[MUSIC PLAYING] This episode is brought to you by Experian. Are you paying for subscriptions you don't use, but can't find the time or energy to cancel them? Experian could cancel unwanted subscriptions for you, saving you an average of $270 per year, and plenty of time. Download the Experian app. Results will vary. Not all subscriptions are eligible. Savings are not guaranteed. Paid membership with connected payment account required. [MUSIC PLAYING] Get three coffins ready, kid, because our latest podcast, Make My Day, is venturing off into the wild and sprawling frontier that is Clint Eastwood's career. More movies than Stephen King has books and more genres than all of the franchises we've covered over at the Halloweenys. Now, I know what you're thinking. Do they really need to start another show? Well, to tell you the truth and all this excitement, I kind of lost track myself. But being this is a podcast, the most powerful medium in the world for pop culture conversation, and Clint's output is infinite. You've got to ask yourself one question. Do I feel lucky? Well, do you, punk? Find out today and subscribe to Make My Day, a Clint Eastwood podcast now, wherever you get your audio. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] Flashes, huh? What's your favorite scary movie? Not that one. [LAUGHS] [MUSIC PLAYING] And welcome back to Horror Queers. We're talking Amaya Papaya. We're talking cryptocurrency and trepination. And we're talking it's game night. And I'm Joe. And I'm Trace. And we're talking should Matthias live. And depending on which ending you watched, [INAUDIBLE] That four endings, Joe. I don't even-- [LAUGHS] Everyone, we are discussing Stephen Sisko's unfriended sequel, Unfriended Dark Web, from 2018. I'm excited. We're returning to the off-not-discussed-on-this-podcast "Green Horror Subgenre," Trace. We've only ever covered one other title. And that was host for Patreon. God, way back during the pandemic, huh? Everyone, go listen to our episode on host from Jesus Christ four years ago. Yeah, it's been a while. It's been a while. I can't believe we've never done another one of these. Because I mean, we both like these types of movies, right? I mean, we all know that I love the den. But I mean like even something, you know, like searching, missing, like all the-- I love this narrative gimmick. Me too, yeah. And I find that the people who do it tend to do it quite well. So yeah, I'm excited for tonight. I am too. But before we get any further, let's introduce our guest who is waiting in the wings. Everyone, she is the programming director at the review cinema, Toronto's oldest operating cinema. She is also the creator and lead programmer for Drunken Cinema, a shocker, Toronto-based monthly game series devoted to extreme filmaholics. And finally, she is the co-host of Movies and Chaos, a podcast on cult movies and their legacies. Please welcome Serena Whitney. Hi, thanks for having me. That was like quite the introduction. Oh, well, thank you. Thank you for your trial. No, thank you. But welcome, Serena, to unfriended dark web. Now, OK, Joe, let me in on a little secret that you-- he sent you kind of a list of things you could pick from. And nothing was really speaking to you, but you settled on this. So out of all the ones that didn't speak to you, why did this one speak to you the most? I like screen life movies. And I was a little scared that just here in your intro, I'm like, oh, good. You guys like screen life movies good. [LAUGHTER] I have a theory that the more time you spend your own screen life. You probably like these movies. But I saw the original-- the first film was called Cybernatural at Fantasia. And Joe, did you go to that too? I didn't know. I didn't catch any of these until they hit BOD. Oh, OK. It was pretty unexpected to see. And there was even a different death in the movie that I just rediscovered because I was like, oh, I'm waiting for this fun death where a girl falls through a search engine and gets killed through a search engine. And I didn't know about this. Wait, was that the original ending of the film? No, it was the girl Jess, the one who dies with the curling iron? Oh. No, she originally got zapped into the computer and there was these ads playing. And then she just starts falling and getting killed on the way down. Oh, interesting. OK, that sounds like unfriended, had a baby with a nightmare in Elm Street. And I'm kind of here for it. Like, that sounds-- It's the most memorable part. And that's why I don't understand why they didn't keep it. I get why. They're probably because it was so campy and weird. Yeah, it's a little bit odd, yeah. Yeah, so-- Well, OK, wait, so before we even dive in a dark web, then I guess, are you a fan of the first unfriended? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I like the second one more, though. Oh, OK, interesting. Joe, what about you? Yeah, you know what? I'm kind of in the same boat. I know that the first film has a bit of a bad reputation because people really love to hate those characters. Well, I would argue people hate to hate those characters because most of the complaints I see are people being like, well, they're so unlikable. And I was like, yeah, we're here to watch them die. Yeah. Which is why I do think that the second film is a little bit more palatable to people because this group is generally nice. They make some pretty bad decisions along the way. Most of them, you know, falling on Mattias's hands. But I think that people end up then disliking the end of this film because it's not as gratifying when, yeah, spoiler alert, folks, all of these people have a really unhappy end and people feel bad about that because we actually liked these ones. Yeah, and that's what makes it scarier to me. OK. Yeah, I felt that, first of all, this is a situation that could happen. You know, I don't feel like the internet was really played to the best of its abilities in this movie. But I do think that this is something that people are scared of. I'm not scared of a ghost girl trying to kill me. Yeah. But I am scared of sex traffickers and hackers online. Yeah, for me, it's a thing more. So I do actually think this is a better movie than Unfriended. I do enjoy Unfriended more as a watchability thing because I do think, yeah, this one is not a happy movie. And I mean, you could argue the first Unfriended isn't happy either. But I think part of the entertainment of that movie is watching these asshole characters just get their come up. And then, I mean, spoiler alert, but the reveal that the main girl at the end was actually like the mastermind behind the bullying. I just, like, just kiss that. That wasn't what I watched it again now. I was like, why did she not just tell the truth? Well, because she's an asshole. Yeah. She's not a good friend. They know through the whole-- she finds out through this weird forum link that, hey, you have to confess your sins. You have to confess. And if you admit it to telling your friend to go kill themselves, why can't you admit to making the video? But I will say, I think the reason I don't prefer Dark Web to Unfriended is because at the end of the day, this just reminds me too much of the den. Like this, I saw this thing where I was like, oh, yeah, it's really amaging the den. And I was like, honey, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, the den wasn't big enough to be homage. It really feels like this writer saw the den and said, I'm going to do something like that too. Because there are so many things in this that I feel like mirror that film. I never seen the den. I got to watch it now. It's a good time. It's a really good time. This reminds me of my little eye. That's what I-- have you seen my little eye? It's like a Canadian horror film. Yeah. And it was about-- they're filming like a big brother TV show. It's going to say, yeah, it's almost like a reality TV where they've got every room cameraed up and stuff. Yeah, and it's Chris Lemke. I loved him. He was like the drug dealer in Ginger Snaps. So he's one of the guys. And then Bradley Cooper's in it as one of the fucking sex trap, like one of these really creepy guys. And it was-- it didn't have the internet component. But it was very similar to what they're getting into. With the den-- and everyone again, like you all know how much I love this movie. But like the den came out in 2013. It predates "Unfriended." And it's basically about this girl who is doing a sociology project for grad school. And she's using this website called "The Den," which is basically this movie's version of "Chat Roulette," and then gets involved in dark web-type shenanigans. I do think it's legitimately scary. And so when I finally saw "Dark," well, finally, I did see this at the South my Southwest premiere. I was like, oh, yeah, it's good. It's just a lesser version of "The Den" for me. Like that's what this movie is. But I still like it. Yeah, it's tricky, right? I mean, it's hard not to compare films, particularly when you have such a relationship with a trace. But I mean, having seen them both, but having seen this film, I think, before I saw "The Den." I was like, oh, yeah, I can see the similarities. But to me, they're very different films, just because-- Sure, yeah. Yeah, I saw this film. I think I was a Montreal for the Fantasia Film Festival, too, because it came out in July. And it was also weird. I remember watching it 2018, thinking, who does this? Who goes on Skype to play games with their friends? Yeah. And then, like, I don't know-- Pass forward two years. Yeah. That's all we're doing. But I remember the time. It was just super jarring. Like the first one I could understand, like, people hanging out on Skype, just not playing games, just saying, hey, what's going on? But for some reason, I thought these 20-something's playing cars against humanity, and I'm like, this is-- I feel like, though, especially with horror films, like, whenever films deal with technology in a certain way, I'm even going back all the way to Scream 4, when people were like, oh, "Harmon--" Jill's motive is so unrealistic. And it's like, well, fast forward five years, and it's actually quite realistic. I feel like a lot of these movies-- not all of them. But they can be very prescient when it's like, oh, they actually do predict how we use these things in the future. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, technology, this movie, I feel it's still scary. I think even now, it's still scary to watch. And it's sad. I think it's got one of the best deaths through a 911 call, which was so creepy. Yeah. I love how Serene is like, it's a really sad death. And she's like, yeah. Because that's one of those things. Yeah, this movie isn't a happy movie. Like, this is actually quite sad. Don't steal laptops, even if they're lost and found. But just don't do it. But that-- I know the way you're talking about it. It's AJ's death series. One of those things where you know what's going to happen and the buildup to it is so-- It's really effective. And you know what's coming. You're just like-- Oh, yeah. And I didn't know about the different endings. So thank you for telling me, because I watched them on YouTube today. Oh, boy. Because the only ending I've seen is the same one I've seen. It's the one that they use for them. It just gets mowed down on the screen, right? Yeah. That's the one I saw on theaters as well. Which I think it's one of only two that actually works. And then there's two that just, I don't think, are effective at all. Yeah. How about we'll talk about the end when we get to it, because we can discuss which ones we like the best. Wait, I'll just dive into the corrections. Shockingly, there actually wasn't a ton of information about this one. And again, the only extra feature on the Blu-ray are the three extra endings, which is boo. I want to hear directors and editors talk about how they make these, because it just seems so laborious. I have some details, not a ton. But yeah, something happened with this movie, because even the release for this movie was much more like-- Yeah, I don't know what it was. And it's weird, though, because Universal Pictures released this internationally. But it was O-T-L releasing that distributed this in North America. But I guess that's part of Universal. But it was also this B-H, Blumhouse tilt band. Nevertheless, it wasn't the same. Because it's opened in about half the theaters that Unfriended did. Yeah. You know what? It was funny, because I loved Unfriended when I saw it at the festival. Again, it was called Cybernatural, which I'm glad they changed the name. It was such a dumb name. But I took my family to see Unfriended. And I'm like, oh, you guys see this movie. Yeah. My family just-- they don't have much screen life in their life. So they were like, this is it? This is what we're watching. Oh, this is the movie. Yeah, from the next hour and a half. But you know what they did like? They liked searching. They loved searching. So that's why you say-- Searching is great. Whenever a host came out, I went to go see my parents in Houston. And basically, my husband and I, we showed them a host, and Unfriended, and Searching in a row. After Searching, my dad was like, can we watch a normal movie, please? I remember I showed a host to my brother when you weren't supposed to have people over, but he used to come over anyway during the pandemic. Because he was like, I'm lonely. I'm like, OK, well, we can risk this. I can risk this for one person. You know, you built your-- Your bubble. Yeah, your bubble. And then we watched hosts. It was late at night. And it was like, it's an hour-long movie. And I'm like, OK, well, good night. He was like, I'm not leaving. I'm scared. I'm terrified. I'm going to just go to sleep on your couch. And I'm like, OK. And that movie was really scary. But Unfriended kind of did it first. But we all were in the same situation, I think, host really resonated with everybody. I mean, you're talking how I feel about the den. The den did it first. Oh, yes, the den did it first. You're right, sorry. No, no, but that's the thing, is like, again, it's a bit of what gets seen on more eyes. And Unfriended was that film. So yes, this is a sequel to-- the director of Unfriended is Leo Gabriazzi. In this movie, screened at festivals in 2014. And this is one of Blumhouse's major success stories. Because yeah, after running that festival circuit, Unfriended was released on April 17, 2015, and earned 63 million worldwide on a production budget of 1 million hours. OK, that's real good, real good. Yes. Now granted, that 63 million was split between domestic and international. So it made about 32 million domestically. But again-- Still good. Like, it made 15 million opening weekend. It was already profitable. Yeah. For a movie where you have actors in different rooms just filming this, I think one time they did it at one take. They did try to do that. Well, because Shelley Hennig, the girl who plays like the head bitch, who you don't know, is the bitch in Unfriended. Basically, because she asked the director like, can we just do one full run through of the movie in one take and like, he obliged her on that? But interesting. Weirdly enough-- so in March of 2016, Deadline reported that the net profits on Unfriended were roughly $17.3 million, which means $46 million was spent on marketing and any like, participations or residuals that they owed people, which-- that seems like a lot for that movie. It seems high, yeah. Nevertheless, a sequel to Unfriended was greenlit almost immediately, exactly 10 days after it opened. But here's the thing. At that time, the screenwriter was reported in a bloody disgusting exclusive to be Nelson Greaves, the writer of the first film with a planned release window of Spring 2016. So like, literally the next year. Right. That didn't happen. No. So cut to October of 2017, well past that planned release window, we've got another bloody disgusting exclusive that now say, OK, hey, the movie is called Unfriended Game Night. At that time, they reported the sequel had already been filmed in secret and had just had a test screening done earlier that month. And on the plot, they reported it uses the same computer screen format. It tells the story about a teen who comes into possession of a new laptop and finds that it may have been stolen. He discovers the previous owner may be watching every move he makes and will do anything to get it back. So this is kind of right. Yeah, I mean, that's pretty much the basic premise. But they're trying to keep the specifics under lock and keys. So six months later, March of 2018, an untitled Blumhouse film made its way on the screening schedule at that year, South by Southwest Film Festival. And I was there. And for some reason, I thought it was Unfriended Game Night, but then I realized, no, it was untitled Blumhouse Film, but everyone pretty much knew it was unfriended the sequel. People have a tendency to figure these things out relatively early, like South by Southwest and Fantastic often try to do these kind of secret. Ooh, it's going to be mystery universal film, mystery Blum And everybody's like, well, it's one of these two films. And then everybody has like a 90% guarantee. Yeah, it's like that wasn't the first time whenever they showed "Don't Breathe." It was on a schedule as untitled Fede Alvarez film. And we learned the title when the title card popped up on screen. And so with-- That's fun. With Dark Web, yeah, Blum comes out and introduces it and says, oh, it's actually called Dark Web. Apparently, one of the reasons they changed it from Game Night was because Game Night came out literally the month before South by Southwest premiere. Yeah, that's just some bad timing. Yeah, it's bad timing. I mean, Dark Web, I mean, it gets the message across still about what you're going to watch. I think it's actually more effective as a horror film title, right? If you see Game Night, you're probably going to think, oh, maybe it's a bit more of a horror comedy, like a ready or not kind of thing. I agree, but I actually do prefer the title unfriended Game Night, just because I like the irony of the title. Sure, yeah. One of the reasons why I like this film a little bit more than the first one is that it feels more or rated and it's PG-13. There are things that disturb me about this movie more. It's R, it's R. It's R? Yeah, OK, I'm glad you brought that up, Serena, though, because when I was doing research for this and I found an article that I wrote after this South by Southwest premiere where I was talking to-- I think I guess I talked to Stephen Cisco, because when I walked out of this South by Southwest premiere, I also thought it was PG-13. Now, at the time, it wasn't rated yet, but I was like, this is clearly going to be PG-13. Maybe it's because we're not seeing gore and violence. Maybe because it's different in Canada. I think it was like 14 A maybe, but everything is-- anything R in the States is like, you could be 14 to see it unless it's really bad. It has to have sex in it, and then it's 18 A. Well, and so for this one, the American rating reason for the R is some disturbing violence, language, and sexual references. And I would argue-- Sexual references. I mean, I don't even think they say fuck in this movie. If they do, it's maybe once. But the thing that I imagine got them, the R rating, is the Trephonation scene. Oh, my god. Even just not even that scene, but just the describing of it. Super disturbing. It's so disturbing. I felt like I was reading American Psycho all over again. Not that I don't know that happens in it, but I remember there's a part with rats and tubing, and I threw the book across the brain. And that's what I felt like when I watched the writing in the river. Oh, god. Well, OK, so I could not find out why the original plans for the Unfriended sequel were scrapped, because why didn't original screenwriter Nelson Greaves come to this movie? So he was replaced instead with Steven Cisco, who is mostly well known for writing the 2004 American remake of The Grudge. He also, I believe, wrote The Grudge 2, which is not the best calling card. Happy 20th, by the way. Yeah, but The Grudge 2? No, The Grudge, The Original. Oh, The Grudge, OK. Well, The Original Remake. [LAUGHTER] I love that we have to say that in this world. SMG, I mean, it's good to program of SMGs of it. There we go. Oh, yes. So we get, yeah, Steven Cisco, who has never directed a film to his name. He's written a couple of films, again, mostly The Grudge and The Grudge 2, but he comes in as writer and director of Unfriended Dark Web. I did find, so whenever he pitched the idea for the sequel, and he said pitched, which means I wonder if Greaves had a couple of ideas, because I know there were some ideas that they wanted to continue the Laura Barnes story. And I just wonder if nothing was working for Blum, and he rejected it outright. Possibly, yeah. But when Cisco pitched it, he said, oh, the idea for my Unfriended sequel is Jaws on the internet, elaborating, because I broke my eyes really hard at that. Yeah, not great. How is that possible? This is his analogy. If you think of the internet as an ocean, what we usually surf is just the surface web. Underneath that is the deep web, the dark web. And that is where a lot of the danger lies. Hence, his comparison of Jaws on the internet. Sounds a bit more like he was going for a catchy sound bite. I think his explanation works, but I would still never say-- Yeah, it would just be like, what? There's sharks on the internet? Like, yeah, there's predators. There's predators. Yeah, it's predators on the internet. Yeah, so we can speculate. I mean, Unfriended was Greaves's first and only feature screenwriting credit. But after that, he would go on to write many episodes of Sleepy Hollow and "24 Legacy." But I have no reason for why he was not involved. At least didn't write this movie. But even still, Cisco said he spoke with Greaves to discuss tips and tricks to make the sequel work, with Greaves giving Cisco some quote-unquote early warnings about how to put the audience into a new place and new genre. But Cisco also said the development process for this film was 20 months. But obviously, filming didn't take that long. So I-- No, I can see that. I mean, the detail that you have to go through and make it seem natural, you know? Just to have a friend that's tech savvy, you need to write that. You need to actually be able to do that and know that. I wouldn't be able to think of stuff like that. Also, it's the detail of, like, you signed out of somebody's account on Facebook, but still pops up because it's now your computer and it's still always, like, a thing, like, in the corner or a tab. I don't know. I think it's a-- I think that there's so many levels of detail that you have to be a little cleverer about that I can see it taking that long. Well-- And one of the production companies on this is Basilevs. And this is Timor Bikmamba Tov's production company. Yes. Bikmamba Tov, you know, he's the director of films like Nightwatch, Daywatch, Wanted. I think he also did Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. Yes. I mean, my god. Don't sell the bad shit. Say all the good stuff he's been involved with. Well, but those are things he directed, you know? But his company has kind of moved more over to Screenlife. So, like, again, their first big Screenlife film was "Unfriended." Then they did "Profile," which I think is a really good movie. They got a very tiny release. I saw that one year, too. Yeah, I really liked it. And then "Unfriended Duck Web" and then "Searching" and then "Missing." So they're kind of trying to corner the market of this Screenlife subgenre. Yeah. But nevertheless, "Unfriended Duck Web" had about eight initial production days, the first week of October 2015. So they're filming this, like, months after "Unfriended" comes to theaters, like probably before it even hits, like, streaming. But then those eight days became 13. But then some of those days were on camera looping because they had to get new audio recordings. And they went through 47 and 1/2 pages of dialogue, the first day of filming. Holy shit. Well, and that's saying that the Screenplay was like 93 pages. So they said they did all the dialogue in four days on the first round of production. And then editing began later in October. So they started editing this movie in October of 2015. Wow. OK, so it is intensive to make one of these movies is what you're saying. Because the other thing is they didn't rap editing until June of 2018, AKA one month before the film hits theaters and after both of its festival screenings with the two different endings. Wow. So he said, essentially, they had to build the movie backwards. But, you know, it was amazing to have the narrative editorial flexibility to be able to go back into the film with new ideas without costing exorbitant amounts of money. But also, like, the script for the film, as I said, was 93 pages. The first cut of the film they had, which was right in line with the script, was almost three hours long. What? Oh my god. Mm-hmm. So when it comes to the script, one of the principles that Sisko set from the beginning was that he really wanted everything that happens in the movie to be something that could happen in the real world. So there was a lot of research done. And the inspiration for part of the film came because he was working on another script a couple of years prior, where he was actually working and talking to people in the intelligence service because his script dealt with this kind of stuff. So it was there. He started to learn a lot about these weak spots in the technology we have. It was there that he learns about government surveillance and hyper-penetration. And so I think when-- I mean, it doesn't sound like that movie worked out, so he kind of put it all in here. Right. Well, you do the research. You want to see a payoff? Well, and I think, you know, to your point, that's part of what makes this movie so scary is that, you know, a lot of this does actually seem realistic or could happen in real life. Yeah. Which is, I think, another reason why people do ultimately prefer this film, because you can look at the first film and say, oh, well, it's silly. It's a ghost hunting your computer. Whereas this one, it's like, oh, no, it's anonymous. Like, there's hackers out there who can do all of this shit. Yeah. I mean, I wrote a script like this with one of my writing partners. It was nothing like this movie, but the ending was. Like, the fact that it's all these people on the internet and there were like doctors and cops and anybody, you know? And when I saw the ending, I was like, fuck! Into the garbage heap. Yeah. But yeah, I felt that it's scary. It's scary to think about. And I think these movies are good, because they make you think about your own screen life. Mm-hmm. Oh, believe me, I think after I saw some of these movies, I bought one of those covers for my webcam, and it's always shot in some meeting. I don't have a cover, got some tape. Yep. Mine is wide open. You can watch me jack off if you want to. It costs like a dollar, Joe. Like, you just slide, it's great. Just get it. It's really helpful. But anyway, so nevertheless, the filming of this movie didn't seem to take that long. It was all the post-production, which again, 20 months of post-production that they were working on to the month before the films release. And so in post, they embraced the idea that post-production was going to be even more of a rewriting experience than it is on a conventional film. So they leaned into the fact that the process meant they could try every single idea they had. And apparently they did. They tried hundreds and hundreds of ideas. Luckily, they were aided by Andrew Westman, who was the editor of The First Unfriended, which I feel like that's your key, because you need someone who kind of knows how to edit. Because this is not like editing a normal movie, right? No. So he had evolved the workflow technologically speaking, so they could do more things quicker and try more things at a speedier rate than in their first go round. But it sounds like that's why this didn't hit its original thing, because they kept tinkering with it. They kept, like they had all this footage, but then they were tinkering with like, "Get over what was going to be on the screen at one point in time." And like, when can they reveal things? So I'm a little surprised that Blum gave them this much leeway to like do this, but especially given how it was released. But it's also annoying because it sounds like there's probably a billion different cuts of this film. And I would have loved to have seen even a feature that said, "Here's how we can do one sequence. Here's how we change it." Like, I don't know. It seems like a bit of a missed opportunity from a feature perspective. Yeah, 'cause there's certain characters who are like, maybe they had more, like, they're scared to get AJ and Damon. They're just there to be like, "Here's how to help." Yeah, they're the tech exposition. Yeah, tech exposition, that's perfect. But yeah, joke to your point, Lex has nothing to do. I actually found her one of those interesting ones just from her first introduction, but like-- Sure, and then she gets nothing to do, and then she's dead. I didn't forget that she was in this movie 'cause I wanted to get in yesterday, and I was just like, "Oh my God, I completely forgot that she was in this." Yeah. Yeah. 'Cause I remember everybody else. I remember all their deaths, you know? And like, Nari, that was like, "Ooh." That one frustrated me. I was very frustrated by her death. Well, we can definitely talk about that because I think a lot of the complaints I see about this movie are, "Oh, the characters are so stupid." But I was also kind of like, "Yeah, but I feel like when it comes to computer stuff, a lot of people make really stupid decisions." Like, I mean, how often do people get tricked into scams? Right? Like-- All the time. It's just so easy to say characters are stupid when you're not the character. Mm-hmm. But anyway, another fun fact. So, yes, on "Friend of Dark Web" screen a month after, it's up by Southwest Premier at the Overlook Film Festival, with an entirely different ending. This was tweeted out by the projectionist apparently at the festival. Oops. Okay. So, cut to July 2018, Blum reveals that the film would be sent to theaters with the two different endings, which would be played at random. I remember this. They were doing the clue thing, right? Where I was like, "Oh, you don't know what ending you're gonna get based on which theater you're gonna go to." But here's the thing, though. There is a conflicting report. So, in a piece for the now-defunct website Sci-Fi Wire, and Sci-Fi like the channel, from July 24th, 2018, this is four days after the film opens in theaters, writer, director Stephen Cisco basically said that the ending was changed after several test screenings, elaborating, and I quote, "The movie kept changing so much that every time we would screen it, I would introduce it like, you're the first audience to get to see this version of the movie, and you're also the last." Oh, wow. It was a very strange, mutable post-production process, so there have been enormous changes throughout, even the last couple of months, just reaching the end of the movie, but everything else is above my pay grade. I don't really know about all those other things. I've only been alerted to that recently. I don't really know. It's probably fake news. So, wow. After the film is in theaters, you have the director saying, "No, we're not doing that." Or, if it was decided, I didn't make the call. - Well, I wanna know, I don't know all those, the one they picked to be the, I guess, the sacred ending. - It's the Vam. It's the Vam. It's him getting hit by the Vam. - Yeah. Like, why did you choose that one to be the one? - I imagine it just played the best with their screen audiences. - I guess it was just a jump-scared effect of it, but it doesn't make any sense why he'd be in the middle of the street. - Wow. - I think you're right, Joe. I think it is whichever one had the highest scores after a screening, that's the one they went with. But I would not be surprised that there were more than four different endings to this movie. - Yeah. - But again, like, is it "Blum" tinkering with this movie? Is it the Korea? I don't know who was doing all of this. Like, it's just wild. So, this movie comes out in the US on July 20th, 2018, and it's in 1,500 screens, which is 1,200 fewer than unfriended 2,700 screens. It opens in the number nine spot with 3.6 million, going under gross, 8.8 million domestically, and 7.2 million internationally for a worldwide gross of 16 million, which a far cry from the first one. But again, we're looking at another budget of $1 million. However, I'm also kind of like, but you're on post-production for 20 months. Like, are these people getting paid? Like, how much are they getting paid? - That trace you wondered where all of the money from the gross went. - Right. Yeah, 'cause that first one, you know, made for a million, makes 63, but it's only a profit of 17 million. So, yeah, I wonder if it's a lot of that post-production, like all these editors are getting a lot of that money, 'cause they're spending so much time tinkering with these films. - Yeah. It's just so disappointing because I remember seeing this film, 'cause yeah, Serena, you and I saw this when we were at Fantasia, and I remember thinking, that was pretty solid, I actually really enjoyed it. And then I talked to people about it, and no one even had a clue it was coming out. Like, not only did it screen in fewer theaters, it felt like it had no publicity push, so when it didn't perform particularly well, I wasn't surprised, nobody knew this was coming. - No one did, and the interesting thing is too, because Unfriended's marketing campaign was notable, because I think it was, if not the first, like one of the first movies were like, 80% of its marketing was done digitally, not on, like commercials and TVs and stuff. And right, they did not do that for the second movie. And I agree with you, yeah, this movie was not marketed to the point where, like, this movie was only in theaters for two weeks. So it drops to 11th place at second weekend, and then it's third weekend, we go down to 200 screens, and then it's fourth and-- - It's gone. - It's fourth and final week, we're on 50 screens, and then it's out of theaters after four weeks. So I would wager if you are not a horror fan, and like you knew of Unfriended, you don't know this movie exists. - Yeah, I agree. I guess my example of my family watching it and being like, fuck this movie, I think that was enough too. Also, I think it plays better on a smaller screen for people, maybe that's why, like, if they do a third film, maybe it's better to just go straight to streaming, or if you do something big, I think what will get the Gen Z crowd out is having recognizable, maybe YouTube celebrities or something in the film. - Yeah, get that influencer TikTok crowd, right? - Yeah, well, but I mean, look at something like missing or searching, you know what I mean? - Missing did really well, yeah, you're right, yeah. - But it also had John Cho. - Oh, that was searching. - Oh, sorry, yes. - I think missing also feels kind of, it's more cinematic too, there's a little bit more of a-- - Well, 'cause it's the whole computer, it's not just a Skype call. - Yeah, and it's a thriller, you know? I think people are more open, like mainstream audiences are more open to thrillers than just horror. I guess 'cause it's also kind of like your following clues, like it's an investigative movie, whereas-- - Yeah, yes. - I'm sorry, both of these are, but I mean, yeah, searching made 75 million and missing made 48 million, but oh, but here's the thing though, searching costs less than a million to make, whereas missing costs 7 million to make. - Huh, thank God. - That's all strange. - I wonder if it's all the-- - 'Cause missing looks like a bigger budget than searching for sure. - But maybe it's 'cause they're in Mexico a lot, so it's a lot of the location stuff. - Oh, okay. - I don't know. But nevertheless, I mean, I love watching these movies, on a big screen, but I do think it's a very interesting experiment to watch them on your computer, because you will constantly want to touch something. (laughing) - I mean, I read a letter box review that was so hilarious, like someone was like, I watched these movies in public on my laptop, so I make people feel like this is happening to me. - Oh my God. (laughing) - I'm just really good at technology folks. - I mean, at the end of the day, I mean, like, whatever you think about these movies, in general, like I just, as I said at the top of the episode, I love screen life as a concept, because it's even like, I remember watching the first one, and there's a part that is repeated in many of these types of movies though, where the Blair girl, she starts typing a reply to someone, but then she backspaces it, and starts typing something else, and then backspaces and types of thing else. So it's a really cool way to get into at least one of these characters' heads, and deliver character development without like, you know, bad exposition dumps. You know what, one thing I don't like about these movies, no, I'll just say this, 'cause watching them back to back, silencing your friends. I know it's the way of like getting the audience to pay attention to what's happening on one screen, but like, that happened in both movies, where Matteus, Matteus, yeah, when he was trying to get in touch with his girlfriend, everyone would just be like talking, but I would be weirded out, it was like almost five minutes, and be like, hello, hello, like, what's he doing, you know? - Oh, I've done that before. (laughing) - I've done it, but what I do is I usually like, take my image off, so I'll just go to like, the blank face. - There you go, like something, like just like, you know, when you're in Zoom, you just take yourself, you know, you put yourself on mute, and you turn your, yeah, something. - Oh, I mean, I've been in like, work Zoom meetings, where I just like, oop, mute that, and just look at other things. - Oh no, that's because that's a work thing, and who could fucking care? - Oh yeah, but it's, yeah, if you're talking to your friends, (laughing) you at least message them, be like BRB something, you know? - Exactly. - I mean, okay, you know, we all did these like, pandemic things, where we were like on a Zoom call with like 15 people, like, you're not gonna notice if one of those 15 people are not talking for like five minutes. - I guess, yeah, like if it's AJ going off in his conspiracy theories, and everybody's just having a laugh at him, yeah, you're not gonna notice that Mateus is looking up, whether some 17-year-old girl has been abducted, but I do agree with Serena, like if you were actually playing cards against humanity, and the taste just like pieces out for five minutes, hey buddy, it's your turn to play. - It's your turn, and also AJ would be, he seemed so insecure that he would be like pointing out immediately, what are you doing? Like he would be so like, he would be so paranoid that people were talking about him, which they were. (laughing) - But nevertheless, I mean, the reviews for this were about on par slightly worse, just by a hair than the first movie. So the first one has a 62% of Rotten Tomatoes, an average score of six out of 10, whereas this one has a 59% on Rotten Tomatoes with an average score of 5.8 out of 10. - Oh no, that is too low. - Letterbox users have given this a 5.4 out of 10, and cinema score audiences gave Dark Web a C, which I also think it's, you know, everybody dies ending. - Right, I think that's exactly what it is. - That's pretty much a go-to for like, yeah. - The unhappy ending. - Exactly. - I think like the best part of these movies are when everyone's together, and everyone's getting creeped out at the same time. Once you see them all dying, then it becomes a little like, okay, now like, like the first one, at least it was all scary and kind of gross when the person would go back onto Skype and it would cut in between the nasty debts. - Well, but I also think in that first thing though, 'cause you're still trying to figure out exactly like who, like, is the main girl we're following? Is she actually bad? Is she as good? I feel like there's a bit of more of a mystery there on top of the whole like, slasher aspect of it. But with this one, once people start, I forgot how quickly, like, I mean, it doesn't happen quickly, but once people start dying, we are blowing through all of these characters, like in like a 10-minute speed of runtime. - Which I think makes sense, because if you're trying to keep them all on the call, if your friends started dying, you would not just hang around on Zoom. So it's got to be dominoes. - Yeah, absolutely. - Yeah. - All right, well, why don't we start from the top? So naturally, we have to have some distorted studio logos to kick this movie off. And then we begin with the sound of a computer starting up, because of course, it's a screen light film. So what else are we gonna start with? I do love that we get to watch as somebody, like, we don't even know who Mattise is. We haven't been introduced to this character, and we see him trying to essentially password break this stolen computer. So we see all of the passwords that don't work, all of the common examples. So yes, folks, if you see anything that resembles your own, change your parking password. - Also, these are things that they were tweaking the month before the film's release, which is why we get comfy feet in here, which immediately dates this film by a lot. (laughs) - Yeah. - Can you just put one letter or symbol for your password? - I think if it's your computer, you can. But if it's like your account, any account, they'll be like, oh no, it has to have an uppercase letter, a special character. - Okay, I was wondering about that, 'cause I was just... - Yeah, too dangerous. - Yeah. (laughs) - Like that. So after multiple unsuccessful tries, Mattise, who is eventually seen on screen, played by Colin Woodell, he does manage to get in, and then he immediately begins removing the information for the original user, which is Norah C4, as in Roman numerals. - Yep. - Yep, everybody knows what this is gonna turn out to be. So. (laughs) So he initiates a call with his girlfriend, Amaya, who is played by Stephanie Negaris, and I did double check this, 'cause I'm always interested around disability representation. Negaris does identify as deaf in real life. - Yes, she was born. Profoundly deaf is the quote that I found. - Yeah, I thought that was an... - Interesting as the wrong term, but it was an unusual term. I've never seen someone describe them so that way. - I wonder if, again, this is me being a little bit naive in this area of the world, but I wonder if there are actual terms for degree of deafness, and if profound is one of the more higher ones. - Yeah, I found that to be like, "She can't hear anything, that's what I read that." - Which, I mean, again, as someone who is not disabled, I mean, just from my perspective, I do think this is a pretty good representation of a deaf person. - I think the character is okay. I like the fact that we're addressing the deafness, and it is like a proper plot point, but I also think from the negative side, I'm turning back to our discussion with Ariel Baska from Wait Until Darkware, there's a certain element of, "Oh, well, this character needs to be saved because her deafness is a problem in the plot." - Yeah, I think that too. She makes some good decisions. - It was so funny. I had a friend staying with me this weekend, and I was watching the four endings, and some of the endings know that it's like, "Oh, she's at this place," and he dropped her up him, but it wasn't him, and my friend had not seen this movie, and she's like, "Why is she going into this place? It's so stupid." And I was like, "Yeah, because my immediate response was like, "Oh, she's deaf, she can't hear him." But I was like, "Oh, well, that's the problem." - It's matter, you're not dumb. You're not dumb. - As a woman, if someone took me off a path of a street, and I ended up in like some bush, there was no way I'm going in there. - It's definitely red flag, but I can't remember if it's in all of the cuts, and folks will talk about the endings at the end as well, but there is a reference to one of their first dates, and it's the video that Matthias ends up playing. When we talk about, "Oh, I thought YouTube were gonna be the ones who get married," they talk about either a first date or a significant date being in the park. So that's one of the deleted endings is that we do go to the park, and that makes sense to me. Like, "Oh, okay, if you're a significant other side, go to the place where we first kissed, you would go there." The other one is at some kind of empty warehouse, and that one's more of a, "Am I going in?" No, I'm not going into an empty warehouse just because you dropped me a pin. - And that's the den, by the way. But I will say, at least in terms of the conversations the film is having around relationships, with someone who is disabled, with someone who's not, I really appreciated that because what is her big issue with Matthias is, "Oh, he won't learn sign language for her," or he will, that he's afraid to. I really like the conversations the film has about those topics. - Yeah, he tried at least the papaya thing. - No, see, that's where I like the nuance is that he's more interested in developing an app to help her as opposed to spending the time himself. - Yeah, but also, yeah, to me, I liked the app aspect, but I also didn't like the fact like, what do you see in her besides that she's gorgeous? - Well, I think a problem with that is, Amaya is kind of outside of everyone else in this film. Like, we never see Amaya interact with anyone, except for Matthias. - Well, she was kind of the gimmick, you know? Like, when the movie gets kind of interesting is when he tells her to stay on the phone when she's in the subway, so every time the connection's lost, he's like, "Oh my God, it's all real." And I love that part. - Oh yeah, we get good mileage out of the fact that there are points where she is on the outside and she doesn't understand. I think the film is good at finding creative ways to use her deafness, that sounds wrong, but I'm still saying it, but as a character, you're right, Serena, we don't really know much about her apart from the fact that she is disabled and gorgeous. - Yeah, and she is gorgeous. - She is gorgeous. Everybody in this film is very pretty. - Yeah. - Oh, they are, yeah. I was like, "Dayman." - We need an ugly friend in here. Who's the ugly one? - Oh, oh, oh, do you all think-- - I think we had to pick somebody, but no, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna-- - No, let's not do it. - Do you all think "Dayman" is really British? - No. - No. - Can you guess what he is? - I thought he was Australian. - He's Australian, yeah. - Okay. - He's Australian. - Okay. - Yes, I got it. - We're trying to sub one accent in for another, huh? - Which at that point, I'm like, "Just make him Australian, it's just my Australian." - I'm one of those assholes who never can tell the difference, but I just thought he was Australian. - Oh, I could-- - Yeah. Well, my favorite thing is, you know, because one of the conceits is that, well, "Dayman" will be fine because he's in the UK, so we don't have to worry about him. And of course, that proves actually incorrect, but it's like, well, you could have just made him an Australian living in the UK. Like, it doesn't have to be, well, he's Australian, so he has to live in Australia, and the time difference is too significant. - But he also could have just been an Australian. It's fine. I mean, I guess it is kind of an extreme time difference, but it does not matter. - It doesn't matter. Why did they make him British? - You know what? British people equals smart. That's what we're doing here. - I guess so. - I mean, he had glasses. That's what I-- - I'm gonna say I put a pair of glasses on. (both laughing) - That glasses and ponytail, and he's a computer expert. - Yeah. - And then, Nari and Serena, they were the couple, but I liked that it wasn't really, you know, there was any jokes about them being a couple or anything, it was just there. - And that's probably the reason why we're covering this, is because, yeah, they are a queer component, even though I would argue, like, I mean, I guess their whole arc is about their new engagement, but, like, the queerness isn't really, like, a factor in the film, just their relationship is, which I really appreciate. - Yeah, that, for me, is the other big selling feature, like, sure. Is their relationship the most important part of the film? No, arguably, that's Matthias and Amaya, but I did like that it's just, it's a very matter-of-fact thing. Like, they're the only other couple in this film, and it's just kind of like, "Hey, everybody, we got engaged." Which just happened to also be queer. - Yeah. - Yeah, I think that the only thing I didn't like is it's that they imply that Nari's parents were not cool with it, and I'm like, "Why can't we just go on?" Like, "Who cares?" - Um, I don't mind that, because I feel like that is a very authentic dream real. - Pretty real. - Yeah, I mean, like, would I have liked to maybe dump more about it? - Yeah. - But I feel like it's necessary, because so much of their plot line is also centered on Serena's mother. So, maybe it's how people can ask about Nari's parents, I don't know. Or Serena's dad. Did he die? (laughing) - I mean, yeah, they didn't really get into the nitty gritty of it, right? Sometimes I just like to see relationships and representation without any conflicts or anything like that, just for escapism purposes. - I get that. I do think though, at least like, again, with this kind of narrative format, we can't just be doling out like normal movie-making rules of how to get to know characters, right? Because this is a game night where all these people already know each other. It's one night, one scene. And I feel like it could come across so much clunkier with some of the exhibition we're getting, but I think it works for the most part. - And I don't even know if it's because of parents or against them, 'cause the girl's white. Like, you don't know them. - Yeah. - And like, they're in interracial same-sex relationships, so I was just like, which is it? And they don't really get into it. - No. I would argue, yeah, kind of like what you were saying, Trace, we know enough about each of these characters that we can, I guess, either invest or invest a little bit less depending on how much you enjoy them. But overall, it's a tricky area to do because so much of the film also takes place over a very condensed period of time, right? Like, it's maybe a couple of hours that we're doing this. So yeah, we're not gonna be dropping a bunch of backstory exposition. Like, I think the best we get is when we do get to peek at certain people's like Facebook profiles, or like we're looking through the videos and that kind of stuff. But even then, to do more would be difficult. But I can't understand why people look at this and say, "Well, we're just not really learning a ton about these people." - Well, but I also wonder, though, and I'm not saying this is the case, but I'm just curious, how many things on screen did I miss? Like, I've seen this movie three times. This is my third time watching this. Have I missed other things on the screen because it's impossible to see everything on the screen at all the time. So like, maybe there are things that are available in terms of character development or like more kind of background type information that I just didn't see because my eyes were drawn somewhere else on the screen. - Yeah. Well, and to your point, Serena, I do think one of the ways that this plays better at home is not just, yeah, you can kind of imagine yourself as one of the characters, especially for watching it on a laptop or a smaller screen or something. But I appreciated the opportunity to pause at a couple of different points so that I can see, okay, what exactly are we zeroing in on? And I think some of the other films, like, I remember, I think Missing did a really good job of zooming in on like when we're enjoying things and search bars and that kind of stuff. And that's helpful to redirect our attention. But this film, yeah, it's packing a lot of visual information into a small screen. - No, you're right, 'cause I'm glad you brought up that zoom in feature of searching or missing because I remember when I first saw that I was like, oh, this is a different way. I'm not used 'cause normally again, we don't do that. We just have the whole screen for the authenticity of it. But yeah, I mean, they can do whatever the fuck they want. - Dade, yeah. Okay, so we have talked about most of these characters. I'll just quickly make sure that we're naming them. So we do have girlfriend Serena, who was played by Rebecca Rittenhouse, as well as Nari, who was played by Jean Rafe, Betty Gabriel. We've got our conspiracy theorist, AJ, who was played by Connor Del Rio. He's the kind of louder, more boisterous, maybe slightly annoying one. The only one where I'm kind of like, why are y'all friends with this guy? But he also kind of gives off the whole, like-- - Well, they're all color trends, right? - Yeah, and he probably got into QAnon shit afterwards. (laughing) - Yeah, when we played the video for him and we see all of his YouTube brands, I just thought, oh, no, not this guy. (laughing) Yes, we have British Damon, who was played by Andrew Less, and then finally, the character that we know the least about, who also dies first, is Lex, and she is played by Sabira Windy Annie. Okay, so we have gathered to do a virtual game night, principally cards against humanity. AJ is very disappointed that people are not coming in person. Damon is obviously never doing that because he lives in the UK and he has stayed up late for this. But every time that Matthias tries to engage the computer that he has just gotten fails. So systems fail, he can't keep Skype running, he can't keep Facebook running, and so he asks Damon, hey, do you know anything that I can do to search to find out why this might be crashing? And this is where we start to get into shit because, of course, we discover that there are lots of files that have been hidden on the hard drive. Bum, bum, bum, bum. Okay, so we discover, yes, that we have all of these hidden files. So this is one of those things where Matthias completely disregards that there's anything else happening. AJ's going in a rant, everybody else is making fun of him. And we should also note that we are fighting with Amaya at this point as well because she's supposed to be coming to games night but because he has spent all this time working on this program, papaya, which translates a voice to sign language, she feels like he's not really listening to her or paying attention to the right parts of their relationship. So we're getting a lot of the early conflict out in the open. - Well, and this is a line from her that I really appreciate. She goes, it helps me understand you. It doesn't help you understand me. And that's where we learn, like he went to one sign language class and either never went back or did go back and just stopped paying attention. - Yeah, yeah. And I think that that does tell us a lot about his character. You know, eventually we're going to learn that this is not a computer he got off Craigslist as he tells people he did steal it from The Lost and Found. Hence the reason why we've got all of this other user information for Nora. But I think this is an early sign that Matass is a mostly well-meaning guy but he will also take shortcuts whenever it is convenient for him. - I really related to him in this because, I mean, Joe, you know me. I'm like a spreadsheet machine and- - Mm-hmm. So the time I will spend, like making organization tools as opposed to like making genuine human connection is like, it's something I'm working on but like I related to this a lot where it's like, okay, you could just learn sign language with these classes and talk to her but you'd rather just spend, God knows how many man hours developing a new software that can't like be that easy to put together, maybe I'm wrong in that regard. - So, yeah, you're right. We're learning a lot about him but I also like deeply understood this and we'll learn more about it later as we get into his fear but still. - His heart's in the right place. That's what I like about his character. I think that's what gets him into all this trouble. - Sure. - And his friends unfortunately. Could you imagine? - Yeah. - Just been a game night. (laughing) - Yeah, logging into Zoom and being like, oh, suddenly we're embroiled in some kind of like a dark web murder game. - Cool. (laughing) - You feel like you asshole? But yeah, no, he had good intentions but he just-- - But Amaya Stance is also understandable as well. It's just like, you just want these two kids to work it out but spoiler alert, they don't know. - Really? (laughing) - I also do like the contrast of how easy everything seems to be between Nari and Serena. So yeah, you know, we talked about the fact that not everything is okay with their families and that will obviously or would have impacted their engagement but they're a nice contrast to what I think is a bit more of a traditional conflict between Amaya and Mateus. - Yeah. - Okay, so eventually we managed to decode these video files that are taking out most of the hard drive of this laptop and they contain, I'm going to say hundreds of innocuous looking video files. So it's a bunch of just people doing their thing in their apartment building or in their condo or their house or something like that. And initially it just seems like, oh, okay. So somebody, yeah, like went on Chout Roulette and recorded a bunch of people doing their thing. - I was gonna say, I won't keep bringing up the den because whatever, but like this feels the most the den to me. - I gotta watch the den. - I'm telling you, 75 minutes of pure terror. It's great. (laughing) - You sold out the posters. - Okay, so the other thing that is distracting Mateus is not just these videos but also the fact that someone named Erica Dunn, it keeps messaging him on Facebook saying that she knows he is not Nora saying that he stole the computer and she wants to know like, who the fuck is this? It's very intrusive and you know, because it's a screen life, we keep getting these pop up messages that are very distracting. So even though we're not zooming in on them, they keep catching our attention because they're adding up in the right hand corner of the screen. - And I can just imagine if you're watching this in your computer, like the way you wanna just go and click one of those, like read message as they come up. Yeah, but it's also funny to watch like Mateus try to like wiggle his way out of these lies that he's got 'cause he even tried to say, oh, I bought it off at Craigslist and Erica quote unquote is like, well, show me the ad, uh-huh. That's what I thought, motherfucker. (both laughing) - That's good stuff. - Also, like I would never engage. That's the introvert in me. I'd be like, it would be a very boring screen life movie for me until like they took over my computer because I would never be engaging with a random person on Facebook. - No. The minute somebody who I didn't know was like, I know you're not you. I would be like, locking out. I would be deleting things. I would just be getting out of there. - Yeah. So initially when Erica accuses him of being a thief and he can't produce this ad, he decides, okay, you know what, you called me. I'm gonna return the laptop to where I found it at the cafe that I work at. I'm going to delete all my information. So he does move things into the trash. He does erase the search history and so on. And then just before he's about to shut it down, lo and behold, we get a DM from Charon 68, about a custom job that will pay double the rate. And this is the hook that essentially leads to every character in this film getting murdered. - Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. Like once this decision is made, there's no out for any of them. And so just again, these complaints about the stupid decisions, I'm just kind of like, I know y'all, but like honestly, like people would click on this shit so fast. Like it is not that far out of the realm of reality. - Well, and let's be real. You know, we'll learn near the end of the film. Damon will hear it and he will try to warn Matthias, but he catches them saying, this is the bait laptop or the bait computer. So the minute that he picked this up, they were all dead. - Well. - Nothing they would have done, would have helped. - He needed to not-- - Well, they didn't even like cocked his Wi-Fi, yeah. I think that was-- - Yeah, yeah. He needed to not turn on the computer. Okay, so he couldn't use this as a paperweight and he would have been fine. - Samantha, yes, exactly. He picking it up, totally fine. Turning it on, the death knell. - Exactly, yeah. So Matthias is directed to an app called The River, which has janky as fuck looking-- - Oh my god, I love it. - I was just like really? - It's like five game on a computer. - I was like, is this doom? What are we doing here so fixly? - I love it, but it's interesting, right? 'Cause like, you know, all these dark web people, there's expert hackers, but then their graphics are like this analog bullshit. (laughing) - Well, and it's fun too, like visually, so this does not look very impressive and you can tell Matthias is kind of like, well, what the fuck, why would I even bother? And we do eventually learn that this is what's called an overlay circuit that redirects through multiple countries. So essentially you're hiding your IP, it's harder to trace and so on, but I do love the moment later on where we're dealing with Charon directly and the circle. I'm using quotation marks, demands that they input like a password or a code or something, and we're back on the river and all of a sudden the graphics are demonstrably better. And I kind of love this idea that, oh, when you're dealing with the circle, you're gonna be getting the premium shit because they have a lot more money, they're a lot more dangerous. - Mm-hmm. (upbeat music) - Get three coffins ready, kid, because our latest podcast, Make My Day, is venturing off into the wild and sprawling frontier that is Clint Eastwood's career. More movies than Stephen King has books and more genres than all of the franchises we've covered over at the Halloweenys. Now, I know what you're thinking. Do they really need to start another show? Well, to tell you the truth and all this excitement, I kind of lost track myself, but being this is a podcast, the most powerful medium in the world for pop culture conversation and Prince output is infinite. You've gotta ask yourself one question. Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk? Find out today and subscribe to Make My Day, a Clint Eastwood podcast now, wherever you get your audio. (upbeat music) - Okay, so we have this conversation over the river, and essentially we learn that, yeah, we've sent through $10 million in cryptocurrency. So this is when Mateus starts to involve the others. He gets called back to game night and he says, okay, so there's some weird shit. We've got these videos. Maybe I lied about the computer, but also what do you folks think? And this is where AJ and Damon really start to take the lead on the techno babble. - I mean, yeah, we get a lot of this, but because they're also like talking like, you know, in private while everyone else is doing the game, and I guess we're getting about Damon and Matthias's turns. - Yes, yeah. So the important thing, which we've alluded to, if you've not watched the film, is the fact that when Mateus ended up logging onto the computer and putting in his own wifi, this is how the hackers get into your computer because they can grab unprotected or low security wifi, and then that will allow them to get into your computer, turn it on, grab the camera. So all of those videos that we saw were stolen videos that we grabbed through people's unprotected wifi. - I'm not comfortable like saying, oh, all of this is super realistic, but I would wager that a lot of this is quite realistic. - You know what's really strange that the first film, the character, I forget what his, was it Ken? He was the hacker in that one. There was always like, yeah, like what Joe said, a tech exposition character. - Yeah. - The thing that they did when they all put everything empty in a trash, I think that would have like worked in the second film more than the first film, right? Because you're not dealing with a supernatural element. - I don't think so. Like I think the only thing he could have done at this point is turn the computer off, but the fact that he needed to keep using it to communicate with his friends who were trying to help guide him. Like even if you took programs and put them in the trash, like putting things in the trash actually doesn't get rid of them. You can totally recover everything from a hard drive. - Well, yeah, in the first film, what was the Trojan? Didn't he execute like a Trojan, like? - Oh, like a backdoor kind of thing. Yeah. - I just seemed like that could have been a thing. - Well, but I guess, again, for me as the viewer, I'm kind of like, okay, well the first movie, kind of anything is fair game because the ghost can ghost and like do whatever the fuck she wants. - The ghost be ghosted. - I remember though, with this though, I kept thinking, oh, this is going to be a supernatural, even while I was watching it because again, like I saw before I knew what this was, except the basic concept. And a lot of stuff that's happening here, I think that's where the horror comes from though, is that it seems like, okay, this is supernatural, especially once we start quote unquote seeing these members, but they're masked by digital trickery. But all of that stuff is things that actually exist. So I think part of the fun, or maybe not fun, the success of this movie is that yeah, it feels like it should be a supernatural thing, but none of it is. - Yeah. Did you two go into this one, expecting that it was going to be another ghost or some other kind of like, supernatural component? - No, the subtitle like Dark Web just told me everything I need to know. - Yeah, and I guess, I mean, I guess like, I knew that like as soon as like right before the movie started, 'cause again, I saw it like when it was announced secretly at South by Southwest. And so I knew it was called Dark Web when Blum told us that and then the movie started, but in my mind, I was still like, cool, this is a sequel to Unfriended. Like this is, I know what this is. - Yeah, I was somewhere in the middle of the two of you. So obviously I knew it was called Dark Web and I know what the Dark Web is because, you know, it's the boogeyman of the internet to everybody, always warns you like, oh, well, that's where the really bad shit happens. You know, if you're going to go into a hostile movie, it's because somebody is selling your body on the Dark Web. But I figured that because it's a sequel that we were going to be carrying over the supernatural elements from the first film. So I did think it was going to be a mix of the two. And I think you're right, Trace. - I think one of the reasons this film works is because it's doing not a soft reboot, but it is saying, oh, it's set in the same kind of screen life world as the first film, but we're not just doing the same thing. Like we are telling a different story and where that goes allows us, you know, we can do it a bit differently. - I would have gladly watched whatever, like all these unfriended sequels being anthology entries, but I mean, it's been six, nine years since the first movie came to theaters and six years since that's when we came to theaters. Like I think our time has passed. - I mean, I think there is, hasn't it been talkable a third film? - Yeah, but not recently. - Oh, shit, okay. - I think that you could very easily do this as, I want to say a cheap anthology and throw it on to a streamer. Like I would watch six episodes of this on Netflix, right? - You get YouTubers or TikTokers and then have them. - But I think the problem is that unless they found a way to edit it faster than this movie for like missing and searching, which I don't know how long the production was for those films, but if it takes you a year to edit one of these movies, then you're not gonna do six hours for a streaming site. It would take too long. - I would watch it though. - Me too. - I mean, every time I watch these movies, I'm like, I will watch this all day. - I would like to continue watching these days. Yeah. - Like, please stop dying. So you can just keep talking in between creepy shit that keeps happening. - Yeah. - I don't know why. - I don't know what it is. - It's a bit like a creepy pasta, but it feels more technologically relevant. - Like the first film and the second film, I feel the sound of the messenger really creeps you out. Like I remember, I didn't go on Facebook late at night or messenger, like I always turn my volume down. I didn't wanna hear it. - Mm. - And the second one is different 'cause it has like, when the hackers take over, it goes down. It's like, it's like a different sound, it's black. And that creeped me out too. - Yeah. (laughs) Okay, so we're actually getting to our interactions with Charon because of course, he sent through this $10 million in cryptocurrency. We do the conversion. We've got both AJ and Damon holding up their phones, telling us like, this is a lot of money that we're dealing with. And then we get the explanation of what this is for. So we would like to drill a hole in a girl's head and then ideally do it while she's alive and ideally then put something else that is alive into that hole. And that is really fucked up. - Yeah, a lot of this too. Have either one of y'all seen Megan is missing? - My mother recommended that to me. - What? - I told you. (laughs) - And then like, I try to get her to watch "Dama" on Netflix. She's like, no, no, that's close. - Too disturbing. - I was like, what the, how are you talking about? You made me watch the most disturbing fucking movie I've ever seen in my life. - Yeah, 'cause Megan is missing that predates the death. I think that was 2011, 2012. And there are parts of this, specifically this trepidation and this stuff in the barrel that is very reminiscent of Megan is missing. - Oh, really? Okay, interesting. - Yeah, I would agree trace, yeah. - I guess these are just creepy things that, you know, even if you've seen them once before, this idea that this kind of video is either floating around on the internet or on people's hard drives. Like, the idea that people would be collecting this kind of stuff is just really uncomfortable. And it is scary. - I wonder if that's also kind of what translated me to the CSenima score, because the fact that there are people out there that do this kind of stuff, like is just a really hard pill to swallow. - Yeah, yeah. - Yeah, like, it's scary 'cause you know it's happening. You know, this is not something that just came out. Like, this is not something someone just made up. Like, this is probably based off something that happens. - Mm-hmm, yeah. So the proof that this does happen is when we look in the contributions folder at the bottom of all of those video files and we find 17 videos of either imprisoned or murdered women. Of course, it's only women because-- - 'Cause why would we torture a man? That's not scary. - They would beat me up. - I do think that it's playing two of those ideas. Like, Serena, you even started this by saying that you're a woman who fears being human trafficked. And horror movies understand that putting a woman in a scary situation is scary for both sexes if we're being binary, because women can relate to that fear personally and then men go, "Oh my God, the idea that a poor, defenseless woman, this might happen to her." But yeah, to your point, Trace, we also know that people are regularly human trafficked or we fear for sexual slavery and so on. - I also think too, like when you're thinking about like, I mean, again, at this point, we don't know if this is just one person doing this, a bunch of people doing this, whatever, but I think the person in the movie goes on. At least for me, I'm thinking in my head, oh, it's a bunch of guys. It's a bunch of douchebag like web bro guys. And then we see at the end, there's some women in this group. - Mm-hmm, and it's all around the world. - Yeah. - I do love that reveal, yeah. - It's always harder, as a woman, it's always harder knowing women are involved in stuff like this because-- - Oh, sure. - Ooh, it makes me so angry. - I remember when we talked about the boy behind the door or trace and we were like-- - Oh, yes. - When it was revealed that it was a woman who was involved in it and we were just like-- - No, it's even worse, no. - I hate to show people that movie. That's one that's followed off of my like, show people this movie right now. - The boy behind her or girl behind the door? Which one are you talking about? - Boy behind the door. This is one of the two boys. - Oh, okay. - But they could have another movie. - The bad guy is someone who, people that watched a very certain popular HBO show will recognize immediately. (laughing) - Oh, okay. - But it's a really good one. It's super tense. - Yeah. - So the last file of the 17 is one called Erica and she is played by Alexa Mansour and this is who Nari suggests is the person that we're paying $10 million of cryptocurrency for because this is the only video that takes place in a bedroom. So as the film unfolds, we will learn that she has actually already been kidnapped. She's only 17 years old and this is another one of those like, oh, this shit is really real. - And we don't know this girl's name yet, right? - No. - Well, I think the file may be listed. - Yeah. - Oh, Erica. - It just says Erica. - Well, because the Facebook person was Erica. So no, the name, yeah. - And the messages that are coming from Erica say I'm not Erica, I'm Nora, but I'm with Erica. - Yes, yeah. So Matthias doesn't put this together yet, but if you're, if your eagle-eyed viewers will notice, oh, okay, Erica Dunn is this probably dead girl, although, she's not dead. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, which is another fun reveal. So finally, Amaya comes back into the picture. She's willing to talk, but, or so we think, because when we open up a chat with her, she's not there, but her roommate Kelly, who was played by Chelsea Elden, is, and there's this great, I mean, here's the thing. We know nothing about Kelly except for, she's the roommate and this character only exists to die, but I do love how long it's kind of drawn out, because it's like, can you just get Amaya? Where is she? And then we get distortion behind her bag over the face. And then we hear the sound effect of a kind of wet bud. - So this is also kind of a dead thing though, because again, the girl has a friend when she comes back and she turns to the computer and all of a sudden, boom, there's someone behind her and they smash her face into the computer. - Mm, yeah. I think it's because it's an effective scare. Like, what's more scary than somebody being behind you while you're looking at yourself on camera? - Also, we need like a scare and a death that is not like high stakes yet, you know, like-- - Yeah, this person can be missed. - And this is when we start seeing to like the digital trickery to hide the actual physical appearances of these several members. Because again, at this point, you might think this is just a ghost type thing. Again, like the first movie. - Yes, yeah, so again, this is something where I imagine it's probably real tech, but basically it just distorts so that whenever this person is around the technology, we can't get a really very clear look at them. - I wonder, like, okay, this is probably like, we don't know the answer to this question, but like, do they have a device on them that scrambles their appearance? Or is this the other dark web people that are watching this that are doing this for them? Like they have someone responsible for this kind of stuff. I just love to know how this is going. But maybe I don't want to know how this is going. - I mean, even if first film had distortion, I think the distortion is really just a help. - Yeah, but at least in the first one, I'm like, okay, well, the ghost is doing it. (laughing) - My god. - Or Skype is doing it 'cause no one like fucking Skype. - Oh my god, that's the real horror that we need is like somebody's trying to relay super important information and they just get the wheel of death. - Yeah, exactly. - Wheel of death is already stressful enough. So yeah, just having to deal with that with that situation. - Yeah. - Okay, so this person, this distorted figure, then begins messaging Matthias in, as you said, Serena, this black font. So it looks completely different so that we can immediately visually denote that this is not a Maya typing, this is somebody else. And of course, the messages are all very threatening. It's essentially like, hey, you need to keep your friends online. I'm going to bring a Maya to you so you need to convince her to come to you. And then when we get there, I will trade you your girlfriend for the laptop. - Yeah. - And I don't know about YouTube, but the minute we started talking about this, I was like, well, you're fucking dead. - No, no, yeah. - There's no way out. So like at this, yeah, like 30 minutes into this movie and it's like, no, no, no. (laughing) - So if anybody disconnects or if they try to call the police, that will also result into Maya's death. So I think it kind of makes sense that Matthias not only lies to everybody because your first inclination upon hearing this, like if I'm Nari, I'm 100% calling the police. So that's one of the reasons why I like that character. Not just because it's Betty Gabriel, who we fucking love and wish she was in this movie more, but also because it feels like that's the smartest, most reasonable thing to react to. - But I love that Charon is like, but watching Nari, she's still suspicious. I think the others bought it though. Like the threatening messages coming from Charon, again, I love the menace that it adds to the film. - And the fact that they disappear as soon as we want them to so that there is no record of any of this. - I like that you're probably going to get into it, but that Charon becomes more of a character throughout. But yeah, I do like that it seems less menacing, this character, almost as if they were trying to help. - Yes. - But Nari was great. I also think of him as I think it was great for him to be like, you know what? I don't want to get my friends involved in this. Like I'm already, I'm done for it. Like I wouldn't think that for myself if I'd be like, this is not going to end up well. I should have just brought this to the cafe. Like 20 minutes ago. - I know. Well, the problems that they're already involved. Like by him saying, like if anyone gets off, like Amaya dies, like they are, they're involved. Whether they know it or not. - Yeah. - All right, so what do we think of Matthias's decision then to open up his own blockchain account and move all the money over as a bit of safe keeping for himself, Amaya? - I get it, but I also, it's like a savior. He's trying to be the hero, but like I remember watching it with people in the audience and everyone's like, ooh, don't do that. - Well, okay, but here, and again, I think this is another one of those examples of people being like, oh, it's a really stupid decision. And I was like, yes, you're saying that because you're watching a horror movie. These people don't know yet that they're in a whole, I mean, he may be Matthias a little bit, but like it's just one of those things. It's like me personally, this is out of my league. Like I'm not trying to do anything too risky. He makes that decision and it's fine for me 'cause I get to watch him make it. I don't have to do it. - Yeah, could be like, he's basically in his head saying, like I'm going to go to jail. Like he's not just trying to save his girlfriend. He's actually trying to save the other girl too. And that was probably the... - Oh my God, that's the stupid decision. I was like, girl, like, no, no, no, no, let that girl die. It's fine. - As much as we do all love to be the hero 'cause I do 100% think you're right, Serena. This is him playing the hero. It's the same reason he developed Papaya in the first place. He wants to be the person who fixes things and he's going to do it. And it is easy for us as an audience to look at this and say it's the stupid thing because the reasonable thing to do would be like, I'm just going to throw this laptop out the window and we're done, right? - Okay, but wait, here's the thing though. And everyone listening if this changes your opinion on this and one of the four endings, this saves both he and Amaya's lives. So I mean, I think that's the weakest ending out of the four but I do wonder if this bad decision would have led to a happy outcome and not the one we have if people would be less inclined to be angry about this decision, you know? - Probably, yeah. I mean, it also kind of makes sense, right? Like, I personally would never do this because it's way too ballsy and way too risky but we're talking about such an astronomical sum of money that I could understand him thinking, well, if I have this, this is my best leverage to ensure my security. It's more the like, oh, okay. But I still have to like, what, open the door and let Amaya in and hope that this person doesn't now know where I live and just attack me or something? Like, that's where I start to go into do mode. - Yeah, yeah. I mean, well, that's the thing, right? There's a hopelessness to all of this because again, by the time you get to the end of the film, yeah, as we said, there's no way out of this. They're a fuck no matter what decision they make from minute 25 onwards. And I guess I can see some people be like, oh, that's really unfair. I'm like, yeah, that's right. - Welcome back to the real world. - That's the point. So we should note that we do sort of manage to get Amaya on the move. And part of the way that we do this is we do a call back to their relationship. So this is where we actually see Matai is getting really vulnerable. He talks about why he was attracted to her in the first place. I think that this bit of character detail is really significant. Like, this really worked for me. Like, I still don't know much about these two as real people, but in terms of making me care for them, for their relationship and making me believe that Matai's would do stupid things to save his girlfriend, I buy all this. - Well, but this is like an actual pea and honest peek inside Matai as his character. Like, we learn something deep about him. And that enhances our knowledge of this relationship with Amaya in a way that we don't get with the Serena and Nari relationship, which is just they're dating, they're lesbians. And one of their parents is in the hospital, the other one has parents that don't approve her relationship for some reason. Like, but those are all service level things. This moment with Matai is deep and true. And like, it's also just very... - Well, it's emotionally vulnerable. - Yeah, yeah, oh, vulnerable. Thank you, thank you, that's the one I was looking for. - So Amaya is on the move, but we've got this $10 million that has shifted account. We've had to deal with the circle. So we've elevated the threat level to know that there are more people. And in the midst of all of this, Lex has stepped out to take a call from her mother, who we learned tangentially from the group is like, okay, she's gonna be gone for a little while. She never mutes herself. But when we do notice she's been gone for a while, we realize, hmm, why haven't we been hearing mom yelling at her on the phone? Like, we normally would. And then this is when the chat is invaded by, what, like 20 different Charons? And they all have no video on. Nobody panics, which I thought was a little bit weird. Like if somebody attacked my Zoom call, maybe just 'cause I worked in a university, I was told like, oh, this is how bad shit happens. But we do get a video that is on YouTube called Found Her. And when we play it, we get to see them basically tracking Lex's location through all of her social media, digital footprints, and so on. - 'Cause no, 'cause they basically show the group, this is how we found her. (laughing) - Yeah, it's a tutorial video. And then this unfortunately ends with a passer by recording her death on the phone as she has pushed off the roof of a building. - Which, this seems dangerous too though, right? Because yes, it looks like an invisible force pushing her, but it definitely looks like a human-shaped invisible force pushing her off this roof. And it's on YouTube. - Mm-hmm, yeah, it's interesting, right? Because we can very clearly see that somebody pushes her in their dress to all them black. But I wonder if it's just because we have been trained to look for the figure in black from the Amaya, Kelly, Skype call. Because at the end of the film, it does become very clear that we plan to make it look like the entire group has died by suicide. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Or cop by suicide, or sorry, or suicide by cop. There we go. - Yeah, there you go. - Got there in the end. Okay, so at this point, Matthias is still telling everybody, hey, this is a horror game that I'm more or less beta testing with you. And it becomes a little harder to lie about that when we realize I think Lex is actually dead. - Yeah, if you're gonna play games on the internet with your friends, you know them well, I would like to think, before the pandemic, you know? - Mm-hmm. - So I would think that you would know immediately if your friend is full of shit. Like, I'd be like, "Nari, too." I'd be like, "This doesn't feel right at all." - Yeah, this smells like bullshit. I think the closest we get is Damon cautiously agreeing to go along with it. Initially, he kind of seems like, I don't know that you have the technical how-to to execute this. Like, we wanna ask a lot of follow-up questions, which I do appreciate, because I think in a lesser film, we would just have Matthias say, "Oh, this is just a game." And everybody'd go, "Oh, you got us." "You scoundrel, you scallywag." But here, everybody's kind of like, "So wait, why did you pick that Erica Dun named then? Why did you do this other thing?" Like, "Hey, that girl's actually still missing. This doesn't all check out." - Well, but I guess it's also because, okay, like, if this is really you, I give both of you are saying it, I totally agree. Like, you'll be able to tell if one of your friends is like off like that, but at the same time, would you think that this is what is happening to you, right? - Oh. - Like this, like, type, this is just something that seems so far out of the realm of reality that I don't think this is the first one that people would think of, except maybe Damon. - Hmm. - I don't know. I mean, I know if I was the one of those relatives, she was everyone would be like, something fucked up is happening 'cause I wear everything on my sleeve. And I think he does too. Like, he's not really good at hiding it. - Yeah, would this movie play better if we learned that Matthias was actually a poker player and a really good thing? (both laughing) Here's the thing. I mean, we're acting like he has this hugely long con. This doesn't actually go on for very long because as soon as Amaya gets into the subway and we realize, oh, Charon has lost wifi connectivity 'cause he's basically patched into Amaya. So as soon as her wifi disconnects as the subway, you know, goes underground, Matthias realizes, okay, I can tell the group, we can start formulating a plan, but we've got a limited amount of time. So it does happen fairly quickly. - Yeah, and I would say that was probably the smartest decision he makes. Like, you know, like, I think it's a, well, it's more of a good gimmick for the film to create tension and suspense. But that doesn't keep the other Charon's from. - No. - No. - Well, that's the other thing, right? Is at this point, we should be aware that there are multiple other people. Like, this is not a single person event. We've got a lot of people involved in this, but they definitely want to act like, we just have to keep the one who's trailing Amaya off the scent and we should be able to survive this. And I think it's another thing where they just underestimate what they're actually involved in. - Yeah. - Yeah. Because again, who would think that they are involved in this? None of them think it's possible they're all about to die tonight. - It should be AJ who really figures this shit out, right? - Right. (laughs) - And said he's just like, they can't find me, I'm so well protected. Like, AJ is the biggest idiot in this movie, right? - Well, because he's also the, that's the next step he is, right? Is his death. - Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so Matthias comes clean, everybody panics and everybody freaks out, but we do agree. Okay, we've got to play pretend because as soon as Amaya comes out or the train comes out, we need to put on a show. So this is where Nari starts to crack. Serena tries to cover four by playing this really awkward, uncomfortable round of cards against humanity. - But this is kind of fun. I love the suspense building between like, you know, oh, in the subway tunnel, it's cool, we can talk. Oh, shit, they're out. Everyone pretend to play. (laughs) - Yeah, yeah, and you're right. Serena, you said that this was probably one of the best sequences, if not the best sequence in this film. And I do think that this is definitely the tenses because we're just looking for that light in the one window where we're following Amaya as she's on the subway. Like, the film I find is really good at displacing windows, but still asking you to keep track of little slivers of them. So we can see a part of Amaya as she's on the train because she's kept her camera on. So we're constantly just keeping an eye on whether or not we can see her if the train is moving and so on. - Yeah, you're paying attention to the left side of the screen. That's what I remember, a little bit of it. Kind of reminds me of source code. Remember that movie? - Oh yeah, that one I would say is not as effective though. But I think what they did in that movie was like four screens and then they would turn on the sound, the louder in one screen that you have pay attention to more. - Oh my God, yeah, I'm sorry. I had to look 'cause I was like, oh, source code. That's the one with Jake Gyllenhaal. - Oh, sorry, no, it's not time code. It's a time-- - Okay, I was like, source code was critically acclaimed. - Oh my God, yeah, you're talking about the one with Salma Hayek. - Yeah, and the girl from Deep Blue Sea. Yeah, time code, sorry. - I don't remember this at all. - Oh yeah, it was interesting. I think a lot of people found it a little bit pedantic in some ways 'cause you are trying to watch action on four different screens. And Serena's right, like the sound would cue you as to which cube you were meant to watch. And the idea is sometimes they would interact with each other and other times they wouldn't, but there was like a very 24-esque deadline where people were doing different things and it was a novel first attempt at telling this kind of narrative, but it's not wholly successful. - It's worth a look if you're curious. - It was a really random reference. I'm sorry for bringing it up. But you know what, watch time code. I'm gonna watch the dead. So you watch time code? - No, there we go. We love a recommendation. - I've never even heard of time code. Now I'm looking at it, I'm like, oh my God, this cast. - No, the cast is great. - It's huge. It came out like late '90s, I think, or early 2000s. - It's 2000 on the dot. - Oh, that's not a dot, yeah. So it was that time period, yeah. - It's a bit of a high concept, right? It was when we were willing to experiment with things like, you know, 24s around then. We were also doing phone booths. - Right. - Yeah. Okay, so, yes, everyone is playing their part. We're waiting for Amaya, the train is maybe on the move. When it disappears again, this is when Matayus gives Damon remote access to his computer so that he can start downloading all of those videos. And we don't really get a lot of explanation, but everybody sort of has a part to play in the plan. So, as soon as Amaya shows up, AJ and his mom are gonna leave the house because they're not safe. We assume Damon is fine 'cause he lives in the UK. And yeah, we're gonna grab Amaya and Nari's got a friend in the police force, so she's going to be totally fine. - I do love this movie, like, the police can't do shit. - I'm actually surprised that the end of the film doesn't reveal that at least one of these people is a police officer. I think it's either a fireman or an EMT that we see, right? - I thought it was a cop, 'cause a lot of this, he looks knowingly into the webcam at, I wanna say, Damon's body, like, in his room? - Okay, that would make a lot of sense. So, you're probably both, right? - Yeah, but I mean, again, we're seeing this wall, again, this is the end, where a bunch of other things are happening on screen. - Yeah, yeah. Okay, so Amaya writes that the subway has broken down. There is a throwaway line. I think it's from Ateus who says, could they have hacked the train? And it seems so utterly ridiculous, but we will learn that that is 100% what they have done. - Yeah. - Yeah, so Nari is struggling to remain calm. We see her trying to, you know, move around. She's out of frame for certain passages, so we're all pretty certain that she's either making a plan or calling the police or something like that. And then this is when we move to the AJ set piece. And this, I think, is my favorite part of this film because it is just, it's so fucking mean. - Well, it's mean, it's scary, but it's also, like, morbidly funny. - It is kind of funny, yeah, like-- - Like Sophie's choice? - No, no, no, no, no, them tricking the cops into killing AJ. - Oh, yeah, sorry, the AJ, okay. Yeah, that is honestly best death. - Yeah. - I just, again, it's like I said the beginning, you know, where it's like, okay, we know what's gonna happen at a certain point. Like once they download the gun sound effect. - Yeah. - And the way the cursor hovers around the play button while they're waiting for AJ to get into their position, like, it's so mean, it's cheesy, it's, oh, yeah, I agree. This is the best executed sequence in the film. - And they keep yelling at him, you know, AJ stayed down because he wants to go and check on his mom and he thinks that by, you know, agreeing or acquiescing to the demands of the police that he's gonna be fine. Of course, we all know that that doesn't actually help you. - 'Cause they kind of, again, what they have done is they've cobbled together a super cut of audio clips of his conspiracy theory videos to make, to call the cops and say, I'm gonna blow up them all. - Yeah, exactly. But then they realize way too late that this took place 10 minutes ago. So, like, the cops are already, like, at his door, ready to, like, arrest him, then we get this gun sound. So he is just blown through the wall. - Yeah. - Yeah, you're right, Trace. It is funny, it is deeply upsetting, it's very, very mean. And I think at this point, if you hadn't figured out, this is the point of, like, oh, they're all gonna get this, it's just a matter of how do we get rid of them. - But it's also, this isn't the meanest the movie gets, 'cause I would argue what happens with Serena is probably the meanest of the movie. - Well, why don't we talk about that? - Sure! - I've been waiting to talk about it. - So we should note that we have had some direct conversations with Charon, who is played by Brian Adrian. And, you know, he had the freak out when we moved the money around. He did actually unmask himself. Serena, as you said, it seemed like maybe he was going to be helpful or less of a villain, like maybe more of a slightly unwilling accomplice in all of this. So, yeah, so he realizes that he's been compromised, and then this is when Serena starts talking about how Nari has actually left. So it's like, oh, shit, we haven't been listening to the instructions because Nari has gone to intercept a Maya on the train. So when the train begins moving, Nari will be at the station, she will have the police, we will get a Maya, we will put an end to this nightmare. And, of course, that's when Serena's webcam gets hacked, and we get to watch this video of the two of them talking about their forthcoming nuptials, but also like all of the stuff with their parents because Serena's mom is dying, she's in the ICU, and Nari has, yeah, like some fraught family stuff. So we didn't want to have to make a choice between the two of them, which, of course, is exactly what Serena is asked to do. She's given 30 seconds to decide whether Nari will get pushed in front of the subway, or whether we will unplug Mom in the ICU, and this to me is the stupid bitch moment of the film. - I know, I know. - I told my Mom while watching it, and I said, if you're dying. - I'm pulling the plug on you because-- - I'm pulling the plug on you, and she's like, yeah, of course, you pull the plug on me. If I'm dying, and it's like, if Elliot was going to be pushing in front of a train, or you're going to die and you're already dying, it's not much of a Sophie's choice. - So I agree with you, and I do find this effective just because I'm a sucker for like, countdown, make a choice, whatever, but it's also kind of a duplicate of a similar scene from the first movie, you know, where we're counting down at the very, that's the climax of the film with Blair. But the logic for me is just kind of like, look, your Mom is literally going to die no matter what. - Like, if you didn't make your Mom like ill, then that's a fucking moment, you know? Like, then I would be like, what the fuck am I going to do? You know? - Yeah, I get, you know, because I'm watching this as if it wasn't, you know, my real life. But I guess the idea, you know, for a real person going through this actual scenario would be, okay, but nevertheless, you are technically still murdering someone by making that choice, but then I'm also like, yeah, but if you don't make the choice, then you're murdering two people, not just one. - So I guess the thing is, is that she doesn't fully know that they'll kill both. - Right. - We don't clarify the rules of the game. - Well, she knows enough of the rules that someone's going to die. Like, how many people have died so far? Two of her friends have died. - Yeah. - You should know by now, like, I get it. Like, I would like, you know, if she just said, you know what, they're going to kill us anyway. So don't put this choice on me. - But okay, but here's the thing, y'all. And like, yes, I agree with everything y'all are saying, but do you really think if she had chosen one, they wouldn't have just killed them all anyway? - No, that's what I'm saying is they would have killed both. And we kind of get that impression anyway, like, Serena wasn't going to get out of this anyway, 'cause as soon as she doesn't make the choice, yeah, we killed both and both those screens go black. And then Serena is just immediately attacked and then we disconnect, but it's very similar to the Kelly death sequence. So it's like, yeah, we were just waiting for her. Didn't matter which decision she made. - Yeah, that's what I think makes part of this so scary, right? Is if these people are just fucking with them. Like the outcome is predetermined. It's just about how we get there. - Oh, they're going to kill Nari regardless, 'cause she's part of the game. And she's also like, she's closest to actually getting help. - She at least does put up a fight though. Like she does struggle with her assailant. - That was so disturbing about it. It looks so real. - Yeah. - 'Cause that shit happens on this stuff. Like, that's why I never stand that close when you're waiting for a subway. I'm against the wall. - Bank yellow line is there for a reason, babies. - Honestly, like, 'cause Joe, I've talked to this before, but Serena, there are certain types of deaths that I see in media that I'm just like, look, that really freaks me out. And being pushed in front of a train or a subway is definitely one of them. Okay, I didn't watch House of Cards, but I remember being really into it, but I'm really interested in it because I love Kate Mara, who's in it. And then I learned that she gets pushed in front of a subway in like the beginning of season two. And I was like, oh, I don't wanna see that. (laughing) - Spoilers, no, sorry. I, it's not spoilers because it's an old show with somebody who, we shouldn't be watching anymore. - Right. - Yeah, that's horrifying. - Yeah, it is. - I mean, it happens. Like, it's happened in a city we in Joe live in. - Yeah. - It's scary. So that's why I'm always against the wall. What is it? (laughing) - I will say, I wish that we had have maybe done a different death relax then. Like, I recognize, I said earlier, we're looking to make all of these either look accidental or in this case, you know, oh, Nari was the victim of a robbery and then she got pushed in front of a subway. Like, we're looking to explain all the deaths away at the end of the game. But at the same time, I wish we didn't have somebody get pushed off a roof and then somebody get pushed in front of a train. It's a little too samey-samy for me. - And Nari seems too smart. Like, for someone who's this already paranoid that her friend was lying to her about this murder mystery game, like, personally, I think she would be very aware of her surroundings while waiting for a subway and notice a man just standing right behind her. Like, when it's back turned to her. Like, as a woman, you notice shit. You know, like, I like to think that, especially if you know something bad's happening, that you would be a little bit more aware. But again, movies have to happen. - Yeah. - Stop has to happen. I can excuse this. (laughing) - We make excuses for it because it's still effective, even if we kind of look at it and say, "I'd like to think she would have been more perceptive." - No, but like you guys said, the fact that she fights is good. You know, it's like, at least she goes down fighting. - She's the only one who makes any kind of attempt to fight. Everybody else just gets taken it. - But there is also something very scary, 'cause again, we're not like in the action with Nari and her assailant, you know. We're just seeing this on like a security camera footage, which it's pixelated, it's choppy. And I think that also makes it scarier. - Yeah, and I also think she takes them out too. So at least-- - I think so. - No, I think there's a, you know, at least she gets one kind of-- - She gets one out of like a million, but it's one. - Yeah, exactly. (laughing) - So at this point, we're now down to two. We only have Damon and Matthias left. So Matthias makes this tearful plea. You know, Amaya is innocent in this. She's not really involved. She doesn't know anything. - I do think good acting from Woodell on this, by the way. I think he has the most to work with from an emotional like acting standpoint. And I think it was-- - Just say it, Trace. He's hysterical. - He's hysterical. (laughing) - But you're right. I mean, I think it's easy to not like this character because he really does get all of his friends fucking killed. But at this point when he's saying, okay, I think everybody is going to die, but also Amaya doesn't need to, because really she still has no fucking clue what's going on. So for him to make this desperate plea, yeah, it works for me. - Yeah, and he has such expressive eyes. He looks like he's crying all the time. He looks at the top to have an aneurysm, honestly. You're so red and so panicked all the time. - Oh yeah. Just like perpetually leaking eyes. - Yeah, ah, to be an actor. So he takes off on the bike to go and get Amaya. And as he's doing this, we learn that Damon is still downloading these videos and he starts speaking directly because he realizes we've been recorded this whole time. But he tries to wager, birder, blackmail. He says, I've downloaded these videos. I'm going to use them to find the coordinates of these girls. I'm going to expose you. This is going to be the end of everything for you folks. So we think, okay, yeah, maybe he's got the tech zaviness to try to pull this off. - And this backfire is spectacularly. - It does not really work, yeah. - So, I mean, one of the other interesting things that I really liked about this, I don't know how popular deep fakes were back in 2018, but they take control of Mateus' computer remotely. And then we just move Mateus' face onto Charon in Erika's abduction video. And you're just like, yep, it's seamless and it's believable. And then we see that they are dumping Erika's body in Mateus' apartment while he's out. - It is a while. But yeah, this is just like, we can't trust photos, y'all, fake news. - No, I mean, that's what the internet feels like a lot of the time, especially Facebook now. And when you hear people like, oh, I saw this trailer, it looks so stupid. I'm like, that was an AI trailer. How did you not know? - Yeah. - Scary. - Yeah. - Scary when people don't know when something's fake. - I mean, it's like a more extreme example of A. And not even a trailer, but like, you know, those fake, like, movie sequel posters that go on Facebook and everyone thinks they're like 1,000s. - 10s of 1,000 people. - Have you seen the clueless two one? I see that all the time. - Oh my God, and for years, it was Beetlejuice two, like for a dare. - Oh, I saw Beetlejuice two all the time too. - But it's just one of those things where it's like, look, have I been tricked by one of these, not Beetlejuice two or clueless two, but like, have I been tricked by one of these things, where it's like, oh, it's not a real source, absolutely. Which taught me, hey, just a quick Google search, because here's the thing. - Fool me fucking once, folks. - Like, look, all you have to do, let's say five years ago, you see a Beetlejuice two poster. Cool. - Mm-hmm. - You just Google Beetlejuice two. Just Google that, because I can promise you, if there's a Beetlejuice two poster, that's all the top results on your search. And if you don't see that, it is fake. - Yeah. - Well, if you see a name that doesn't make any, you've never heard of this website, or does whatever-- - Oh, yeah. - Right. - Just don't ever believe whatever they have to say about it. - The ones that piss me off the most is when I'm trying to find something on YouTube, and the top results are inevitably fake trailers for upcoming seasons of shows, and they're sometimes very realistic, like they're repurposing footage from a previous season, or a previous film, or something like that. But so often, they're just these janky fucking fan-made bullshit things, and you're like, there's a hundred thousand likes on this. - Yeah, so how do you like got monetized for that? I mean, like-- - Well, so here, I'll give you one. Okay, so there's one Twitter account that I followed. They're not my most official source, but if I see something, I'll go check, and normally it's true. But like, discussing film. - Sure. - Discussing film. - Okay, yes. Oh, they do get some stuff wrong, though. - So I just went to go just search, discussing film on Twitter. - There are one, two, three, four, five, six accounts with the exact same logo. There is discussing Menge film with the M instead of the N. There is discussing film with two Cs in discussing. There is discussing film, and there's all these copycats of this account that post fake movie news. But again, if you're going by, you know discussing film, you look at it, you might be like, okay, cool, that's real. You have to actually look at the goddamn handle to see if one letter is out of place. I've seen that too with Popcrave, and there's a fake account called Poohcrave. - Yep. - Mm-hmm. - And people get fooled all the time. - Were they the ones that like put out that Justin Timberlake was on? - Yes. - Yeah. - Pop poppers in Molly, yeah, yeah, yeah, and PrEP, and PrEP, they just had to PrEP in his system. (laughing) - And all the queers were like, yes, yes, PrEP? - Oh, I don't know. But that's the thing where it's like, y'all, this is like less than a day after he got arrested. Like, they're not gonna fucking have that. Like, also, do they even test for PrEP? (laughing) Especially even the first one. - Who knows, who knows. - It was so, it was so-- - I'll admit, I almost fell for that one, though. - I almost fell for it. - I definitely was like, oh, interesting, okay, I mean, here's the thing. I read it and I go, huh, and then I don't do anything with it, I'm not re-sharing it, I'm not commenting on it. - Like, exactly. - It's just like hit pause on that immediate response, right? Just wait to see. - It's the thing? - Save it for your own knowledge, but if you want to tell someone else, then you gotta fact check it to make sure you don't look stupid. (laughing) - Exactly, you know, think before you retweet, you know? You just don't just, like, look? 'Cause I think we know better. - I think we'd like to think we know better, but-- - Well, I mean, we know better enough to know that something's fake and we had a question. It's validity. - It is really easy to fact check. And it comes into a thing, though, where it's like, okay, well, what if, like, some nothing site gets a scoop? That's like, okay, this could be real, but know the major elements are reporting on it. And here's the thing, the reason they were not reporting on it is because they are fact checking. - Are fact checking. - Yes. - Yeah, 'cause we saw that even, and maybe after this, we'll come back to the movie, but we definitely experienced this when the news that Nev Campbell was returning to Scream 7. We had a bunch of people message us, and we were like, we're not buying this, 'cause we don't know the site. And it came out later, of course, that it was true, but it took an extra, like, couple of hours. - It was the same thing with Melissa Barrera's dismissal, I'll say, from the Scream franchise, where, yeah, that was reported by nothing sites before any major outlet reported on it. But that's also just a thing where it's like, well, it's because these fucking Scream fans now are-- - So your parents are known? There are hackers. - Oh, or, like, again, I saw a bunch of people, because they were sharing or reporting that A24 got the rights of Friday the 13th, or, no, to Halloween, the TV series stuff. And, like, three hours later, the actual, like, you know, this is what it actually is, and it wasn't A24, and then I saw a bunch of these outlets like deleting their posts, and I was like, "Mm-mm, unfollowing you." - You know what? I guess it's hard, yeah, you gotta believe it's disgusting. You're like number one horror site, so I guess you-- - Just check that. - That's the thing, anything horror related, I'm just like, let me go back to the mother's show. - Exactly. Let's go to the headquarters, and yeah, if you guys aren't reporting it, then, yeah. Some things are going to, like, slip, but at the same time, it's better to wait and be right, right? So-- - Exactly, exactly. - Go to poo crave is what we're saying. - But nevertheless, this is all 'cause Moira's on to. If you wanna check if something is real, it literally takes 10 seconds of a Google search. - It does. It's like, go search on news, there you go. - Yeah. Nobody gets a trophy for being the first to retweet something. It's OK. - Exactly. - Yes. - OK, now that we sound like a bunch of PSA tech assholes, let's move back. So, all this to say, we have discovered that we think Damon's maybe gonna be able to fight back, but also we're learning that Matthias is definitely going to get framed for this Erica Dunn kidnapping because he's now got the money, we've got the deep fake facial recognition piece, and yeah, things are not looking super great. And then, of course, things get worse because when Damon tries to communicate all this to Matthias, this is where we see them kill Damon, we hang him and we write a suicide note. - Yeah, that was hard to watch, I was saying. - Well, I love the way this is shot because yeah, we're watching them type the suicide note and we don't even get a full view of him getting hanged, but it's 'cause part of the window is hidden by the window that's doing the suicide note. So, we've watched him in the background getting hanged, but my favorite detail on this is the smiley face at the end of the suicide note. - Oh my God, I did not notice that. - Really gross. - Yeah, so he, quote unquote, ends it with, I'm sorry, smiley face, which interestingly enough, in the alternate endings, 'cause we get to see this play out in every single one of the endings, I think in two of the four, they backspace the smiley face and just write Damon. - Yeah. - Which I thought was weird. - Yeah, which again is one of those, oh, we can tweak it right all the way up until the end just to see which one plays better, which one do we think works best? - Mm-hmm, yeah. - Yeah, 'cause in some of the endings, this is a little bit longer, and in some of them it's a little bit shorter, so Damon was going to die regardless, but how quickly and what the note says is different. - Yeah. - Okay. - So now we're down to just our romantic lovers, and Matthias, Matthias is still, Matthias. - Matthias is, I think I said it differently every time, so I'll tell you. - Y'all have said Matthias the entire time, I don't know where you get it. - Is Matthias? - It's Matthias, it's M-A-T-I-A-S. - I just, I feel like Matthias sounds better, out. - Here's the thing, Serena, I think you and I are doing French, and I think it's more. - Maybe 'cause we've been in Montreal for too long. - I would say y'all are doing Mateo from Anaconda. - There we go. - Oh my God, Mateo, that's a drinking rule. - When every time his name was mentioned, - Mateo. - Serena, you nearly killed me with that drinking rule. - I'm sorry. (laughs) - Mateo. (laughs) - Okay, so yes, we're down to just our lovers, we just have Matthias as well as a Maya left, and she has messaged him to be like, "Hey, I'm outside the building that you sent me to." And he's like, "What the fuck are you talking about?" And then we see, I love this detail, we see the Charons use papaya to tell her to go inside. I love that that detail comes back up, because if not, it just feels like, "Oh, he invented this app, "and that's the cause of the friction and the relationship." And here it's like, "Oh yeah, you built the fucking thing "that sends her to her death." - Which, going back to what you were saying earlier, Serena, about how, yeah, why would she go in there? I think this gives her enough of a push to go in there to be like, "Oh yeah, why would she think "that anyone is hacking his software "until I get her to go into a warehouse?" - I still wouldn't go, I get that, I get that. - I still wouldn't go, I'd be like, "Fuck this," like, I-- - She's like, "We're breaking up." - 'Cause even if she didn't know, I would think he's a serial killer at that point. I haven't been dating him this long. - Yeah. - With also, like, does she can't hear? So she, yeah, there's just no way. - It's just so unfortunate, right? Because the saddest thing about her death, because we assume that she's dead, we see her get attacked when she goes in, so that we can really just crank up the whorableness for Matthias, but-- - Matthias! - Oh, yes, I've committed to it, my face. - I think this was sad about this original ending, is that you know she got it bad. - Yeah. - She's the one that people paid the money for on the river, so-- - Right, yeah. - But also, I just, this is your thing, Trace, where the person who did wrong doesn't realize that they're getting their come-up-ins or from who, and in this case, it's the switch or that, where she just thinks she's literally been harassed by her boyfriend to come and visit him, and then he detoured her to this place, and she dies never knowing any of this. - Yeah, and she's, oh, she's gonna get the worst death, because I think how they described the guy who wanted to pay more, was kinda describing her almost. - Well, I think also, she probably thinks also that Matthias did this to her. - Yeah. - She may die thinking that's what happened. - Right, 'cause he told her to go inside, he brought her here. - Yeah, even though it wasn't him, it was them. But still, yeah, absolutely. So the last thing, as far as she knows, Matthias did this to her. - Yeah. - And you know what? Don't do that! Like, I'm sorry, but I don't buy. Well, you see her in that room. - The dark-ass room with my lights on. - I started, I remember in a theater, I was like, what? And I started laughing, 'cause I was just like, there's no way someone would be like, yeah, I'm just in here. I mean, I 100% would. If Brian was like, yeah, meet me at this location. - Yeah. - Just regard the fact that it's dark, just go inside. I would be like, oh, okay. - Absolutely never do that. - I just, yeah, I would just think it was my husband playing some weird horror sex game with me. - I would think someone stole my partner's phone and is trying to sexually assault me. Like, that's what I, that's a woman. We always have to-- - No, absolutely, absolutely, we are two men. - Yeah, you're two kids, you're just like, I get it, but whatever, a woman would be like, absolutely if I could not, that's not happening. No, so, yeah. - Okay, so, but this leads us into kind of like-- - We're nearly there, one of four, yeah. - So, the interesting thing is that we kind of do a strangers here, right? Where Matthias is like, why the fuck are you guys doing this? And they just replay this little clip of him from earlier in the evening where he says, it's game night. - Yeah, oh yeah. - I love, again, I love any movie that takes clips from different things and forms them into-- - Repurposes, yeah. - There's a movie, oh god, it's all into my time. We're like, some grew, oh, oh, it's live for your die hard. Timothy Olafot takes all of these president speeches and uses it to make his terrorist speech. - Oh yeah. - All right, yeah. - I haven't thought about that movie in forever. - I like die hard for it, even though it's beach 13-- - It's not great, it's fine. - I haven't even watched die hard five, I don't even know-- - Oh no, don't watch that one, that's a bad movie. - Yeah, that's a bad movie. - My version would be copycat, where we're getting kind of doing deep takes, but we're turning them into kind of giffable cards. - Yeah, absolutely, yep. They have a lotion of technology throughout the decades. - And used always her murder. - Yeah. (laughing) - Okay, so because it is game night, let's end this with a bang. We open up voting to all of our charons so that they can decide in two minutes whether Matais will live free or die hard. And of course, because people are shit and because these people are literally playing the game, they vote overwhelmingly no and he gets smoked by a van. - Well, so, but while this is happening though, we see Erika Dunne crawl out of Matais's closet and like, you know, the piece of her skull falls off, which is really hard to watch. - But I remember looking at this and saying, oh, what's up with her forehead? That must have been when they knocked her out and she's just got a big burp and then oh God, it falls open. - Yeah. - And I'm like, how is that possible? - I mean, they just took her, they didn't touch her brain, they just opened up her skull a little bit. - Yeah, but I mean, presumably she dies from this too, right? I mean, I just think about the infection. Like, yeah, your brain, maybe I'm wrong. 'Cause I mean, this is an actual medical procedure that is used to help relieve pressure on the brain. - Sure. - But that they reseal it back up, I'm assuming. - Yeah. - I think she'd be justified. She'd go to the hospital. - She's got a happy life ahead of her. - Yeah, plug it in back and then don't fade. Like that would be, that's how cute. - Yeah. - Just put a tampon in there to stave off the bleeding for a little bit and then you're fine. - We're all just talking about it. But then like, I mean, so we lose Matthias in the van, but then yeah, we have this like where we back out of the screen and we win this. Oh, okay, there's a real person like kind of running all this as we seal the charms, which again, very much the den. - Well, okay. So you keep saying it, yes, yes, we fucking get it. To me, this is also a skaper and hostile. - Oh, yeah, I would see, yeah, I can see, yeah. - Especially this ending where we're betting. Like if you look at the right hand side, we can see a bunch of different computer monitors and there's different bets that are going on. So it's an odds board. Things like time to first kill, how long it takes Matthias to get to the warehouse, how long? - Yeah, like hostile two. That's like the one when they're really betting. Will you see the bets, right? - Well, okay, okay. So I'm really sorry, Serena, 'cause this is kind of like, I mean, it's not really a plot point, but it's kind of like the coda to the den where it's like going back out. We learned that this is one of many videos of someone's life quote unquote that before they die, that is being sold on the dark web and we back out, it's this guy pulling out his credit card to buy the next video of this other girl. And then all of a sudden we hear dad and he turns around, sees his son cut to black. Like that's the end of the den. So this reminded me of that. And maybe I'm being unfair about my one to one comparisons with this, but it just reminded me of it. - Yeah. - Well, it's a gut punch. I mean, it's an effective ending because it makes you doubt your faith in humanity. Like, oh my God, people are betting. Oh my God, people are doing this and they have children. Oh my God, these are businessmen who went to fictitious, you know, Eastern European country so that they could murder somebody. - It just makes you think like rich people are different. (laughs) - What links will you go to when you're bored and rich? - Yeah. I mean, I kind of like this idea. I'm like as a strong word in this case, but I'm intrigued by this idea specifically for this film where it's not just this network of people, but people who actually have to go and be actors in the drama, right? Like we basically learned that the charm that we were speaking to throughout the course of the film, like that was his role in "Game Night" was to unmask himself and to drive the conflict. And there's, yeah, like the police officer, there's the person who deposited Erica in the room. And so I'm like, so some people are really tech savvy, but then some people are like, cool, I wanna get my hands dirty doing this. - Yeah, 'cause when he was saying like, I didn't kill Kelly, I just banged her like on the head. - Which is a lie though. - Yeah, it's definitely a lie. - Yeah, for sure. - But like, you kind of buy it for a second, right? You're like, oh, and then you're like, no, no, no. - Yeah, yeah. Okay, so let's talk about these alternative endings, so. (upbeat music) So the first one is Matthias and Amaya, and they're both being held hostage, but they survive their vote and they get to live. So this is the happy ending version. - That version makes no goddamn sense. - Yeah, it felt very, 'cause I watched this today and I thought it was very rushed. So yeah, he's basically like, oh, my insurance still, and then they let them live and that's the end of the movie. - But no, no, no, no, they still end with Erica opening her head and screaming. - So I guess that's the bad ending, you know? Our two leads survived, but this girl still has this happen to her. - Yes, and all the rest of them have still died in horrible ways. - And it wouldn't make sense, 'cause it's like, why would you keep these two alive? Because you're trying to frame this kid that he's the one who did this. - Well, I guess you can say the others that did die. They can still blame them. 'Cause I think that a Damon and AJ are kind of the two that you can really pin this on. - But why would anyone vote, yes, that's the whole thing. I think these are awful people. - Yeah, unless we're meant to believe, oh, the insurance is that important to them, but the way it's done doesn't give it that kind of importance. - Yeah. - I think they just need to have a happy ending, just in case people were so upset. Yeah, the suits were like, okay. - Nevertheless, that's the worst ending. So what's another one, Joe? (upbeat music) - Okay, so second one is Jess Matthias, and he is shown the location of the pin so that he can go and track down on Maya himself. He discovers her jacket and other clothes in this empty warehouse, and then he spots a gun, and as we pull out and the voting opens, it's whether or not he will kill himself and we don't see the results. - Which, that to me is just a cop out too. - I don't like the sending at all. Yeah, I don't like it either. - I think this is the least effective one for me. - It's also like, it's just like, what? I mean, I don't, to be quite honest, I don't like any of the endings that much, but this is the one that really left me... - It just feels unfinished. - Unfinished, you're right, yeah. - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. - And I get the idea that, okay, we're not gonna show this person deciding to kill himself, but I don't think it has the same visceral impact as even the other endings. - I also don't think he would kill himself. That's probably the- - I don't think so either. - I don't either, but I also think, and like, I mean, not saying I wanna watch this guy kill himself, but, 'cause the movie, again, isn't that violent, but it is mean. And I just think if we're gonna stay in the spirit of the meanness of this movie, - Yeah, do it. - In this ending, you would have to have him kill himself. - Yeah. - Yeah, on screen. - Yeah. - Not that I wanna see that either, but. - Yeah. - Or even like, put the gun onto your head, cut to black, and have the gunshot or something. - Sure. - Okay, final, delete-addending. (upbeat music) - Amaya. So we go through the whole rigamarole, but we do see Damon warning Matthias that the circle knows he's headed to the park where they had their first kiss. So this one is much more clearly laid out. That's why we go to a park. And we see a video of Matthias being knocked out over an open coffin. And then, yeah, we get the whole Damon death with Erica coming out of the closet as well. And then we go back and we see that Amaya has arrived. The ground has now been filled in and we're doing a buried-alive situation where Matthias has his phone and he's trying to communicate to say, "I'm right below you, I'm buried alive." And Amaya, of course, can't hear him and they are intercepting and changing his text so that it just says, "I wish I could sign better." - I do like this one. - I like this one. - This is my second favorite. - This was, yeah. - You like the original? - I prefer the theatrical one that we have where he just gets hit by the van because to me, it's kind of funny. As we said, there's a slight amusing humor to this, but also it's incredibly dark. And I do think it's like, yeah, he dies and we voted for it and we just had somebody ready to mow him down. - When did the buried movie come out, like with the-- - Oh, that's like, that's like (snores) - Early 2010s? - Yeah, I think I was still working at Blockbuster when it-- - Oh, I want to say like 2013 or so. - No, it's 2010 on the die. I was working at Blockbuster when this came out. - Holy shit, okay. - I think I'm with you, Joe. I prefer the theatrical ending, however, I do think thematically and plot-wise, this is a more fitting ending for the characters. - Yeah, I like this ending. I mean, I prefer the ending where he gets mowed down 'cause it's very quick for him. But yeah, I agree, Trace, the tying it back to papaya. - Yes, uh-huh. - And then tying it back to almost the first movie, it almost seemed supernatural that part where it was just like everything he typed was skewed to say something different, but it was just hacker shit, so. - Yeah. - Another interesting thing about this ending that I'm surprised they didn't ultimately go with it is that it does spare a Maya, presumably. So the person who was the least involved, who was the most innocent, gets to walk away. - 'Cause it almost makes the circle be like these avenging angels for this disabled woman. - We got rid of all of your shitty friends. - No, and they would probably like, let's face it, they would just be like, oh, she's like special. We need to drill a hole in her head and put something alive in it. - God, you really want to kill this disabled woman. - I don't, I don't put those words in my mind. (laughs) But that's what they would be like, so. - I mean, I could envision like a sequel, we would never make a direct sequel to this, but I could imagine, you know, opening with the kill scene where they say, oh, you're, you're our special participant to start the next round of game night. - 'Cause we do learn that this is the 14th game night, by the way. - Right. - Oh, it's the 14th game night. - Yeah. - For the, the people at the end. - Yeah, when we, when we back out, like on the circle, it's like game night, Roman numeral 14. - Yeah. - Oh God. - So yeah, this is not the first time they have done this. (laughs) - Which again, makes no sense why that one ending they would have allowed them both to live. No, we've done this 13 previous times. Presumably we have not let anyone survive. - It makes sense for Amaya because she has no idea what's going on. - Exactly. Yeah. - Yeah. - But I think that was just like where you guys in the studio interfere and just like just have a-- - Have one happy ending option at least. - Yeah. - But I could see this being the alternative one where it's like you go one night, you get the van, one night, you get the cemetery. - Like I was gonna say, I'm like, do we know which ones, like I know it's the one with the van, but what about-- - I'm not convinced that they ever did a different ending 'cause of the edge. I think it was just the van. - Yeah, I think so too. - Yeah. - Listeners, if you remember seeing this in theaters and you did not see a van momentize down, let us know because yeah, I was so intrigued by the concept of a clue style like release strategy and then it just like this movie came out and nothing. - Yeah. - So I don't know. - I felt like they walked it back when they decided they weren't gonna give it a wide release or a big marketing push. - Yeah, that's what I think too but-- - I don't like the whole alternate ending stuff like where you have to go to a movie multiple times. - It's such a cash grab. - Also just tell me, like I'll buy into it. If you just tell me that I'm gonna see a different alternate ending than the one I just watched. - No, that's what they did with Clue. So in the newspaper listings, they would say ending A, ending B, ending C. - Oh really, that's clever. But I like Clue. Clue plays better with all three endings. It's funnier, having all three tacked on together. - Yeah. - This is the way it could have happened but this is the way it really happened and yeah. I mean look, it's a way to make more money and I respect that, it's fine, it's capitalism. But I agree, I would be less bothered if they told me, okay this theater gets this, this is the ending you will get. Like don't say what happens but it's ending A, B, C, or D, whatever. But yeah, I agree with you Jo. I don't think that's what actually happened with this movie but we'll see, we'll find out. We'll see ourselves. - Yeah, we'll find out by people. And if anybody remembers cyber natural and Jess's death falling on a search engine and dying. - Honestly, I now want another unfriended movie with more like all deaths being like that. (laughing) Like they all get stuck to the computer for their death scene but it's like a different corner of the internet that's killing them. So, you know, sure, search engine, she falls through death, whatever. But like what's another good like internet type death, you know? - What is a good issue? - Listeners, let us know. - Again, more challenges, yeah. (laughing) - All right everyone, well that is unfriended dark web and before we announce it, we're covering next week. Serena, thank you so much for coming to talk to us about this movie. - Oh, thanks guys for having me. I'm sorry, I kept wanting to go right to the ending like two hours ago but that's fine. I'm sorry. - You want to get to the good stuff? - No, you're good but let everyone know. Where can they find you on social media? - Yeah, you can find me on Twitter, Switney 1984, I think the same thing for Instagram. You can find me @reviewsinema in Toronto. - There we go. - So yeah, I cover those social media accounts as well, so. - And movies and chaos, how often do you turn out episodes for that? - Yeah, we release every two weeks on Thursdays. - All right, well if you want to get in touch with us, you can reach us on Twitter and Instagram @horakwears. Shoot us an email @horakwears@gmail.com. Find us on Letterbox to get track of all the films we've covered. If you want to chat with other listeners, please join our Facebook Horror Queers group. If you have a moment, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And if you want even more content, please support the show about becoming a patron at patreon.com/horakwears. If you subscribe today, you will get 322 hours of Patreon content, including this month's new episodes on Hannibal season one episode eight, strange darling, trap, alien Romulus, and to tie in with that last one, we've got a brand new audio commentary on James Cameron's aliens, and we've got a special bonus episode on sleep away camp three teenage wasteland for all patrons this month. So you can listen to that for just one dollar. - There we go, 35th anniversary. - 35th anniversary. But Joe, oh boy, what are we talking about next week? - Well, I feel like we need to dive back into the past race and we made a promise a couple years ago during our summer of camp series that we would check out the other sexy Udo here title. So don't call it Andy Warhol folks. We're gonna be checking out Blood for Dracula. - And I would recommend maybe do a refresher, go listen or re-listen to our episode on Flesh for Frankenstein because I have an inkling that the production of both of these films will be very, very similar. - There we go. And Trace, correct me if I'm wrong. Is there a content warning for sexual assaults in this one? - Definitely a content warning for sexual assault. I want to say more, but I don't want to spoil the surprise, but definitely- - There's a surprise sexual assault? - Well, the sexual assault isn't the surprise. It's more so how the film handles the sexual assault in the film. - Oh, okay. - Obviously, if you're curious about that, go read the Wikipedia plot. But yes, content warning for sexual assault and blood for Dracula. - Yeah. - I love a '70s film. - Absolutely. But until next time, we can cross out unfriended dark web. - Indeed, and cross out horror queers. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Get three coffins ready, kid. Because our latest podcast, Make My Day, is venturing off into the wild and sprawling frontier that is Clint Eastwood's career. More movies than Stephen King has books and more genres than all of the franchises we've covered over at the Halloweenies. Now, I know what you're thinking. Do they really need to start another show? Well, to tell you the truth and all this excitement, I kinda lost track myself. But being this is a podcast, the most powerful medium in the world for pop culture conversation and Clint's output is infinite. You've gotta ask yourself one question. Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk? Find out today and subscribe to Make My Day, a Clint Eastwood podcast now, wherever you get your audio. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) [MUSIC PLAYING]
Beware of The Circle because we're exploring the dangers of Screenlife with Stephen Susco's sequel, Unfriended: Dark Web (2018).
Along for a journey on The River is Serena Whitney, who remembers seeing the OG Unfriended back when it was called Cybernatural!
Plus: casual queer representation, a disabled damsel in distress, why none of these characters are stupid, the best/meanest death(s), a PSA about fake movie news, and - cue the Clue music - our ranking of all 4 endings.
Bonus Drinking Game: every time Joe or Serena mispronounce "Matias"
Questions? Comments? Snark? Connect with the boys on Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Letterboxd, Facebook, or join the Facebook Group to get in touch with other listeners
> Trace: @tracedthurman
> Joe: @bstolemyremote
> Serena: @swhitney1984 / Revue Cinema: @RevueCinema / Movies & Chaos Pod: @MoviesChaos
Be sure to support the boys on Patreon! Want more Screenlife horror, try our episode on Host.
Theme Music: Alexander Nakarada
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