Us with Korama Danquah

they're nicer than us? What if they're actually not evil? What if we're the evil ones? It's open to interpretation. Well, guess what. Here's the twist. I am the other. I am the one outside is the one that you thought was me? Oh my goodness. That was an effective opening. That was our best on ye yet I think. Welcome to the Bechtel Cast. My name is Caitlin Darante, names Jamie Loftus, and this is our podcast about the representation of of of of a lot of things in movies.

We we come to some of your favorite movies using an intersectional lend, using the Bechtel test as a jumping off point for a discussion, and the Bechtel Test, of course, being if you're not familiar, if this is your first episode ever and you've never heard I think this will be a fun point of entry this. This would be

a fun first episode. Yeah, so welcome. The Bechtel Test is a media metric uh sometimes known as the Bechtel Wallace Test, was created by cartoonist Allison Bechtel, and it requires for our purposes, this is our rendition of it, because there are various versions of the test, but ours is that two people of any marginalized gender, they have to have names. They have to speak to each other about something other than a man for at least two

lines of dialogue. That's our bar, my favorite, and I suppose so this is just a jumping out point for discussion. So I can already say this movie passes the Bechtel test. But one of my favorite passes is when it's Lupete and Younga and Elizabeth Moss talking to each other about how Lupide doesn't really want to talk to her, and Elizabeth pass is like, oh okay, totally, like that's a past.

She's like, are you okay, Lupeta, and She's just like, I'm not good at talk I don't really want to talk to you right It was one of my favorite passes of this movie, or really of the cast at all. Like, you know, two women agreeing that they don't really want to talk right now, that's a pass um. And we're so excited to bring back a a much beloved guest for a movie that she was really excited to talk about that is a much requested movie on the cast.

The movie, of course being US Jordan peels us from and the guest, of course being writer, actor, co host of the podcast Popcorn Book Club and recent guest on our Cheetah Girls episode It's Karamadonqua. Hello and welcome back. Thank you, thank you so much for having me back. Um, I am so excited. Like Jamie said, I was very excited to talk about this movie. I think I sent you an email with seven different us is on it.

I was like, I can talk about any of these movies, also US and this movie and also US and I know, I don't know US. Maybe it's and it's been a movie that has been requested by listeners since before it came out. So we are we are so excited that you're back. Welcome back. How are you I am good. I am you know here, which is more than a lot of people can say. And I'm very happy for that have not been killed by an evil doubelganger or a coronavirus yet, So knock on wood, knock on wood.

That keeps being true. So tell us what is your relationship with the film US? Why of the list that you provided was it on their seven times? Um? Well, I saw US. I would just like to shout out my friend Mike. He took me with him to an advanced screening of US, so I got to see it before it was officially released to the public. He works at BuzzFeed, so they had like a little screening thing for BuzzFeed people and he was like, do you want

to be my plus one? And I'm like, good because if you would ask one of your white friends, I would have felt funny. So I got to see I think it was like a couple of weeks before it was released to the public, and I was just struck by And I love horror and growing up as a black person not seeing myself in a ton of horror or seeing myself as like definitely never a final girl in horror. Uh sucked? Um Like I think Screen. I

love Scream. That's one of my favorite horror franchises. I'm so excited they're making a new one because I've seen all four Screen movies, all three seasons of the television show, which no one watched. I was like, I totally forgot that was the thing, yeah, for multiple seasons. So um. I think Scream Too was the movie that was the only Screen movie that had any black characters in it. And they killed Jada Pinkett Smith in the cold open in the movie theater. It was a beautiful scene, love her.

Like after acknowledging, they're like, wow, horror movies always killed the black characters right away, and then the black characters get killed right away immediately, like four seconds after they're

done saying that sentence. So just Jordan Peele bringing black horror sort of to the forefront of the horror conversation is exciting and like, I feel like this much more than Get Out, leans into horror more than comedy, though he is sort of on the line of both, which I think is great, and I love that tradition, which is one of the reasons I like the Scream franchise so much. So I'm excited about talking about black horror and I love Lupe Tonyongo just always forever, and so yeah,

I just love everything about this movie. And it's there they have matching jumpsuits. I mean, it's fashioned forward, it's got everything. Yeah, the I mean the tethered I think. I mean from a well we'll talk about all the complexities, but from a fashion perspective, I mean, hands down, you gotta admire it. We deserve to die for not coordinating our outfits, just like on that basis alone, it's like, yeah, you guys underground and they got it together? Yeah, how

how did they do that? Where they get them? That is my main question, Like, I have a lot of questions. I do think that it's hard to talk about this movie without talking about get Out because it was like everybody's comparing it to get Out and get Out with so critically acclaimed, and I think that it is not as good of a movie as get Out in terms of it's not as tight, but I like it better. Interesting. Yeah,

I'm I'm really excited. It's it's weird because it's like because especially when it's like a director's second movie, it's impossible to not be tempted to compare it to the first, but in terms I mean the conversation surrounding the two movies were also very, very different in ways that I think are really interesting and excited to get into it. Kimmy, what's your Wow, We're us, It's us. I saw this

movie shortly after I came out. I saw it in theaters twice because I was really confused the first time, and then did a little bit of reading, a little bit of research, and then was really excited to go back and see it again. And then when it hits streaming, I think I've seen I think this was the fourth or fifth time I've watched this movie. It is a

very rewarding movie on the rewatch. I think, like it really is watched in theaters three times, I think, and then I've watched it again like four or five times since, so I've seen it almost ten and it's like free time.

It is. So I don't know, like I I really respect, especially like a director that can put a lot of references in their work without like feeling like they're being like thrown at you and you're being back show Like it doesn't feel like a Gilmore Girls episode kind of level of we're just like, Okay, I love the Chudd reference right right, Like but they're but they're so subtle, and like there's a Goonies reference, but if you haven't seen the Goonies, you don't really lose anything, Like I

just I don't know. I think his style of writing in this movie in particular is really layered and cool, and I like saw stuff on this viewing I didn't realize on the first and yeah, I'm a big fan. What about you, Caitlin. I also saw it numerous times in theaters. The first time was with Jamie, our mutual friend Bryant. We had to go to one of my favorite bars that I haven't been to in what feels like years now for obvious reasons. But afterwards we were like,

there's so much to talk about. So we went to this bar and uh talked about the movie for like three hours and we were just like, what did we just watch? What did it all mean? No? No, I missed doing that, I know. And then I saw it again in theaters with my friend Nolan, and you know, we had a similar like hours long discussion afterward and both times, and I've also seen it about I think four times. Now Here's the thing. I'll be completely honest

about this. I really really liked this movie for the first of it, and then the last ten fifteen minutes or so. And this is completely from a screenwriting standpoint, it loses me. I think some choices were made in the writing. I think this is a movie that you didn't need to explain where the tethered come from or what the origins are in like different like like. I think it would have served the story a little bit better if we had just not been given any explanation

of the origin. And and maybe that actually does something to mess up the intent of the allegory and stuff like that. I'm not totally sure, because I also don't really know what the allegory is supposed to be entirely not don't exactly because there's so many interpretations. Um. But from a strictly screenwriting point of view, I was like, oh man, I don't like that they tried to explain some of the stuff that I felt could have just been left unexplained. But for the first again, ninety percent

of the movie, I'm like, this is awesome. I love this family, I love their journey. I've come I've come around on the ending, This was the first viewing where I'm like, I think the because I felt the same way that you did. But then I like, weirdly turned a corner at some point where maybe I was reading. I read a lot of new analysis that had come out since I last was seeking out analysis on this movie, and I don't know, I'm excited to talk about it because I've turned a corner on the ending of the

movie and now I'm pro, Wow, I'm fifty fifty. I think it's depends on the day. I'm like, on a Tuesday, I'm like, yeah, this is a great ending, but catch me on a Thursday. Who knows, who know exactly. This was also the first viewing of the movie too where I like, I had never really sought out any information on the music of this movie, but the story of like how the music was composed as really interesting as well. Michael Abels is an incredible composer. I loved him. I

think he's great. One of my friends actually wrote a movie that Michael Labels did the music for that came out in April. Yeah, it's called Bad Education. It's on HBO. I've seen that movie. Yeah, Yeah, my movie is awesome. Yeah, my friend Mike different Mike than took me to this movie though, I did he get out with the mic who wrote Bad Education? Uh? Yeah, my friend Mic wrote it. He's incredible. Love him to death. Oh that's so everyone

should watch Bad Education. I really enjoyed it. That's so cool. Nice. But yeah, Michael Abels is just like a genius. Yeah, it's amazing. Like where I don't know, Like I we don't talk about scoring very often on our feminist movie podcast, which I guess fair enough, but there is like there's just so much to talk about about. How where he was pulling from And like I was, I was like, oh, what are they saying in the in the theme and it's nonsense, it's nothing. He made he made it up.

Like I don't know, there's so much cool stuff. Well shall we dive in with the recap? It? All right? So we open with text on the screen saying that there are thousands of miles of underground tunnels in the US. They're abandoned subways, service routes, mine shafts, and then others that have no known purpose at all to be where the tethered live. Every time I watched the movie, I forget that that's the beginning, because my brain has to forget that so that I can walk around on top

of these times. Yeah. Uh, now, it's like that. Every time you watch it. It's like you think about that non stuff for a week and then it just kind of leaves you until the next time and you're like, oh, no, the tunnels, because is that true? Yes, Oh my gosh, yeah, there are a lot. I actually did some reading on tunnels, and right around the time the movie came out, there was a book that was released. I can't remember the author.

I didn't write it down because I was like, i'll remember, sure, but it's called Underground and then it has a subtitle and it talks about all of the various tunnels that exist under major cities that are not being used and I shouldn't say are not being used. A lot of them are actually being occupied by people who are experiencing homelessness, and some some of them are in New York City,

some of them are in Chicago. There's some in Los Angeles, and I was like, no, oh, don't tell me that, Like in downtown Los Angeles there are tunnels that were possibly used by bootleggers, but were the original subway in Los Angeles before it shut down, and then they made a new subway, so the original Redline tunnels are just abandoned and I didn't know that. I'm so curious how one would even to one of these tunnels and figure

that out. Right, right, you go down an escalator that is on the other side of the door at a fun house of mirrors, well maintained escalator. I love the escalator shot so much goodness. That's the opening. Then we cut to a close up on like an eighties style TV. We see an ad for hands across America, and then we meet a little girl, adelaide A k Addie, the cutest child. Shout out to all the child actors in

this movie because they all do a terrific job. Incredible, so good and and it also made me just appreciate Jordan Peel's directing again, where I know that he pulls a lot from Kubrick, who is like so notoriously a shitty person towards actors. But you can just tell, like there were even certain shots because I think I've just seen this movie enough times to notice the shot changes and stuff where you're like, oh, if that was Kubrick, he would have just let that kid walk into a mirror.

But Jordan Peel cuts to another shot and it's like, don't hurt yourself. It's okay, Like, I don't know that was I don't know why I'm an extra notice that this time. Yeah, so we meet Addie. It's nineteen six, which is the year I was born. Thank you so much everybody. Um. Yes, actually hands across America happened like a week after I was born. Um, I've just remembered how close you were born to Robert Pattinson as well. When I was just googling Robert Pattinson last night. Wait,

is he my age? Yeah? I think he's born like the week the same week as you. Oh my god. Robert. Also, Winston Duke is like, is my age? He's actually a few months younger than me, So you should hang out. I will say that was the one thing for me where Winston Duke and Lupete and Youngo do not seem

old enough to have a teenage daughter. Yet I agree on the first like four watches, I didn't think about it, and then afterwards I was like, wait a Seger, Yeah, we Robert Pattinson, Ma, whoa, he's like four days older than me. Then oh my gosh, Robert, let's get married, because that's how you know if you're compatible someone you have similar birthdays. Okay, So Addie is with her parents at like the boardwalk like carnivali area in Santa Cruz, California.

She wanders off and goes into this creepy house of mirrors where she encounters another little girl who appears to look exactly like her, and we're like, and then smash cut to a close up of a rabbit and there's like this creepy chanting uh, and then we pull out

to show hundreds of rabbits. That was the coolest scene to see in the theater ever, because you do you're not expecting it, and you're just like, oh my god, there's there's more rabbits, and then there's even more rabbits, and then it's and then so long and yeah, it's like they're telling you you're going to go down a rabbit hole. Wow. I had a lot of fun looking for like this really deep layered symbolism of the rabbits,

which I did find. There's been a lot of writing about it, but all I've been able to find from Jordan Peelee is He's just like, I am personally afraid of rabbits, and you're like, oh cool. It doesn't always have to mean something sometimes sometimes Alfonso Korn is like, the reason that green is a prominent color in The Little Princess is because I like the color green. At the end, you're like, oh yeah, it's dear a movie.

I guess you could do whatever you want. Um okay, the rabbits and then we cut to adult Adelaide who's played by Lupida and Yongo, and she has a husband Gabe that's Winston Duke, a teenage daughter, Zora, and a younger son, Jason. This family, the Wilsons, arrive at their summer home that is not far from Santa Cruz, California. Then we flashed to Addie as a child. Her parents have brought her to a child psychologist because she hasn't spoken since she went into this House of mirrors, but

we don't know why. We assume she's been traumatized by this interaction with this other doppelgang or girl. Then we cut back to the present um the family goes to the beach in Santa Cruz against the same one where this incident happened. They meet their friends Kitty and Josh, played by Elizabeth Moss and Tim Hidecker, who you don't think are going to work as a couple until they do. Until they do, it just does it, just does work. But also I'm like, they have teen Elizabeth Moss can't

have a seventeen year old daughter. I don't huh whatever, Oh yeah, I guess I don't know how old. I mean she has, she's had work done, so I guess maybe we're supposed to think that she's older than she looks. That's true, not the character Kitty has had work done. I am not. No one sued me for accusings of having worked on because she's thirty eight. I mean, I guess if she and which means she would have been like thirties six or seven. It doesn't matter. They have

teenage twins, is true. Becca and Lindsay are their names. So they're on the beach. Jason sees this scary guy on the beach is like hand is dripping with blood. Adelaide freaks out because she thinks Jason has gone missing. And there's all these other like weird coincidences that are happening with like spiders and frisbees, and eleven eleven make a wish, and I know eleven eleven is bad, and this I was like, wait, it's not a junior high

school student making a wish. I can't relate because it's a biblical reference that I don't remember the exact Jeremiah eleven eleven, and I believe it was Jeremiah. Again. I was like, I'll remember that. I don't need to write that one down. I'm I'm over to I've got a little analysis section on the on the bable versus because I'm not I'm not very Bible literate myself. That someone was, um, someone on the Great White Internet was kind enough to break it down. Well, yeah, I think that I'm not

super vible literate. I will say my favorite translation is definitely King James because I think it slaps and like the new International version, I'm just like, this is boring. Where's the poetry? Where's the moving? King James keeps it moving and I appreciate that. But I think the gist of the Jeremiah eleven eleven passage is y'all are going to cry out and I'm not gonna do ship. Love

you God. That is yeah, that the cliffs notes and then if you go back averse to Jeremiah eleven ten, there it's all like sins of the ancestors, sins of the Father, and it's like for certain reads of this movie, like if you're like, oh, I think Jordan Peele may have read back a verse or two. Who knows Jeordan Jordan Okay. So that night they're back at home and Adelaide tells Gabe about the night that she saw a little girl who looked just like her when she was

a child, and that how her whole life. She felt that she's been coming for her, and that all these little coincidences that have been happening to her, it feels like this person is getting closer and closer, and then suddenly they lose power. And then Jason is like, by the way, there's a family in our driveway, And sure enough, there's a family in their driveway, and this family invades the Wilson home and they realize that it's them. It's Adelaide, Gabe, Zora,

and Jason. But it's like scary doppel ganger versions of them who are wearing red jumpsuits and carrying scissors. Now, scary doppelganger Adelaide ak Red explains that Adelaide and Red are tethered together. Every thing that Adelaide did in her life, Read also did, but like a horrible version of it. So instead of eating warm meals and playing with nice toys, she ate rabbits and had sharp toys. Instead of falling in love and getting married and starting a family, Read

was forced to do these things. And now she wants to become untethered, and the way to do that is by killing Adelaide and her family. The pairs of the Doppelgangers kind of break off. There's fighting, there's chasing their injuries. There's the boat scene. I love them. I'm obsessed with the boat. I love that the boat is called the Crawdaddy. All the boats have great names in this um. Josh's boat is called the b Yacht but with ch in

the middle. Um. And then I love how Winston Duke's character gave when he's like, oh, this is a home invasion, Okay, just give them what they want, protector bodily stuff, and then just give them whatever they want, Like you can have the boat and the daughters like dad, no one wants. It's so good. Yeah, She's like, like, tears are streaming down her face and she's like, shut up, dad, no

one wants your boat. Okay. So there's all these altercations, but the Wilson's eventually managed to get away in the boat and they head over to Josh and Kitties, who surprise also have scary doppelgangers who have killed that whole family. So when Adelaide and her family show up to Josh and Kitties, they have to fight scary Tim Hidecker and scary Elizabeth Moss. But do they think are the character names? Yes,

they do. They have been given names like on I AMDB and like in the script, but I don't think we ever hear those ones. It's like texts and Dahlia and something else. So the Wilson's managed to kill them and the twin daughters and stuff, and then they turn on the TV and they learn that there are many, many more of these doppelgangers. Basically, everyone alive on Earth, or at least in the US, seems to have a doppelganger in the US or the US. Think about it.

It makes you think. And so the doppelgangers have been killing there above ground counterparts and then gathering and holding hands not on like hands across America. So the Wilson family takes off. They head to back to the boardwalk area because they're going to like drive. The plan is to drive to Mexico along the coast, but they get interrupted because Jason scary. Jason is their a k a. Pluto, But it's a trap that enables Read to kidnap Jason.

She takes him underground via the House of Mirror, so Adelaide goes in after him and she ends up deep underground. We see the dwelling, you know, these tunnels where the tethered have been living. She finds Red, who explains that the tethered are like clones or copies of people, but

they don't have souls. They were created. There's like the illusions of this sort of like science experiment gone wrong, but it was failed and the clones or the copies were abandoned, but they kind of just had to live on, remaining tethered to their above ground counterparts. As this is happening, we get flashbacks where we see getting into the twist

is moment. But yes, yes, we're seeing like Addie as a kid and Red as a kid, and the carnival and how they sort of came together and met up, but the tethered were like, oh, look at the little girl. She's going to be the one to save us from this misery. And Red explains how, you know, she had orchestrated this whole movement where they would rise above and kill their above ground counterparts, the untethering, she calls it

the untethering. And then you see this cool montage where they get their suits, and you're like, where they get the suits? Where they where they get the scissors? Where did they get where they get the shoes? There might be manufacturing down there. We don't we don't really know what the what the system is like could be. And then Adelaide and Red fight most of the time Red has the upper hand. The score really shines here, and

then Adelaide finally kills Red and rescues Jason. Their back above ground, the Wilson family reunites, and then we get a flashback where the big twist is revealed. We see Adelaide and Red when they have met in the House of Mirrors as children, and we see that Red caps Adelaide switched places with her, so that Addie has actually been a tethered this whole time. And Red was actually little Addie the whole time. And then we zoom out and we see that the Tethered are holding hands across America.

And then that is the end of their helet afters what are they doing? Who? Pilot? Who? Who is it? Tethereds? I don't know, they don't know all that and more will discuss, but first we're going to take a break, and then we'll come right back and we're back. Where to begin? Where to begin? Here's here's here's a fact that's just pure fun. Sure, I get you know, you know how at the beginning, Um, they're talking when they're on the boardwalk in the eighties, they're like, oh, I

think a movie is shooting around here. It's the Law Lost Boys. Yes, it's The Lost Boy That is fun. I was like, Oh, that's it. That's Jordan Peel hides so much cool stuff in here that I was like, wait, that's the Last Boys. His little Easter eggs, which the little rabbits. What if? What if those are just a bunch of little Easter bunnies hiding all the Easter eggs around his movies to find them. So that's that, Um, anything else we want to discuss or Nope. At the end,

I find it interesting this time rewatching it. I rewatched it twice before we talked, because why not. And I realized on the second rewatch for this discussion that it was ADDIE's birthday when they were at the board walk, which was not something I had picked up on any other viewing. Yes, because he wins her, her dad wins her the Thriller shirt right, or she's like having to pick what prize and then her mom's like, it's your birthday, you do whatever you want. Yeah, it was like what

a day? What an intense birthday? Bad birthday? They made me wonder do the tether to have any concept of birthdays? Like they have to understand what they are because there's it's a mirror, So whatever we're doing above ground, they're doing underground. So it's like they're just doing the like worst case scenario version. So I guess that they would have worst case scenario birthdays. Yeah, I guess. So I

mean red mentions Christmas. She's like, on Christmas, I opened my toys and they were sharp and cold and cut my fingers when I played with them. So I think they get the concept of holidays. Yeah, but Red also wasn't above ground person before, so that also who knows. I don't know, I don't know. I don't know anything, And I love that I don't know anything. It's so much to explore. It's like tunnels of movie reference and

so many tunnels. Also in that um that sequence on the boardwalk, there's so I'll just go back and hit the Bible verse really quick, well, because we were just talking about it anyways. So you see an unhoused man on the pier holding a sign that says Jeremiah eleven eleven, which says, I mean charma. I think you honestly, uh, summarize it pretty well, says Therefore, thus say it the Lord. I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape, although they will cry out to me, I will not

listen to them. Then, if you go back a verse, it says in Jeremiah one ten, they have returned to the sins of their ancestors, who refused to listen to MY words. They have followed other gods to serve them. Both Israel and Judah have broken the covenant I made

with their ancestors. Don't know what the last sentence is, but the read that I feel closest to on this view, and again it's like changed over time, but the view I've the read of the movie that I feel closest to on this day, I felt like finding out that

verse was really helpful and kind of solidifying that interesting. Yeah, well, I think before we maybe dive into the nitty gritty of all the readings and the symbolism and allegories and things, I kind of wanted to touch on the way that horror movies have historically treated black people and black characters because you wouldn't believe it, but it's been terrible. Um there's a really good documentary called Horror Noir, A History

of Black Horror. That's a Shutter original documentary. UM So I would recommend watching that to the listeners, but it does a deep dive of this, but basically a very brief overview of the representation of black characters in cinema historically, again has been terrible. There's a long history of black men in particular being shown as villains who brutal lies white women. A lot of that was white actors in black face. There is a long history of the magical

negro trope being used in horror films. There's the widely known trope that we referenced earlier that gets called out in screamed too and then acted out anyway, and then and then and then followed through on where in an ensemble horror movie where there's a bunch of people who die throughout this story, there's often one black person in the cast, and they are often the first to die. So there's different things like that. That's only kind of

the tip of the iceberg. So a movie like Us, a movie like get Out, a movie like the upcoming Candy Man, I'm very excited for. While they're not that I know, I'm so excited for it. While they are not the first movies to subvert all of these problems, they are pretty unique and that they don't fall into all these tropes, and you'll never guess why. It's because

they are made by black filmmakers. So I just wanted to again just acknowledge the really reprehensible history in terms of representation of black characters in horror films, because it's been real bad. Uh. Not that non white filmmakers have been forced to enact these tropes, they have just continued to make the choice. And I think it's also marketing. It's like, I don't know, are people gonna go for a black final girl. Who's to say it's like I would? Yeah,

I like those movies. I mean yeah, it's like Us and get Out where enormous box office successes. Yeah, I mean it's and Karama, you probably have more thoughts than we do because we every year when we do our Month of Horror, where like we don't know enough about horror. I don't want to say I'm like a horror expert. I am, and I'm an enjoyer of horror and I've loved it since I as a kid. Uh. It is not something that was handed down to me. Neither of

my parents enjoy horror films. I was like, Mom, will you watch Us with me? And she was like no, I'm good because she saw she saw get Out and that was scary for her. She was like, I heard this one scarier and I'm like, oh much, and she said no, thanks. So it's interesting that I just sort of adopted that on my own and was like, yeah, this is cool. I love the creepy Crawley's and the

killing and the monsters. I think the horror as a genre is great because it allows and I think that there's a really big love of horror in a lot of black communities, despite the treatment of black people on screen in horror, because it is a safe space to be afraid and you know two hours this is what's

going to happen. And it's very it's almost like law and order and procedural television where you know what the beats are going to be and it's like very safe and formulaic, but still good and still fresh and interesting in various ways. Is and like the different monsters that are going to come and kill you, like, oh, this one's a haunted lake man, and this one is a child molester that's been burned, and this one the one that we see all the time, something that has a

vagina for a head. Uh, always has a lovely little little vul the head. And it's like, I'm coming for you. Women are scarier. It's like, oh my god, take movies away from men today. Um, no vulva heads in this movie. And so you do have to you do have to hand it to the restraint of Jordan Peel. That's true. Um, but I mean, but what is going down into underground into tunnels, but going into a vagina going into the

Earth's womb. The makes you think what I liked because this is the way that this movie plays out does inspire so much conversation, and I feel like it is almost one of those movies that and it seems like an interview is that and people kind of wanted it to be like this, that how you read the ending kind of like says more about you than it says about the movie, which is always kind of fun and

terrifying to engage with. But in terms of like flipping horror tropes here where horror, like you're saying, chroma is so built around I don't know what what scares the filmmaker, and in theory for horror movies to do well, what scare the audience at a certain point in time and

taking the idea of the other. And I watched a there's a really good analysis of this movie from the take, which is just like an analysis YouTube channel where it basically they make the point that the general horror UH formula is to take the other and reoppressed them by the end of the movie. So with the example of like Michael Myers, he is the other villain of this movie.

And then the victory at the end is to oppress him further than he was at the beginning of the movie because he's bad and so what's cool and like also like scrambles your brain about this movie is that you it's unclear who, like who deserves what in this where it's like the surface read of the movie is, Oh, we love this family. They're not doing anything wrong that we're seeing that is like they're not outwardly bad people, but their existence is like it's just it it fox

with your head. But I do like messing around with that there is not a clear cut hero or villain to these families. Yeah, I find the more I watch it, the less I'm sure. In that scene, um, which I love. I love the sort of dance read of it because as I've told you too, I love dance movies. I love them so much. And it's like, look at a little mini dance movie and the and my little scary movie.

It's beautiful too. Yeah, it is gorgeous. And the orchestration of this sort of classical version of I Got five on it is just Chef's kiss. But I don't know who should win. And at the end, I'm like the first time watching it, I was like, Yes, amazing, we beat the bad person. And then I was like, oh no, because you get that reveal at the end, and then watching it every subsequent time and like, I don't is

this good? Who's good? I never know how to feel I at this point, I'm like, I'm like team Tether.

I love the family, But I'm like, if this is so like the read of the movie that I feel closest to right now, is the story being like this allegory for basically like the unacknowledged guilt of living in a colonial society and in America specifically, which the more I watched this movie and the more I read said the hints of that are everywhere, not just in interviews Jordan Peele has done about it, where he says, literally quote, one of the central themes in Us is that we

can do a good job collectively of ignoring the ramifications of privilege, and he's referencing the privilege of being a

modern American. But even from like really early in the movie when she walks into the Hall of mirrors, that hall of mirrors, when you look at and listen to what's happening in there is the basically Cowboy American presentation of false history that we all learn um as it pertains to indigenous people in America, where it's like every lazy, harmful stereotype is being laid out just in the background

of this scene. Yeah, it's called like Shaman's Vision Quest and its imagery of like a native and you'll you'll if you're fine intentional. Also at the end of the movie that has been changed. It's now Merlin's Forest or something like that, but it's still the same thing and you can. Yeah. And when you when we see Adelaide walk in, we hear this audio. And I always watch everything with subtitles. Drag me. I love subtitles, um And

I don't understand why people hate subtitles so much. Like, if you don't want them, that's fine, but don't hate on me for using them, because I get extra layers. But you get information about these hopie like mythological characters, and so they're like, oh, we're gonna roote this and this, and yeah, if we use these names that we barely researched, it'll be fine. And while I was doing research because I was like, oh, who are these names and where

did they come from? I read something that said that all Hopie mythology that has been shared with non Hopie people might just be big stuff that they tell us, which I love. They're just like, yeah, this is what we believe, um, and that there is a sort of layered level of mythology where there's what's shared with outsiders and then there's stuff that's never shared with outsiders. So I find it interesting that these characters are from the

like foreigner friendly version of Hope mythology. That's incredible. Yeah, I didn't. I didn't know. I mean, and I honestly on my first I think like at least on my first two viewings of this, I didn't really pick up on that. But this time it's like another one of those things where like the subtext is there and if you engage with it, it's like a more a better

way to engage with the movie. Yeah. So yeah, if we're if we're reading it, so I guess coming at it from the idea of it being from this entrenched basically like they're being more than one America and what we're presented with the at the beginning of the movie is a very comfortable middle class life. Um. And then what is happening, and so I'm trying to think of the way to like articular late this correctly, but essentially it seems like this movie is playing on for every

person that has it that comes with a cost. You don't just get that. And the direct allegory happening here is like for us to have what we have, someone that we don't know and very possibly are willfully ignoring the existence of entirely are suffering for us to have the lifestyle that we have, which is true and horrifying to consider. And I really like that Jordan Peel wrights likable characters so that it's not like, oh, well, like these characters are like awful and suck and it's like, no,

they're good people. They love their family, They're like living their lives, but just like us a lot of the time, just in complete ignorance too. Well, how do you have this lifestyle and who upholds it and whose labor um affords you to have what you have? Yes, I too, That is my read of the film, because there's a few different ones that have been posited. You know, people are like, okay, is it about you know, the socio economic class and privilege divide, which is like what we're

talking about. There's the is it about, like the duality of one's self as an individual? Is it about you know how Americans are so polarized politically at this moment during like the Trump presidency. There's a plenty of reads, and I see like merit and all of them. But yeah, as far as the one that I am closest to, like you said, Jamie, is the one that we've just described, I am also on board that. I I think that

it's the same thing. I feel like you have to look at what Peel is giving us, and it's there's so much stuff about that native imagery. Like even when they're on the beach and kiddies and looking at a magazine, there's an ad with a native headdress and she's like, oh, that's so pretty and just moves on from it really quickly. But I just like that stuck out to me the

first time I watched it. I was like, wait, you can't ignore that it has to be about that, especially knowing that The Shining is a movie that Jordan Peele just absolutely adores, draws a lot of influence from, And the whole thing about that was this sort of haunted Indian burial ground trope, and this feels like a reversal of that, where instead of being cursed because you're living on top of dead Indigenous people, the bad luck comes from living on top of alive people who are just

like you but speak another language that you can't understand. And we are tethered to these Indigenous people whose land we've built on top of. Right, Jordan Peele, I'm realizing everything I just said. Jordanville has obviously said a much more intelligent version of so I just wanted to read a quote from him that there's a few different reads. It's kind of funny because it's I wonder if you

both feel same way. I felt like when the movie first came out, it was a little harder to find quotes where Jordan's Peel was explicitly saying like, well, this is what I was trying to do, because he seemed to want the audience to have the discussion. And then but there are like, in the year since I have read about it, he's talked about it pretty extensively, and now it feels like his um his thesis statement is out there where it kind of wasn't at the beginning.

But to continue the quote I was reading from earlier, which is from UH the Like DVD of Us. So he says, one of the central themes in US is that we can do a good job collectively of ignoring the ramifications of privilege. I think it's the idea that we that what we feel like we deserve comes, you know,

at the expense of someone else's freedom or joy. You know, the biggest disservice we can do as a faction with a collective privilege like the United States is to presume that we deserve it and that it isn't luck that has us born where we're born. For us to have our privilege, someone suffers. That's where the tethered connection I think resonates the most is that those who suffer and those who prosper are two sides of the same coin. You can never forget that we need to fight for

the less fortunate. So that is kind of his thesis statement, which also makes the doppelganger even more resonant and cool, and it like really hits on that point of like we are no different. It's like what made uh Lupete who lives above ground and Lupeta who lives below ground different? Not much, to the point where when they swapped, no one knew, like, no one noticed, and it was like the circumstance that they were born into that shaped who

they became in so many ways. Right, you get the sense that it it just took red after emerging back above ground. And sorry, yeah, I keep saying upstairs, lupetea downstairs. I get what you mean. Um, she basically it seems like it takes her maybe a few weeks or months to assimilate, but she starts dancing, and she starts like I suppose, learning to speak, and and then she is

indistinguishable from all the other upstairs people, the nontethered you know. So, yeah, it's just commentary and like if you were in a position of privilege, if you have access to things that you need to be a boat called the bet the what is it? The crowd beyond? Yeah, I always forget. That's another thing that I just like always forget. And then I see it again. I was like, oh, right,

that's the name of Tim Hidecker's boat. I love the competition that sort of happens between Winston Duke and Tim Hidecker and these two families, and just even above ground, before we really get to the underground people the levels of privilege between them, and they're both these middle class families, Like there's no no one can argue that the Wilsons

are not doing well. They have a summer home, their kids, they drug the Mercedes, their their kids are doing after school activities and magic tricks and fun things like they're okay. They have I love the sticker that they have on the back of the car. That's like their little family sticker, which I don't understand what anybody has those, because then people know they can follow you and then murder your children. That's how I think that's how the Tethered found them.

They're like that this this is the family. They have the sticker, and this is how we know that they live here. They shouldn't have been giving away their coordinates like that. I think about that every time I post, Like back in the before times when you would post as like a comic, you would just post your location every single night. I'm just like, this would be a great way to get killed, like just thinking out out

or like the blame ring. That's how the blame ring happened in real life because celebrities would be like going on vacation, and then those teenage kids from the valley were like, what if we robbed Paris, they'll to him anyway.

I digress um. I think that I love, though, the difference between this white family and this black family that are ostensibly the same in that they're both living these privileged, middle class American lives, but we see the sort of slight disparities and the jealousy and like the nicer boat and the newer car and stuff like that, and how Winston Duke is just like, well, I really wanna one hup him and get to him. It's like I got a boat that he has flares on his boat and

I don't have flares on my boat. And I thought it was kind of also a fun touch that it's like the families get along, but they don't seem to actually like each other that much, Like, yeah, they don't. They're not close that you get the sense that they see each other once a year when they're both vacationing

together and that's it. And also, Okay, so I was thinking about this where the Wilsons seem to own their family home, but I think the other family of Kitty and Josh, they're like air being being or like they have a time share something because he says like, we

need to get out of here. So even though it's a nicer house, it's like it's almost like the illusion of them doing better because they have their only renting this nicer house for a short amount of time because he's like, oh, we have to be out of here by ten am tomorrow, as if it's a rental versus the Wilson's owning that. So it's like, I don't know, it's like there's a there's this illusion that they're doing better, but maybe they aren't even interesting. I didn't read that

as an Airbnb rental. I read that as a kids take too long, I have a meeting I need to so less is a checkout time, and more as a alright, Gremlins could be that, but I didn't think about it that way, and I think that could be true. Yeah, yeah,

that's I suppose open to interpretation. Like much of the movie, Yeah, I like the kind of like subtle freak shin that you see between these families where especially between the two uh fathers, where I don't know, I mean, I feel like it's something you see, but especially because it's between a white middle class family and a black middle class family. That friction there's like kind of another dimension to it as well, and it's not one I've ever you really

see in movies that much at all. That's to me. Gabe is a very interesting character because, like was mentioned, when the Tethered first show up and invade their home, Gabe he's like trying to reason with them and saying like, we don't have much here. This is our summer home. But you can have my wallet, you can have my money, we can go to an a t m. You can have the car, you can have the boat. You know.

He's trying to like his values are these like material possessions, and that's what he thinks is going to be valuable to the Tethers, and they're just like, I don't give a ship about your money, Like we're here to kill you know. We want to end this connection that's been happening. That you've been bullissfully unaware of the friction between these

two families. Makes me wonder how they know each other because I don't think it's from college, which is kind of the generic assumption, because Winston Duke's character gave he has a Howard university sweatshirt on, and something about Tim Heidecker's character just doesn't read to me as white person who went to Howard. It just I'm not getting that vibe. Can you imagine that wasn't the case. I would be

fascinated to see that first semester, just that one. I don't want to see anything beyond that, And I hope there's a transfer after that, not because of white people, because of that particular white person. Um So, I was curious because, like you said, it seemed like they see each other annually, because there's that line that Addie has where she says, you look the same as you did

last year when the plastic surgery is discussed. So it's like, who are these people to each other and what is the positive of their relationship because it just seems like they're there to compete. That is Yeah, like it, I really I never really, like thought about their relationships to each other too too much before preparing for this episode. And even it's like the kids, clearly they have no interest in each other, Like the twins only talk to

each other. They're like Jason's weird. Yeah, they're they're clearly not even like Summertime friends. And Zora like has her headphones and she has no interest in the chaotic high Decker twins or whatever. Uh so it is like it is. And also it's kind of she does not hesitate to kill the ship out of them when they're She definitely was like getting some Catharsis from killing these twins. Yeah, I mean, based on what we see of those twins,

I get it. Yeah. Yeah. And and the relationship between Um, Adelaide and Kitty I also think is pretty interesting where I mean again, it's like they don't have I think Kitty is like kind of doing a fakey attempt to connect with Adelaide Um, and I kind of appreciate Adelaide's like, yeah, I don't Yeah, we don't have to be chatting right now. But I like, I thought it was kind of cool that there was some commentary into how particularly Kitty story

plays out. I feel like, more so than anyone else than anyone else in the Tyler family, I feel like Kitty is the one character that you kind of see something in her tether that is like reflective of like, oh, if we're seeing this as like the haves and the have nots on which America is built, the scene where Kitty's tether whose name is Dahlia, pretty name. Uh so Dahlia has this moment where we heard earlier that Kitty has had like some work done. Whatever judgment isn't passed

either way, but it just is a fact um. But then um, Dahlia, who has been playing out the actions of Kitty her entire existence were assuming like, finally has that moment of like holding that lip gloss and it looks really scary, and like Elizabeth Moss is scary as hell in this role, and I just I love her. She I really like her in this movie as well.

But you get that moment of like, oh, this is what I have been suffering for, is for this other woman to look like this, And then you see her cut her face open, which I'm pretty sure it's a reference to Kitty's procedures, and like it all every time I look at that seeing I'm like, okay, girl Joker, we get it, but like, uh, do you want to know how I got these guys? But it is a little bit girl Joker the way it plays out, yea, oh, it is very girl Joker, like very dark knight girl Joker.

But I yeah, noticing the scars on her face. The second time I watched the movie, I was like, Oh, she had to do her own plastic surgery underground. That's terrifying, right, And I always get a little like if he around uh male filmmakers making comments on women getting plastic surgery. But it didn't feel I don't know, I certainly I don't know. I didn't end up being really bothered by it. In this particular movie. It didn't feel to me like

a judgment of plastic surgery. It felt more of a judgment on these layers and how if you choose to do this to yourself, do you think about the consequence to the other person. So it was less about like objective surgery bad surgery good, and more um consequences that thinking and conscientiousness good. Good. Right, let's take another quick

break and then we'll come right back. I wanted to talk a bit about just kind of like the characters as individuals, starting with Addie, coming at it just from a what do the characters do in the story as it pertains to like their actions in the context of being in this horror movie, because and we've talked about this on various episodes in the past, where women in horror movies will kind of be stripped of agency a lot of the time, or they'll be and again I'm

always like worried about sounding victim blaming when I talk about this, but they'll they'll be like kind of flailing around and there's a killer right there, and they seem completely oblivious of their impending doom and just like different things like that where female characters were often just written to seem oblivious of their surroundings for whatever reason, and then they get killed about it. So this is sort of here what we're used to seeing as horror going audiences.

So that you have Addie taking charge and making active choices and knowing what danger she's in and knowing anticipating what's going to happen, and we see her fighting and we see her, you know, knowing that there there's this scary family outside, let's call the cops immediately. Meanwhile, Gabe is like, no, I'm gonna go out there. I'm gonna exert my you know, masculinity at them and maybe scare

them off. And then that doesn't work, so then he goes out again, this time with a weg Bin breaks his leg and gets his knee broken, right, So like meanwhile, like ADDIE's like I've already called the cops and we know that that's not going to do anything, of course, and then of course that they cops never show up in this movie. Well, I think they all got stabbed by Tether's in the cops defense, Like there was a

lot happening. I think that all if it had just been one family that had Tethers to come, and I think the cops maybe would have come eventually eventually, like two later perhaps, But I do think it is cool, and especially the dynamic between Gabe and Adelaide, where I think that he has and we were kind of talking about it with how he relates to Tim Heidecker's character, but he definitely has like this need to appear to be the dominant figure in the family, when if you know,

the second you want to the family interact, you know that Adelaide is the one that makes the decisions, and the way their relationship is is like she doesn't necessarily need the credit for making the decisions, but she's making them, and that is like how how the story plays out down to like those subtle moments that happened between Gabe and Adelaide, and then also happens right before the Tethers arrived at the other house, at the Tyler House, where

wife goes to her husband and says, something isn't right. I know, something isn't right. Something is going to go wrong, and then the husband is like, baby, baby, baby, relax, everything's fine, everything's great, it's good. Let's listen to the beach boys, and or let's just go to sleep or

whatever it is. And which is I mean, I guess kind of like a horror classic of like don't believe women and then immediately get killed or injured, which I think there's a converse of that between Adelaide and Gabe, which I found was I thought was really interesting and thoughtless, handled better than what we see in most movies where so, you know, a lot of movies will have something that happens out of this world and that would be difficult

to believe, probably by most people. It happens to the character, the character tells someone else about it, and then because it is difficult to believe, the other character is always like I don't believe you, and I and classic yep, amazing performance by me, Thank you so much. This happens with Adelaide where she's like, Gabe, I, as a kid, I had this experience. I feel like this person is

coming after me. She's I feel like she's getting closer, and he's a little dismissive where he's like, well, you know you were in a house of mirrors. Are you sure it wasn't your reflection? And she's like, no, it was real. She's explaining all this stuff and then she realized. She's like, you don't believe me, and he's like I do. I'm just processing and I can't believe you kept this inside for so long. And then he makes a really joke in bad taste about it, like a domestic violence joke,

and then he's like, oh, that was a bad joke. Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood. And I feel like that. I just liked that exchange because in most cases you just get like you'd be like, I don't believe you. You're being hysterical or whatever, and then there's no possible way that happened. What are you crazy? Should I call the doctor? Yeah? But then Gabe, Gabe comes at it.

I feel like kiss. Caitlin and I have talked about this a bunch of like how sometimes when male character is being dismissive towards a woman or being kind of cruel, whether they mean to or not, that it's presented in a very broadway that male viewer could not really see themselves in. But in this it's like, I mean, I've been in that type of situation recently of just like someone being like that's okay, No, it's like what, I

don't know what it's a soft nag. I don't know what I would call this situation, sure, but but something that is certain the recognizable behavior. So he's not dismissive, but he is. He's like he says, he's processing, he's trying to figure out what this could have been. And then two seconds later he would have to realize that she is was telling the truth and this did happen to her because who shows up on their doorstep but

a family that looks exactly like them. So yeah, I just I thought that was interesting that way that was handled. It felt like it was handled with a lot more nuanced than it normally is. So I appreciated that. And Vincent Duke just is great. He's so he's like the funniest perform Like it just he's great, he's amazing. But in terms of Adelaide making decisions and not needing credit

for them, I thought that was spot on. And we see sort of a reversal from that when they're in Josh and Kitty's house and he's like, we should stay here. We've got the backup generator, we've got food, We're safe, and she's like, really, are we safe? You don't get to make the decisions anymore. And she's like, I've been making decisions, and I've been fine with letting you think that it's happening. But she's just like, this is enough. I'm not going to die for your masculinity. We're going

to take my advice and we're going to Mexico. Because his pitch was like, let's do home alone. Let's set some traps, do home alone thing. And she's like, really, did you just really reference home alone right now? And then of course the kids are like, what's home alone? What are micro machines? The kids are like, we are young, that is old. What is reference? It's like, really, you don't know what home alone is? Everyone knows what home alone. I was working with the kid once who was in

I think ninth grade, last year. So he's like sixteen, had never seen The Little Mermaid, had never heard of the Little Mermaid. So yeah, and I was astonished. Yeah, I was like, one, this is a classic, but it's also very old. At this point, it's stated, yeah it's generating. Damn, we are simply old. So I believe they didn't know what Hamelan was there there is. And then I on the inverse of that, I like how I mean. I I think the child actors in this movie are really

really talented and well directed. But even the way those characters are written, I felt like was unusual in a way. I really liked where I feel because you sort of get to know who Adelaide and Gabe are pretty quickly. I liked that it seemed like their daughter kind of took after Gabe a little more, and that Jason took a little more after Adelaide. I feel like that is

not something you see in movies a lot. It's usually like daughter is like mother, son is like father, because gender binary where you can see I think, especially in Zora, you can see like both of her parents um, and then in in Jason, to have a younger son character who is like very sensitive and seems like resembles a lot. I think it's just kind of very much like how Addie was when she was a kid. I thought was

really cool. You don't usually get to see a mother's son relationship that is like a mirror in in that way. Usually I feel like it's a little more gender like normative and strict about who resembles who in their actions. For sure, I think the fact that Jason is sensitive and different in many ways is one of the reasons that this big theory has come about where Jason is secretly it's heathered and um, I'm wondering if you were familiar with that theory and what you two thought about that.

I read a little bit about it, but as soon I was reading in it in the same moment that I was also reading that Jordan Peel had completely dismissed that as a possibility, so I like, didn't even I'm like, yeah, I don't think so. I remember that was one of the first, I think one of the first popular theories I encounter after see in the movie the first time and was like, wait, what what there? It's interesting. I think, like, if you like draw that out, it is kind of interesting.

But I think that yeah, it holds very little water. Jordan Peele was like, what, no, stop it. But I think it's interesting that this sensitivity and difference instead of just being like a sensitive boy was like, no, he must be a nightmare person from underground who has been replaced. So yeah, I don't like the applications of the theory. Yeah, that's how little leeway we're willing to give young boys in our society to be sort of soft, right, like

it has to be has to be a conspiracy. Well, speaking of some other gender normative stuff, here's like one of the few things that bumped me a little bit was so they the family has decided after killing like evil Josh and Kitty in that family, add he's like, we have to be on the move again. We have to leave, we have to run. And they realized they don't have the car keys that they need. So Addie goes back inside and she realizes that one of the

twins is still alive. Now Addie is holding a fireplace poker tool that we have seen her used before as a weapon. She's right by the sink and she so she was realizing that one of the twins is about to pounce on her, so she grabs a frying pan even though she's already holding holding the poker, and then

uses the frying pan to hit the twin with. And we've talked countless times on the podcast about how oftentimes women, if they are allowed to fight back or use a weapon at all, it is often some sort of domestic item, often specifically a frying pan. I will argue that it's like I thought that too, But then I'm like, but

then I was like, wait a second fire poker. I mean it's not it's not like as over the top as a frying pan, But I'm like, that's kind of a household object as well, Like it is, but it doesn't have necessarily like the same it's not the gender right to me, it felt a little bit more neutral. So but then I was like, why was she grab a frying pan? She's already holding this weapon, which she continues to hold and fight like that's how she kills that's what she uses to fight red with at the

end and stuff. So I think that it's interesting because yes, they are both household items, and one could argue like in terms of like Goddess of the hearth and like fires are also historically in some cultures very feminine and like keeping your house warm. But the fire poker was an item of necessity that she was able to grab while she was tethered to the coffee table, and so like that she used that to extract herself from danger and then continue to use that. So I was like

fine with that. I was like, this is what you were able to grab. But then having that already, then grabbing the frying pan definitely read is weird because it's like, you have a thing in your hand, why another weapon?

And it's like her signature weapon too. Yeah, so it was just like why what a weird choice, especially because again, I mean we could ratle off several movies right now where a woman uses a frying pan specifically, we see it and Tangled, we see it in Roger Rabbit, we see it in Raiders of the Last Dark, we see it in Shako La, you know, like it's always and Alfred Molina's shock. Okay, I got my little alf now in my recording area. I have my little Alfred Molina

at already. I love Alfred Molina. I saw him in a play when plays were still a thing, the last the last play I ever saw a start. Alfred Molina in it. He's great. Wait the last play? Did you see the one in passive? I did, Yeah, the Father I saw it too. He was so good. He was good. Everyone else was okay, everyone else was okay. I don't see I don't see a lot of like live like plays, but I was so glad I got to see that. It was a weird play. I don't know if I

liked the play. It was weird and sad, and ultimately I was like, Okay, I could have not seen this and felt better, but it was. It was well acted. But anyway, back to the movie, Um, I wanted to just really quickly say something that was a reference to something I said earlier. So and I because I just figured it out in real time. I was like, why

does this bother me so much? And it's the my my criticism of female characters being written in a certain way in horror movies where they do seem unaware of their surroundings, or that they make questionable choices things like that. And this is almost always a male writer director presenting female characters this way. And I'll use one of the

worst horror movies I've ever seen as an example. A movie called The Terror Fire, which is about a killer clown who reaks havoc around the city and is specifically trying to kill this young woman and her friend. I would watch it. I will say it would get a negative one zillion nipples on the Bechtel cast, so stopped us. In that movie, you see the protagonist, who as a woman, making countless choice after choice after choice of just you as the audience would be like, why would you do that?

Why would you go back into the scary warehouse where you know a killer is Why would you do any of what you're doing besides running away and trying to find safety? And that is the thing that I take issue with because it's like, as women, we are constantly on high alert for our safety, right, we know the dangers lurking out there, and we're not just like obliviously making horrible choices all the time to go into scary

warehouses where we just almost got murdered. Right. So yeah, Like I I just said I wouldn't put one of those family stickers on my car because somebody might come and murder my family, right, Yeah, we're all on the defensive now. I'm like, damn, I hadn't thought about that about the stickers, but now I'm off them for life, or I'll put a different sticker to throw them off my track, right right, Like we have eighteen kids and

we all have guns, stay away. So yeah, So the point is, like I just I get so annoyed when like against specifically men who are making horror movies don't even know to take into consideration the high alert that women have to be on just in everyday life, especially at night, you know, and then make the assumption that

it's irrational at its core. So that's I just wanted to clarify because I'm always like I sound so like victim blamey no. And I think that's one of the reasons that I like the Scream franchise so much, because Sidney Prescott is always very aware and hyper aware, and she's had multiple killers come after her. So as each movie gets on and she becomes smarter and more creative.

But it's like basically about a woman who continues to be stalked and like how she fights against that as opposed to like, oh, Ladi da, I'm finding myself in this situation, like she becomes a target for these people who become obsessed with her, especially after a film about her life is made, So I think that that's really intriguing. Also, I love the movie Stab, which is the screen movies inside the screen movies, um, and I love that inside the movie in the fourth screen they have like a

stab fest. But anyway back to us, I love screen and going off what you're saying, Caitlin, I am encouraged by seeing movies like us, and even because it's like, you know, we can't necessarily stop men from writing movies, right, so if we're going off of that, it is nice that they seem to be getting a little bit better about at least recognizing the tropes of the genre that are irrational and harmful and have everything to do with

their writing versus what the reality is. I feel like another example you could point to is the new Halloween movie, where you know Laurie Laurie strode Um in the original franchise, like her actions are made to seem somewhat irrational, very like final girly, and then in the new one you see that she's been like living this life of fear and like what are the ramifications of that and examining at least and it's I will say that horror movies.

Recent horror movies have done it with mixed results, but examining the PTSD aspect of being pursued by something terrifying and how that affects you psychologically, I will say that I don't think. I don't. There's not a lot of horror movies that do it extremely well. The Babba Dick comes to mind of like one horror movie that deals with PTSD and and just like a fear really really well. I thought, or at least when we did the episode,

wasn't I thought it was postpartum. Yeah, but I mean like a form of psychological stress and trauma here in in US. I it's kind of muddled for me. Where So we see young Addie, who actually is young Red, come up to the service and then she's put into therapy because she's not speaking. This is perceived to be a result of PTSD. It also appears to be a stressor on her parents marriage, which is every child of divorce is worst fear, although they seemed to have some

issues before. Also, Oh yeah, because there's like it sounds like he you know, like there's there's some drinking going on and other other stresses on the relationship. Um, but I don't know. I'm curious of like what you both made of that plot point. I felt I felt like it was less about developing PTSD and more about setting up for the reveal. And also I do like that it was she was gone for fifteen minutes. What can

happen in fifteen minutes? And when we are in real time and the invasion is happening, Uh, they call the police and the police say they will be there in fifteen minutes, and we already know what is going to happen or what can happen in fifteen minutes. If you're rewatching it, you're like, fifteen minutes is not good. You need to be there sooner. Bad things can happen. And I thought it was interesting that it was the dad

who was like, what could have happened? It was only fifteen minutes, and the mom was like, a lot can happen in fifteen minutes, Like ADDIE's mom like knows, and that's why she's so concerned for her daughter. Yeah, because they have no clue what's happened to her, and it's far worse than they could have even imagined, Like they don't they never see their daughter again actually, and the other the other read that I was and this isn't. I don't have this backed up by anywhere. So maybe

I'm just my brain is just turning into putting over time. Um, But I was. I was thinking, um just in terms of how it seems like ADDIE's parents want to get

her help from a therapist. But the pts D, while it it's made I feel I feel like it sort of ties into what the message of the movie is, where it's they're ascribing PTSD to an individual when it actually represents something that is far larger, where it's like read is representative of this whole unseen population that is being actively oppressed and that is where this like stress

and trauma is coming from. And also she can't communicate with her parents and she cannot describe what the problem is. And for self preservation issues, even when she has the tools to communicate, she doesn't because she wants to thrive in ADDIE's place. And I don't know, it's dense. Yeah,

here's a question. Do we think that Addie when she is newly Addie, when she's come from underground, do we think that she has repressed the fact that she was originally a tethered because I felt like that was supposed to be something we were believing. Yeah, I thought that was how That's how I thought we were supposed to

see it. I don't know. I was focused far more on and again, maybe this is just me trying to make sense of something too hard, but I was focused more on, well, why doesn't real Addie, who has now been trapped underground and made to live among the tethereds, even though she is not a tethered why does she

never try to escape and just go all? It seems like all she would have had to do is like run up an escalator that is going in the downward motion, But it seems I was like, why doesn't she she knows where she comes from, why doesn't she ever try to leave this terrifying place? I that was curious for me too, because so the tethered are mirrors of what's going on above ground. They're doing all the things that they're above ground people are doing, and then they switch places.

So when they switch places, is now underground Addie and tethered to above ground Addie. Because there is also the speculation that they're sharing one soul, so it's not even that they are soulless. It's that they're like everybody's got half a soul sort of split between them, So like, is the soul stationary and it lives above ground? Like

what is what the deal? Well, that's what Red seems to explain in the when they first invade the home, and she's like, I was tethered to you, and that's why I'm trying to become untethered, so I I think, but yeah, I guess that that's why I don't really like the ending. There's so many story logic issues that come up for me, and I'm just like, oh, what well,

And the dance is the big lynchpin. When she's like fourteen years old and she has this dance recital where she ends up getting injured, and my understanding of that was that Red underground version read was able to take control during that dance and that's how she was ultimately injured, because she has that line where she's like, oh, I piked at fourteen with her leg as a dancer, and that's when they realized she was special because she could

control her above ground or she could break from the tethering. And I don't understand what that was because they would all have to have eventually broken from the tethering to be able to even plan this and put on these fashionable jumpsuits, so that the moment where everything switches, the ending worked for me on this viewing, going with the read of the movie that I'm currently going with, um

in that way, I feel like it really works. Where if you're going off of Jordan's Peel's kind of thesis that this is a movie about, like you, you know, American exceptionalism, like I deserve this lifestyle, this is I'm entitled to this, and just kind of I don't know, like exploring that fallacy of like, oh there's enough, there's enough prosperity to go around, where the reality of what I mean, I we've gotten this far without saying capitalism,

so sorry, but like the reality of like American capitalism is that it's designed so that there's not enough room for everybody, and so for one person to prosper by this movie's logic and buy a lot of reality, another person has to be oppressed and suffer. So in that way, I felt like the swap ending works if that is supposed to be the message of the core, But like logistically there's for sure, I'm like, huh what And also there every time I do have to say it's an

incredible line read from Lupete and Youngo. But every time reds like we are Americans, I'm like, okay, all right, Hitn't it real hard? There? Jordan's Well, that transitions into talking point that I wanted to hit on, which is, um, the use of disability equals evil in a horror movie.

This is an enormous, widespread trope because what happened here is that Lupeta revealed at some point that as inspiration for the way she made Red's voice sound, she used the symptoms of spasmodic dysphonia, which is a neurological disorder that causes involuntary spasms of the larynx um. And her revealing this received understandably backlash. And uh, I'm pulling from an article in The Guardian entitled Lupida Nyongo's under fire from disability groups for quote evil voice in us SO.

Respectability is a nonprofit organization that works to fight stigmas against people with disabilities. The president of Respectability, Jennifer Laslow ms Rahi, said, quote connecting disabilities to characters who are evil. Even further marginalizes people with disabilities who also have significant abilities and want to contribute to their communities just like

anyone else dot dot dot. What is difficult for us and for the thousands of people living with spasmodic dysphonia is this association to their voice with what might be considered haunting end quote. So again, this is just another movie that describes a disability or a characteristic of a disability to a character who is evil, who is violent, who murders people. And this isn't just a horror movie thing. This happens in action movies. This happens in sci fi movies.

This happens fantasy a lot ton basically across film in general, where disability could be demonize. Yeah, fiction across the world, in every aspect, disability will be demonized. I will say I love How To Train Your Dragon Too, because I feel like it's sort of goes against that where in How to Train Your Dragon Too? What's his face? I just forgot his name? Hiccup the main character. He has lost the leg and he modifies his dragon so that he can ride his dragon even with the missing leg.

And he has like a prosthesis, and the villain of How To In Your Dragon Too also has a disability, but refuses to accept that their disability is a part of who they are, and like that's why they're bad, not because of disability. I like, I literally wept when

I saw How To Train Your Dragon Too. It's like, this is beautiful, that they're pretty good, but I mean even speaking to how disability is portrayed, and then and the fact that it's it's like the demonization of disabled people is so normalized that Lupete and Youngo didn't think twice about saying that is I mean, it goes I'm glad she was called out for that, but it speaks to something that is much larger, where it's like, this is a horror movie that subverts so many common pitfalls,

but there still wasn't really thought of or discussion about how disability is presented by by the filmmakers or by the actors or kind of on any level, which I feel like speaks to just how cooked in it is, to what is quote unquote okay to do for movie. And Lupida apologized, and I have this quote here as well. She said, quote it's a very marginal group of people who suffer from this, which sidebar. It's like, well, that doesn't make it okay. It's almost like, are you saying

that that makes it okay? That it's only or offended, like who are this affected? But it's like I was only going to hurt seventeen people to continue the quote. The thought that I would in a way offend them was not my intention. In my mind, I wasn't interested in vilifying or demonizing the condition. I crafted read with love and care. As much as it was a genre specific world, I really wanted to ground her in something that felt real. For all that I say sorry to

anyone I may have offended. End quote. So I don't love this apology. I feel like she's it's kind of like well in my the ends, but also I'm sorry, yeah, but it's like love and care for how like that's such a weird thing to add that the aircrafted red with love and care, Like ah that Lupeta. I mean, I mean it's like if we're giving I don't know. That was like not a great apology, But I do hope that, like she's, she is going to carry this forward, and I hope that, you know, other actors saw this

almost we're you know, we'll think twice. It's it's an easy It's just again, it's like it's so easy to

just not do this and be respectful of other people. Um, and yeah, it's not like it's usually people's intention to demonize things like this, but because, like you said, Jamie, it's become so normalized that people just do it without even giving it a second thought about who would be negatively affected by these kinds of misrepresentations, which is kind of fascinating because that's like what the movie is about that she's in is like how the whatever upstairs Lupeta

has nothing but good intentions and is trying to do well but is ignoring what is going on elsewhere and is willfully ignorant of what's going on elsewhere. And this is like, I guess, not a one to one example, but a microcosm, but he is not even willfully ignorant.

I mean maybe, but it's is it comes down to the question of is she has she repressed all of those memories of when she did live among the tethers underground or I guess I'm guess more just like those characters in general, not not the swaps well, And the frustrating thing for me is that there's also a plot based reason for Red to have a voice like that. She gets choked, she gets choked out and dragged down there.

And she also has not spoken English in presumably many many years, so she's been using this other language that is very throat based, and she has throat injuries. And like, I don't understand why it had to be, Oh, there's this disease that looks interesting for me to copy. It just doesn't make sense because there's so many things that are based in the character and in the text that would make crafting that more sense. Like I don't could have just done an Andy Circus Golemn voice or something.

I love Andy Circus, Yeah, okay, Circus hive over here. It feels like he'd be so much fun to like go to a party with and just hang out with him the whole time and talk to no one else at the party. I got to interview him a couple of years ago, and it was I think my favorite interview I've ever done with anyone. Just such a pleasant, smart, thoughtful I could go on. I spent one hour with him, and I just have carried it for like I don't even know how long it was. It could have been

like four years ago. But I was just like he was so nice, so my taller than him, exciting. The other things I had to mention were kind of I mean, I wanted to touch on the music, not really for uh intersectional feminism, but just because I think it's really fascinating the use of music and um karama, like you were saying this composer Michael Ables, I have no idea how it's pronounced. I just made a choice and went with it. Sorry, Michael, I don't know how to pronounce

his last name Ables or abouts uh. I mean, his composition is incredible. He pulls from just like learning even about the music, he pulls from Tchaikovsky for that ending, he's like blending. I got five on it with Tchaikovsky, and it's like a section of Tchaikovsky from The Nutcracker where Clara is being pulled into a mirror world. So there's like that whole thing. It's so smart and so cool. And I also really liked um that there is a

black ballerina like a motif in this movie. You like, that's like such a rare thing you never get to see in movies and especially in professional ballet. That's like a huge discussion that is ongoing in the ballet community. And I just love ballet in general. The dancing in this movie, it's upstairs, downstairs, it's all beautiful. I loved it. Okay, I think that that was That was just a small rant I saved for the end at least. Thank you, Karma.

Do you have anything else you wanted to discuss. I wanted to just discuss how I think Jordan Peel does a really great job of integrating visual clues and like just a lot of visual symbols and elevens coming up a lot, Like it's the first scene, the first scene on the boardwalk. Yes, we have the eleven eleven. We have the people playing rock paper scissors who keep doing scissors, which is also like a two. There are a lot of twos and elevens throughout the movie. Yeah, and uh,

it's her birthday. She gets number eleven, which is the thriller one, which is sort of about the like real the like good Michael Jackson turning into the bad Michael Jackson. Uh, there's just like a lot that's happening there. When she's watching the news, it's like Channel eleven news. You see the little elevens um, although they say channel seven I think, or they say channel four channel seven instead, but it says eleven on the screen, which was like I was like, huh,

somebody missed that or I'm missing something. Um. And just like the ambulance, the ambulance that gets the Jeremiah eleven eleven guy at the beginning of like the current day stuff, it's ambulance number two, which is the same ambulance that they end up getting in and driving away in in the end. Um, there's there's so much just with elevens

and twos that happens there. And like I said, the fifteen minutes thing that I mentioned earlier, how that became a mirror of what can happen in fifteen minutes with the disappearance at the beginning and then with the police

coming in fifteen minutes. Just I think that it's really cool to see him sneak all that stuff in there, and I just think it's a pretty it's pretty tight, except for like you said, Caitlin, that last like ten fifteen minutes where it's like you explained too much, right right, Yeah, Just like Jordan's do another rewrite of the end. Um they're just going off of because I think we like vaguely referenced it at the very beginning of the episode.

But um, something that has been coming up a lot in this year's month of Horror movies is the fact that there is an unhoused person that is dead at the or really injured at the beginning of the movie as like a warning. UM. I think is something that we have been seeing pop up in a lot of horror movies, or at least two out of the four we're covering this month UM feature a story beat where an unhoused person and as UM brutalized or killed as a vague plot point to keep the protagonist story moving.

We also saw this in A Girl Walks home alone at night and Uh, just right, better, you don't have to do that. Yeah, I agree. I think. The last thing I wanted to say was that I don't know if anyone noticed ADDIE's dad at the very beginning of the movie playing whack a mole and how bad he was at it. He really sucked. He didn't he wasn't moving the mallet around, he was just hitting the same empty hole over the mole hole over and over again, and nothing was popping out of it. I'm just like sir.

He also stopped playing in the middle, where I don't know why I got so, but I was just like, you just gave them two tickets to play, and you're stopping in the middle. You waste You're wasting time. And oh it was too tickets. Like my inner Chucky cheese stand, it was two tickets. Also to play the game, two ticket. It was two tickets a lot of Jordan Peele is a terrific writer. I love get Out. I wish the ending of US was as solid as the ending of

get Out, but most again, most of the much discussion. Yes, for sure, I just yeah, I can't wait to see more of his work. I also, I feel like US has more rewatch value than get Out. I feel like

because there's so much that you notice different times. In a way, I feel like get Out is almost because it's so tight, you're like, oh, I see everything, it's there, Yep, yep, good, okay, got it, And with US it's sort of like, oh, there's so much that I don't understand, and maybe if I watch it again, i'll understand it a little bit more like I feel like there's a secret message and I don't quite have it yet, but if I watch it eighteen times, maybe i'll get it right. Yeah, it's fun,

it's cool. It's weird because it's like it's the same genre as his first movie, but it's like completely different, Like it's yeah, you love to see range, Yes, you love to see the range. Uh does this movie pass the Bechdel test? We already said yes it does. Between um Addie and her daughter Zora between well, my question about that with Red? They never say Red's name on camera, So does she count as a named character if they

don't say the character's name? That's my question. Well, my take on that is always like, even if the character isn't given a name, are they narratively significant enough that they matter to the story because the name the naming caveats always like, oh, are they like a barista who who you see for five seconds in the movie? Uh, and they don't have a name because they are not an important character? I think it's yeah, So I yeah, I count any interactions between Addie and Red as passing.

And as far as our nipple scale goes, the zero to five nipples based on its based on an examination of intersectional feminism. UM. For this one, I think I would go like a three and a half. I do appreciate its exploration of class, uh and privilege and kind of the the what is the word that I'm trying to think of, the fallacy? I think of the American dream and and things like that as sort of like

an allegorical presence in the story. I do really appreciate the way that Adelaide's character is the protagonist and the most active character. Uh. We see her do things uh that are my brain is also putting. UM. I also love how active Red is. I mean, both of Lapida's characters are like the people in charge of their respective situations, which makes sense because they're tethered together, you know, they share the same soul. But they are the ones who

are making the most active choices. They're the ones who are calling the shots in whatever it is they're trying to do. Zora also we see doing a lot of fighting.

She attacks three different characters there. There's at one point they're talk about like their kill counts, and they're almost like kind of being like, well, I get to drive because I've killed the most people and she kills two, uh, and then she thought she killed three, but then yeah, she thought she had three, but she actually had too.

That seems really funny. Yeah. I like that you see female characters in a horror movie, like knowing the danger they're in, immediately responding appropriately to that, making active choices, doing fighting that feels appropriate to what they would be capable of doing. Um. Nothing felt like how did how does she suddenly like a martial arts master with this uh fire poker? Like, we don't say anything like the Mary sus stuff. It's all it's all pretty grounded. So yeah,

I I just wish the ending was a little bit different. Um. But other than that, I do really enjoy this movie. I'd give it three and a half nipples. I will give two of them to Lapita on the condition that she learns from her mistake of demonizing a characteristic of a disability. Uh. And I'll give one to the actor who played Zora, whose name is Hattie write Joseph, I think, yes exactly. And I'll give my remaining half nipple to the actor who played young Red slash Addie and her

name I also wrote it down is Madison Curry. So those are my distributions. I think I'm gonna go for on this movie. Um, I yeah, I mean there's there's definitely some small things and a lot of it were had a little more to do with the production than the movie itself. But I mean Lupida marginalizing disabled people in that way, that's, uh, you gotta docket. Um and there.

I mean we discussed a few things, but I think by and large, I mean, this movie does so many things that your average horror movie isn't doing in terms of like, you could not have a more complicated dual shared soul character than Red and Adelaide. There's so much being examined just within these two characters and how they interact with each other. Like it's, uh, it's slightly confusing at the end, but it's still it's I mean, show me, show me more layers. I don't think it's possible. I

I I don't know. I like how I guess kind of like the reflection of a lot of family dynamics, of like Adelaide is very much in charge of her family, but has I mean, even the reflections on masculinity that this movie has I thought were pretty effective. Of Um, you know, you understand why Gabe is kind of in this standoff with Tim Hidecker whose name I never remember, uh Josh, but it is an impediment to the family ultimately.

And I like the showing of masculinity in um Jason, whereby being more sensitive and more receptive to things, he sees things that other characters just don't. Uh. Zora is super active, I choose like one of the funniest characters, very able to call her dad out on his book bullshit and like, I don't know, I just like that and and I and I enjoyed most of the commentary

being made with Pittie Tyler as well. I didn't really I was touch and go on the face the girl Joker moment wasn't my favorite thing in the world, but I I think, I mean, for especially for a movie that's written and directed by a man, that it's largely I mean, the portrayal of femininity and masculinity I thought was really effective and cool and used to examine a larger thing of pretty effectively. So I'm gonna go four.

I'll give one to Adelaide, one to Red, one to Zorah, and then half of one to Kitty, and then the last half the little adelaide sorry for cutting a nipple and half, so it must be done. I am going to like two to others standing together, give four nipples, um two and two. They two twos everywhere nipple nipple nipple npples. Also eleven eleven is one one, which adds up to four. Yep, the number of nipples I'm giving.

I like the commentary and how there's an acknowledgement of the fact that we are all living on stolen land and how that is going to bite us in the butt if we do not acknowledge it. And UH should be acknowledged because of the way that people are treating each other. And I would like to see less of the issues with the unhoused people and the the issue with the demonization of this disability. So that's automatically a nipple off in terms of not hitting the five nipples.

But I will give a nipple to the shared nipple between the lupidas UH. Two nipples for Shahari, right, Joseph, because I honestly, every time I watch it, I have to remind myself that she is one person playing two characters and not two different actors. I feel like she and her were the most different for me. So she gets two nipples and then I'm going to give the last nipple to uh to Jason for the line kiss my anus, which is beautiful line or like, where did

you even learn that word? He doesn't want to get in trouble for swearing, so he goes to the anatomically correct terms and I love it. So those are my four nipples. Um. Great exploration of privileged disparities, uh, and not great exploration of privilege disparities between people with disabilities and able bodied people. But you know, overall, good stuff, good story, good characters, fun time. Thank you for being here, Gramos, thank you for having me. Yes, I'm so glad. Tell

us Swear Bowl can check out your stuff online. You can check me out at Karama Drama k O r A m A d r A m A it rhymes for your pleasure. And I'm on Twitter and Instagram that I do not frequently post on Instagram because it makes me sad, but Twitter is great. Follow me on Twitter. I make jokes about Batman stick. It's fun. Oh yes, good, hell yeah yeah uh. You can follow us as well on Twitter and Instagram. At becktel Cast you can subscribe to our Patreon aka Matreon. It's five dollars a month.

It is UH to to wow to bonus episodes every month, including access to the entire back catalog. You can do. You can get our merge at public dot com slash the back del cast UH and we also have a face masks there. So if you're looking for a fun and fashionable way to UH live in the scariest timeline, that's a way to do it. Yes, indeed, and now we go, we scuttle back underground and stay tethered. I don't know my brain, it's tired. Fine,