? Because ultimately he did have a little bit of wisdom. Not no.

unknown 49:58

Right.

SPEAKER_05 49:59

But obviously, we've dished out some hacks this year. And sometimes we go a little hard and we think, mmm, should we take it back? Let's hear it. Was there a movie this year that any of you would like to retract the hack from? And I'll say this, I think I actually stand pretty solid this year for the first time in a long time. Usually I have one that clearly stands out as a oh yeah, this one may grow on me after a while. I think the closest I can get is the Omen remake. Because I did hack that.

SPEAKER_02 50:29

Interesting.

SPEAKER_05 50:30

But like I still feel pretty confident about it for now. And I don't think I cared enough to rewatch it anytime soon. But you know what? If it gets me on a day where I'm feeling just right, it might surprise me.

SPEAKER_00 50:40

I don't want to take back any hacks. In fact, I think I need to give out more hacks. Or at least I should have this year.

SPEAKER_05 50:46

That's not how this works, Mac. You just listen to your heart, and it's okay to have a year where you give a lot of slashes, that's fine. There's no quota here. You don't get a bonus for how many hacks you give. If these cops do enough speeding tickets, no penalties here.

SPEAKER_04 50:59

No out-of-pocket maximums. I was thinking about this, and I feel like I have hacked a lot more movies than I did the previous year. Definitely get feeling more confident.

SPEAKER_02 51:07

Harsh this year.

SPEAKER_04 51:08

I was harsh this year, without a doubt. Yeah. I will say that at a quick glance. I almost thought to retract my hack for Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey. For the sheer fact that that episode alone really just it did something for this show and for me. So, you know, I thought about it, but I still am gonna stand by the hack. Although I feel like I've grown to love the movie a little bit more and appreciative of it, I still am gonna keep to my hack.

SPEAKER_02 51:36

All right. Well, we're seeing a lot of almost growth here from all of you. You know, we're we're almost poking through, maybe, maybe taking back one of those hacks, but I'll be the one to do it. Don't worry. I think this year I actually think as I reflect on all the movies we watched, all the hacks that I that I hacked, which wasn't a lot. I feel it was a slashy year for me, but Cuckoo, I think, maybe I was a little harsh on. So I think now that I I think back on it, I've watched it again, I think that it actually I think it deserves a slash.

SPEAKER_04 52:08

I watched I listened to the episode for that one, actually, because I I wasn't able to get um to s to be on the episode with you all, and you were pretty harsh on it. So that's uh I was harsh.

SPEAKER_00 52:19

Now let's do the opposite. Have there been any slashes that you could go back and alter? Now I'll start us off here and just say that maybe I was a little bit too kind to Uncle Sam.

SPEAKER_01 52:28

Oh maybe.

SPEAKER_00 52:30

If I had to pick one, if I had to.

SPEAKER_02 52:32

It was so fun. What do you mean?

SPEAKER_05 52:36

It was deep.

SPEAKER_02 52:36

That's crazy.

SPEAKER_05 52:37

It was deeper than it had any right to be. It was like serious about some shit, even though it was silly about some shit too.

SPEAKER_00 52:43

Yeah. That's true. I said that's what I'm saying. If I had to pick one, if you force me, I could say maybe I was a little bit too nice.

SPEAKER_02 52:50

I will say though, this is one that I feel like I'm not taking back any slashes. I feel like I just had a good time this year. I think, yeah, there were movies that maybe aren't the best, right? But I think they were fun. And I think that's the thing. We had some bad movies that were also just kind of fun to watch, and that's okay too.

SPEAKER_05 53:08

I think Sean and I are living in 2024, the year of no regrets.

SPEAKER_04 53:13

I love that for you both. I really do. My pick for this one is gonna be so interesting because it was an episode that really aligns with my brand, and that's Tarot 2024. I feel like in hindsight, I was riding a high, if we can call it that, where I appreciated the kills a lot, I appreciated the aesthetic and really the representation of astrology to some extent, but it was inaccurate to me and to what I know for a vast majority of it. That after a while I'm like, yeah, I don't think that movie was actually that great as a whole. So that would definitely have to be my opinion.

SPEAKER_05 53:50

Yeah, so it was bad representation, is what you're saying. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 53:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 53:53

But shout out to that being the episode where you did our tarot readings, and you know, fuck you for being so accurate.

SPEAKER_04 53:59

Yes, that listen to me, listener. That's okay.

SPEAKER_05 54:03

If you re-listen to my segment in particular, holy fuck, I was just thinking about it like two days ago.

SPEAKER_04 54:10

I feel, and I'm not trying to bait here, but hear me out. It's like if you were gonna upgrade to be a patron, okay, it's to listen to that B side, at the very least, because my goodness is scary for me.

SPEAKER_02 54:23

I think it was good.

SPEAKER_05 54:24

Binx, I think when I move, I think you need to come over and I think we need to film a tarot card reading.

SPEAKER_04 54:29

Oh, I'm down I'm terrified. We're gonna have to sage a little bit just because I don't know what kind of spirits are gonna get captured in the screen.

SPEAKER_02 54:35

Evoke though.

SPEAKER_04 54:36

Yeah, we can do that. Evoke, meanwhile, Sean.

SPEAKER_02 54:40

Do it. Yeah, do it. Well, hey, listen, welcome to the hack side of tarot, because you know, that is what I feared Smile 2 was gonna be. Just a generic kind of run-of-the-mill horror movie, and um, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 54:55

Well, it was I thought tarot was fun, but I think it's time for us to swing on through to the real deal slashers choice awards, and that's going to be first up for our best episode of the year. Now, our patrons nominated several episodes that they felt best represented our show this year. And folks, holy shit, we had a lot of nominations, and it was a tight race, but the top three episodes were literally our first episode of 2024, which was episode 312, Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey, 2023.

SPEAKER_01 55:33

I'm so bad I wasn't on that episode.

SPEAKER_05 55:35

Episode 339, Long Legs, 2024. And 356, Terrifier 3, 2024. Holy shit, great episodes all around.

SPEAKER_02 55:48

All of them.

SPEAKER_05 55:48

And the Patron's Choice Award for best episode of the year is episode 312, Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey, 2023. Because the quote, but you do think he's fuckable, is really just Oh my god. Took it to another level. At no point did Binks ever say Winnie the Pooh was fuckable. At no point. But we have now created the illusion that she did.

SPEAKER_04 56:13

And here we go. A viral sensation. I don't even know why I feel like I have to give a thank you speech right now because this is crazy. But I appreciate you guys, and I don't regret it one bit. I say some ridiculous things, and that was a very fun episode. But this is what happens when you just have me riffing just out of nowhere at the beginning of the year. Who knows? Our first episode of the year is a very good one, friends. A real good one. And I can promise you I'll probably say something outlandish, 99.9% positive I cast.

SPEAKER_05 56:43

I really don't hope you say Nasuratu is fuckable.

SPEAKER_02 56:46

Oh my gosh. Well, man, there have been so many good episodes, but it's only because there have been so many great movies to watch, and we covered a bunch of fresh new release movies this year in 2024. So many good ones to choose from this year. It's been a strong year for horror, and our patrons voted for the ones they enjoyed the most. And the top three new releases were The Substance 2024, Terrifier 3 2024, and it was really a tie between Long Legs 2024 and Late Night with the Devil 2024. So that's a tough one. But the winner ultimately of the Patron's Choice Award for the 2024 best new release is the Substance 2024, and rightfully so. I mean, that's a great pick.

SPEAKER_05 57:42

I do wonder if this suffers from recency bias, though. Because like the first omen was fucking great.

SPEAKER_02 57:48

The first omen was absolutely fantastic. I actually for the first omen is in my top for the year for sure. Binx has seen it, I haven't seen it yet, but I feel like there's a lot of categories in this entire episode that we're covering for the year, and we haven't seen Nosferatu yet. We just couldn't get it in, and I feel like that would take a sweep.

SPEAKER_05 58:09

Yeah, to be clear, we're recording this now on Wednesday, December 18th, and Nosferatu is gonna come out around Christmas, and that is gonna be our first episode of 2025. So let's all cool our jets here because it's fucking coming.

SPEAKER_02 58:23

Yeah, it's just a it's tough.

SPEAKER_04 58:25

I'll keep tight-lipped, but I will say, despite that though, because I I would agree, there's even some new releases that we didn't get to in general that have happened throughout the year, but it is interesting that long legs didn't win considering how well that episode performed. But I think it's like we were saying, it was a little bit dicey ultimately in terms of people's opinion on it. And the substance, not only is it recency bias, potentially, but I think had much more of an overwhelming positive response than negative in comparison to long legs.

SPEAKER_05 58:57

I think there's also, I mean, the substance is one that is polished and packaged in such a way that I think it's very palatable for people because I had employees at my job who don't watch horror movies, who don't fuck with horror movies, are like, did you see the substance? And it's like all anybody could talk about for like two weeks.

SPEAKER_02 59:15

Yeah, everyone was talking about it.

SPEAKER_04 59:17

All right, well, great new releases. We have also had some pretty not so great new releases. So the top nominations for worst new releases were The Strangers, Chapter 1, 2024, Tarot, 2024, and Night Swim, 2024. And the winner of the Patrons Choice Award for the 2024 worst new release is Night Swim 2024.

SPEAKER_05 59:40

Yeah, that's fair.

SPEAKER_02 59:41

Drain That Pool.

SPEAKER_05 59:42

Drain. Listen, I don't think there's any more time to be wasted on Night Swim, but there were several movies that came out this year that we didn't actually get to for the show, and hopefully we can squeeze in next year or in the years to come. Let's move on to our honorable mentions, the horror movies that we didn't get to see, but maybe it stood out for you.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:00

Well, I will say there's a couple that come to mind, and the first one I want to mention is Oddity. Oddity is a movie that I think we definitely need to get in the lineup. I think everyone should watch it. It's a creepy, really good, ghosty story. I think it's just fantastic. It's macabre. That's a vibe. The other one I think comes out of left field, destroy all neighbors. It is a really B movie campy, fucking weird trip of a movie. But if you're in the mood for something balls to the wall and bonkers, definitely watch this movie. It's on shudder, I believe, and it it gives you all the feels of like the shitty 80s B movie campy horror movies. It's got a lot of gore, it's over the top, the plot is absolutely ridiculous. I think it's worth a watch, and it was kind of fun.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:53

Nice. I saw Oddity and I agree with you, Sean. It's an underrated one that I think for sure is worth it. I'm gonna check out Destroy All Neighbors for sure. I haven't heard of that one. So I've talked throughout the year about what would be my top horror film of the year, like what's gonna take that number one spot. I thought it was First Omen, then I thought it was Long Legs, thought it was gonna be I Saw the TV glow, because that one I kind of didn't really put as a horror entirely in comparison because most people don't even realize it's a horror until we obviously reviewed it. But friends, the number one horror movie for me this year, if we don't count Nosferatu, because I cannot wait for us to view that. I got very lucky I saw an early screening of the movie, and I can't wait for us to dive into it. But my favorite horror movie of the year is Strange Darling. This one flew under the radar. It has Kyle Gallner in it. We all know on this show how much I love him. But wow, it was so surprising, threw me in for a fucking loop. Incredible, both on a technical level, on a storytelling level. It's so, so good. So I really hope that we get to review it and chat about it, but at the very least, recommend it to everybody because it's incredible, very, very good.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:09

Yeah, that was one that I planned to see and didn't get around to. Maybe I'll check it out soon. But one that I just went to the theater to see, and I hadn't been planning on it originally, but Allie really wanted to see it was Heretic. And oh man, I love Hugh Grant already. Big, big Hugh Grant fan. That movie was fucking awesome. And it gets a little weird in some places, sure. And I think I want to go back and sit with the ending a little bit more, but that was one that the entire way through I was feeling something, and it felt long but also short at the same time. It had characters that were so charming, so compelling. And you know what? It's a movie full of I mean, they got a point. I agree.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:52

It was also very entertaining. Hmm. Nice.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:55

I didn't do a lot of horror movie watching outside of the podcast lineup, I'll tell you. The closest I came was a lot of real-life, like true crime docuseries that were very entertaining to me. That just seems like real life horror. And then I finally watched The Walking Dead, The Ones Who Live, which is the wrap-up for Rick Grimes. To me, this was something where I was really wary about watching it. A couple of spin-offs, not really into it, but I did it, and I'm happy I did. And I think if you're a person who made it through The Walking Dead and you're like, I just want to know kind of what happened in this universe, at least to these characters, excellent choice to get through it.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:34

Yeah, that's true. It's good closure, short and sweet. Yes, agreed.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:38

Well, obviously, there's been a lot of tremendous stuff for us this year in terms of the podcast and in terms of horror, but let's take a little bit of human time here. What is a positive personal thing that's happened to you this year?

SPEAKER_04 1:03:50

So for me, I feel like it's been definitely a wild ride of a year, but more recently I got the incredible opportunity to be a producer in first AD for my friend's short film. Two of my friends, their brother and sister, they co-wrote a short film in dedication to their mom and the house that they grew up in, and it was a beautiful experience, and I felt very honored to be a part of it. I've never been a producer or been on a film set in that capacity before, but it was just really heartwarming and meant a lot to me that they reached out to me and thought that I could do something like this to the point where I was on set and most of the crew assumed that I had been a producer before and been a first AD for some time, that it wasn't my first rodeo. We kind of kept it secret until the very end and they were shocked. So it was just really fun. It reminded me of my good old days when I was doing event management for universities and stuff and planning music festivals and things. So it was really nice to kind of be back in that team setting and be on a film set. And, you know, we talk so much about movies. I watched so many movies, but to then be a part of making one, especially one that meant so much to people that are important to me, was really nice and very, very grateful for that.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:06

That's awesome. And what were we just joking about? My biggest accomplishment this year is actually getting through reading all of it. Yes. That's what I really feel like. It's a feat, man. I've been reading it for like months. Granted, don't give myself a lot of time, but I'm at the tail end of it, and I'm gonna do it. And I think that's the accomplishment this year. Because, man, this year has been rough. This has been kind of a rough year. Not in a not in like a personal negative way, like I had a lot of hardships, but it's just been kind of a rough year, you know? Like, just felt like I grinded a lot at work. You know what I mean? It's just been a grind, it's just been there's a lot of shit going on in the world that's not that great, right? You know, and I just yeah, I didn't find myself doing anything that exciting, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:50

It's been a year, there's been a lot that's happened for me personally. It's a lot of stressful stuff, I'd say, going on this year. I started the year off with the good medical scare, if you will, and so it's Been kind of the theme for this year, and it led to me taking a medical leave recently. So the good that came of that was I had the time to see my family, which was nice. You know, getting to see them for holidays is important. And so that was a really positive change. I also this year discovered Stardew Valley and started playing that for the first time back in probably January, February, and switched platforms, unfortunately. And so I had to start over. And I spent a good several months not doing so and finally did and said, you know what? Hey, it's a good stress relief, so so why not? So that that's a positive, I guess, finding a good stress relief game. But yeah, it's been it's been one hell of a year, that's for sure. It's been a tough one.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:38

I I thought of you, Mac, because I've had actually a stressful week for sure. And so I started to play Stardew Valley. So I was thinking of you. I was like, you know, this has been really nice. Now I can see why Mac turn resorted to this as a as a comfort through the tough times. And restarting your farm is a bitch. So I'm so sorry that you didn't have to do that.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:59

Well, when you already know how to play the game, though it kind of moves a little bit faster, at least it seems like it's moving faster.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:05

So I think my positive personal thing is being smiley and watching what we do in the shadows. I'm kidding, that's not it. But also, yeah, like great job because all the series finale, fucking amazing and also heartbreaking.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:17

Oh my God, what am I doing? What am I saying? I forgot not only did I watch that show, I pretty much met them. I went to their panel, I saw them from at a distance, I like waved at them. You made me a what we do in the shadows fan.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:29

Maybe next time you'll listen to a recommendation.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:32

Not me forgetting I met like my favorite voice actresses from The Last of Us. Oh wow, so many positive things this year.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:38

What? My gosh.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:39

Yeah. Love that. No, I 100% agree. This year has fucking sucked.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:46

Being so glad you had so many. Meanwhile, just practicing like positivity, gratitude.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:51

That's great. We need the positivity and the gratitude. But I want to actually dial this back. So obviously, as this episode releases, it's my now 35th birthday. And last year I was in a fucking super dark place towards the end of the year, and I realized that I just needed to set some better boundaries for myself, but then also like I was gonna say, like, okay, this is gonna be the year of self-care, and just like trying to focus on myself a little bit more. And literally the next day I met Allie. Well, we had already kind of met, but we actually started talking on January 1st. And obviously, I talked to you guys a lot about Allie and just what she's meant in my life, but I think the bigger thing that she has represented is someone in my corner who has helped me believe in myself, and I think it in a lot of ways has enabled me taking time to prioritize myself. So similar to Mac, I took my own leave earlier this year. Technically medical, although not to anywhere near the extent of what you have. But being able to take that time and just separate and try to reprioritize things for myself has really enabled me to be in a place now where I am ending the year of self-care by moving into my own apartment. And I haven't lived alone since 2018. So I cannot tell you how life-changing that's gonna be, how much better that's gonna be for my mental health. I have, I mean, this is I'm I'm living in a place where I fell through a roof trying to fucking put a tarp up. So I am just fucking ecstatic, and I'm just super grateful to have my alley this year. I'm super grateful for all of you this year. It's been bittersweet. Like I feel like this year without those things would have felt so much worse than it actually was.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:26

Yeah, that's great though. Yeah. Love to hear it.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:29

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:30

Yeah. I mean, I think we had a year where we had some really, really tough times, but at the same time we had big things that I've done.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:36

I think I got to go see Mac this year. That is very true. Yeah. I got the babies.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:40

Got to hang out with me. Yeah. That's right.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:42

And I feel like it's one of those things where, I mean, not to get serious because I I l obviously love to joke, but I feel like it's so easy to kind of stay in this frame of thinking when we experience very negative things. Like we just stay in that realm of like it's a bad year, it was a really tough year. And it's so difficult to kind of reframe that thought and think of positive things that have happened to you in grief. You're gonna remember the terrible things more than you are at the positive, unfortunately. But it's really nice to even amongst all of us to think of the positive things, whether it is just reading, which is a huge feat. I certainly am gonna try to tackle that audiobook we were talking about before we started recording. But also just like all the other little things that I even myself have forgotten because it's nice to have friends and have this community to kind of remind us of the positive things when things are tough.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:32

Yeah. And also uh Nathan coming through and starting the crypt. Fucking great. Incredible.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:38

Love that.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:38

Having Tessie on board, she's been incredible with her blog post and Nathan too. I mean, that's been something fantastic that we've added on.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:46

Support from the community in general is always amazing.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:50

Absolutely. Which I think helps us move on to our goals and thinking about where we're gonna go. Let's just really quickly recap our 2024 goals for the show. My goal in particular was to streamline our workflows and tools to try to help simplify what we do. A big check on that. We moved over to the script for editing. Sean's been able to help edit, so that's been fantastic. Sean, I don't know how you feel about it, but it is a much simpler system than what I was doing before personally. We also secured a vendor space at a horror convention, so we did get a vendor booth at Spooky Empire. Hurricane Milton said, fuck that. So that sucks, right? But we did do it. Like we got it. Everything was lined up. And then the one thing that kind of counts, kind of doesn't count. Uh I also wanted to try to host a local event down in South Florida to help market and grow the show. Yes and no, right? We had some opportunities. Uh Binks was able to link us up with the Miami Film Festival, with Miami Movie Goers, and then the House of Horror. So we're able to meet new people and grow the show in that way. So I'm really excited to see what comes of us. For what we were able to do this year.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:53

Yeah, it's really cool. I am happy that I was able to take some things off your plate with the editing. It's actually been really fun for me to go in and edit the episode because I like being part of that production element. So that's really cool. I hope we can go further. I know we've talked about taking on more of the audio production moving forward, which would be super helpful so we can continue to focus on how we can start delivering more video content and really just amplify this show, you know, to different levels. I know we've spitballed some ideas. Vero has some ideas for merchandise and things like that. So hopefully we can really get that ball rolling this year as well.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:33

For sure. I know that my goal last year was to stream more for our listeners, and I will conquer that fear soon. I promise. And I keep saying that every year. Now it's going on two years, I think. But 2025 is a new year, and so maybe it will happen. But here's what I'll say I did other things, which is nice. I created a TikTok account, which kind of sucks because apparently, in like two weeks or so from when this episode airs, it might get banned. So oh well, but it's fine because we invested a lot more time on Instagram this year, which I love, and we posted more IG reels, a lot of them getting like 2,000 views. Winnie the Pooh, of course, got like over 4,000 or something like that. So naturally, me being ridiculous with Chris, that's what happens, right? But we also grew our Instagram account by, I think it was like over 300 followers or so, maybe a little bit more than that. So that was awesome. We broke 1,000 and that was like my big goal. So I'm so glad that we got to do that and create that community over on Instagram. And yeah, it was really those local events that I think was really, really fun just to kind of do with the Miami community, whether it was the film festival with Sting and you know, House of Horror doing our special episode with the creators of House of Horror and the set designer. I thought that was really, really fun just to kind of integrate a little bit of our culture and where we're from into the show. So that was nice.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:59

I had some goals for this year. I should I certainly did. I wanted to attend another live meetup or event. And of course, we were all planning on doing that. And that didn't happen, but you know, there's still time in the future. I wanted to improve my organization and planning and routine for getting everything done. And because of my recent medical leave, I've had more time to actually stay ahead of watching things, and so it wasn't necessarily the day of. So that was inadvertent, but it came together. And of course, the last goal I think I set for this year, last year, was to figure out what we were doing with fact or fiction, and we kind of ended up there naturally. It's still a pocket, it's still a reserve, it's set aside for if we want to do that for something special, but effectively we streamlined and I stopped doing that this year.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:44

Let's go ahead and go into our goals then for this year. I think uh first up, mine is going to be A, let's fucking get back to Spooky Empire and not have a hurricane fuck it up this year. I also want to just keep an eye out for like local South Florida conventions and events of that nature and try to just like get some more, I think, one-on-one, like exposure and presence out there. I just joined today. I got invited and I was having a conversation with a Starbucks barista, and he was like, Oh, you know, I love your tattoos, da-da-da. He was like telling me about this like local like South Florida horror group. So we'll see. But I also want to focus on expanding our video content to you know drive our social media presence and help broaden our reach, like Sean was saying. Sean's gonna be taking on a little bit more of the audio production, and then I think for some select episodes, we're actually gonna put out a full video version of the episode, starting with I believe Nasferoth 2.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:33

So cool.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:34

Yeah, and then also just seeing what other kind of shit we can make. I'm gonna have my own fucking studio space now, which I have never had for this show, so I am so fucking excited for it.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:44

That's so rad. Yeah, I think it's just growing the show is like the ultimate goal. And you know, we were talking about expanding the video content and and all of that stuff, but I think um just getting new uh fun ideas, different content for our patrons, right? We're looking to maybe hopefully secure some cool interviews and different things like that, some really fun content that we can put out there for our listeners to really take advantage of and just really get a different uh side of the podcast, right? Like get some more in-depth with some different people in the horror community, I think would be really fun and just trying to find ways to overall just keep this show moving forward.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:27

Yeah. And in that same vein, I think that because of the experiences that we had this year with Miami Moviegoers and Mime Film Festival and House of Horror and stuff like that, I would love to continue to leverage like those local film lovers that we have here in South Florida in particular or around the country. I think I'm a big believer of you never know who knows someone. And even my experience working in the short film with my friends, I was able to meet filmmakers and people that are in the business, people that flew down to help with the short film that love horror and I was able to talk about the show. So you just never know who knows someone, right? And I would love for us to get, you know, more invites to early screenings and things like that. So just kind of building our network, even if it is local and seeing where it takes us from there.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:14

And this year I want to do something a little bit different in from past years in terms of goals. I want to focus on firing up the book club again. Um, this time I've gone ahead and pre-selected 12 books, and these picks I think have some more manageable read times, and they also shouldn't be too scary for the most part for anybody. So I think that's just a little bit more approachable.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:34

Oh, yeah. Love that. I can't wait. Between our book club, our crypt episodes, and a lot of the other bonus content that we have in the pipeline, I personally cannot wait to see what 2025 looks like for us. But I think for now, it's time to bid farewell to a year well had. We had a terrific year, but 2025 promises to be even better.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:53

And if you want to go into the further with us, consider becoming one of our patrons. Visit patreon.com/slash hackerslash to enjoy more of the show with early access, extended episodes, bonus content, and live shows.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:08

And if you've loved listening to us this year, 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_05 1:18:17

We'll see you next time, folks. And remember, contrary to popular belief, there is such a thing as bad press.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:23

There's been a slight misuse of the substance.