How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 300 Part 2…and no-one gets out of this town, not even Miss Perfect. Fear Street Part Two: 1978 (2021) continues the Shadyside strife with a trip back in time to 1978, as C Berman relays the story of her sister's death at Camp Nightwing. Ziggy is a rebellious Shadyside-r who is growing increasingly distant from her sister Cindy, who lo...
Jul 01, 2025•50 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 300 Part 1…and stop being mad at me for wanting a different future. Fear Street Part One: 1994 (2021) introduces us to the crime-ridden city of Shadyside, the supposed ‘murder capital’ of the United States. Amidst the latest killing spree, star-crossed lovers Deena and Sam become embroiled in the town’s mysterious and macabre history ...
Jun 07, 2025•1 hr 3 min
This episode was originally released as a Patreon bonus. To find out more, head to Patreon.com/howtosurvivepod It's time for the long-awaited 300th Episode Spectacular! It's a bumper session, filled with correspondence and reflections - and we couldn't be more grateful to everyone who has been part of the fun. You can also expect a few announcements about upcoming features - including a return to covering not one but TWO franchises. Thanks for all your support. It means a huge amount that you've...
May 21, 2025•1 hr 15 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 299… My mommy always said there were no monsters. No real ones. But there are. Alien Resurrection (1997) is the concluding chapter in the Alien Quadrilogy, and introduces Ripley 8, a supercharged Xeno-human hybrid of Ellen Ripley, cloned in a lab to act as a genetic vessel to recover the Xenomorphs from the annals of history 200 years...
Apr 02, 2025•58 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 298…and at 50, it all stops. The Substance (2024) follows Elisabeth Sparkle, a fading Hollywood star who is fired from her TV fitness show when she reaches 50. Learning of ‘The Substance’, a black market pharmaceutical product that promises to create ‘a better version of you’, she signs up, producing Sue - a younger, idealised version...
Feb 21, 2025•1 hr 1 min
Anyone can feel strong hiding behind a piece of metal. I prefer to know my own strength. Love Lies Bleeding (2024) tells the story of Lou, a gym owner who falls in love with Jackie, a gym user who plans to enter a bodybuilding contest. As they fall deeper in love, they become tied up in violence, deception and crime - all thanks to Lou’s family and their violent, deceitful, criminal ways. We offer investigation tips to the FBI, question whose perspective you can really trust, and question the tr...
Feb 19, 2025•40 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 296…and you’d be surprised what the human brain can edit out when it can't handle the truth. Censor (2021) follows Enid, a censor at the BBFC during the moral panic around ‘Video Nasties’ - a 1980s proliferation of graphic horror movies flooding the new frontier of VHS home entertainment. Enid acts as a kind of moral guardian, exposin...
Jan 25, 2025•1 hr 4 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 295…and what big eyes you have, what big hands you have. Ghostwatch (1992) was broadcast ‘as live’ on BBC 1, on Halloween night in 1992, and saw TV stalwarts Michael Parkinson and Sarah Greene trying to prove the existence of the paranormal by taking a camera crew to ‘the most haunted house in Britain’. While the show documented the E...
Oct 18, 2024•1 hr 5 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 294…and you've made it to the belly of the beast, congratulations, very few come this far. MaXXXine (2024) concludes Ti West’s X trilogy, following Maxine Minx in her journey to Hollywood stardom. But as she’s pursued by a mysterious leather-clad stalker, it’s not long before Maxine’s friends and colleagues start turning up dead. Is M...
Oct 05, 2024•53 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 293…and I'm sorry, it seems I wore my long legs today. Longlegs (2024) follows FBI agent Lee Harker, who is assigned to the case of a serial killer who is apparently responsible for compelling several patriarchs to murder their families across multiple decades, with the only trace being cryptic letters signed ‘Longlegs’. Can Agent Har...
Sep 07, 2024•56 min
aka Vermines (2023) It’s episode 292…and are you interested in animals? Infested/Vermines (2023) tells the story of Kaleb, a young man with a passion for selling sneakers and buying bugs. Living in a multicultural melting pot of a tower block, his friendships have become strained following the death of his mother. Can he reconnect with his Jordy, his childhood best friend, and reconcile with his sister Manon? Anything is possible if you move forward with grace and acceptance. Oh, and he also bou...
Aug 23, 2024•57 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 291…and would anyone object if I tore this floor out? Arachnophobia (1990) takes us to the sleepy Californian town of Canaima, via the jungle sinkholes of Venezuela, to follow the story of the newly arrived family physician Dr Ross Jennings. When townsfolk begin dropping dead in mysterious circumstances, Jennings suspects foul play of...
Aug 05, 2024•49 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 290…and the Internet and dreams are similar. They're areas where the repressed conscious mind escapes. Paprika (2006) follows its titular dream-based protagonist, and her real-life alter ego Dr Atsuko Chiba, as she administers a futuristic form of therapy using a prototype device called the DC Mini. However, when so-called ‘Dream Terr...
Jul 19, 2024•54 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 289…and you're tarnished and filthy. Perfect Blue (1997) follows the story of Mima, a Japanese pop idol who gives up singing at the advice of her management in order to pursue an acting career instead. What follows is a descent into paranoia and doubt as Mima begins to lose track of who she is, all as mysterious murders occur in her v...
Jul 03, 2024•1 hr 4 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 288…and we have travelled further into space than any humans before us. Aniara (2018) follows a titular ship of evacuees escaping a climate-ravaged Earth as they set out for a new life on Mars. When a collision with some space debris results in the ship losing all control, the Aniara begins to drift further out into deep space. As wee...
Jun 05, 2024•56 min
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May 27, 2024•2 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 287…and you mean more to me than any scientific truth. Solaris (1973) sees psychologist Kriss Kelvin dispatched to a space station orbiting the titular planet to see if the skeleton crew’s reports of strange goings on and mysterious 4 metre tall babies are to be believed, or whether it’s a simple case of space madness. While there, he...
May 17, 2024•55 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It’s episode 286…and I will make the land desolate so that your enemies who settle it shall be appalled by it. Mad God (2021) is the singular vision of Phil Tippett, the stop motion genius behind Star Wars ’ AT-ATs and RoboCop ’s ED-209. Over the course of 30 years he slowly created what some believe to be his opus– Mad God –a nightmarish film wit...
May 08, 2024•41 min
It’s episode 285! And I’d rather kill myself than work here. Stopmotion (2024) tells the story of Ella, a Stopmotion Artist, who is pouring her heart and soul into creating something truly outstanding. Stepping out from her Stopmotion Artist mother’s shadow, Ella is tempted by opportunities to be a Stopmotion Artist at an advertising agency, urged to slow her down her Stopmotion Artist lifestyle - but it may just be too little too late. We talk about the productivity-gains that come from slowing...
Apr 17, 2024•1 hr
It's Episode 284 and congratulations to Emma Jones in Monkeys Running the Zoo III. Candyman (1992) tells the story of Helen, a grad-student investigating urban legends - or more specifically one urban legend about 'Candyman' - a hook-handed slasher who appears if you say his name five times in a mirror - and promptly disembowels you. Not much of an incentive to summon him overall, but what a premise! We talk about correct police procedures; optimal concussion care; and rubbish foreplay - all bef...
Apr 03, 2024•51 min
It's Episode 283 and congratulations to Repeat Repeat in Monkeys Running the Zoo III. When Evil Lurks (2023) tells the story of brothers Pedro and Jaime. When a neighbour in their rural town comes down with a case of Demonic Possession, they begin a series of increasingly desperate (and ill-advised) methods to contain the monster before it can wreak havoc. We talk about inadequate public health messaging; the wonders of modern technology; and the benefits of keeping a low profile. Whatever happe...
Mar 20, 2024•51 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's episode 282...and a shower and a change of clothes wouldn't hurt. Shin Godzilla (2016) serves as a rebooting of the classic Japan-set Godzilla movies in the modern day. When a gigantic monster emerges from the sea, the slow-moving cogs of Japan's bureaucratic machinery begin to turn, but in the face of a walking natural disaster and threats o...
Feb 21, 2024•54 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's episode 281...and I'M GONNA BE A STAR AND THE WHOLE WORLD'S GONNA KNOW MY NAME! Pearl (2022) tells the story of Pearl - a young woman who is unhappily stuck on the family farm while her husband is away at war. Pearl dreams of life as a dancer in the pictures, but must overcome a forebearing mother, ailing father, societal barriers and her own...
Jan 31, 2024•55 min
It's Boxing Day (ish), and that can only mean one thing... These broads would hump the Leaning Tower of Pisa if they could get up there! Black Christmas (1974) tells the story of a sorority house beset by threatening phone calls in the days before Christmas break. When one of their number go missing, it's a race against time to find her, and the person responsible, but perhaps they should be looking closer to home? We talk about a film that serves as the origin of the slasher genre and the on-sc...
Jan 15, 2024•48 min
A quick note - our Boxing Day podcast on Black Christmas, and our episode Pearl, will unfortunately be a bit delayed due to illness. Sorry about that. How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's Christmas Eve, and that can only mean one thing... I thought everything was fine until I saw you last night. Then I knew there must be something between us, even if it's only an ocean. An Affai...
Dec 24, 2023•46 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's episode 280...and whoever we contacted, they followed us. Talk To Me (2023) follows Mia, a teenager struggling to move on following the overdose-related death of her mother. When her school friends discover how to summon spirits using a mysterious embalmed hand, Mia becomes obsessed with contacting the dead, and even allowing them to take pos...
Dec 20, 2023•41 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's episode 279...and do you believe there is a part of yourself, deep inside in your mind, with things you don't want other people to see? The Cell (2000) follows the FBI as they pursue nefarious serial killer Carl Rudolph Stargher, who imprisons his victims in glass prisons that will gradually fill with water. When Stargher's capture leaves him...
Dec 06, 2023•56 min
What could it mean?
Nov 29, 2023•1 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Support us at Patreon.com/HowtoSurvivePod to get every episode one week early, plus monthly bonus episodes and more. It's episode 278...and s he locked away a secret, deep inside herself, something she once knew to be true... but chose to forget. Inception (2010) tells the story of Cobb and his band of extractors--thieves who use dream-sharing technology to break into the subconscious minds of their targets and steal information. Cobb has a dark history and live...
Nov 21, 2023•1 hr 7 min
How to Survive is now on Patreon! Visit Patreon.com/howtosurvivepod! It's episode 277...and I like you... This week's film was chosen by our patron Sam Goff as part of Monkey's Running the Zoo Season II. V/H/S (1995) is an anthology found footage movie, depicting a parade of detestable characters doing detestable things. Across the series of short films we see: a group of daters get more than they bargained for; a honeymooning couple get more than they bargained for; some teenagers at a lake get...
Nov 01, 2023•56 min