418: Frankenstein (2025)

SPEAKER_02 0:04

Wow, this is for sure Rob Zombies Frankenstein. Pretty Sadie Tastes and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. Some of what I will tell you is fact. Some is not. But it is all true. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie movie podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack.

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A total joke. A waste of time.

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Or a splash.

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Totally killer. Unintended.

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

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Victor.

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The classic horror connoisseur Sean.

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Flush that for me, will you?

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And the paranormal paramour Binx. If you are not to award me love, then I will indulge in rage. This week we're checking out the latest adaptation of a Mary Shelley novel.

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And if you support the show, you'll also be able to stick around after this episode to hear our B-side where we get into some of the differences between this movie and the novel.

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Now, long before this film reached our screens, this week's story began with that very novel from 1818, which we revisited a few times on the show. Over the last century, the story has been adapted many times, with each version choosing a different center of gravity. For some it's gothic horror, for others the scientific warning, the moral lesson, and for others maybe even the tragedy between creator and creation. In this latest adaptation, however, director Guillermo del Doro approaches the story through the lens of failed parenthood, rather than the misuse of science. In his vision, the heart of the narrative lies in the inability to accept death and the consequences that follow when a person attempts to outrun it. The story follows a scientist determined to outpace death, the being he brings into the world, and the unraveling that occurs when both creator and creation are forced to confront what they are to one another. This week we're talking about the 2025 adaptation of Frankenstein. What were you all expecting going into this one?

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Perhaps this is my limited scope when it comes to Guillermo del Toro, but I was expecting like Pan's Labyrinth with basically.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

I mean Yeah, that's fair. I think one always nervous when I hear about someone trying to remake a classic. So there's that, right? I think you just have to be nervous. But then I said to myself, well, this is Guillermo del Toro, right? So we know it should look really good. Like there will be this gothic vibe that only Del Toro can really do. So I feel like I got a little bit excited, right? But is it gonna be like you just never know what you're gonna get with these? Is it gonna be closer to the novel? Are we gonna take a lot of liberties? Are we gonna change things around? Like, what version of this story are we gonna get? And to be fair, look, I know like my favorite movie, 1931 Frankenstein, is far from a perfect retelling of the novel, right? It definitely adapts that novel in its own way, but it really transformed horror cinema and really set the bar for so many films to come. So we're just gonna have to see what happened.

SPEAKER_03 3:18

Yeah, that's really fair. I think for me, being a big Yemen Toro fan, I know that he is extremely obsessed with Frankenstein. He has a massive figure of Boris Karloff's face as Frankenstein in his house. So I knew that if he was gonna put his hands on this film, it was gonna be great and something that exuded a lot of passion. So aside from knowing it's gonna be very gothic leaning because he loves that stuff, I just figured there's just gonna be a lot of heart in this. So I was expecting that, but also really hoping what I wasn't going to see was the cliches, right? I really didn't want the it's alive line and like the dramatics of it all. Like we've seen that, been there, done that. I wanted something a little bit more serious, or at least that was what I was hoping for.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Yeah, my relationship to Frankenstein is actually, I think within the context of this whole IP, it's super limited, right? So it's Frankenstein, it's Bride Frankenstein, it's some other random stuff with probably Abbott and Consello, and then there's also young Frankenstein. And between that and the Munsters, that's really all I've got going for me. So walking into this one, understanding that Mary Shelley's original novel is very different from the original film that I saw, obviously growing up throughout my life. Knowing that that's on the table and knowing that there are other adaptations that explore that, I wanted to really marry and temper my expectations with okay, what could I possibly get from Frankenstein that we haven't already seen? But also, what is it gonna be with Del Toro at the helm? Right? So I expected this to be long, beautiful, and emotionally heavy. I felt like this movie was gonna feel like work, not as in it's a chore to get through, but that it was gonna be very layered and have a lot of depth. He obviously loves fables, he loves monsters with depth, he loves the tension between love and abandonment. So I anticipated something that was gonna require me to be patient, that the film would be slow, that it would be really thoughtful and reflective. And I think with that, right, you don't expect a lot of action. I didn't expect spectacle, and I expected more so like intimacy, philosophy, and grief. And let me tell you, oof, just circling back for a second, damn, this movie was long.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

You definitely felt the length in some moments in this movie. I would agree for sure.

SPEAKER_00 5:48

Yeah, I think that's not something you feel necessarily while you're watching it right away, but as it continues, you keep like I don't know if you're checking the time necessarily, but you become more aware of it as things go on. Because you're expecting something that is, I think, like visually a you know, a spectacle, and you're expecting the Frankenstein story, and things kind of go in different directions, especially if you're like me and you never really took the time to read the novel. But what this ends up feeling like is just this massive fantasy adventure epic. It feels like almost like Brother's Grim in its scope, to where when you actually read some of that stuff, it goes off into these crazy directions. And yeah, I think slow is the right feeling for a lot of it because you spend so much time going into further depth that you never really explored in other films. But there's other some other points here where you just imagine bro, like speed it up already.

SPEAKER_02 6:41

Yeah, for yeah, 100%. And I think that's where I wouldn't say I struggle with it because I enjoyed watching this movie. Like I felt a lot watching this movie, right? Emotionally, it's a little bit of a roller coaster, but also emotionally it's a little bit of a bummer. Let's just be honest about it. This movie, I think more so than others that we've seen, really focuses on the emotional architecture of Frankenstein and what this story is. It really goes into like the grief, the ego, the longing, the inability to accept responsibility, just the rejection of accountability, right? And that's something that I haven't seen portrayed with this level of focus in the other versions that I've watched. I know it's been explored, I know it's out there. It's just not something that I personally have seen. So I think for me, this movie felt even longer because of how bummed out I was this whole time, right? Like this movie feels deeply tragic. And there's beauty within that tragedy, absolutely, but I think so more so like the tone is more like mournful, right? It's slow burning, it's heavy, it isn't interested in scaring you, right? It's it's interested in grief, in ego, in the consequences of like wanting to hold power over life and death and just flying a little bit too close to the sun. So I think for me that's what this experience was, right? It's emotional weight that never let up, and the heaviness really, really got me.

SPEAKER_03 8:06

I have to agree. I think I definitely got what I was expecting in terms of the tone, but it's like a trade-off, right? Because although I definitely felt the pace, I feel like I instead got more meat to these characters than we probably have in other adaptations, especially with Dr. Frankenstein. Like I think that he was a little bit more of a serious character, and we'll unpack that a little bit more later on in the episode. But he was a lot more serious, and the same could be said about the creature. I think that we definitely get a lot more from him as well. But what does that look like? Probably a longer film. And when you mix that in with a more serious tone, and definitely the themes of humanity and parenthood and just the complexity of death mixed into all that, yeah, I can feel very somber for a long, long time. So I'm not necessarily mad at it too much, but I was feeling towards the first half of the film, like, man, why am I feeling like, damn, I'm where's this going? We still got another hour of this. And it's not bad, right? It's not a bad thing, but it is a a sentiment that I've never really felt before watching Gameladoro films, I'll be honest.

SPEAKER_02 9:20

It is, in fact, a pilgrimage.

SPEAKER_01 9:23

A pilgrimage, yeah. I mean, this movie, it's definitely like y'all have said, it's heavy with emotion. It leans heavily into the sympathy for the creature for sure. But I think the first thing that is gonna stand out to you is probably the way that this movie looks, because from the set design to the cinematography, this movie is actually visually stunning. Like it is so pretty to look at, it's literally a gothic marvel. Everything about the way this movie looks just kind of captivates you. And so there are moments that feel long for sure. You might feel the pacing. There's a lot that goes into trying to capture what the novel gives you. And it's not even that the novel is that long, right? It's not even that it's that long of a book, but to really capture the essence of what that novel is depicting, I think it takes a lot of work. And so the set design and the cinematography, the lighting, the costume design, everything that goes into making this movie look really good is gonna stand out to you. But I also think that one of the things that took me by surprise was literally the performance we got from Jacob Bellordi. Because, man, don't get me wrong, I have my qualms with the monster in this one, but his performance was a standout for sure.

SPEAKER_02 10:46

He was rock solid, but I have to be completely honest with you, I looked at him and I saw Nicholas Holt in Warm Bodies, like I just couldn't not see it. You know what I mean? And listen, that's neither here nor there. It did put me in the mood to watch Warm Bodies right after, but man, I'm not surprised that he had a great performance. I am surprised, I think similar to how we got you know these portrayals in Nosferatsu, that these dark, painful emotions being explored in these period pieces can really still shine through in a modern movie. And I really appreciated that. But for me, it's interesting because it's not like the story itself is surprising. It's Frankenstein. You know Frankenstein, I know Frankenstein, Sean knows Frankenstein more than any of us. But what is surprising is how much this one committed to showing us the process and to show us so much more than we've ever really gotten, maybe even in some ways from the novel, because I know that there's some deviations and this movie has some audacity and the courage to change some things, whether it's for the better or worse. I mean, I'd have to read the book to understand, but there are some specific departures that I just I know that it didn't happen, and not because I've seen it in a movie, but because I've heard of Frankenstein this entire time. So that was a really interesting thing to walk into, right? To know that Guillermo del Toro like holds this book and this property like it's a Bible, and he still was able to carve his own identity into it, not only visually with incredible dialogue, but by also shaping the entire tone of the story.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Okay, I gotta say something about shaping though when it comes to the story, because there was a big surprise for me as someone who has not read the novel. And in this case, it's that both of them have framing devices for the story that I was not aware of, and they're slightly different in delivery. And this particular one was just it was like out of left field for me. This movie starts off in a completely different way than I thought it would. And you know, talk about framing, you make it all the way to the end. It's like a nice, beautiful way of gliding to the final frame, and it's just it's brilliant. It was for me like kind of very surprising the way that it was done. But it allows everything in between to kind of I don't know, to be more about storytelling than it is necessarily about the story in a way. And so even when a character is not the one telling the story, even when it's the filmmaker doing it through dialogue and and through like amazing, you know, body acting, it's just like this is so much deeper than I thought that it could go for Frankenstein. I had a very like shallow understanding of what was possible, and this really took it to another level.

SPEAKER_03 13:37

Yeah, I completely agree with you, Mac, because I also was not expecting the frame narrative and how it starts off whatsoever. And to go back to what you were saying, Chris, a little bit earlier is like this idea that we know Frankenstein, we know what to expect. And so I feel like to an extent, that could be why I also felt a little bit of that pacing and that drag because I already know what's kind of going on. So once you know, maybe it just sort of impacts like, okay, I want to see something fresh, like what's going on with that intro that we get, I felt like that's what kind of carried me through that. It feels like, where I was familiar with the story. And even then, it does unpack a little bit more than what we have seen in the past. Because it starts the way that it does, I realized, wait a minute, I'm about to get something that I haven't seen before. And what is that going to look like? So that definitely surprised me and changed the trajectory of my thoughts about this film. I think if we hadn't gotten the way that it would started, I would probably feel a little bit differently and not feel as like enamored by the rest of the components of this film, like the production or everything else. I would have been like, okay, this is still just like every other Frankenstein movie we've seen.

SPEAKER_01 14:51

I think it's interesting just hearing all of the uh comments about like what was surprising, because I think what was surprising to everyone here is is probably what keeps it so close to the novel. You know what I mean? So I I think that a lot of what we get in this movie is something that a lot of other adaptations may try to leave out, or they just do something completely different or start it from a different point, right? And so I think the way that this movie started, the way that this movie kind of like really framed its story, is what keeps it very similar to the book. But I also feel like there are some surprising and disappointing elements when it takes some of its structural changes to that story and when it changes some of the characters that we see or don't see, and even to Mia Goth's character, which we'll get into in the second half, right? Like nothing against Mia Goth in any way, but the character was just a tad bit disappointing for me.

SPEAKER_02 15:54

Oh, I 100% have a huge disappointment in that realm. And we'll talk all about that in the spoiler zone, but in all reality, right, when you look at this story, how could this be scary? And I think that's what they do with Mia Goth's character and what they do with the relationships and the dynamics between people, when you have to like look at yourself in the mirror and think, who really is the monster here? I think that's supposed to poke at some existential dread, right? Like this is a a story that may have terrified Mary Shelley in the 1800s. But because this is so familiar, this isn't gonna be something that uh is going to alarm you or scare you in any way. But what I will say is this it's a great drama that you can watch with your friends who don't like horror movies, but there's still, surprisingly enough, enough violence and gore in here to really wet your appetite a bit, right? I think more so than Scary Rate, this movie is heavy. We talked about that a little bit ago. It's sad, it's reflective, but the horror here really is just emotional. You're watching ego rot a person from the inside out, and then you're watching someone who's only ever wanted connection become defined by violence that others place on him. And that's the story of Frankenstein. We all know that, but this movie also explores it to a whole new level. So, you know, if you're feeling sad about things and disconnected from people, maybe this ain't the one.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

It is a good point. It is definitely leaning into the drama aspect and like the horrors of the emotions that you feel within this drama. And you're right, I don't think this one is trying to be scary in much of any sense. There are moments of horror in terms of visuals for sure, but this is not a film that has any intention of really trying to scare you.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

There were some moments where it grimaced because of what we saw on screen. Like you mentioned, Chris, it's it's brutal. There's some good, hearty gore. It's not absolutely gory, disgusting, bloodbursting everywhere, right, all the time, but when it hits, you're kind of like, all right, did we have to go that far? Because it seems like we went for like maximum fatality here. It's absolutely kind of wild. But it is balanced enough so that it's not too much. If you can't handle it, that's a different story. But if you can handle it, you just don't prefer it like me. I think it works out well.

SPEAKER_03 18:23

Absolutely. And I think the look of the monster, right, isn't also something to be very wary of. I think intimidation is certainly a factor, especially that, you know, just on the basis that Jacob Alordi is tall as hell. So, I mean, that could be intimidating in and of itself if he's very scary looking and shrouded and whatnot. But I would say for those that, again, are very like against horror, very unaware or unsure of what they're stepping into, Frankenstein is something that you could handle, most definitely. But with the asterisk that there is some mutilation and violence for sure. So if that's not your bag, then maybe just nyx this all together.

SPEAKER_02 19:08

You know what's interesting, making you talk about the violence and the mutilation, and it really just makes me sit back and appreciate the fact that this is the first time I've ever seen a Frankenstein movie that makes me think of, oh wow, the Anakin Skywalker parallels are so there, right? And I cannot wait to talk about that when we get into the characters. But the way that this movie reapproaches this horse material, if you're someone who has seen every other Frankenstein adaptation, you're like, okay, what's the big whoop all about? No, this is still something to watch. Because this adaptation places Victor and the creature on equal narrative footing, right? But it doesn't treat them equally in terms of sympathy. In the Frankenstein films that I've seen, you know, you love to hate Victor Frankenstein, and in this one, it's like, oh, okay, it kind of goes into a different direction. It goes into a completely different degree. You have someone who's framed more so as the monster, not through spectacle, but through choices and intention, where ego becomes a villain. So I think even though this is a novel from the 1800s, this movie still managed to do something different with it, which honestly, word up to Guillermo de Toto, because whoo, boy, what else you got in there?

SPEAKER_01 20:24

It's true. Whether you like the direction of this story or not, you have to give it credit for adapting a classic tale and finding new ways to innovate and tell this timeless tale, right? Because, you know, changing maybe the time that it takes place in, some of the characters, even some of the events, whether you like it or not, you have to at least acknowledge the fact that it was able to do something slightly fresh.

SPEAKER_00 20:48

There's a lot to me that like reminds me of other films. Bram Stoker's Dracula is most definitely one of them in terms of like some of the visuals and some of the styling. The fall, Tarsum Singh. I don't know if you recall that at all, kind of like the cell, but a bit more colorful mostly. Uh, that kind of feeling. But that's also Guillermo Dotoro's style as well. So, like, I don't know, as a story, it feels like all right, we got Frankenstein, but at the same time, it's like spiraling off into its own Fibonacci sequences. And I know the story is obviously based on the novel. I know we took some liberties here and there, but this as a film most definitely kind of feels its own thing. There's moments here where I forgot we were watching Frankenstein. Like I said earlier, it kind of feels like a Grimm's fairy tale in some points, where it feels so fantastical, like it went in this other direction. It's interesting. Like I had literally, I think I made it like halfway through the film, maybe a little bit more than half. And I was like, oh yeah, like back to that story. That's what I forgot that we were doing because this is this like adventure epic. And it's interesting because it it's its own thing, and no other Frankenstein feels like it but at the same time. same time. There's like subtle little moments where it even made me think of young Frankenstein at certain points where I'm like, it kind of touches on some stuff that they also touched on in in sometimes humorous ways and sometimes ways that are obvious nods and sometimes other ways that are probably just in our brains.

SPEAKER_03 22:14

No, absolutely. And Mac, you triggered me with the Tarsom Singh thing because of course I love Tarsim Singh and you're right, like the reds reminded me of that as well. Just beautiful all around. But I think something that called to me again without not much prior knowledge of what the book is supposed to be because I've gosh, I mean I probably started reading it when I was much younger, but I don't remember. I'd love to read it now is it reminded me a little bit of Nasferatu, like this most recent one that we got, because the cool thing about that adaptation was that it changed the perspective and we got to lean in a little bit more on a character that typically in other variations of that story we don't really focus and hone in on. And again, I'm not super familiar with the book and all that. And I've only seen a certain amount of adaptations, but what I have seen feels like it always really centers around Dr. Frankenstein and it's like a cause and effect, right? The impact of his work leads to the creature and so on and so forth. But this time around it feels like we really get to see both sides of the story. Both characters are humanized in a way where we really see the downfall there, there's a lot of complexity to each one of them. And so I I thought that that was really cool that we've gotten at the end of both years, now both in December of last year and now November here, like it's a good holiday moment for classic horror that we are seeing a perspective that we don't typically get. So I thought that that was really neat. I think that again I expected a lot of passion to come through here and it's evident that that was very much the case when from what I'm hearing, right, it's like we're really getting something different while it's still paying its respects to Mary Shelley's novels. So if anything at all this absolutely encouraged I'm sure not just me but lots of other people to want to read the book dive a little bit more into you know the original work. So looking forward to that.

SPEAKER_02 24:17

Dr. Virgin Frankenstein and then also how you're looking at his relationship with the creature the dynamic between them in this movie in particular just makes everything in this movie feel inevitable. Right. And so when you get to this end of this movie right it lands but my one thing about this movie is how exhausting it is because this ending is thematically earned it's emotionally consistent it's great but go back to that word I just mentioned ago inevitable. You're on a journey and this story is going to reach its ends and it's like who damn could we have gotten there any faster because the film is long for sure but the ending carries this full weight of just burden grief pain sorrow like everything it's just you're just trucking through this emotional like molasses and so by the time the end of this movie arrives it's a good ending and I know that there's a change that's made from the original novel and I think it's a good choice but damn I was drained by the time this ending actually wrapped up.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Oh boy this movie ends with like it's basically a sweet kiss goodbye after this long well fought battle that Chris mentioned and it's a bit bittersweet because I think like you said it's consistent. It has closure but it's just so soft. I know we don't always need like an explosive ending to things. We already had the explosion of the plot earlier in the film and everything but it definitely kind of I don't know I feel like if it would have been explosive at the end I might have forgiven it for taking so long to get there a little bit more than I did with kind of how it slowly softly faded out.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

For me the ending is actually one of the things I disliked the most about this movie, unfortunately and it is probably because of the things that they took out of in comparison to the novel the things that straight up just didn't happen. And it left me a little bit disappointed I'm not going to lie.

SPEAKER_03 26:22

Ooh it's interesting I can't wait for us to unpack that and for me to discover what the original source was because I don't know guys I feel like for me this ending was like a really good culmination of what we were getting right like inevitable most definitely. I don't know if I would have expected it to go any other way and I feel like what we got was I mean definitely what you expect out of a gothic literature or a gothic tale that's for sure nothing great that's tell you that much but I can see how when you've been spending so much time and definitely parts of the film that feel like it's dragged on a little bit when you get to that conclusion you're like it's like a release but for me personally I felt like it was pretty cathartic actually. I don't feel like I was deterred by what ends up happening with some of these characters but I'm definitely curious as to what the original ending was supposed to be.

SPEAKER_02 27:19

Well we'll all get schooled on that when we make it to the B side but let's throw ahead and start making our way towards our ratings before we actually score this film. Sean how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_01 27:31

You know there are like quite a few scenes of I don't want body escore throughout this movie right there is dismemberment blood pooling severed limbs cadavers the stitching together of body parts as you can imagine right but it's often obviously tied to the creation of the creature it is graphic and explicit but it never feels like over the top and to me it was a little bit disappointing with the gore specifically because there was so much CGI used for this film. So I would probably give this one just a solid medium gore score.

SPEAKER_03 28:06

And what about the animal report? It is just not good. It's not good at all not even a single bit. It's the dead of winter and that does some things to the animals but it's not even so much that as much as everything else that goes on. So this is your very intense warning it's not pretty it's not pretty folks.

SPEAKER_01 28:26

Well let's go ahead and get into our ratings in Frankenstein from 2025 was it a hack or a slash well I mean I can kick us off here I think Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein is definitely visually stunning. It's a visually stunning reimagining of one of my favorite tales as someone who deeply loves both Mary Shelley's novel, the 1931 classic and a good number of other adaptations and spin offs of this tale and this creature this character as a whole and I went into this one both cautious and hopeful and for the most part I wasn't disappointed. I think this movie is definitely a feast for the eyes the set design is amazing the costume design is fantastic. The entire production feels drenched in that signature Del Toro gothic beauty and the performances are equally as strong I think Jacob Bellordi and Oscar Isaac bring a real emotional weight to the tragedy of creation in consequence but that being said I think what pulled me out of this film a bit were the liberties it took with the story some of the choices what was changed what was left out and how certain characters were reshaped almost felt unnecessary in some moments and it's not that the heart of Mary Shelley's work is missing in this movie but it's been kind of re-stitched into something that doesn't always move quite like the original but still as a film I think it's it's a rich emotional experience that definitely honors the monster's humanity even as it rewrites his myth. So it might not be quite the monster that Mary Shelley built it may be a flawed creation but even with a few missing pieces I think this creation has heart and it still feels alive. So I think it's a slash worth resurrecting.

SPEAKER_02 30:30

Love that I'm gonna go ahead and jump in here because I had a great time watching this with our community and our Discord server. We had a watch party going on we were talking all kinds of trash during the whole chat and it was a great time. But I wouldn't describe this as a movie that really felt great for me. It's not a comfort movie for sure but it's a bummer of a time and it's not something that I'm gonna put on again just to vibe with the atmosphere of if I want to watch Frankenstein I think at this point the things that I've seen is going to be at the bottom of the list of things that I would want to revisit. But but this film what I can say is intentional. It's thoughtful it's deeply well crafted it is objectively a good movie. It's not a fun movie no I watch other Frankenstein movies and it's like this old classic charm that I want to have fun with or I want to watch young Frankenstein and laugh. But this movie knows what it wants to be and it has a story worth telling it's a tragedy about ego about grief about the consequences of refusing accountability and refusing to accept that for yourself. It executes that vision with complete confidence for sure. But I think one of the things that stands out the most for me is there's this beauty here both in imagery and in the literal and figurative language. The script understands the emotional architecture of this story. It's about a creator who can't face his own reflection and their creator who becomes defined by the absence of love. And that is so much more interesting to me than I think just like the obsession of power that maybe we've seen in the past or we've I think it had in past versions of this we spent so much time thinking about if we could that we never asked if we should. But this honestly gives Victor Frankenstein a whole new sense of dimension in a way that I think honestly makes him more interesting and more relatable if not more infuriating. So this is a hundred percent a slash but it's a slash because it is a masterwork of adding texture and depth to characters that are familiar that you've known your entire life but bringing them to life in a new way it honestly should have done some different things with some other characters we'll talk about that later but this is a movie that achieves exactly what it intended to do with precision and with clarity. So I even if I never need to see this movie again it's good and if you can settle in and enjoy a two and a half hour long movie this is the one that you need to watch.

SPEAKER_03 33:12

Absolutely I was really surprised by this film because ultimately I love Giametoro so it wasn't even so much that I was like going into this thinking oh I'm um automatically gonna love this like five star it's fantastic I was surprised by the fact that I wasn't moved in that way what moved me was the fact that we're getting a Frankenstein that I can relate to both characters whereas typically all of these other adaptations have felt to me like just a fun time a madman creating something blah blah blah we know the story. I'm not diminishing those adaptations right I'm just saying that there's a lot of iterations of this story that have felt like niched in a particular like horror comedy genre and I really wanted something serious and I was hoping that Gyameletoro would really see it through. And although I don't feel like up in arms like I was for Nosferatu like screaming from the rooftops in love with this movie, I really do feel impressed by the fact that I left watching this a little bit like curious about what the story really means and really curious about wanting to read the novel now and unpack a little bit more about Mary Shelley's intentions with the themes and the story because I've never felt that way about nor Dr. Frankenstein or the creature. So I think that ultimately this movie although a little bit of a drag in some areas is really worth your time it certainly was worth my time I think that it's something that everyone should at least watch once just to kind of change it up for yourself. If you've seen lots of Frankenstein movies this is different and I think it's worth exploring even if you're a little scaredy cat. You know, it'll be okay I promise just maybe get past a little bit of the violence if you can but I think that you'll leave viewing this thinking about a lot of things about yourself, about mortality about loneliness connection so many themes that maybe have been adapted and and seen through in the horror comedy versions of this but I feel like really lands in this particular adaptation. So for me it definitely was a slash.

SPEAKER_00 35:38

I am so curious to see how this turns out for people watching their first Frankenstein property of any sort because visually I I mentioned that it reminds me of Dracula Ramstokish Dracula film but it also reminds me of that in a different way that movie for me was defining in its depiction of Dracula everything else kind of compares to that even the movies that came before it and that's a weird thing that happens with generations and when you watch it and all that kind of stuff but I'm curious to see if this is going to have that impact for some younger viewers or some people who've never really gotten into it because of that depth and dimension that we've mentioned this goes harder in the paint than any other Frankenstein depiction like whatsoever. And visually stunning it's just an absolute gorgeous film. It absolutely nails pretty much everything it should never have used CGI and it should feel bad for doing so. Sorry Gamber just saying it was a weird choice, bad choice maybe it just wasn't executed as well as you deserved because it didn't work out here but everything else was gorgeous. The costumes were amazing the set pieces were amazing the way that you worked with color it was perfect. Bravo but the story here I think really takes the cake yes it's a little bit too long and it almost felt like we kind of shrunk down a mini series into a film in some ways and in some places but I think overall this is just one of those things I don't want to look away from while I'm watching it because there's too much going on and you have these moments of like it doesn't matter what's happening on screen because it's just too gorgeous. They could literally be talking gibberish and I would just watch them speak gibberish and it would be amazing. But the acting is phenomenal the actors we get here absolutely insane start to finish how on earth did you secure this cast it is so next level with like quality just stunning. So I think overall I could complain about certain things the CGI length of the movie whatever but this is an absolute slash and it's not taking away from the previous Frankenstein for me but I'm pretty sure it's going to define it for others.

SPEAKER_02 37:40

Well what a rousing applause for this film and with that Frankenstein has earned a universal slash now there's still so much more to discuss when we return from the break we have teased significant discrepancies with some of these characters in this movie can't wait to get into that but you can find this movie streaming on Netflix and you can also follow the link in our show notes to join the conversation about this movie in our Discord.

SPEAKER_00 38:04

So go check it out hit pause then come back to us so we can break down these spoilers together we'll see you in a bit to get rid of a body maybe you're all done adding to finally kick the buttons you cover for the hot stopping costs of mortuaries these days whether you need help cleaning up a body or firstly cut a limb Red Dead has got you covered at Red Dead we help you dispose of any cadaver from head to toe and everything in between that's hard as we don't have everything we collect to science. That's right we help licensed reanimators find the perfect parts to sit together their ungodly creations limb by limb.

SPEAKER_02 38:44

We specialize in things they pick up no matter if it's your home, your console or your arc text chip just call 1-800 Red Dead and tell them how I prefer you to get that half off your first removal 1-800 Red Dead because we believe everybody can be reperfect Welcome back folks you're not entering this spoiler zone for Frankenstein from 2025 which has earned a Universal Slash we have a lot to unpack here but before we get into the specifics of our ratings let's go through those kills and let's at least shout out the rats who didn't die in this movie.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

Oh we love it when the rats don't die I think I'm not sure. This is one of those films that definitely makes it tough to keep an accurate account of the kills throughout the movie primarily because of one scene showing the aftermath of a battle making it nearly impossible to count all of the bodies lying dead across the snowy fields so we're gonna go with maybe a rough estimate of like 121 some odd kills in this movie. It feels like a safe number you know what I mean it feels safe enough but there are plenty of other kills to dive into outside of the hundred and so odd dead bodies lying in the snowy fields we have the 21 other deaths that we do see in this film.

SPEAKER_02 40:07

So let's get into them which one of these kills brought you back to life before we get into the rest of the kills I also just want to shout out this film for doing the thing that makes Sean's job easier which is when a lot of bad shit happens inevitably one person's gonna say how many people died and someone's gonna say six. So you get your own little built-in body count it's pretty fucking great yeah it is quite convenient.

SPEAKER_03 40:33

You know I know I do the animal report and all a lot of animals died here. A lot of them true and I know it's gonna be crazy to say that my favorite kill is those wolves but listen I know that they were just doing what they needed to but when they attacked the old man I said nah you got me you gots to go you gots to go I'm sorry you're hungry and I get it it's winter and blah blah blah but you gotta go and so that's my pick folks I know it doesn't really count towards the body count or whatever but I controversial I said it you know less for me about the viejito more for me about the sheep that it you know that it's true apart.

SPEAKER_02 41:14

Also the sheep they just threw that sheep up in the sky it was crazy laughing oh my god it was terrible sheep man yeah it's pretty terrible okay my favorite death was actually Harlander because wow I really love the note about spending a night with Venus and spending the rest of your life with Mercury that was terrible RIP in your syphilis but to have fallen and then to have so thoroughly splatted that the entire back of your head is just gone just caved in or viscerated it was like almost hollowed out it looked like it was gnarly. It was so good so good I honestly had no notes. I also thought how fucked up that Victor killed so many people in this movie and never took fucking accountability for any of it.

SPEAKER_01 42:03

Right? The real unchecked monster of the film for sure you know I'm not the first one to say it but the hunter getting his jaw ripped off was also insane. If you're talking about the wolves getting killed you know I was like dude that hunter getting his jaw just ripped off was fucking brutal.

SPEAKER_02 42:24

Yeah that was great that was 10 out of 10 that was some Michael Myers Jason Voorhees shit.

SPEAKER_00 42:31

Straight up like felt like Punisher Warzone when he caves the dude's face in with a punch. It was just so next level and I felt a bit unnecessary when he used that level of brutality with the wolves you know he could have just scared him or something or like I don't know stomped loudly maybe kicked one at best but he like literally ripped their spine out or snapped them in half and ripped their jaws off as well. There was a lot of people don't like their jaws apparently around the monster it was too much those were all amazing and violent and brutal but when he was taking out the sailors at the beginning of the film he just went in on them and did not care and uppercutted that dude I don't even know what happened like physiologically I don't know exactly like he applied enough pressure the dude backward just yeah dude that's bent as a human that's a classic Mortal Kombat fatality that's Jason Vorhez uppercutting that boxer in Manhattan and just decapitating straight into a dumpster finish him he's to enter the Thunderdome.

SPEAKER_01 43:32

Yeah wild that was like one of the first kills too and you're just like what in the holy shit is happening here and how did that happen?

SPEAKER_02 43:41

Yeah but you know what I just want to point this out and I'm sure there's still some other deaths to talk about but I just want to give a quick little note here because it it works so well. Throughout this entire movie I was just really taking in the design of the creature 10 out of 10 stands out. I feel bad for Jacob who had To get up the night before and sit through the entire day of all this application for this makeup. Interesting that there's no stitches. So love that. But I wouldn't be completely honest if I just held back the fact that the entire time this movie was on, and especially during this kill scene, I was thinking, wow, this is for sure Rob Zombie's Frankenstein. Long scraggly hair and a hoodie? You couldn't tell me this wasn't Halloween 2 2009.

SPEAKER_01 44:31

That never even crossed my mind, but now that you mention it, yeah, dude.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

Look at how fucked up he is. This is like if Michael Myers' Halloween 2 mask was skin on a face. That's what this design is.

SPEAKER_01 44:42

You're putting it out in the universe. Now Rob Zombie has to make a Frankenstein.

SPEAKER_02 44:46

I mean, he kind of already did with the monsters, but we'll get that. The monsters, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:50

Oh boy.

unknown 44:50

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 44:51

That that oh god, that's like a weird thought process of him making a film and this being it. I don't know. The look was cool though, because it like gave me one part kind of Prometheus in a way, you know, and that that was fun. I mean, he looked very intimidating. The muscle outlines everywhere was really cool. There were some parts that looked kind of silly with how they did his his like eye glinting in the darkness, but then again, it was also kind of cool that that they did that as well. I don't know. I didn't I really didn't hate it, and his movements as the monster were Doug Jones level, like not exactly as dramatic, more controlled, more careful. But there's there's points where I was like, is this CGI now? Because I I couldn't tell if it were, because it just looks so real, but at the same time, it looks inhuman the way that he is kind of moving his arms and legs.

SPEAKER_01 45:41

He definitely studied some form of like movement or dance or something.

SPEAKER_02 45:46

He did, and he also studied the movement of his dog.

SPEAKER_01 45:49

Oh, okay. That part I didn't know.

SPEAKER_02 45:51

Yeah, Mac, you'd be surprised how much in this movie is actually practical as opposed to CGI.

SPEAKER_00 45:56

But it's amazing. I mean, as you make it towards the end of the film, it becomes very obvious that he's like putting in the work to make him look good, but I think at first it kind of catches you off guard a little bit because you're kind of like, oh, that can't be real. Like people don't move like that. Maybe Doug Jones, but you know, he's not in this film, so we can't say it's that like always. And nah, dude, like really kind of nailed it. And I want to see him play an alien now. That's how good he was.

SPEAKER_01 46:20

Well, you're right. His look definitely did kind of remind you of this alien being. You know what I mean? It definitely it was like one of the first things that I remember thinking of like, man, this version of the monster definitely feels like we're watching some form of alien versus like a created monster.

SPEAKER_02 46:38

Yeah, he's because he's a tall, lanky, stretchy boy.

SPEAKER_01 46:42

Well, the coloring, the like to your point, the lack of actually seeing stitching and it is based on the illustrated rewriting of Mary Shelley's novel. That look came from that illustrated version of Frankenstein. So it's not like a perfect spit and image, but that's where the idea came from.

SPEAKER_03 47:01

But to me, that kind of makes sense to an extent because if Victor Frankenstein is so skilled, right? I mean, would there be so much like visible like sutures and such? Like, I would imagine that he would be very skilled in I don't know, sewing up together some skin and stuff. And then also, like, why would Frankenstein be green? That's my naivety and not knowing too many adaptations, but I don't know. For some reason, the creature's always green. I don't know why. Where did that even come from? But Rotten decompose would technically be gray. Grass stains, grass stains, rolling and who knows, folks. Who knows? I don't know. I definitely see a little bit of the Prometheus type vibe for sure with the gray and and whatnot, but I don't know, it felt like pretty realistic to me personally. But the other visual component that I've gotta highlight now that we're talking about looks, is Mia Goth, because one thing that the Toro can do and will make sure gets done is some sick costume design and the gothic vibes were insane. But more importantly, what Mia Goth taught me in this film is the value of eyebrows because I will say it here, folks. I did not realize that she played both the mother and Elizabeth until after the film was done and I saw like I guess it was an edit of both like both characters.

SPEAKER_02 48:34

You know, the thought to my thing is I I think I don't think I've ever seen a Miagoth movie where she's just one fucking person because even Infinity Pool, like what's it?

SPEAKER_01 48:42

That's true. That's true. She does like to play multiple characters, doesn't she?

SPEAKER_03 48:46

But Pearl and X. Pearl has eyebrows, she doesn't have eyebrows. It's eyebrows, folks. It does everything, it changes the game.

SPEAKER_01 48:54

It's her trick. She's like, look, this is me with eyebrows, this is me with eyebrows. I can play two characters, let's do this.

SPEAKER_02 49:00

It's very much like the Superman Clark Kent glasses effect. You had eyebrows and then all of a sudden you're a whole different fucking person. For sure.

SPEAKER_00 49:08

Cool. I didn't learn any of that until literally this moment because I didn't pay attention at all. And I just brought up a photo of them of both characters side by side, and that is just mind-blowing.

SPEAKER_01 49:19

Holy I was literally watching the film and I was like, I'm looking at Frank Victor's mom, right, Claire, and I'm like, I know Mia Goth in this movie. Is this Mia Goth? And I was like, for some reason at that moment, I was like, that doesn't look entirely like her. Maybe it's not. And then when Mia Goth showed up as Elizabeth, I was like, oh, there's Mia Goth. And then I was like, wait a second, did she play both roles? Yeah, it was wild.

SPEAKER_02 49:45

Yeah, it's the Mia Goth mouth, you know, like it's a very distinct aspect of her face.

SPEAKER_00 49:50

It's wild. I would love to talk more about those costumes. The costuming work here is like so phenomenal. And this is part of like kind of what reminded me, if you remember, like Dracula's armor in Ramsoker's Dracula, where it's so ornate and it's so interesting and it seems almost anachronistic, but that's probably makes it more correct. But this here, everything was so intricate and ornate. Everybody had some amazing costumes, but then the games that we played with color were next level, just so cool. The red tying things together throughout. When it comes time to have some red gloves, those gloves are one, as red as it gets, and two, it kind of catches you off guard for a moment because you're like, wait, why are his hands bloody? Oh no, those are his gloves. That's amazing. The greens that you get are like the definition of green, like on the color wheel. If you're like, hey, what does a good emerald green look like? That's Miyagoth's dress in this film. It is so vivid and so bright, and the way that we get contrast with the set is beautiful. So everything has that texture, everything has those layers, and then it bounces off of everything around it when there is like candlelight in the room. It's a world of magic. And this is probably why it feels more like fantasy than anything else to me in many parts, because it looks like fantasy, it looks like what fantasy wishes it could be.

SPEAKER_01 51:13

For sure. Yeah, it's true. And the other thing that really adds to that is what we have talked about, and it's the set design because the use of practical sets, the hand-building, hand painted, like really structurally built sets that brought these things to life was absolutely insane, right? Even when we think of like the ship and we think of all these different settings, it really just adds to everything that you're seeing and making this feel like such an epic tale. And when we're looking at all of these things, that's where it becomes so disappointing that they didn't use that much practical effects for the gore and stuff like that, right? Like, why lean so heavily into a lot of visual effects, even for the animals, right? Some of those moments kind of take you out of the immersion of this film because of how they looked. But outside of all of that, this movie can't live without the score. The score for this movie was absolutely brilliant, and I want to highlight it for a very specific moment. And I know this may be somebody's favorite scene. I don't know if anyone's gonna talk about that, so I'm not gonna dive super far into that scene, but I am going to highlight the score because as we start to build on the creation of this monster, we get this like really interesting contrast that kind of oddly works really well. Like you're you're starting to piece together this monster, you're sawing off limbs of cadavers of dead bodies, right? You're sawing off legs and arms and shit like that. And the score is very like whimsical, it's very uplifting, it's so interesting, and I just couldn't help but notice that as I was watching those moments, I was like, holy shit, like what a weird pair, but it oddly just works.

SPEAKER_02 53:12

Sean, see, this is exactly my favorite scene in the whole movie. Less about the actual lightning strikes and more about the preparation of it because this is an aspect we haven't seen. And you think back to the original Frankenstein and how horrified people were about the idea of grave robbing and stealing these bodies, etc. But now we actually get to see it front and center. This is the scene where Victor is dissecting and assembling the creature, and it feels honestly like a large part of the thesis of the film, right? It's methodical, it's obsessive, it's reverent, but it's also horrifying. There is so much uh violence and brutality, and he is just so normalized with this. This is his work, and Yermo Lodoto really wanted to make him like a rock star artist, more so than like a doctor who's obsessed with science. And obviously he has that obsession, but this scene is such a great representation of that because it is the clearest expression of his identity before the consequences really appear. As it were, it's the fucking around before he finds out.

SPEAKER_01 54:22

Yeah, for sure. But listen, I think this is a safe space to bring this up. Am I crazy in thinking that there was a specific moment in the creation of this monster that was giving Bella coming back to life as a vampire in Twilight?

SPEAKER_03 54:37

First of all, that coming from you is historical. Notate it, folks, because Chris and I didn't even bring that up. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 54:47

It was my first thought as soon as that scene hit, or that part of that scene hit. I was like, wait a second, I've seen this before.

SPEAKER_02 54:53

I love that so much because I was also thinking less about that and more about when he shows up at the bed. He's all in his wraps and like, oh wow, they really made Frankenstein look like the mummy. That's so great. And then here I was, just sitting on the Twilight reference.

SPEAKER_03 55:06

Listen, I've got one more because technically Alexandra Desplot, who did the score for this, also did the score for New Moon. So we're not really too far off in the Twilight.

SPEAKER_01 55:16

The pipeline is just saying.

SPEAKER_02 55:18

Okay. I'm just saying. Playing the thick old pipe done to get these two things connected.

SPEAKER_00 55:23

I don't have a follow-up on the thick old pipe, but I gotta throw out my favorite scene because it is Harlander and Victor walking through the shambles to get to Victor's residence so that Harlan Harlander can proposition him. How fitting is it that he would live in a butcher alley? It's so perfect. Is it in the novel? I don't know. I'm gonna read it, I'm gonna find out. But that visual of them walking through in the street is like cobbled and there's blood flowing down the street as if it were water. Perfect. The fact that Harlander hops over it like no big deal to get into the house, also perfect for the character. And then once they get in, there was a weird tension, and I wasn't sure if we were gonna go a different direction, but Harland definitely was giving that he had a thing for Victor in that moment, and I was getting like it was a little tense, so he got right up in his face, and I was like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, where are we going with this? Their discourse, like after him presenting at the school, and then now he is like a heat-seeking missile, knows what he wants from Victor, saw it happen in real life, and it's in his house, and it's like, no, I'm gonna offer whatever it takes to make this happen. That was just so perfect after walking through butchery and blood flowing down the street, and it was like, Oh, these are both predators, these are both animals. And the coming together here is so interesting to see this happen. Favorite scene, I think, for me in the film to see this merger of distorted minds that don't yet realize the monstrosity of everything that they're thinking and doing. But to have all of that follow up, this almost academic, not very interesting, but not quite academic portrayal of him showing off his little creation with the arm and everything. That was fun. That was a great scene. I loved that as well. But seeing the two of them finally interact afterwards was awesome.

SPEAKER_02 57:06

Yeah, Mac is really on his energy of I want to see two toxic people who are gonna be terrible for each other before they start dating.

SPEAKER_00 57:13

Right. It's the origin story. You want to see it happen. You want to see it's like, you know, a hunter and its prey almost, except both of them are hunters and they're both, like you said, toxic.

SPEAKER_01 57:23

Oh my gosh. I think to your point though, like even there's two moments where we see Victor kind of playing with his like early stages of creation or his testing, right? Like you're talking about that like whatever it was, like a lecture or a presentation or whatever it was where he kind of like showcases how he can hit the nervous system and bring this half quarter person dead thing back to life. And I think just that moment was super cool because of just the way that you know, even though it was very like you could tell there was some CGI used and stuff like that, it was very cool to see, and like the sounds felt really good, and it was just like a good way to kind of like get out of the intro to the film and like right into like the vibes of like Victor trying to trying to really showcase his passion for you know bringing something back from the dead and and whatever it is, and that is really cool. But even the testing that's later on in the tale where he has like the person that's hunched over and his back is split open and he's like trying to tap into those different things through the spine section and stuff, really fucking cool to look at, really horrific to look at, really, when you really think about it. And just like those moments, I guess if you could call any moment that would give any kind of semi-jump scare, it would be the moments where he finally, even though you know it's coming, he finally gets that hits that right nerve or whatever it is to bring that thing to life. And it's just so jarring when it does happen.

SPEAKER_03 59:04

I think for me, it's a little tough to pick like a favorite scene because I think a lot of like small bits stand out, but a character that we haven't really talked about too much, aside from me ranting about the fact that she was two different people, eyebrows and without eyebrows, is Elizabeth. And I think that a moment that comes to me right now is like that banter, that introduction of her at the dinner. You know, first of all, just like her costume in and of itself is just I don't know, it's staggering. You're kind of like shocked by her beauty and just the overall look, but it's her wit and her clap back, for lack of a better word, that I think it was really fun and fresh. And honestly, it kind of sucks that we didn't get a little bit more from Elizabeth. I think I would have liked more of her presence, and I guess I can't ask for too much when I'm already talking about a two and a half hour-long movie that gave us a lot about characters that we didn't really typically get. I just really appreciated this kind of version of Elizabeth that again I'm not super familiar with other versions of, aside from I guess, like the OG stuff. But I don't know, I I liked the way that she presented herself and kind of was very self-assured in that moment. So I don't know, I was kind of hoping that we'd get a little bit more of that throughout.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:31

So here's my struggle. I didn't really like Elizabeth. I love the confessional scene. I thought she was funny, but like the further she goes on, it very much for me was the same way that I was upset in Halloween ends when Allison is just relegated to being somebody's love interest. Elizabeth seems interesting because there's depth, there's sympathy, there's empathy. She can honestly add a lot of dimension to the creature's experience. But for me, it was just like okay, so y'all really just fucking sent it. Obviously, was not satisfied marrying William, didn't really want either of the fucking brothers, but wanted the fuckable monster. What's up with that? Come on, you saw him one day, two times on one day, but you're gonna then throw out these uh again, absolute banger of quotes, like great dialogue all around. But she's talking about this beautiful aspect of love, right? To be lost and to be found, that is the lifespan of love, and in its brevity, it's tragedy. This has been made eternal. Better this way to fade with your eyes gazing upon me. Ma'am, you were about to get married 20 minutes ago. What the fuck are we doing? Sorry. Well, I just i I struggle.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:53

Yeah, it was just the choice to make Elizabeth like this weird side love interest that never came to be when that was never the intention of the character. So that was a liberty that this movie took. I don't think it's any shame to me a goth because I think she did the best she could with what she was given, but I just think the choice to make Elizabeth Williams' wife to be, and for there to be this kind of like interest, like almost like uh side thing with Victor just didn't feel right.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:31

Yeah, for you to be William's fiance, but maybe you're interested in Victor, but then also I recognize like hey, you see what Victor's all about. Good for you for not fucking going down that path. I get it 100%. I'm aligned. Yeah, I have no issue up until we get the show with the monster, and I'm like, what the creature, sure, but like, ah fuck, come on, guys. This is where I feel like this character was misstepped because we could have just gotten a great, like, platonic kind of love, but it just felt way too romantic there at the end, and it felt very like for all the sense she had, for all the presence she had, with how dynamic her character felt and how much dimension she added, it was then like really just saying, Hey, let's just abandon all that and just really make this like a romantic love interest angle. And it felt so sudden and so unearned that it was frustrating for me.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:33

It's interesting. We have one of our patrons in the chat just brought up something that as you guys were speaking, I completely agree with. She mentioned something that like Elizabeth could have been a great foil for Victor Frankenstein, and I think that that hits the nail on the head because when I first saw Elizabeth, and again, I'm talking about how much I enjoyed her wit and her banter and and all that, for the moments that we got it. I actually considered her relationship and her purpose to be kind of like this example of nurture and motherhood. And that's really what started it all, right? Is Victor losing his mom, and that's what you know starts this journey and his obsession with death and mortality and reviving that sense of nurture that he got from his mother. And I thought that Elizabeth definitely has those qualities as she has that towards the creature. But then when it does take that pivot, you know, that you can't deny in the romantic scheme of things, that's where it's gets I agree, it gets very unfortunate because it could have been a great foil. It could have been like, I am the representation of what you've lost in a different way, and here's what I could provide to your family in the family structure, right? It doesn't have to be with Victor particular, but just I mean, his brother, the creature, etc. But it just gets a little bit murky and it also runs so quick for how little screen time we really do get of Mia Goth, anyways.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:07

Yeah. It was too little for playing two characters, you know what I mean? Very strange. And look, even outside of Mia Goth, I think that obviously we've talked a lot about Jacob Alordi as the creature and the look that he portrayed, the way that he moved as the creature, and we can talk even more about how effectively he conveys vulnerability and intelligence and confusion and rage and all of these things all in one, a really standout performance. But I also think, and we've touched on it, you know, Oscar Isaac as Victor Frankenstein really brings a certain charisma to the role that we hadn't seen before. And we've talked about the look, right? And and how Guillermo del Toro wanted him to be more of that rock star look, which is very cool, really cool choice. But just the performance as Victor Frankenstein as a whole. Like the ambition and emotional weight that he brought to the character, I think is something to be said for sure. Really, really great performance as well. I just like the one thing that I think bothered me, and it's just like, why did we go so hard in the paint to hating this monster like right away? You know what I mean? Like, you spent so much time really obsessing over creating this thing, and like we spent very little time getting to the point where we didn't want anything to do with it. Like you really treated this poor creature like some stray dog.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:37

Generational trauma. He became what he hated most, which was his own father.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:43

Yeah, Papa Frankie. Yeah, getting slapped in the face with that stick, you know? Terrible. Terrible.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:50

They almost could have laid it on thicker when it came to showing their relationship. I mean, they gave us a good little bit of it, but I feel like it could have gone a little bit older in his story, and I would have kind of liked to see how things would have evolved. You know, would he have been a rebel in his teenagehood, or would he really just have stayed, I don't know, compliant the whole time? I don't know. I liked seeing it as a kid. I think that was a great touch to see kind of like where his ambition comes from and why he's so driven. That was really solid. And then we kind of jump into adulthood just so fast. This would have been a great miniseries, to be honest. But that jump was interesting. We get it. He's ambitious, he's really driven. But Oscar Isaac was, I think, the right choice to have someone show that off because you think you're supposed to like him, you know he's really cool. Come on, we get it. But you just immediately realize like I could not survive around this guy because he would drive me crazy. Because he's just so into the things he's into, and everything else does not matter.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:51

Yeah, but hey, let's just stay on the Poe Dameron of it all and go back to that Star Wars connection because yeah, young Victor honestly just all it takes is one deeply emotional, misguided boy to lose the only woman he cares about, which is his mother, to then suddenly turn to the darkness within him. He is a representation of the path to hell that was paved in good intentions. And that's what I love so much about this look at Victor Frankenstein, because again, it's less about the sheer pride and just the fascination with science, but it's everything that happened to him from a very early age to make him give a fuck about doing that. Like, yes, he wanted the power, he wanted to be the best, he wanted to be able to cheat death, but why did he want that? And I love getting that take of it. And honestly, Mac, to your point, this honestly would have been a great mini-series, and that's where I think I struggle with this movie with its pacing because it does feel like a little bit of a labor in terms of how long it is. Yes, it's deliberate for sure, it works with the thematic depth, but there are some emotional cold spots where yeah, maybe we could have ditched a little bit of that and got a little bit more of something else, especially around Elizabeth and even her significance to the creature himself. So ah man, I I would be interested in seeing if somebody could cut this up in a in smaller chunks to make this feel better.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:27

Yeah, for sure. And listen, I feel like I can sit here and say that like I think maybe the worst part of this movie is the ending, and there's a lot of truth to that, but I also want to highlight before we get through talking about this movie, that I think maybe one of the other parts that I really didn't like is the way that this movie kind of stripped the creature or the the I guess the best way to put it is I really dislike the way this movie stripped the monster from the creature, right? So, like we we do humanize the creature a lot in this movie, and it's not to say that the novel doesn't do so as well, but there is a really great balance to how the monster shows up as this horrific monster in the novel that also like is just a it's a good balance between humanizing and having this empathetic view of the monster versus this horrific part of the monster, and I don't think we really dive into that side of this creature in this movie, which I think was a little bit disappointing, right? Like there is and a lot of that also has to do with the changes to the story and the changes to the characters, right? Because they're not all depicted in the same way, they're not even like all tied to Victor in the same way, and so it's just very interesting. Like, we see a lot of the monster in this one killing people, but a lot of it is just due to like defense, right? Or is just due to like trying to get to Victor physically or something like that, where in the novel we really see the monster like straight up murdering, like straight up going and murdering Victor's family, like killing, you know, killing William or killing Elizabeth on their wedding night, right? Like it's just very, very it's a different tone. And I think that it doesn't necessarily have to be the exact same thing, but when you take all of that away, it feels like you're missing a piece of the monster that makes it the monster.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:47

There's something about this monster that has not kind of sat right with me this whole time, and it's especially shown when he can move the ship so easily. But it's I this idea that I think a lot of larger than life characters, a lot of very strong characters, end up becoming superheroes within their own films. He's not quite there, but it's like almost there. And there's some moments in the novel, can he heal from being shot by bullets? I don't know. Again, I'm gonna read it soon, we're gonna find out. But like that went a little far in this, and I understand that he wants to kind of be as mortal as his creator. But at the same time, it reaches a new level where it's like he's gonna get a cape and tight soon because we're almost headed to that direction. It went a little bit too far. I could complain about the CGI, I think like Chris mentioned, it's small, and so in those moments you're kind of like, ah, I get it, you know. You're really good at the practical stuff, so the other stuff, you know, we'll stomach through it. It's not the quite the worst part of the film for me, but it's this idea that like when you finally really start to appreciate Frankenstein and Frankenstein's creature here as these beings, these real life mortal beings who are like going through emotions to have one of them show up and just kind of be impenetrable, you know, to be super strong, to kind of be too perfect. He can't fly, but he's getting so close to Superman in those regards that it's just a little bit too far for me.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:13

I bet if he jumped, he'd be fine. He'd probably just chill for a little while. Stick the landing.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:18

ACLs of steel.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:20

You bring up a good point about just kind of like this yeah, Superman of it all of the creature. I hadn't really considered that because again, I guess I just didn't know whether that was actually like something he could do in the original stuff. But I struggle to kind of think of a worst part that isn't maybe just like the pacing. I do want to comment on like maybe the worst part is the uncertainty, uncertainty, maybe the word in terms of the balance that you're talking about, Sean. Because uh you brought up a point that I was like kind of shocked by because I think for me, I was actually like really digging what I thought to be a good balance of the creature and the monster. But I guess in the way that you phrased it, it made me think like, you're right. I mean, a lot of the violence that he ensues is of self-defense. So it's so easy for me to empathize for the monster at that point or the creature, right? And not the monster. Whereas with Victor, I feel like we typically just instantly know that he is a madman and like maybe the quote unquote villain to some extent, or perceive him that way to be, because of his just grandiose nature. But in this film, yeah, I don't know. I felt like this was an opportunity for me to kind of understand some motive and understand why he is the way that he is. There was like real purpose for him. And so maybe the worst part is that it wasn't like really clear. And after two and a half hours, you would think that it would be very clear where we stand with both of these characters. There is a balance to both because you've had enough time to really flesh that out. And it's very evident that that really wasn't the case. I mean, that could also be the best part, right? Some may view that as the best part where it's like, that's the interpretation of the film. But maybe for me, I'm viewing it as like, okay, there was an opportunity there to be a bit clearer about these two characters, if that's where you're going with this adaptation.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:20

And I think we've kind of touched on the fact that each of the major characters here, Victor and his monster, are kind of both, like you said, the hero and the villain. I would like to re-watch this with somebody who's interpreting it from the point of view that society is the real villain here, that all of this happened because we can't accept our own death and our own mortality because of everything that has come before and the idea that we have to have legacies, at least in Victorian era. But like, I don't know. That would be a fun time to rewatch, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:51

You know, my struggle is I watched this in our watch party. It was great, loved it. Oh, I loved the experience of it. I liked the movie a lot. But then I tried three times to re-watch this movie, and I fell asleep a couple times. And I wasn't even remotely tired at that point. This movie is too long now. I re-watched it, I think at this point, cumulatively, probably about three and a half times. And I in this camp of I'm so glad that I saw it, but I do not need to see it again anytime soon. Because again, if I want to watch Frankenstein, which I kind of still am Jones in for, I'm gonna go watch the originals and I'm gonna go explore and experiment and see what else is out there. While I know that there is this work of art that Guillermo del Toro put together and that exists now, it is out there.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:42

Yeah, I by no means would say that this is one of my favorite Guillermo del Toro movies. That's that would be extreme, let's be honest. But I I did watch this movie sick as hell. So the fact that I didn't fall asleep is really just a shock. I would definitely watch it again when I'm not sick with a fever, but you know, I'll give it some time, I think. I'll give it some time. It's not one that I would like re-watch constantly every spooky season, personally, but if I ever really wanted to appreciate a classic tale like with a Guillermo touch, I might throw it in if I were to do like a binge watch of some of his things within a week, but would recommend to people to at least watch once in their life.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:32

For sure. It's definitely worth watching a hundred percent. It is overall a really good movie. I don't know how many times I will watch this one. This is definitely not the only time I'm gonna watch it. I have only watched it once. I definitely think that there is more to pull out of this movie, and one watch just isn't enough. So it's definitely something that is worth revisiting for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:57

Well, we'll see how it fares once you've given it three and a half times its on its own, Sean. But for now, there you have it, folks. Frankenstein, at least the 2025 edition, has earned a universal slash. And we've certainly had a robust discussion here, but the conversation doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:13

It doesn't, because if you want to find out how you can experience life after the death of this episode, consider supporting the show by visiting patreon.com/slash hackerslash. This is where you can enjoy even more of the show, including bonus content with early access, extended episodes with our B sides, movie nominations, and live shows.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:34

We'll see you next time, folks. Remember, believing something does not make it true.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:39

Is anything