379: The Monkey (2025)

SPEAKER_03 0:04

Why are you making it sound like they're gonna get a little wet? Greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. I can't speak for you, but I don't feel especially fucked to hell. 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, horror slash.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Totally killer, pun intended.

SPEAKER_03 0:33

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_00 0:47

You know I don't go in there anymore since I found that stiff sock.

SPEAKER_03 0:50

The classic horror connoisseur Sean.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

You still got some of Barbara's load on you.

SPEAKER_03 0:54

And the paranormal paramour, Binx. It is what it is. The word of the Lord. This week we're back in theaters to explore another Stephen King adaptation.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

And if you support the show, you'll also get to hear our B side at the end of this episode where we get into some of the creepy toys from our childhood.

SPEAKER_03 1:11

In 1985, Stephen King published a short story collection titled Skeleton Crew. Now among its pages was The Mist, which we reviewed exactly one year ago tonight, back in episode 319. This year, though, we're checking out an Osgood Perkins adaptation of another story from Skeleton Crew, a story involving a cursed toy. The film explores the tragedy that befalls a pair of twin brothers after they find a seemingly benign toy. When they try to get rid of it and move on with their lives, though, we see that some things refuse to stay buried. This week we're talking about the monkey. What were you all expecting going into this one?

SPEAKER_01 1:49

I feel like the trailer was a little bit interesting, right? I feel like this trailer, at least the trailer I remember watching, it seemed like, man, this looks like it's gonna be a little quirky, right? A little wild, could be a little bit fun. And obviously, you said it, it's based off of Stephen King's short story of the same name. So there's a lot of interesting things surrounding this film. And despite I feel like it's mediocre scores that I was seeing on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB and things like that, I was actually hearing a lot of good stuff surrounding this movie. I was hearing things like fun, funny, entertaining, even gory yet hilarious kills, right? So I feel like, yes, it had my attention. And I think an Osgood Perkins film, right? Written, directed, you know, he's acted in a number of movies, anything ranging from nope to legally blonde, right? Like that's wild. And then more importantly, recently he directed Long Legs. So I went into this movie not knowing exactly what to expect, other than I felt like it was gonna be a little bit zany, a little bit weird, maybe weirdly fun.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Interesting because I didn't pick up on the quirkiness in the trailer, at least when I was watching them. I think what I thought was that this was gonna be over the top in its gore and the death. I just thought it was gonna be so far across the line that I was going to I was gonna feel kind of grossed out almost. Not by what's on screen, because we've seen it a thousand times, of course, but like just the sheer volume of it was just gonna be overwhelming. And I was not looking forward to that at all.

SPEAKER_02 3:24

Yeah, it's interesting because Osgood Perkins is obviously working very hand in hand with Neon right now. And when I saw the teaser, it was like, okay, Osgood Perkins, I know he can do some dark shit. It's with Neon, so it's gonna have a good budget. I feel like this is gonna be a good film, you know. And then I'm thinking, James Wann, what are you doing here? What are you how did you get on this table, you know, like how are you in this mix? It's a weird and then we're talking a Stephen King adaptation, which usually is there are other directors, right? So it's just very interesting conglomerate of people involved in this film. I didn't catch up on the quirkiness though. That's the one thing that I agree with you, Mac. I didn't realize that it was gonna be funny. I just thought it was gonna be like a weird, scary film. In the stereotypical way with James Wan involved, because you can't help it, right? Like there's probably gonna be a flashback or two, and I like James Wan films, but I just thought it was gonna be very serious with a lot of gore. Completely agree with you.

SPEAKER_03 4:25

I was right there with both of you. I did not pick up on any of the zaniness outside of what a couple of our Discord members were saying about this movie in their initial reaction to it. But going into this, I expected that more somber, that more sinister take. Really, the entire time that I watched this, I had such a range of feelings. I I laughed. I felt like I should have been laughing in moments and I wasn't laughing. I cried, I winced a bit, and man, I was also hit with this feeling of when the fuck was the last time I saw a phone book.

SPEAKER_01 5:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:00

You got some nostalgia in here, you know. This movie has a way of sneaking up on you, and just again, from the wild range of emotions I felt down to the huh, they really packed some shit in here that's gonna make me think about things that I haven't experienced in my life in so long.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

It was so interesting, all the anachronisms that are like throughout this thing where you can't really figure out. I know this is set in modern times, but is it? Because if they removed a couple things, it wouldn't be. Most of the movie feels like it's supposed to be set between the 70s and the 90s, and in reality, it's modern times. It's really weird. It definitely lends to this interesting timelessness that we've seen in a lot of recent properties, whether it's TV or movies, where yes, we know it's set in you know yesteryear, kind of, but it's also set in tomorrowland in a way. So it's interesting. It doesn't really matter when it's happening. And the way that they write things, like people are using landline phones in this film, which is phenomenal because I think they could have chosen to say it's 1988, it's 1975, it's 1996, it doesn't matter. And that's what works really well here. From start to finish, this is a wild ride. They are doing so many things with the editing, with the sound design, with the music, and especially with the effects on screen, to constantly go after all those little neurons in your brain and make sure that they are firing at full speed. Because there's moments that you could slip into a little bit of like a lull, and they're like, nah, just kidding, gotcha. They splash something on the screen, they have a loud sound that cuts really quickly, whatever it is. They want to keep that adrenaline going the entire time, but it's also got that quirkiness to it. It's got this weird out-of-place time setting, it's got characters completely out of left field. No, right? And so you're watching this just kind of like picking up on everything that's constantly going on in the screen. It's not full ADHD, it's not all the way there, but there is not a moment where you can just let your guard down while watching this.

SPEAKER_03 7:01

You know, you mentioned the time element of it, Mac, and it reminds me of this feeling of being out of time in the same way that it follows felt and obviously this one has some very specific technology or elements to it, and we have you know, date cards where we at least get one point of reference on what year it is, and then a certain time uh a certain amount of time passes. So we get when it's supposed to be, but the feeling of the moment is very different. It was it follows, and it was Rob Zombie's Halloween, where you have a sense of when this movie takes place, but you can't pinpoint anything in particular to show you yes, this is when it takes place.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

Yeah, I feel like this movie made me feel a lot of things. I think the most important one that I can think of is that it just felt for some reason like uh I was just stuck on the fact that it felt really lighthearted, right? So strange for how intense and gory some of these scenes are because I found myself laughing during a lot of these moments, including the kills. And I feel like this movie just had a really interesting and good balance where you felt emotional in some parts, right? There was tension and suspense, but it also didn't feel too serious, and it actually made for a really fun and gory, kind of campy horror flick. And so it was a lot going on in this movie and the way that it balanced some of these things out, but I think just this light-hearted feeling was so interesting for what it was really kind of showing you.

SPEAKER_02 8:39

And it's interesting because I didn't expect it to be so funny, and so I was so disarmed when it really just starts with humor and ends with humor the whole way through. It's one big dark comedy. And I've seen the movie twice now. I got a early screening for it, and I watched it again last night, both times laughing maybe like a good 85-90% of the time, nonstop. Even more so the second time around. It just really hits. And the beauty of Osgood Perkins is like, man, is this your sense of humor? I feel like it is. And if so, man, I would love to hang out with him. He is my kind of guy. This is incredible humor because it's also talking about really dark shit that he has gone through personally. Both of his parents died in the most insane ways. I know that when we saw long legs, I made the connection that his dad was Anthony Perkins. Then doing a little bit of a deep dive, realize okay, his dad passed away from AIDS, tragic, but his mom passed away in the 9-11 attack. What? Hello? That's crazy. Fun fact for the day.

SPEAKER_01 9:53

Yeah, it sounds terrible.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

I know. That was fucked. But again, look at me with the dark humor. Do you see how we would be best friends? I'm just saying. So this film feels personal, obviously. It uses humor to explore grief, daddy issues, you know, how we glamorize kills and the insanity of gore in the horror genre. And it's so fun on a rewatch, I have to say, because you like really take a moment, now that you like know the comedic bits, you realize, like, oh, he's like a sinister guy, the way that he laughs. Like, if I would love to have dinner with him, and he would say some fucked up stuff. Not in an offensive way, right? But in a way that, like, wow, I feel like so disarmed, and I feel like I can be vulnerable and like just be silly and say some quirky stuff around you because you have no filter. You'll do whatever. You don't even care. And apparently, this movie was supposed to be serious, like a very serious script. And he went in there saying, No, we're not gonna do that. It's a damn monkey. Change it up. Okay, change it up.

SPEAKER_01 10:56

Well, thank God, because man, it was like one of the more surprising things in the film, right? Like, to everyone's point. I see in the trailer that I watched, like, I see this toy monkey, and I instantly think, like, okay, this is gonna be kind of a wild ride, right? Like, anytime there's this toy monkey involved, and if you've read the short story, right, like you're just thinking, how is this gonna be adapted onto film? And it just looked like it was gonna be a little bit over the top, right? I think Mac, you said it. You're expecting some intense, gory kills. And I think I'm just thinking, campy ass toy monkey killing a bunch of people, right? That was my initial thought. But I think you might be surprised and possibly disappointed to find that we actually don't even get that iconic eerie monkey with the clapping cymbals in this movie, right? I don't know, I don't even remember if they showed the whole monkey with the drums in the trailer, but we see the monkey, right? And I feel like it's just such a weird fact about this movie because instead, obviously, we get this drummer monkey because Disney technically has the rights because of fucking Toy Story 3, which is wild because the fucking director only put the symbol monkey in there as a nod to Stephen King, and it's a nod to Stephen King, but couldn't be used in the adaptation of his own fucking story. So it's a weird conundrum that is like surprising and also kind of disappointing.

SPEAKER_03 12:21

Listen here, man. If we live in a world where you can watch Terrifier 3 on Disney property and Mickey Mouse is gonna be in Screamboat Willy, I think they could have gotten away with the drums. Fucking go hard neon. Somebody's gonna have your back in the court system.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

The whole organ grinder monkey thing is so bizarre to me, anyway, like walking around with a little capuchin monkey, and they're playing, you know, they're playing some cymbals and doing some little dances to to bring you some money because you broke. That whole setup was severely strange.

SPEAKER_03 12:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Just like this movie is severely strange, but I think Sean hit it on the head that the thing that catches you off guard is definitely the humor and the quirkiness.

SPEAKER_03 13:02

Mm-hmm. Yeah. See, here's the thing. What caught me off guard in this movie was twofold. One, how absolutely stacked the cast is. We have some parks and rec vets in this movie. And throughout all of that, I mentioned earlier that I laughed. The movie felt very front-loaded on the comedy for me. And there were moments that for sure I'm like, okay, this is funny, but it felt more like when you write LOL and you're kind of tickled inside, but not enough to outwardly emote that you're laughing.

SPEAKER_01 13:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:32

I wasn't like, I would say probably around like the halfway point, I stopped laughing out loud. I laughed out loud in the first half of it. And I don't know why that is. I'd be curious to see what that looks like on a rewatch, but it felt like a couple actors gave me a lot of the comedy in the front part of the movie, and then all right, we just kind of taper off a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

I have a similar disappointment because um notice how I said 80%, 80 to 85, because that small bit was that lull. There was a lull in maybe the second half. There, maybe even if we were to segment into thirds, right? The third act. And I think it's because it pivoted into a serious film for just a brief second. That's weird. Yeah, it felt long, and and the whiplash hits you when it goes right back into comedy. However, I full on was in tears laughing yesterday. In tears laughing. I've quoted the movie several times and not just my opening quote because I say it is what it is constantly. So I felt heavily seen. I felt insanely seen by that quote, but there are some other fantastic quotes, guys, that you're just gonna revisit multiple times in conversation throughout the year.

SPEAKER_03 14:48

Yeah, and that's the thing. You mentioned earlier how it pivots to being a serious movie. This movie is laced with serious topics all throughout it, but it handles it very deathly. Yeah. It takes it with a grain of salt, it talks about it and says, Hey, we're gonna sit in this. This is gonna be uncomfy. It's gonna be real sad, but we're gonna have a good time with it. And I think it's a really good reflection of even that level of processing that you would want to do in your own life. But I will say that it doesn't make any of it even remotely tense. This is a good horror comedy, right? It's a tragic comedy, it's a tragedy. There's a lot in here to go on a really interesting journey with in terms of like your emotions and what you're feeling. But even when we have our most violent moments, it feels slapstick funny.

SPEAKER_01 15:40

It's true. And I think it's yeah, to your point, that's why you're probably not gonna find this movie scary at all because of that approach to its extreme gore. Everything is done in a way that makes it makes it almost so over the top that it's almost comical. And I found, you know, I've already said it a number of times, I just found myself laughing out loud during almost every single one of these kills. Almost every single one. Even when they were like super serious at first, right? That didn't seem super comical. There was a couple in there in the first half of the film where I was just like, no, it's actually too wild to not laugh. And that's what I found myself doing throughout the entire film. And so, yeah, it takes away from the fright factor, but not the fun factor.

SPEAKER_00 16:26

And I think the fact that it's over the top really helps with it being not super duper scary because when you watch a final destination, you're putting together in your mind how these things could happen to me in ways that I don't expect because it all seems so real. This one has a similar kind of kill factor going on where it's not somebody stabbing you, it's a series of occurrences that you know just take you out or whatever, but they're so over the top that you're not really worried like you would be. You're not worried about that log truck. You're thinking that is absolutely insane. And it's I see how it's happening. Like the okay, the logic works, I guess, here, but I'm not I'm not concerned it's gonna happen to me. I think really the focus really kind of comes into the gore. And like I mentioned earlier, there's a a lot of it. And so if you're a gore fan, you're gonna love that. If you're not a gore fan, you might look away a couple times or wince a little bit, but it doesn't make it seem scary, it just makes it seem squishy.

SPEAKER_02 17:21

Squishy is so good. That's a great way to put this because there's definitely some interesting kills and squishiness. I can't wait for Sean to share his thoughts on the gore because boy oh boy, if you don't like gore, don't see this. I don't know how I I I say from like the perspective of the intro to horror community, right? Like, you know, they're dabbling, their toes in the water, they're asking us, oh, what movie should I see? I'm not really into horror movies, but I can do XYZ. If one of those things is, eh, I can't really do too much gore, wrong, not with this movie. But Mac, you said it, if you have seen Final Destination and you like that movie, this is the one for you. I haven't seen Dead Alive, but I assumed that maybe this would be kind of a little bit of that regard to an extreme you guys have, so you could tell me if I'm wrong. I thought of like Evil Dead as another one that, you know, in terms of campiness and horror. So when I think of originality and like its approach to it being a horror, it's a comedy, right? And it's more of that than it is to be scary. The only thing scary about this movie is the monkey. But in terms of originality, that's what makes it great and original in my perspective, because we said it earlier, this could have been another serious adaptation of a Stephen King film. And Osgood Perkins said, I did my Silence of the Lambs film not too long ago. I'm probably gonna do other serious stuff later. If this is about death and grief, I know a thing or two about some wild stuff. I'm going to do it in a funny way because it's a toy. And I appreciate that because when we've got the boogeyman, right? We we saw that earlier last year. The way that it approached its short story adaptation was it took a small minuscule moment of that short story, blew it up into a whole film, and was very serious. I enjoyed that movie. You know, if you haven't watched it, I would say to watch it and then listen to our episode on it because it's a good approach to a Stephen King adaptation short film, but short story. But this one I think is like similar in its approach, but it is a great standalone. I could have watched this movie never knowing that it was adapted to Stephen King and been fine about it. I don't need to know the origin of the monkey. I don't need to know that it's a Stephen King thing to watch to read the original short story. I haven't, I don't know. Have you, Sean? Did you read the short story for this?

SPEAKER_01 19:51

I have read it, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts then on like how it adapts because to me it's like, oh, this is Stephen King. That's actually the last thing in terms of the long list of what I appreciate about this film, and that's never the case with me.

SPEAKER_03 20:03

Yeah, this is one of those where if you walked into it having zero context of Stephen King, and you're not super familiar with his work or the tropes of Stephen King, then you'd absolutely miss it. But I think for as different as this movie is, both from its original short story and just a Stephen King property as a whole, there are still some great Easter eggs baked in for you know the knowing glance, the wink and you'll miss it kind of situation. And I think what this movie does really well is it makes me curious to know what does this feel like seriously? What would I feel if I were to read the story? I don't have to find out because I think this handled it in the way that I needed this kind of context or this content to be handled. So listen, shout out to Osgood Perkins for being able to take on Stephen King doing something completely fucking different and not getting the Stanley Kubrick reception.

SPEAKER_01 21:03

I mean, it's true, right? It's not always easy to adapt Stephen King's work and translate that to film. And there are definitely some key differences in this one. Uh, it's kind of hard to really dive into that without giving any spoilers away, but Oz Perkins did find a way to essentially have this film stand on its own. To your point, right? Like you don't necessarily need to have read the short story to appreciate this film, and vice versa. But yeah, there's enough key differences here that allows that to happen. I like that one thing we can probably share is that I I think that I like that it kept the origins of this monkey ominous and unknown, right? Like in both the story and this movie, we're not focused on the origins of the monkey, right? We're just focused on the story at hand. And obviously, we just talked about the monkey design itself changing. For better or worse, that's up to you, right? But the way that the toy works, right? The powers of this toy that be a little bit different than the story. There are certain elements that were added for film entertainment purposes. And of course, like the ending, I think is one of the biggest differences between the story and this film. So I feel like, yeah, there's just enough differences where you have to give Perkins credit for reimagining this story, this short story, and bringing it to life on film.

SPEAKER_00 22:28

Gosh, I'm glad you mentioned the ending because that was so different, I feel like, from the rest of the film. It was really weird. I haven't read the short story, so I'm not sure what it's like and what its ending has. But this one was let's take that quirky campiness up to another level for a whopping like three and a half minutes. And it caught me off guard. You know, there the rest of the film here was it was very different. You know, I mean, I think a lot of folks loved long legs and they were expecting this to be along the same lines, and they found it's a little bit different from that. You know, this is somebody having a little fun with some horror, and it's gushy, it's gory, it's nasty, it's wild. The characters are are cray cray. And then you get to the end and it was silly. It was kind of a silly ending. And then I can't wait for us to talk about spoilers because there is a character cameo, if you will. There's some we someone we see on screen that completely caught me off guard. Right. And I'm still not sure how I feel about that happening at the end of this film.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

I'm so with you on that. Definitely something strange that we're gonna have to talk through in the spoiler zone because it was definitely an interesting thing to to throw at you at the end. But outside of that, yeah, I feel like this ending this ending really wrapped up it exactly as this movie should have ended. Not that I predicted that the ending was gonna be this way, but it definitely ended on a high note.

SPEAKER_02 23:52

Yeah, and ultimately, although the humor fell a little flat right before it finishes and puts a bow on it, I would say if you are an Osgood Perkins fan, stick around after the credits because I didn't when I saw the early screening, but I did last night because I was busy talking to my friends about the film, and all of a sudden I see something on screen and I'm like, oh, was there a end credit situation with a monkey? Like, you know, whatever. It's actually a teaser to his next film that he's gonna do. My boy has been cooking, all right? He doesn't sleep, he's on to the next one. And the teaser is pretty interesting, I thought, but I'll leave that up to you to decide.

SPEAKER_03 24:31

Yeah, I didn't stick around for the teaser, but man, that ending was redemptive for the lull that I felt leading into the third act. Things we were talking about, that point where it kind of stretches and pivots, it gets a little bit weird. But one of the things that I love about this ending is yes, it's conclusive, it doesn't feel like there's any kind of sequel baiting or anything like that, but it just feels peaceful. And I don't mean that to imply that there's a happy ending here, because the ending of this movie is fucking chaos, undoubtedly. But there's something emotionally healing and cathartic about the ending of this film that really makes it worthwhile, and I can't wait to see how all that translates into how we're gonna rate this one. But before we get there, Sean, how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_01 25:22

You know, this is definitely an interesting one. I feel like this one, this movie definitely it has a ton of solid gore, and I want to get into it, but I also want to wait till we get into kills, so I'll just put it this way with everything from human entrails to human flesh made into jelly, this one definitely did not disappoint. And even though it was over the top and campy, and I found myself laughing out loud in most, if not all, of these kills, this one is earning itself a high gore score, a hilarious one, but a high one nonetheless.

SPEAKER_02 25:57

And what about the animal report? The monkey doesn't hurt his own friends, so the animals are actually safe.

SPEAKER_03 26:03

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings then the monkey from 2025, not showing in theaters. Was it a hack? Or slash. I think we're just gonna kick this one off just to get it out of the way. We've said it already this episode, but this movie brings a certain final destination energy to the function that manages to blend absolutely absurd comedy with the absolute sobriety of processing grief and generational trauma. Yeah, Bings mentioned it. We have daddy issues galore here. We all have baggage, but this movie feels like it wants to help you carry that load, and I think that's really special. The comedy doesn't always land for me for sure. Again, it was the silent LOL, not the big LMFAO in a lot of parts, but it was absolutely fucking brutal and buckets of bloody fun. So it's still a slash.

SPEAKER_00 26:57

You know, parts of this movie watching it in a theater were a little bit insufferable because there were so many people reacting out loud, and there wasn't that many people in my theater. It was that loud, the reactions that it got out of people. And then the further we got into the film, I kept thinking this is one of those things you experience as a group because there's moments where people just can't help. There's moments where people just can't help but react. Whether it's the gore, the ridiculous humor, the humor of a really dark moment in the film. There's a series of kills here that happened so rapidly, and the audience kept laughing during them. And and I love that for a film. It's so absurd, but everybody who's there is having a good time with it. So it is a lot of fun. The pacing is kind of wild. As soon as you think you're gonna slow down, they hit you with something really quickly and then cut away really quickly as well. And so it keeps things moving. There's some moments that get a little bit slower, as you've all mentioned so far, but I think you have this fast pace, you have a lot going on on screen, you have characters that are fun and silly, and some that you really don't like, and horrible things happen to those people as well. So there's just a lot to love here. I think I would have been happier if there were less gore. And I know that's a controversial opinion talking about this film, but the story would have worked just fine. And I think the silliness of some of these kills would have worked just fine as well. It's just that there were so much of human beings being completely annihilated instantly, just turned into remnants of organic matter. And it was a lot to look at. I'm not a huge gore fan these days. I don't know that I ever have been. I'm not gonna let that turn it into a hack, though. I still think it's a slash. It's over the top. I told somebody bring your raincoat with you when you go see this movie because you need to be prepared for that. You know, I mean, it's not like you're watching a live show where it's gonna splash on you or anything, but it does feel like that.

SPEAKER_03 28:48

Why are you making it sound like they're gonna get a little wet?

SPEAKER_00 28:51

Well, with blood.

SPEAKER_01 28:53

It's raining blood.

SPEAKER_03 28:54

I'll say my piece on that and then spoiler his own. How about that? He was hot, Binks. It's okay. Was?

SPEAKER_01 29:00

Oh.

SPEAKER_03 29:00

Past tense?

SPEAKER_01 29:01

All right.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

After this, is that what changed it for Chris? Is this movie changed it? He was hot, then she saw this. But I'll stick to it. It's it's a slash, you know. I I've got a friend who's gonna go see this tomorrow night. And I was like, yeah, dude, I think you're gonna, you're gonna have a good time. It's not what you expect. That's what I told him. Parts of it are, parts of it are exactly what you expect, and then 40% of it is completely not. And I think some of that's gonna be having a little fun, some of that's going to be enjoying some of the dialogue, and some of it's gonna be getting into the comedy when you have some of that. The rest of the film, yeah, it's gonna go along the lines of what you think you're in for, and that's probably a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Yeah, I completely agree. This is a film that I did not even anticipate to have liked even more than I did the first time around watching it, and that's been such a nice feeling, right? To revisit a film, a new release specifically so early in the year and have such a good time watching it, laugh even more than I had ever anticipated. It's just right up my alley in terms of the dark sense of humor. It explores uh parental abandonment, grief, the glamorization of kills and how we just eat that up and have a good time with it, like if that's normal. And it gets quirky, silly, ball to the wall in terms of creativity and its kills. I just had a blast with this. I really did. And it's kind of like making fun of itself in certain moments. It has no shame, and I appreciate that. In a new release for a big studio to kind of not even care for a Stephen King adaptation when you kind of revere his films and his work and think everything has to be so serious and feel like it's so grandiose. We talked about The Mist earlier. I what's his name? Frank Dapapont, the director for The Mist. He was supposed to do this film, and in a way, thank God he didn't, because I feel like Osgood Perkins, now knowing his sense of humor, was made for this kind of stuff. And I feel like this to me was the kind of horror comedy that I needed, more so than hard eyes. I know I wasn't on that episode, but like I feel like there's two kinds of people, or three, really. You could be in the middle. Chris famously loves her Venn diagrams. So there's the people that love hard eyes and the monkey, then there are those that love hard eyes, and then those that like the monkey. I'm more on the monkey side of things, right? Like I really I have a dark sense of humor. Maybe like I relate more to like British comedy and British TV shows because they kind of align on that front too. So if that's your speed and that's the way that you kind of jive, I think you're really gonna like this one. Because for me, despite the pitfalls and the lull, it was so, so short that the overarching film warranted its slash forever.

SPEAKER_01 31:41

Well, I definitely like both of them. It really feels like we're getting a lot of lighthearted horror this year, and I'm here for it, right? We've had a lot of very serious horror over the years, and I think it's really fun to explore something that can show you something serious while still having a good time. And Stephen King film adaptations can be pretty hit or miss, right? Let's be honest. Like there are some good ones for sure, but there are some pretty bad ones as well. I mean, hell, as good as it chapter one and two are, right, they are still far from the book, right? They're still pretty far from the book, and it's probably not an easy feat trying to translate Stephen King's writing into film, even though I feel like he has more movies adapted from his work than any other fucking writer in existence. So it's a very interesting dynamic. But the monkey takes his chilling short story and finds a way to turn it into a really fun and entertaining movie. And I feel like it's got just the right amount of dark humor. It really does a great job balancing tension with this twisted sense of fun. Uh, I think it proves that horror really can have its cake and eat it too. You know what I mean? And we had some really great dual performances from Theo James and Christian Convary. The kills were brutal. They were creative, they were drenched in this almost macabre playfulness that I feel like allows for this movie really never to feel too heavy. And I think that this film knows exactly what it is, right? I think it's suspensible, but never too serious. It's horrific for sure, but oddly playful at the same time. I think it it's like a murderous wind-up toy that won't quit, right? That's really what it is. And horror fans, I think, everywhere should be able to wind this movie up and just let it play because it's a fucking good time, and this movie might not take itself too seriously, but no monkeying around, this one's a slash.

SPEAKER_03 33:45

Well, with that, folks, there you have it. The monkey from 2025 has earned a universal slash. But there's so much more for us to unpack when we get back from our break. If you've already seen this before, please let us know by joining the conversation about this movie over in our Discord server. You can find the link for that in the show notes. And if you haven't seen it yet, buckle up and check it out in theaters, then join us in the second half. Because when we return, we're gonna dive deep into our spoiler zone territory and unpack the absurdity of these kills. We'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_01 34:22

Are you in the market for a mysterious music box that plays on its own, or maybe just a mildly cursed necklace that whispers sinister prophecies in your ear but goes with every outfit? No matter what you're looking for, we've got it all. So come on down to Hal's House of Haunted Heirlooms, where every item has a story, a soul, and a slight tendency to ruin your existence. We specialize in rare oddities, cursed collectibles, and lightly haunted heirlooms. We have the largest selection of sinister Simeon souvenirs, everything from antique drumming chimps with a thirst for blood, or to vintage music boxes that definitely don't summon spirits. But wait, there's more. Tell them Hacker Slash sent you and trade in any unwanted cursed item to receive store credit with minimal supernatural backlash. Just remember, all sales are final, no refunds, no takebacks, and no reversing the horrors you've unleashed. So come on down to Hal's House of Haunted Heirlooms, where possession is 9-tenths of the law and 10-tenths of our inventory. Hal's House of Haunted Heirlooms, you wished for it, now you're stuck with it. Oh, for sure, there is absolutely no way to be disappointed with this kill count because not only do we get an official 25 kills, not counting the undisclosed amount of victims that we saw like falling through the sky and shit like that, but we also got some really fun and creative kills that made for a wild fucking ride on this death train. And I mean, we're talking flesh grinding, face searing goodness with all kinds of other wild and zany ways to die. So I gotta know which one of these kills wound you up.

SPEAKER_03 36:34

There are so many fucking great ones, and I feel like it's a crime to even say anything that is my favorite because they're all excellent. But I just want to say the way my jaw hit the floor, seeing Uncle Chip's remains.

SPEAKER_01 36:49

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_03 36:51

The sleeping bag full of human pudding flesh jelly.

SPEAKER_02 36:55

Of course, we're back at it again with the same fucking favorite insert here because Jesus, yeah. The fact that it's Osgood Perkins makes it even better. My boy had like insane sideburns, 67 horses, trample like little cherry pudding. It was the specificity of that. It was the specificity, and the quick cut portrait shot that it just like instantly cuts to his face is like the best. So funny. Then second favorite kill is his wife, the aunt, because the clusterfuck of things that that woman went through. Oh insanity.

SPEAKER_01 37:32

A journey, a journey.

SPEAKER_03 37:34

Yes, it was a journey, it was a fucked up journey. And then for them to freeze frame on her head being impaled on the real estate sign, crazy. However, one thing I really want to look at when I re-watch this movie is gonna be why her face was so close to the fucking stove top.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

You just gotta be careful with the fire. I just don't know who it who would ever get that close. I agree.

SPEAKER_03 37:59

Well, I was wondering, like, was something wrong with it, and she was like troubleshooting it. It was just too much for me. I I I I gotta go back and I gotta watch it again.

SPEAKER_01 38:07

It's true. We would have to watch it again to see if they showed anything different, but it I my imper impression was that it was like just like she was trying to get it started. Maybe she was going in there to maybe I don't know if she was gonna check it out or light a match or what.

SPEAKER_02 38:23

The insinuation is that she's trying to smell if it if there's gas coming out of the room.

SPEAKER_01 38:27

Right, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:28

But why would you get that close to even still see if you're smelling gas? It doesn't make sense.

SPEAKER_03 38:33

Yeah, let me also say this is exactly why when I used to rent apartments in Virginia, I was like, fuck that. I don't want a single gas stove.

SPEAKER_01 38:42

Oh no, you have to have gas stove.

SPEAKER_03 38:44

I'm not responsible enough for gas stoves.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

No, gas stoves is like the only way to cook properly. You can't control the heat on electric, man. It's too fucking much, man. It doesn't cool down fast enough. No, you gotta have fire. Fire is the only way to live. But that's another topic for another time. That part of this kill is not even the most ridiculous part of the kill. It's the fact that afterwards she fucking like steps into a goddamn planter and then like stumbles headfirst into a fucking sign in the yard. Like it what in the holy shit happened?

SPEAKER_03 39:22

So they kept the sign, these savages. They kept the sign. They put a safety cone over it as if that makes it better. Alright Perkins talked about when he was going through like the deaths and thinking about how they would approach it. He wanted things that would not actually ever fucking happen in real life because that's when you know you hit the level of comedy he's looking for. But he specifically described it as very wily coyote. Her death is the most wily coyote of any other death in this film.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

A hundred percent. I see it. Definitely.

SPEAKER_02 39:54

Runner-up of potentially wily coyote or just absolute insanity has to be which Halloween film is it that this shitty boyfriend makes this cameo in this film with the one with the long hair.

SPEAKER_03 40:08

Halloween ends. I fucking hate him. Corey Cunningham, I think I hate Ricky.

SPEAKER_01 40:14

Ricky.

SPEAKER_03 40:14

I got so much to say about Ricky later. Fuck Corey Cunningham. No, thank you. I saw his fucking mouth. Yep, the mouth. It was the mouth! I saw the fucking mouth and I was like, get the fuck out of my movie.

SPEAKER_02 40:28

Listen, I that is your field house. Like that that is your shit, and how I recognized that mouth and knew that it was him was crazy.

SPEAKER_03 40:36

I was like, oh boy. To be here, I enjoyed Halloween ends to a certain extent, right? Like I enjoyed it, but I do not fucking like Corey Cunningham at all. So get the fuck out.

SPEAKER_02 40:48

Does anyone actually know? He sucks. And so when he gets devoured by a ton of wasps, I was like, what in the fuck?

SPEAKER_01 40:56

That was a weird fucking candyman trip of a fucking kill, though.

SPEAKER_03 41:00

Why was this a better version of Candyman 2's kills? And the better shows.

SPEAKER_01 41:05

How are we not getting these kills in the Candyman in general? I want to see this swarm of bees come out of Tony Todd, go into somebody and eat them from the fucking insides, dude. Like that is some sick ass shit for sure.

SPEAKER_00 41:20

God, there's too much to pick over, I think, in terms of kills. Like I know we have 19 of them listed, and some of those are multiples. So there's a bunch to choose from. But there's a couple that either made me laugh or made me wince. It's really hard to choose. So I think the babysitter, that was one of those that was such a bummer, but wow, what a kill. The very first kill of the movie, though, that was a make-me wince because when you see it in the trailer, you're imagining he's gonna get hit by this bolt, and oops, he's dead. No, we didn't get that. We got a bolt going into the guts, and we're like, um, okay, that's it. And then when it pops out, it pulls out his entrails. And that was a winceworthy kill for sure.

SPEAKER_01 41:57

But a way to open the film, though.

SPEAKER_00 41:59

I mean, gosh, it really set the tone, didn't it? It was like, no, we're gonna go 10 miles an hour over what you think speeding is. That's what we're gonna do. And but there are some kills that really either made you chuckle or really made you laugh. I think one of them is, you know, the young boss like getting his vape mod stuck in his throat. That was a good chuckle kind of a kill. That wasn't like, okay, not completely laugh out loud, but like uh lol silently or at least quietly. I did enjoy that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 42:25

I mean, you're right. There's a ton of really great kills. Some of them are better than others, some of them are funnier than others. You mentioned the babysitter, right? The babysitter getting fucking decapitated and the head just landing on the hibachi grill and just starting to cook was absolutely fantastic. I'll I'll talk more about that scene in general because I think later on when we start breaking down some of our favorite scenes, there's some funny moments that I got out of that scene. But I also gotta give it up to the realtor, right? Because it's not even the fact that how abrupt it was that she got completely obliterated by this shotgun from the closet. It's the fact that her fucking fingertip landed in Hal's mouth. Yeah, it's the fact that he had to pull her fingertip out of his fucking mouth.

SPEAKER_03 43:13

It reminds me of Evil Dead Rise and that eyeball transiting the hallway and landing in another man's mouth. Disgusting. You just know weird mouth shit is happening in these horror movies, and few movies are brave enough to point it out.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

Yeah, but we love to see it. As much as we don't like it, we love to see it.

SPEAKER_03 43:32

Okay, but also the combustion with the electric pool.

SPEAKER_01 43:36

Oh, yeah. The midness swimmer.

SPEAKER_03 43:39

I was wondering if they were gonna be bold enough to just immediately kill Petey. But then when you see this woman out here, simply to pad the body count, we knew what was up.

SPEAKER_01 43:50

A hundred percent. Also subtle towards the end when we're seeing a lot of like the chaos that's ensuing, but like we're starting to see like a bunch of random shit going. Down and just the surfer dude that was like impaled with his own surfboard that was also stuck into the tree.

SPEAKER_03 44:06

Amazing. Oh, absolutely. Also, the fucking cheerleaders who are cheering every time a body is found. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:13

That was the why.

SPEAKER_03 44:14

It was hilarious. But then to get taken out at the end of the movie, just side swiped.

SPEAKER_02 44:20

So that's the part that I was like, this man is hilarious, and he's saying more than we realize because he's those cheerleaders are us. We're the ones cheering every time we see a new kiddle, and we're like, oh, that is crazy. Like, yeah, bring out that dead body. I'm like, oh my god, this guy's he's like meta. He's literally calling us out in this film. And when they get railed by that bus or whatever, just like absolutely annihilates them at the end, too. Fantastic.

SPEAKER_03 44:51

Mm-hmm. Yeah. A couple things that were a bit of a bummer, not to take this into too far of a depressing vibe. Okay, one, the mother's death was terrible.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

That wasn't that was like the one that I was talking about earlier in the spoiler-free section where I was like, there are some kills that like didn't feel as funny, you know what I mean? So man, you're right. You're right.

SPEAKER_03 45:13

It was hard to watch. Absolutely. And you feel it coming, especially because one thing that I know for sure in the trailer reveals that both brothers make it to adulthood. So it's something where as soon as he winds it and there's a lack of response from the mom, it's like, okay, well, fuck. Here we are. Buckle up, we're about to cry. And I cried. However, the other thing, and this is just I think the timeliness of this movie and where it falls and what's happening in current events, the plane crash was hard to see.

SPEAKER_01 45:45

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_03 45:47

Plane crashes are always hard to see. I fucking am terrified of flying. I hate flying. Final Destination fucked me up as a kid, right? But in particular, there were some really funny Easter eggs in there with the fact that it's like a skydiving company and they do weddings and it's a bride hanging down. But I think with as much as we've heard lately, and there's no way, right? This movie has been planned and has been made for a long ass fucking time, but it's just eerie to see, and it hits different knowing everything that we've had happen lately and how many people we've lost in to fatal airline or airplane crashes as of late.

SPEAKER_01 46:26

That is true. Poorly timed, but obviously we know it's not intentional, but it's tough. But I can tell you one of the things outside of the kills and the gore and all that, because we know that that is one of the better parts of the film. Aside from that, I was kind of here for the narration bit throughout the whole movie. It was giving me a little bit of the Wonder Years vibes, you know, maybe some Christmas story vibes in there, right? Sometimes I'm not here for a narration, right? Like it doesn't make sense or it's annoying. It's like just give me the movie, give me the story, give me the acting. But the narration kind of added a little vibe to this movie that I didn't mind at all.

SPEAKER_03 47:05

Yeah, the narration was top-notch. It made me feel like what could be achieved if Mac were to narrate movies, that would be fantastic. I think you got a world of possibilities in front of you, but the other thing that I love though was basically the way that it used funerals and headshots of portraits from the funerals to just jump forward in time. Like those are the seed markers, and I fucking loved it. It felt like a great portrait to punctuate every fucking moment. And then we get so many all of a sudden that there's not even enough space to just jump to funerals. We get the breakdown every single day of how many kills were happening. Ah, so good.

SPEAKER_02 47:47

By the realtor. It was hilarious. And those portraits literally looked like they were straight out of JCPenney. It was fantastic. So good. I would say speaking of the kills though, in general, like it they were executed so incredibly well, like makeup effects, everything was fantastic. 97% of it. The other 3% was like maybe just a little bit of the little bit of that CGI that missed the mark with maybe the wasps, and I would say also Bill's head with like his body just you know, just like floating there for a second, staggered, the CGI with the bowling ball hitting his head or whatever towards the end, like not exactly as crisp as everything else, but for the most part, fantastic.

SPEAKER_03 48:29

Oh, I do love though that he went out the way that he always was fantasize of having gone out.

SPEAKER_00 48:36

There's a couple things that I really loved about this, and one of them was the very beginning of the movie, the intro credits are fantastic and it sets the tone for the movie. It's giving me Inglorious Bastards, it's giving me Quentin Tarantino, but in a classier horror-themed version. I think a lot of times when you go retro or vintage with your credits and you have some music to match, you're like, okay, you got a shtick. Let's see where the shtick takes us. I think here it wasn't, I don't have a shtick, it's I have something to say, and I have a really clever way of doing it. And that I appreciated just from the get-go. But beyond that, the rest of the movie, we have this vintage feel, this retro feel, the things that are out of time and out of place, the uncle's glasses and facial hairstyle, right? Those are not of 2025. They're not of 1999, though. And that's when we were supposedly set in that moment. I'm like, no, this is like 30 years antiquated. And it's so much fun because it's giving me that 70 show for some reason. But it's pervasive. It goes through everything. The set design, the wardrobe, the makeup, all sorts of stuff seem to be from the wrong era based on when we're watching the movie. And that was a brilliant touch. We've mentioned that it kind of makes it a little timeless, but it makes it funky. And I love that funkiness because we've got that combined with quirk quirky characters into this weirdness. It's not weird as in like, I didn't like it, it's strange. It was weird as in like there's not much else that feels exactly like it. It's its own unique thing.

SPEAKER_03 50:04

I have the perfect quote for what you're describing. It comes to us from the script of Grease 2. And it's Michelle Pfeiffer, Stephanie De Zanoni saying, it's weird. Not weird, weird, but exciting weird.

SPEAKER_00 50:16

Exactly. That is the perfect quote. Thanks, Grease 2. Gosh. But I think all of that is combined with me for the casting that they did here to make this just one hell of a production, honestly. And I know we're going to talk about some of the characters here in just a few minutes, but the cast of this film is so fantastic and made me realize some things about myself. And I don't know that I'm fully comfortable with it yet. But if you look at some of the casts, it reminds me of my adult crushes, my adult like celebrity crushes. You know, because when you're younger, you might have adult celebrity crushes on certain people. But Tatiana Maslani, huge adult celebrity crush, reminds me of Alia Shakat, also massive adult celebrity crush, even Sarah Levy. And then I'm like, do I have a thing perhaps for the darker hair, especially with the curls? Is that what's going on here? And if you look at my life, that just matches up with reality. So uh gotta, gotta love that. But Elijah Wood, just a man that you used to love to love, now you love to hate in this film. Or it could be better than that. Adam Scott starting us off here was such a pleasant surprise that I'm thinking, did they just get together and think who are they cool with? Did they put feelers out? Did they do it the old-fashioned way? It seems like these are choices you would make if you knew a bunch of really cool people and you wanted them in on a project with you, but it made for almost like a scene-by-scene delight, just seeing who they're integrating, except for when we get to Rowan Campbell.

SPEAKER_03 51:43

Because fuck Corey Cunningham.

SPEAKER_00 51:46

Honestly, that's exactly it. That's exactly it. But I mean, we even get Oz Perkins himself in the film, and that was a fun casting choice. So it seems like we're eating the dog food here and we're having a good time with the film, and that was just really enjoyable. I think we've all mentioned some great stuff that's gone on, but character work here was so good. One of the best scenes of the movie had to be at least one of, if not both, of the major funeral scenes. For sure. And it's just you get a little bit of it in the trailer, but it's so awkward and it's so uncomfortable, and yet it's just comedy. It's pure comedic genius. And that awkwardness is on purpose and it's hitting you in the face for a reason. And I loved it.

SPEAKER_01 52:25

Yeah, the reverend was so ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.

SPEAKER_02 52:30

Going up to the going up to the podium, being like, oh fuck.

SPEAKER_01 52:36

Everything for a reason. Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_03 52:39

Okay, he belonged in Y2K.

SPEAKER_02 52:42

Oh, he yeah. Yeah. When he said he he made a comment or something like about heads or tails, but not her head, because that's I juiced. I was in tears. And speaking of comedy, favorite scene is tied between a small moment when it's a callback to something that the mom says earlier when she's talking about how the dad just went, made like an egg and scrambled, you know, trying to get you know a pack of cigarettes, never came back. But when fast forward, Hal just screams it, we need to make like an egg and scramble, make like eggs and scramble, I was in tears crying, crying of laughter because holy shit, yes, has that not been me? I feel like that constantly. It was incredible. But that's one tied with you mentioned to him earlier, good old Elijah Wood. The shock on my face. So when I saw that he was in this movie, no one, no one could have seen it because I was like taken aback, went so far into my seat because I was stunned. More so because it's not even that Elijah Wood was in this movie, it's that Elijah Wood is Tony Robbins. He's like basically Tony Robbins slash Joel Olstein with his plethora of books of being an industry leader in his field or industry expert of fatherhood, and all of his like what was some of them was like Jesus Dad and Fatherhood three and all of these books wearing what kind of jumpsuit was that? His nipples were so hard in that jumpsuit.

SPEAKER_01 54:19

Yeah, it was like really showcasing, you know, his man boobs.

SPEAKER_02 54:26

His form, like what's happening? It was fantastic. He was such a dick. I loved it.

SPEAKER_01 54:31

Great scenes, right? But just to touch back on the hibachi scene, because it it's not even that the scene itself or what is actually happening is super, super funny, but it's just as soon as I saw this hibachi scene going down, and I'm watching this chef, you know, twirl his knives around, and he's like doing these little like faces and they're just eating it up, right? It just that scene was so funny to me because I feel like every white dude or white person loves to go to hibachi and just be entertained by some dumb, mindless bullshit with shitty food. Like, when's the last hibachi place you went to and it was actually like fucking delicious food? Like it's the best food you've ever had. It's like fucking mediocre food. They're shooting sake out of a fucking like condiment squeeze bottle into your mouth, they're lighting shit on fire, and and we're just eating it up like we're at fucking Disneyland or something. We eat that shit up, us white guys, you know?

SPEAKER_03 55:27

Okay, I've actually had pretty good hibachi. I've actually had pretty good hibachi, but hibachi in the experience, I was just saying this earlier, is an introvert's nightmare because they want to talk to me way too fucking much. And like, if and if not the person cooking or making jokes, the other people at the hibachi table, no fucking thank you. I'm just here to dine.

SPEAKER_01 55:48

Oh man. I'm not look, I'm not saying there isn't good hibachi out there. I'm sure that there's decent hibachi, but I haven't had anything that's gonna be like mind-blowing, like if I go to a five-star restaurant, right? Like, it's just like, okay, it's fried rice, you've got some chicken on there, they throw it on the grill. Like, it is what it is. It's not, I've had some really questionable hibachi, but I've also had some decent hibachi, but nonetheless, I think people just eat it up for the experience for whatever reason. But I will say, I do think that there was a scene with a little more serious tones, right? There was the scene after the mom dies, shortly after there, where Bill notices something outside of the window, right? And it's that scene where he's looking out the window in the dark and starts to see that evil face of the toy fucking monkey emerge from the darkness. There was just something ominous about it, the way the monkey's face faded into view. And you could see that there was this moment of realization, which they play into when Hal and Bill have that talk about the moment Bill realized the evil powers of the monkey, and that's when he was like, that's that critical moment where whatever he went on this whole fucking path of fucking everything up, you know?

SPEAKER_03 57:00

Damn, that was a really good one. And I love the way the monkey fucking lurks in the background and corner of what feels like every frame of this movie. Obviously, it's not, but it feels like you can feel the monkey's presence even when you can't see the monkey. And you know, I want to take it back to my favorite scene because before all this bullshit really hit rears its ugly head, we have the funeral post-hibachi, post-beheading, post-stoner priest, and we have their mom's breakdown of death.

SPEAKER_01 57:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:36

I absolutely fucking love this because she has clearly had exceptional execution of her comedic dialogue, right? There's a moment earlier where she even says, What's worse than a blind date? I really kiss a goddamn frog and see what happens. Relatable. I get it. But at the funeral, she's planting the seed of how they need to come to terms with and process loss and death. It's not if or even how, but only when everybody dies, and that's life. This is the whole heart and spirit of this entire movie. But these boys are, you know, they're too young to understand what their mom is really saying. And what I love about this movie is how you can take this thesis, but you see how people operate when they don't heed these words or they're not really processing it in a way that feels healthy. This entire movie is one big long experience of a man who hasn't really healed from his mother's death, but then comes to terms with it, and then realizing, okay, yeah, maybe we should dance. It's really beautiful to have that emotional sucker punch and then to have them dance together, yeah, and then only for the very what feels like the next day for her to die, it's just terrible. But her presence in this movie just is so fucking heartfelt.

SPEAKER_01 59:00

Oh, for sure. And they sprinkled those like gut-wrenching moments throughout the movie. Like it this movie is filled with dark humor, but it's also got these little dollops of like really kind of intense emotional scenes. There's another one I think of was at the mom's funeral when Bill stands up and stops the whole thing and is just has that moment where he's like, Mom, wake up, and it's just like, fuck, what's happening? And he's like, Okay, go on. And that was like he just realized yeah, he had that moment, and that was just a fucking emotional ride right there. Which I would say like directly ties into the performances that we get because you know, whether we're talking about young or old, the fact that we got these dual performances for Hal and Bill, both actors did such a phenomenal job playing these two brothers and contrasting each other with the different personalities and different things like that. That I I was actually really surprised in a horror movie that we got such good performances.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:00

Oh, 100%. I've never seen Divergent, but I almost want to see Divergent because this guy fucking rocks.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:06

You've put out my trap card. So here I go. Theo James, ladies and gentlemen. Boy, oh boy, where do I start? Here's the problem. What is he doing in this movie? Because if you're supposed to be a guy that doesn't have any friends that's reclusive, but you are probably, I don't even know. Are you like in the top 25 or like 50 hottest guys on this planet? Maybe. That's probably in some kind of like people magazine at the very least. Like it's just not, it's just my generation is like foaming at the mouth for this guy. What do you even mean? It's crazy. Divergent was like only great because of him. I ha no offense to Shailen Woodley, but let's be honest, okay? He I don't even think he was like a good actor in that movie. I think we were just stunned that he was a human that existed on this planet.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:58

Oh, he's not like a good actor? Well, I mean this you see that he is, but in that movie, he's not a particularly good actor.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:04

I couldn't even tell you. I couldn't even tell you. Was I fully like assessing? Who knows? The thing is that divergent, well, the thing about divergent is that it's divergent, you know, like it's of the YA time. Like it was that or Hunger Games, and Hunger Games wins, right? So the right answer, by the way, if you were gonna tell me something different, we're gonna have to have a chat. I think that he's very good in other more recent things, though. The White Lotus, season two, snaps. He snaps. I think he does a really good job in that one. He's in the Time Traveler's Wife, the show. And that one, you know, a mixture views, depending on how you fall in terms of the book or the movie. I think he's a great actor for sure, but in Divergent, that's don't use that as the indication to gauge his talents. Just watch him because you can see a young Theo James. Also, his name, are you kidding? What? Get out of here. And he's British. Come on, it's too much.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:55

I did enjoy The Gentleman, and that was my entry into his career, honestly. I don't think I've ever seen Divergent. And the gentleman was great, he was really solid in it. When I saw him in the trailer for this, I was caught off guard. I didn't imagine that he would be in this kind of movie, and I think it worked out really well for him. Like you said though, he's exceedingly attractive. So for his character here, it doesn't perfectly match up because it's unbelievable, which is hilarious because when he plays his brother, you buy it. So it's interesting that strangeness between these two characters that look exactly the same, technically, because they're the same human being, but there's a big difference. Can we go back to their mom for just a moment? Because the she-hulk of it all, this woman is a national treasure, an absolute gem. And Chris, you mentioned her monologue earlier. And I think it was just the her delivery of that final let's go dancing that was so perfect. I think that's really what nailed it in. It wasn't like a big sigh, I guess we can go do this, like a lot of people do with it. It was like, bro, this is life. You have to keep moving forward because you have no control over these things, and you can't start to imagine that you have control over these things every time. You you really don't. And her description of their father when she's laying it out for them was so perfect. Like she's somebody who's over it. She's beyond, she's past it. She's just gonna be real with her boys. I think that flowed into them and who they were as people as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:18

Yeah, I mean, she was definitely an OG, right? She was just telling it like it is to her kids, which sometimes I feel like you gotta do, right? You can't sugarcoat everything in life. And the delivery was great, right? Like I feel like it was a good character in contrast to the rest of the film. But I am curious also, I don't know if I'm crazy, but it it had me thinking, right? Was the was their dad also the dad of Ricky?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:43

They're two different people because Adam Scott is a pilot and Ricky's dad was the police officer.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:51

Oh, that's true. That's true. He has a cop outfit.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:54

Yeah, but what I think like the story, right, or what Osgood was maybe trying to do was like again, like that daddy issue situation here that potentially the monkey like kind of lures what seems to be men, because it it seems like it was the dad, and then it was his son's, and then it was going to be, you know, Hal's son, and then the appeal that Ricky has to the monkey saying that it looks like his dad, it's like almost like a a commentary on on, I guess, fathers or like males to some extent.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:25

Yeah, that's probably the vibe.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:27

But it was interesting because both fathers abandoned their children who went missing. In Bill and Hal's case, their dad went missing, we would imagine because he was trying to keep them safe to an extent. He left them that monkey and then just disappeared. He panicked, he freaked out, etc. Yeah. The on the other hand though, Ricky's dad, I mean, we don't have much of an explanation, we just assume that it was, yeah, because he w went gambling or cheating or whatever the mom tells him, but he doesn't want to believe that, right? He'd rather believe some other story or he's got that pent-up aggression towards it.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:59

Yeah. Something that I love is how Osgood Perkins is focusing on saying, with all the best intentions, you can make the most terrible decisions for your children. And you try so hard to not put this shit on them that you put on entirely different shit that they're gonna have to like fight through and navigate through their entire lives. And so at some point it becomes a matter of fucking just be with the people you love and keep them close. The rest of the shit you'll figure it out. But to keep a distance from someone, to create distance and space and walls between people because you're trying to keep each other safe, it's fucking really counterproductive.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:40

Yeah, because the opposite side of that is Elijah Wood's character who's out here writing books and feeling like he's got it down to a T, but actually has no warmth to him. He has no real care. He's like a standardized version of what a dad should look like because he's present and that's it. Like that's all it takes. There's more to it. There's got to be love. There's got to be warmth there. There has to be to an extent, like some level of flaw so that you can understand a person, especially at the son's age where he's a teenager. He's not going to be the perfect kid either. He wants someone that he can relate to and get to know. And it seems like the stepdad is not someone that he would want to get to know or has any depth to him as a human being whatsoever.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:24

Yeah, for sure. I do want to know though, what are your thoughts, obviously, on the strange character that we get at the end, right? What looks to be like maybe death, maybe the four horsemen of the apocalypse. We don't know, right? It feels a lot like that, but what are your thoughts on that? I'm curious.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:42

Seems like the monkey went so hard on the drums he busted his nut a little bit and let himself out of the doll.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:47

No. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:50

The Grim Reaper. I took it as the four I took it as one of the obviously the four horsemen, but like a grim reaper.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:57

A pale man on a white horse.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:59

Yeah, just strolling through town, fucking shit up, death in everywhere, right? Everyone was dying in that town.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:06

Yeah, their gaze and the stare back at each other was giving, do you come here often?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:12

Yeah, it was a weird daze for sure, glare, whatever you want to call it. It was very off-putting at first. I'm like, why is this here? Why am I super?

SPEAKER_00 1:07:20

It did seem it was so out of place and so like over the top supernatural, because to this point we were just in the mysterious supernatural, and now it's like religious overturned supernatural. I will say that that back and forth I had, I did appreciate that because it was kind of like a, oh, you get it. We're good. Have a good drive. See you next time. They're gonna go dancing. And so I like that. It was like you're in on it now. Fine, I'll keep moving. But it was weird. Like it doesn't add up why he's there. He's not in the rest of the movie in any ways. So that was strange.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:49

Yeah, I think uh, you know, it's a little nod to Final Destination bloodlines, and we're gonna finally see what the what death looks like. I'm kidding, absolutely kidding. But it is very much like if as Mac was saying, right? It feels like the hey, I see you, I recognize that you are here and you are always gonna be here, and there's nothing I can do to stop you.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:07

Which is, you know, maybe it's a good little moment of catharsis that we've gotten to at this point in the film where he can now live his life and not have to cut his child out. He learned, he wasn't like his own his own father, he's grown, which is fine.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:19

Exactly. But let me tell you though, worst part of the movie for me, and maybe this is like a very grumpy thing to say, I didn't like the kaleidoscope dream.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:29

Oh, you didn't like the kaleidoscope dream sequence?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:31

I sure did not. That's saying a lot because I really liked this movie, and even at its worst part, it's still not bad, but it is the one thing where I'm like, okay, I see what we're doing here. It's very trippy. I don't really like things in movies that are trippy, so maybe that's just me. But it was also just the way that he looked being dropped down. Something about it just didn't sit quite right, didn't sit quite right with me.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:56

I feel similarly about his casting again be only because god damn, he's too fine to to be a nerd. I just can't, I cannot believe it.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:07

Honestly, I think I cannot believe it would be. Good for you growing up to be hot.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

My lord, no, no, no, absolutely, absolutely. No, but that's just me like nitpicking too, right? Because of course I'm so happy to see him in this movie. Are you kidding me? I would say that on a serious level, it's gotta be something about those that little bit of a lull. Like driving that momentum. I think you could still be funny with even like the the serious times, because in the first half we've got the moms killed, and it still kept going after that. The laughs were still laughing, you know, like it was still happening. So I there was potential there, but it took a moment and then it felt almost a little bit awkward when it was revealed that it was the brother because it's like, yeah, I mean, okay, but what else do we what else we got? It continued with a little bit more laughs after that, like his little continuing to do the head swipe thing and his little giggle was really funny, but it just didn't hit the same as much as the first half of the film.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:04

Yeah, no, that I 100% agree with you. Their dynamic together was nowhere near as funny as I thought it should have been.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:12

I agree. I was unsure actually. I was like, am I just tired? Because I saw a late showing after work, right? Like, I was like, Am I just tired? Am I just like at this point in the movie, just like wanting to go home and chill? But no, I'm I'm glad that we're all like in alignment that there was this kind of moment throughout the film where it just felt like we were kind of dragging on until it finally kind of picked itself back up towards the end.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:34

Yeah, fuck that. I mean, I saw the shit at like 10 15 in the morning.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:37

Uh wide awake. See, there you go. There you go. But yeah, I guess okay. Outside of that, though, I'll just go back to it, right? Like, it just sucks that we had some copyright issues or we couldn't get what the original vision for this monkey is. Because I think, you know, whether you've even read Stephen King's short story or not, I feel like, and and maybe it's due to Toy Story, who fucking knows? Who am I to say? But whenever you think of an evil monkey toy, I think the first thing you're envisioning is the monkey with the symbols. You know what I mean? Like that's probably the first thing that comes to mind. But I wish that we were able to get the original vision. Other changes that were made, I'm here for.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:14

You say evil monkey, and I think of evil monkey from Family Guy. That's the only monkey I could think of.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:19

I mentioned it earlier, but I'm gonna mention it again. The gore was just a little bit too over the top for me, and I think this would have been a much more approachable film had we calmed it down a little bit. Save some of the exploding bodies, use them sparingly. It seems like we used a lot of them. There was the whole Lawnmower thing at one point, that was a lot. Entrails coming out, and I think a lot of folks are fans of gore, and that's obviously fine, and that's okay if you enjoy it. It's just at this point in my life, I'm a little bit I'm a little bit uh overexposed, I think, to perhaps a lot of gore, and I prefer things to be a little bit less messy. And I think that would have also drummed up some more of that comedy. I think we would have felt it more if some of these scenes focused on being funny, which they were without having to splatter human pink mist everywhere.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:06

Not only do I not mind the gore, I can't wait to see it all over again when I watch it again in theaters.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:13

I was about to say, I definitely will probably be watching this one again pretty soon. Hopefully, maybe in theaters, I got some time off. Maybe I'll have to wait till it I catch it streaming, but it this one's way too fun not to watch again. And there are Easter eggs, you're probably not gonna catch everything the first time around. I know I probably didn't because I was so hyper-focused on making sure I keep track of specific things for this podcast. So by watching this one again, I could probably just like really hone in on every little detail and have a really, really great time pulling some of these little Easter eggs and different nuances and different things out of the movie. So I'm excited to watch it again.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:54

Hell yeah. Let me go watch Annie Wilkes.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:57

I've already seen it twice. So let me, I guess, watch other films this year since my time is limited now. But I would rewatch it in the future for sure. My own? I'm pretty sure I'm gonna buy this one for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:11

Feels like a good choice.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:12

It definitely feels like a movie that you would own on some sort of physical media. I definitely see myself seeing it again. I'm not sure when. I'm not gonna go see it in the theater again. Once is enough. You know, I'm not a big theater fan these days, so I wish more things would hit just hit streaming so I could enjoy them at home.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:26

Well, I can't wait to see if any of your opinions sway upon watching this movie more, but for now, there you have it, folks. The monkey has earned a universal slash. We certainly had a robust discussion here, but the conversation doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:38

Do you like sticking around for those fun post-credit scenes? Want to find out how you can go further than this episode? Consider supporting the show. You can visit patreon.com/slash hacker slash and 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 1:13:58

Not me just realizing the B-sides is our post-credit scene.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:01

It is genius.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:03

And if you want to keep monkeying around with us, 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_03 1:14:11

We'll see you next time, folks, and remember it's not if or even how, but only when.