Too Scary; Didn't Watch - DONNIE DARKO

Episode Date: March 27, 2024

Time-travel, teens, therapy and the most stacked cast ever (Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Patrick Swayze, Drew Barrymore, Seth Rogen.....let me go on?!) - we're recapping DONNIE DARKO! Henley is in the hot seat this week as she tries to recreate the movie that defined her adolescence (lol). Wish her luck. Happy Easter everyone!!!Movie stats @ 16:28Recap @ 24:14TrailerFollow the show: @TSDWpodcast on Twitter, TikTok, and Instagram.Check out our Patreon for bonus episodes and additional content!Rate Too Scary; Didn’t Watch 5 Stars on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and leave a review for Emily, Henley, and Sammy.Advertise on Too Scary; Didn't Watch via Gumball.fmSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is a HeadGum Podcast. This is Emily, Henley, and Sammy, and you're listening to Too Scary, Didn't Watch. Hi everyone, welcome to Too Scary, Didn't Watch, the horror movie recap podcast for those too scared to watch for themselves. I'm Emily and I am too scared to watch scary movies. I'm Henley and I'm also too scared to watch scary movies. I'm Sammy and I love watching scary movies and so I watch them so that you don't have to. And I am very excited for today's episode. excited for today's episode and if you are so excited that you can't wait and you've got to get right into it you can check out the time stamps in the show notes because we have a little

bit of haunted housekeeping to do um which is i'm just i just decided i'm gonna do little horror check-ins as things come up and love that and excite me because if it excites me it may excite you it might love that and this week the trailer for the new alien movie came out alien romulus yes which is directed by freddie alvarez who directed my beloved 2013 Evil Dead and Don't Breathe. And truly just this teaser trailer, which was probably one minute long, had me floating around the room again. It was just like, wow, only Fetty can do it. I got so excited.

It looks so good. There was a interview with him where he says he loves doing things practically. He won't be doing CGI. And I feel like no CGI for a new alien. Alien movies, which have been very CGI heavy, which is part of why I think they've been bad. I actually didn't see the most recent one, but I think it's kind of widely agreed that they're not great. People like them in their own right, but it feels like we're getting back to basics here and going to get our first real alien feeling movie feeling movie i mean that'll be so fucking cool face huggers in there oh i'm excited and um i'm i'm really really excited so go check out that trailer if you're brave a brave person because there's one- I'm not brave. There's one shot in it- You sent it to us and I was like, I don't know if I can do it.

There's one shot in it that is so nasty, but it got me so pumped. I think it's going to be disgusting, this movie. And really scary. So I'm very pumped on that. And on the last little horror check-in we did, I forgot to bring up Long Legs, which... Ew, I don't like the sound of that.

It's the one that is with Micah Monroe and Nicolas Cage, directed by Osgood Perkins. It's because it's like number one on my list that I forgot to talk about it. Because I'm like, well, obviously Long Legs. Everybody knows that there's a 0% chance that we would forget about that movie. So, Long Legs is coming up this year. Also found out this year that there's a third Cronenberg.

Caitlin Cronenberg is directing. Her directorial debut is coming out soon. It's called Humane. These Cronenbergs just keep coming. Yeah, where are they coming from? And then lastly, I just wanted to say I was planning on skipping Immaculate because I thought it looked bad, but I've heard enough interesting things. Not necessarily that it's good, but that it's gross or crazy enough that I am interested again to check it out.

So I think we will cover that. So stay. Hell yeah. I do want to hear about it. Yeah. Wow. I'm back in on that one. Great.

Great. I'm so happy because I brought it up and you were like, no, I don't think so. My heart sank to the bottom of my feet. I was like, no, Sammy, please. The trailer is bad, but. I haven't even seen the trailer. I don't know. I'm curious again, so we'll check it out.

As long as it's like at least bad or crazy enough to be interesting, which it seems like it is. So stay tuned. Watch this space. Watch this space. Listen to this space. But okay, that's all I got for horror news today.

So enough about that. Let's talk about us. Let's talk about us. God, I hated not talking about us just now. Did anything scary happen to you guys this week? You guys, I slept funny last night. Oh, no. It's the worst. I don't know how I could have possibly done it, but I pulled something in my neck

that then kind of radiates down my arm and it hurts so badly. And the main problem is that obviously i'm trying to take advil or leave i have this like tylenol leave combo that i take that's great and i swallow pills like a crocodile or an alligator which one like the one what does that like a i swallow them like or like a bird that doesn't chew up its food. Like, throw them in my mouth. You just like gulp it down? Yeah. And then I always.

Like a pelican? Just full. Throw my head back. Okay. Yeah. And like, I do it that way. I can't do it without literally throwing my head back as far as possible. You have to get your mouth vertically on top of your throat. Yes. Yes. 100%. That is the image I'm trying to evoke. And I can't do it with how I

pulled my neck. So I'm in the bathroom like, all right, Henley, you got to just learn how to take pills like a normal person. not like a pelican. I'm able to do it. It's not that bad. But I got to say, I was feeling embarrassed by myself in the bathroom trying to take my painkillers. Do you do? I just hate it when that happens. Multiple pills at a time or are you a one at a timer? I can do multiple pills at a time. But in this scenario, I was doing one at a time. Yeah, that's understandable.

These are exceptional circumstances. This is a learning moment. This is a learning moment. I've just recently started to do two at a time. Bunk is talkative again. Guys, everyone will be happy to know. And I felt really proud. I can do two at a time now

but that's my ears are also really big well not those ones those ones i don't do two at a time but like a tylenol or something i could do two at a time now great it's just a psychological problem you swallow food like that all the time but psychologically it's tough no i have i have a hard time with pills i'm not i would usually either gag or it's just a i choose i choose a lot of gummy vitamins and liquid medication for this reason exactly oh interesting okay this is making me feel better i'm not alone um what about you guys how's your weeks um i already about you guys? How's your weeks? I already told you guys this, but I just need to share that. So the birds, they had made a nest in our lemon tree. That's where they lived, is our lemon tree, which our lemon tree is overgrown right now. It's blocking our entry to our house. There's so many lemons on it, but respect the

birds. But the other day I was making my lunch before work. It was early. I was tired. I wasn't thinking straight. I needed a lemon. I needed a lemon for my salad. Uh-oh. And I thought, okay, if I just go to like the farthest away from the branch to the very end, cut a little lemon off like they're not even gonna

notice. I go to grab that lemon. Cynthia flies out of the nest and then in a panic one of the babies flies out of the nest no because mommy was gone oh and i was like oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god like i mean it was like fuck fuck fuck fuck like it flew out of the nest but i was like should it have like can it get back in like can it fly i'd never seen it leave the nest i immediately go into the bedroom i wake joel up and i'm like i like curl up into a ball and i'm like i just killed a baby bird like what the fuck are we gonna do oh my god it's like it's fine calm down come back and i was i truly was like

this is what henley warned me about like I and I was like I can't believe it's me like I did it like I'm gonna have just fucking killed a baby bird and I'm gonna have to because I needed a fucking lemon for my salad you idiot not to be a bitch but if this bird can't survive someone picking a lemon off the other side of the tree then that's that's Darwinism right there and that's not on you thank you um which I do realize like there are things out there in the world that aren't just like me grabbing a lemon from my tree. But in the moment I was like, I didn't have to grab the lemon.

Right. Like I could have just not. Yes. So I'm really freaking out. Joel goes out there to see if there's a way that he can lift lift that baby up and back into the nest. But he's like, I went to he goes again. I went to go put the baby in the nest and it started like

flying a little bit like i think it's okay i think i think it can like fly around it's learning how to fly because you're not supposed to touch him right he wasn't trying to touch it right well i he wasn't trying to touch it but apparently also that maybe isn't true i don't know but either way he didn't touch it a bird myth but that's what i yeah i think it might be i said that too so you can't touch and he was like i think that's a myth anyway whatever he didn't have to touch the baby but but so then we can see them. It's like right outside our living room window. So we come inside.

We're watching. He's like, look, look, look. And the other baby is like in the nest, shaking her little shoulders, like looking like she's like, wait, I want to fly. Like, I want to fly. And we watch her work up the courage. And then she flies. Oh, that's so cute. And then the other baby flies up onto the branch with her. And they just like shaking their little wings at each other. Like, oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, that's so cute. And then the other baby flies up onto the branch with her

and they just like shaking their little wings at each other. Like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Look what we just did. Look what we just did. It was the cutest, most special thing I'd ever seen. Ever seen. And then Cynthia came back and then later daddy came back

and then they were a little family of four being like, wow, look, we flew. Isn't that so cool? I knew there was going to be a happy ending to this story. It was really special. I was just like, something good is going to happen here. It was really, but it was really scary. And I was like, I can't, I need these birds to like grow up and get out because I cannot

live with this. But then, so then they haven't been around in the tree at all the past couple of days. And I got sad and scared because I do want them to grow up and go away. But I'm like, but only under good circumstances and I was a little bit scared that okay like maybe something has happened to these birds I saw a feather in the tree and I'm like is that just a feather that gets shed because they're birds

or did something eat it and leave a feather behind but then yesterday Joel and I were coming home and in the other part of the yard on the ground we saw mom and daddy and both babies just like hanging out and it's like sitting around i learned that morning doves are monogamous so they're like just a true little family oh my god it's like the sweetest thing in the world no shade to polyamorous people out there

but that's very sweet but it's sweet when it's animals because i don't know it's very easy to like anthropomorphize and be like wow mama daddy baby um but I'm just really really really pleased that the birds are all doing great and that I did not kill a baby bird by needing a lemon for my sod which I didn't get by the way

oh no um but now they've moved out of the lemon tree and so I can get lemons again and it's really just a win-win for everybody do you have photos of these of any of these events i have some photos of the family we have i yeah joel got a good photo of the family and then i also got a really bad video of the family we're gonna need to put something on the instagram for that yeah we'll put we'll put something out. They're really just very sweet and very cute. And thank God.

Thank God they're okay. Thank God. That's all. Thank God. Real scary, though. Touch and go. Yeah, that is scary. Touch and go there.

Well, nothing too scary happened to me this week, to be quite honest with you. I will say that I've been working lately, and that is scary. That is scary. That is scary. Having a job. I realize it makes me not watch movies, which is scary because it's like if I've been using my brain all day, it's like I just want reality TV. Yeah, you're just done. Yeah. But anyways, this isn't to do with that. I was going to say that yesterday I cleaned my house because

I guess it's sort of to do with work because if my house has anything messy at all, I'm like, well, I have to clean. I can't do any work in here, I guess, until the whole house is clean. It's hard to work from home when you're not in like a clean workspace. I even feel like it's hard for me to relax

on a weekend morning if it's messy. I like have to clean so that I can relax. Also, it's the perfect procrastination. Yes. For anything else. Yes. You're like, you're like, can't I don't have a choice. I can't I literally can't work because I got to do all this all these chores. Unfortunately, there's a couple dishes in the sink. So I'm gonna have to tend to those. And then that will lead to seeing Oh, the sink's a little dirty might want to get some bleach out scrub the sink. to seeing, oh, the sink's a little dirty. Might want to get some

bleach out, scrub the sink. So, anyways, yesterday I had a day where exactly that happened. I meant to do just kind of a surface level regular cleaning. But then you started to see, you start cleaning and you start to see all the things that need to be cleaned. It became the like on your hands and knees scrubbing for six hours straight. Oh my God. I was like sore from it. I didn't eat at all. I just was like so hyper focused on cleaning. I pumice the nasty shit in the toilet.

Wow. Oh my God. That's dedication. My toilet is sparkling white again wow i i mean sometimes you just gotta go for it was i bet it felt good waking up this morning oh it felt that you were looked around and you were like i'm a new woman it did but then i guess the scary thing is also that there's still i can still see so many dirty things like i think i could detail clean my house for the rest of my life like yeah

uh-huh especially with cats because it's like the one place you're not they're making yes and you know once you're done cleaning one thing it something else just got dirty again because now they're tracking cat litter across the house again and it needs another vacuum but i was like i need to like wash these walls just like scrub everything like clean all my windex all my in in windows inside and outside don't even get me started on that there's so much to be done but i did get a lot done and i'm very pleased but it was a little scary that just i guess the person i became which is not a stranger to me i know her well she is me she is me but um did you listen to anything while you're cleaning here's the freakiest thing i don't like to clean with any i like to really

focus on the focus i don't i mean we've talked about this i i also tend to clean it yes i like to really focus on the focus i don't i mean we've talked about this i i also tend to clean it yes i like to be it's i like it to be silent that's fascinating i definitely don't i definitely need constant background noise all the time uh no i just need people chittering chattering in my ear at all moments of the day. But I'm so focused on the cleaning that I won't hear any of it. And I like all my podcasts. So I'm like, well, I want to listen to them when I can listen to them. Really focused?

Yeah. That's amazing. I can listen to them on like walks or if I'm cooking. Not cleaning. Cleaning takes 100 percent of my attention um well something else scary happened this week you guys which is that i watched the movie i watched the movie i was racking my brain i was like what, what movie am I going to do? I literally Googled not scary horror movies, looked at a BuzzFeed list, Donnie Darko on this list. And I was like, light bulb moment. I was obsessed with Donnie Darko as a teenager. This is really interesting. I'm surprised to hear

this. I've never seen it. I know like basically nothing about it, which has always felt insane to me it's like such a heavily referenced movie it was a huge deal when we were I don't know 13 14 and I'm so thrilled that my lack of knowledge about Donnie Darko ends today you're mind blown Emily um wait Sammy yeah you've seen I have seen it but I don't really remember anything other than the one very scary image from it. And I feel like I remember being pretty scared of it at this at the time that it was out. So this is a fun little role reversal for us. Well, it was released in 2001. So maybe you saw it at a really young age. I didn't watch it until I was like 15 or 16. And it's not a horror film.

It's like a psychological thriller drama type of film. But it has horror elements, I guess. And you guys, I just fucking love it. I just love it. Wow, I'm so excited. So we are doing Donnie Darko. I fucking love it. I just love it. Wow. I'm so excited. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So we are doing Donnie Darko. The only film that's available is the director's cut.

So that was what I watched, which is two hours and 13 minutes. So it's kind of long. Woo! It's like, I think like 25 minutes longer than the normal film. Okay. Okay. It has an 8.0 on IMDb. Whoa! 87% on Rotten Tomatoes and 88% on Metacritic.

Eight? Holy shit. Eight on IMDb. That's astronomical. Really high. It came out in 2001, and it was written and directed by Richard Kelly, and it's starring... Okay, guys, wait for this cast. Okay, guys, wait for this cast.

Jake Gyllenhaal, Jenna Malone, Mary McDonnell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Patrick Swayze, Drew Barrymore, and Seth Rogen is in it, too. What the fuck? Patrick Swayze is really throwing me. I mean, a lot of those are really throwing me. That is really unexpected. As someone who has seen this movie, that doesn't sound... I don't remember any of that other than the Gyllenhaals. The Gyllenhaals. Is this the first thing they did together?

Yeah. This movie made Jake Gyllenhaal, didn't it? I think so. I think so. It was a big deal for him. But also, I wanted to bring up that it's also starring Beth Grant. Do you guys know who Beth Grant is? Not by name

alone. Alright, she is a... You'll recognize her. Oh, yes, I do recognize her. She's like the definition of a that guy. So, I looked her up on IMDb. She's been in 242 things. Holy shit, Beth! Including... I just...

There's so many. yeah yeah no country for old men speed little miss sunshine teenage bounty hunters ever heard of it the office the mindy project Grey's Anatomy justified Dexter modern family six feet under Malcolm in the middle Everwood CSI the X files and that's only

she's in so much stuff that I can't think of what the main thing I know her from is even as i'm looking at her i i and as you're saying all those things i'm like i still know that there's one specific role i'm thinking of but how the hell am i ever gonna find it i don't know in this 242 she was in willie Wonderland, which we have covered on the pod. Okay, some trivia. We discussed this, but the Arrow Theater

in Santa Monica, where the film's theater scenes were shot, has an annual tradition of playing Donnie Darko on Easter. So this is an Easter film. Oh my God,

how appropriate. Very fitting. It's an Easter film, you guys at the wrap party for the film Seth Rogen and Jake Gyllenhaal agreed they had no idea what the movie was about great for the lead actor

great for the lead actor Drew Barrymore helped produce this film and she played Miss Pomeroy who's the English teacher and if she hadn't stepped in the movie would have gone straight to video because her production company helped fund it and also put it into cinemas

and this is Seth Rogen's first feature film and his first line is I like your boobs so that was Seth Rogen's first line in his first film that really set the stage that tracks

okay and that's it wow i i will just say and this is conjecture but top of mind for me is that jake gyllenhaal is rumored to be the person that made rebecca ferguson cry oh really yeah he. Oh, no. He's one of the top contenders. Top contenders not confirmed. You say, oh, no, as if you think Jake Gyllenhaal is a good person. I don't know anything about, I like, is he supposed to be bad? Is Gyllenhaal the pussy posse? He's not, but he's that vibe.

He kind of has the vibe, but no, I like pussy posse adjacent. Wait, who's the pussy posse? It's Leo and Toby. Yeah, Leonardo DiCaprio, Toby McGuire, and Lucas Haas, I believe. Lucas Haas, yep. I haven't heard specific bad things

about Jake Gyllenhaal until this Rebecca Ferguson incident, but I'm not surprised by it. I guess Taylor had a bad experience with Jake Gyllenhaal, as we know. Taylor had a... And it's also like he's 10 years older than her

and she was very young when they dated. That's always going to be a, that's always going to be a knock for me is like if you're a man in his 30s who wants to date

a 20 year old, I'm sort of like, uh oh. Yeah. But you know, what you gonna do? Well, I got it.

I was telling Tim last night that it's so funny rewatching it because as a 15 year old, I was totally in love with Jake Gyllenhaal in this movie understandably I feel like we all had a moment of

we all had a moment of being in love with Jake Gyllenhaal I think but I also don't find him attractive he is attractive but I'm not attracted to him do you know what I mean his current girlfriend's 28 by the way just throwing that out there old enough

frontal lobe development complete that is one of my his current girlfriend's 28 by the way just throwing that out there old enough old enough for our frontal lobe development complete that is one of my you know i still don't love it uh can't say i love it anybody um watched the new roadhouse yet no no no i'm not interested i have not either and yeah i'm not sure that i will be but that's kind of fun being that he was in this his first movie with Patrick Swayze yeah it's a fun little connection um but yeah no watching this again as a you know

in my 30s I was like oh he's such a gross little teenager and it's so funny yeah as a 15 year old I was like I was like oh I'm in love with him and now I'm like oh no okay also I just got to point out that according It's so funny. Yeah. As a 15 year old, I was like, I was like, I'm in love with him. And now I'm like, oh, no. Okay. Also, I just got to point out that according to people, he and his current girlfriend have

been together since 2018, which is five years ago, at which point she was 23 and he was 38. So it's just not ideal. You know? Yeah. He just continues to. I think he's just he just gives me the ick a little bit i could see that fair fair um okay so should we do it oh my god we should let's do it in the past few years

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a full-size freebie product of your choice. That's hellobello.com slash too scary to start bundling with 30% off your first order. Don't forget, that's hellobello.com slash too scary. Okay, so it's 1988. We open on thunderstorm noises, rain, cicadas, birds chirping. It's a blue and purple sunrise in California. We pan over what looks like the San Gabriel Mountains down a deserted road. We spot Donnie. That's Jake Gyllenhaal, obviously, lying barefoot in the middle of the road. He's slowly waking up. He's confused. He's alone. His bike is knocked to the side. We get the impression that he slept walk or slept bicycled to this spot. It's beautiful. There's beautiful eerie piano music playing.

He's kind of laughs to himself while he wakes up, looks around. Title card, Donnie Darko. At this point, I'm so excited because this film is so good and I cannot believe I haven't seen it in so, so, so long. so so so long um so then never tear us apart plays while he bikes barefoot in his pajamas down the saint gabriel's back through to his neighborhood to his gorgeous large suburban house slow motion of his dad leaf blowing outside in the yard we see his sister his older sister um and then his younger sister and then also his older sister played by Maggie. Yes, yes, yes, yes. His little sister is jumping on a trampoline.

All this is in slow motion. His mom is reading Stephen King's It for some reason on a line on a Chase Lounge. Great. He walks back into the house and on the whiteboard on the fridge, it just says, where's Donnie? Cut to dinner time. Donnie and they're all sitting around the fridge. It just says, where's Donnie? Cut to dinner time. Donnie and they're all sitting around the table. They start bickering and Maggie, I'm just going to call her Maggie. I don't even know what her name is. That works great. That's totally, yep. Yeah. Perfect. Maggie calls Donnie a dick and he's like, whoa, a little hostile. Maybe mom and dad should pay someone $200 an hour to listen

to your thoughts. And she's like, you want to tell mom and dad why you stopped taking your medication? And everyone gets really quiet and is upset, clearly. So then later, the mom asked the sister, she's like, how did you know that he wasn't taking his medication? And Maggie is like, I didn't know it was such a big deal. And the mom is like, how did you know that he wasn't taking his medication? And Maggie is like, I didn't know it was such a big deal. And the mom is like, it is a big deal. And she goes into Donnie's room and she's like, where do you go at night? What happened to my son? What's going on with you? And he goes, you take the goddamn pills. And then she leaves the room and he calls her a bitch, which she hears. Then she goes to tell her husband and he says, great line. He says, you're not a bitch. You're

bitching, but you're not a bitch. Really reassuring. Really reassuring. That's really great. Love to hear that. So Jake goes and he takes his pills. He has sad Jake Gyllenhaal eyes looking at himself in the mirror, goes to bed. In the middle of the night, the dad can't sleep, so he gets up. He goes downstairs. He turns on the news. Weirdly, now we get a date, October 2nd, 1988. We didn't get a date before, but now it just shows on the bottom of the screen. Okay. And then we get a creepy voice in the background, just says, wake up. And then a close-up of an iris, of an eye, and then Donnie, eyes closed, breathing heavily, kind of slowly gets out of bed, walks down the stairs, and the voice in the background goes,

I've been watching you. Come closer. i can't do the voice wow he grabs a marker from the kitchen and walks out the door down the streets the sprinklers are going he then we get the first image of like the iconic bunny this is what makes it an easter film he sees a scary bunny in the distance and he uh uh it's a man in a bunny suit got it yeah okay that's what i thought i remember with like a metal mask and metal ears yeah it's really scary oh it's very creepy it's the creepiest yuckiest bunny you've ever seen can you believe it's been 23 years since this movie came out and I don't know what you guys are talking about. Donnie Darko. You gotta see it. You're not gonna like it.

It's a very hard mask. Ew! Oh, that is really scary. Oh, I don't like that at all. And the bunny says, 28 days, six hours, 42 minutes, 12 seconds. That's when the world will end. And Donnie smiles, still asleep. And he says, why? Then we cut back to the house. Maggie comes home. We see Maggie come home. We see the mom sleeping. We see dad asleep on the couch. And suddenly, boom, huge explosion. The entire house shakes. There's a chandelier that goes wildly side to side. Everyone wakes up and is like, what the fuck? Maggie goes down into a ball, looking around, looking really scared.

And then we cut to the morning. Donnie's asleep on the golf course. Two guys, one of them being Patrick Swayze, is like poking him with their golf club and waking at his forearm and he's written the 28 days etc on his forearm so he walks back to his house police are everywhere his house is like caution taped off and he looks up and a plane engine is being craned out of the middle of the house that's so scary and his family's all there like looking shocked and scared and his sister is like it fell directly in your room

ah then the FAA basically make Donnie's parents sign some papers and they go they give them a room in a hotel and um they talk about how they don't know where it came from no one knows where

the plane engine came from that's worse than knowing it is worse than knowing for sure so we cut to the hotel and the kids are in one room and the parents are in the other and the mom and dad are lying in their hotel bedroom kind of stunned and we find out now they've been together since high school.

And the dad is basically like, is Donnie doomed? He's talking about this kid who died from their high school. And everyone talked about how he was doomed. And he was like, now people could be saying the same thing about Donnie. But dodged it someone was watching over him cut to next day they're waiting for the bus stop and we meet donnie's two best friends who are just horny dumb little teenage boys and we get an iconic seth rogan well no seth rogan's actually a. He's one of the bullies. Whoa! He's like the sidekick bully. Yes. We get another slow-mo scene.

Loves to do slow-mo scenes in this film. Donnie jumps out the back of the school bus. Tears for Fears is blasting. And we get an intro to everyone in the school with this very cool kind of slow-mo single shot through the school hallway, kind of swinging around into different rooms, into different things. So we kind of meet everyone at once. We see the school bully, not Seth Rogen, the main one, doing a bump of cocaine. We see a teacher who is Beth Grant, the iconic character actress and headmaster greeting Patrick Swayze who's there to promote his self-help book. We see Drew Barrymore.

We see Jenna Maloney. We see a group of elementary school girls including one of Donnie's, his little sister, doing a synchronized dance. And we follow Drew Barrymore as she goes into class. and she's teaching Graham Greene's short story The Destructors

She's a teacher? Yes so she's a teacher How much older than Jake Gyllenhaal is she? No that's a really good point she's only like three years older than him so I guess we got ourselves one of those love actually situations three years apart

is the difference between a young child and a married woman. Yes, yes, yes. Let me tell you, I for sure read Graham Green after seeing this. That's how much I liked this movie and how embarrassing it is. I think that's

cool, Henley. Okay, thanks. I don't. They're talking about this short story. And then Jenna Maloney enters. And you guys, this is going to blow your fucking mind what Drew Barrymore does next. It is so insane. So Jenna Maloney enters. She's standing in the back.

She's a new student. This is her first time ever coming to this class. And she says to Drew Barrymore, where do I sit? And she says, sit next to the boy you think is the cutest. Oh. And then the entire class is like, oh. And she goes, quiet. Let her choose. And then she goes and sits down at her desk. Next to who? Oh, the teacher sits down.

Yeah, she sits down. Jenna Maloney, totally unfaced, stands in the back, looks around the room, takes it very seriously, looks at everyone. Looks at Donnie Darko. Clearly, they're into each other. Drew Barrymore goes, Joni, get up. And makes the girl sit next to Donnie. Get up. And Jenna goes and sits next to Donnie Darko. Incredible. The piano music in this moment swells. This movie is insane. And I fucking love it. That's very funny. I feel like I've brought up Love Lies Bleeding one million times

to Emily in the last 24 hours, but Jenna Malone is in it and I just love her. I feel like I've seen her in Pride and Prejudice and then this and that's it. Darcy Saved. Oh, yes.

Saved. I'm glad she's saved. I want to see that one again. Oh, yes. Saved. I'm glad she's saved. I want to see that one again. The Hunger Games. Sorry. I've seen her to the fucking wait. Not even the first one. Right.

The second one. I can't remember. But yes, one of them. Yeah. So then we get dad driving Donnie to therapy and they're talking about how they still don't know where the plane engine came from and while they're chatting they almost run into this crazy old woman with the craziest wig on that I've ever seen um Donnie gets out to help her she is walking very slowly over to her mailbox and then she opens the mailbox and then she closes it and then she whispers something in Donnie's ear but but we don't see what she says.

And then we cut to therapy. He's telling his therapist that he made a new friend named Frank, who's imaginary. And he wants him to follow him into the future. And he said, the world is coming to an end. And she's like, do you think the world is coming to an end? And he says, no, that's stupid. And in this moment, Jake Gyllenhaal, he seems like he's a little kid. It's weird. He plays this scene like he's eight years old, which is strange.

Cut to we see Patrick Swayze's motivational speaker video. It's called Controlling Fear. It's the most 80s thing you've ever seen with ridiculous twinkly little music and crazy transitions between scenes. It's very funny. And while Donnie's watching it, he hears the creepy bunny voice go, pay close attention. You could miss something. And then Donnie wakes up in the middle of the night and the spooky bunny is there. And he walks outside, but this time he grabs an axe and he walks somewhere. We don't see where. And he does something, but we don't see what.

You can just tell that he's like swinging the axe. And that's all you see. Does it seem like the axe is making contact with something? Yes. Well, we quickly find out what happened. So the next day, it's October 6th, and they're back at the bus stop, and a little girl runs up to them. It's Donnie and his little sister. What's the Mean Girls Day?

Oh, I don't know. On October 3rd. Oh, yeah, October 3rd. Okay, sorry. Close. We missed it. Three days after Mean Girls Day. But also many years in the past.

Right. Sorry. Right. Right. No, this is it. That's definitely relevant. Same universe. Same universe.

For sure. That'll probably come up later. Probably. So this little girl runs up and is like, school's closed today. It's flooded. We don't have to go. There's a busted water main. And then it shows a shot of the school flooding.

And there's an axe also right in the center of the school's solid bronze statue of a bulldog. So there's a funny scene between the little like freshman girls where one of them says, they found feces everywhere. And the other one goes, what are feces? And the other one goes, baby mice. They go, aw. As Donnie walks home, he runs into Jenna Malone. Her name is Gretchen. And she's being harassed by Seth Rogen and the other bully. I think that's a character in Mean Girls. I think it is.

The connections are coming. Wait, wait. There's going to be more. You guys just have to do their Easter eggs throughout, for sure. It's a theme. It's an Easter movie. So this is when Seth Rogen gives his iconic first line. I like your boobs.

She asks Donnie to walk her home so she can get away from the bullies. And this is also where we find out that her dad stabbed her mom four times in the chest. She says it very casually. She says, I think she says, like, we moved here because my dad has emotional problems. And he's like, I have emotional problems, too. What kind does your dad have? And she goes, he stabbed my mom four times in the chest. And they look at each other. They're perfect for each other.

They love each other. Wow. They decide to go together. that's what they call it donnie's like do you want to go together and she's like go where and he's like uh with me uh uh it does that does feel like something grandparents say that's not of this era that phrase i was kind of surprised by it too maybe they used that terminology in the 80s who can say no one knows no one knows lost to time soul remembers yep so his therapist then we go back to therapy his therapist tries to hypnotize him and when she does that he almost immediately starts masturbating not quite but he's like it's like clear because she asked him like

what's new with what's new at school and he's like i met a girl i like and then he immediately like gets turns into like a horny little teenager and she claps her hands and his hand is almost going down his pants and he's like, oh fuck, that's embarrassing. So we don't get very far with that. You guys ever been hypnotized? No. No. Have you?

No. I think it's kind of scary. Yeah, I don't want to be. Did you guys at school, I remember at my high school one time a hypnotist came and people like did things on stage that i was like this feels like it shouldn't illegal yeah i don't think you're allowed to do that to children in a public setting they did a hypnotist came to my senior grad night and yes for the most part you could tell that people were really getting it was very crazy but then there was one kid that was fucking with him and every

time he turned his back this kid would like look at all of us in the audience and be like i'm joking i'm joking i'm joking i'm joking that's hilarious anytime the hypnotist looks at him he'd be like oh and do whatever he told him to do. It's a real treasured memory of mine. Yeah, that's a good bit. That's a really good bit. That's going to work. Okay, so the school is now questioning the students about the vandalism.

They are very upset. This is some serious vandalism that has happened. There's even at one point, there's a scene where you see they're talking about on the news. That's how big of a deal it is. So they're having the students go up to the board and write. Because also, shit, I can't remember what it said. Oh, now I can't remember. Part of the vandalism is that someone graffitied Donnie, obviously, graffitied words. And now I can't remember what they said. Oh, so they're trying to do like a handwriting analysis?

Exactly. Okay. But Donnie's handwriting does not match. So he's in the clear. But he's clearly stressed. It's pretty obvious he's stressed. And he goes into the bathroom because he's trying to calm down. And there's a crazy scene where the school bully kind of attacks him, holds a switchblade to his throat and is like, I know you did it. I know you did it. Is this the bully that's taken bumps of cocaine in high school?

Okay. Yes. And the bully who's really mad that school got closed? And why is he? I think it's because I think he's worried they're going to blame him. I think he's worried that they're going to try to put it on him. Well, sir, why do you think that is? Let's look at our own choices. Exactly. Exactly.

But he lets him go. Doesn't actually harm him. Just a casual little knife to the throat threatening. No big deal. And then there's an emergency PTA meeting that's held due to the vandalism. There's an active investigation. They're trying to get to the bottom of it. At this point, it's really sad to watch this because also Beth Grant, the teacher, Kitty Farmer. She has a real stick up her ass, and she's also using this

PTA meeting as an opportunity to condemn Drew Barrymore's choices for her English class, like saying that the books they're reading are pornographic and are immoral and are the reason why things like this are happening. She basically blames Drew Barrymore. Blames the vandalism on Drew Barrymore teaching Graham Greene, essentially. Also, Kitty Farmer. Don't love that name. No, it's a terrible name. It's just sad because it's like, oh, books are banned now.

Because they're playing it as though it's like, we would never books of course not we're not that type of community like we don't ban books anymore that doesn't happen anymore and it's like it's happening again i mean i already had that feeling when jake gyllenhaal's therapist asks him if he thinks the world is ending i'm like well yeah i mean it is and like five to seven years. Just because climate change is maybe going to reach a precipice of being too catastrophic. So we got to just enjoy. It's sooner than we think. That's why we have to really enjoy our time now.

We got to live it up. We got to live it up, watch Donnie Darko so yeah no I don't know why what was I like at 15 I don't know what was going on in my brain something in this movie spoke to me I don't know what it was so meanwhile this PTA meeting is cut going on in my brain. Something in this movie spoke to me. I don't know what it was. So meanwhile, this PTA meeting is cut in between scenes of Donnie going to take his medication

at home. And then he starts to have this vision and he hears Frank's voice. He says, don't worry, you got away with it. And then he starts, Donnie basically slams the air in front of him. And we get our first like vision of this. It's hard to describe. It's like this, it almost looks like flubber, like clear flubber. Though basically it's like he's hitting the space-time continuum or something. And it's like you see the air like reverberate in front of him. So, he like starts like hitting the space in front of him and it's buzzing. And then he says,

he's talking to Frank and he's like, how did you do that? And Frank says, I can do anything I want and so can you. And he goes, why did you make me flood the school? And he says, I can do anything I want and so can you. And he goes, why did you make me flood the school? And he says, they're in great danger. And he says, where did you come from? And he goes, do you believe in time travel? And then his little sister walks into the bathroom and is like, who are you talking to? And then it cuts to Donnie reading a poem he wrote in class, which is so funny. The idea of making kids write poetry and then come in and say it out loud to your whole class. Humiliating.

He says, a storm is coming, Frank says, a storm that will swallow the children and will deliver them for the kingdom of pain. And it's this long poem. And that's the vibe. Like kingdom of pain. And it's this long poem and that's the vibe. Like kingdom of pain and saving the children. Yeah. Yeah. You get it. You get it. Drew Barrymore pauses when he's done, really thinks about what he says and then looks at him and goes, who's Frank? And he goes, a six foot tall bunny rabbit. And the whole class laughs. And Drew Barrymore looks at him kind of like, I know you're telling the truth and I'm into it. I respect that. I'm a cool teacher. I'm a cool teacher. I'm only

three years older than you, so I get it. I'm basically your peer. Then Donnie's class watches another video from Patrick Swayze's motivational class. Beth Grant is teaching it. She's absolutely salivating at Patrick Swayze's character. She is in love. She makes them do an exercise from it. Lifeline exercise number one, she puts on the board fear on one end of the spectrum, love on the other. And she gives them scenarios, they read it out loud and they have to mark whether that person was acting out of fear or love. There is a Chinese exchange student named Sharita who appears in this movie and she's bullied so hard. She doesn't speak very good English. And it's a poor Sherita has to go first. And she just appears a few times in this movie. And it's like, so I'm like, this is your image

of America. This is like what you get to experience in America that fucking sucks. This sucks. So Donnie then goes next. And he's given a scenario about a person finding money in a wallet and then keeping it. And he gets really angry. She's like, just put where, what is this? Is this a fear response or a love response? And he's like, you can't lump all of the human emotions into two categories. I won't do this. He gets, he's like, this is bullshit. I won't do this. He's like, this is bullshit. I'm not doing this. And they cut to the principal's office with Donnie's parents in there. And the principal is like, first, I just want to say, Donnie, your state scoring is intimidating. But before he can keep going, he's interrupted by Beth Grant, who's in the room too. And she basically screams this line.

She says, he asked me to forcibly insert the lifeline card into my anus. She, like, screams it. And the father laughs and the mother looks very upset. And however, there's, like, no punishment given for donnie for this it's weird they basically just tell his parents and that's it it's so funny to imagine being a parent and and having to discipline your kid when they do something objectively funny like yeah i know it would be really hard it's especially when it's like yeah they were the teacher is stupid like you like you can tell them

I don't know how do you like I guess respect and knowing when to say things out loud and when to not it'd be really tough for me I feel like I would be too much like who gives a shit that's pretty funny

hell yeah what you did was really cool. So that's what the dad wants to do. The mom does not. They have a conversation about it later where they kind of, it's funny. But so then we go to October 10th and Donnie is asking his science teacher if he knows anything about time travel. And the science teacher gives him a book and he's like, don't tell anyone I gave you this, but this person used to teach at Middlesex. She was a nun. We love nuns. She was a nun.

Love nuns. Love nuns. Until she just up and changed overnight. She had like a vision, completely changed her life and wrote this book, The Philosophy of Time Travel. And it's by Roberta Sparrow, aka the crazy old lady in the wig. So that's the one that they almost ran into

who's constantly checking her mailbox. That's Roberta Sparrow. She wrote this book, The Philosophy of Time Travel. This book will come up a bunch from now on. And Donnie is like, wait, Roberta, what the hell? He starts reading. We read as well. Chapter one, The Tangent Universe. It says, I'm just going to tell you because it's helpful to understanding the movie. I'm just going to tell you because it's helpful to understanding the movie. Incidents when the fabric of the fourth dimension become corrupted are incredibly rare. If a tangent universe occurs, it will be highly unstable, sustaining life for no longer than several weeks.

Eventually, it will collapse upon itself, forming a black hole within the primary universe capable of destroying all existence. So, that's the first chapter. Okay. I started Three Body Problem last night, the new show by the Game of Thrones guys, and it has some time travel and countdown aspects, and I'm feeling a little spooked. Uh-oh.

Is it a sign? It's a sign. Hope not. Then we get another therapy session. He's hypnotized during these therapy sessions now, so he's kind of like being more honest. And she asks him what Roberta Sparrow said to him when she whispered in his ear. And he said that she said, every living creature on earth dies alone. And he said,

how'd that make you feel? And basically, the whole conversation is about how he's like, he doesn't want to be alone, and he's scared to die alone. That night, Donnie and his family and his friend and his friend's dad are watching football. And he kind of like, seems like he all starts to fall asleep. And then all of a sudden, he sees this, what looked the same kind of image that you could see when he was hitting his hand against the air. And and like it was this kind of clear obviously it's a like a force field type thing yeah yes yes so that starts coming out of everyone's chest so if they're and it kind of shows where they're going so um like he sees it come out of his dad's chest and then a few seconds later his dad like gets up

and follows it so it's clear that it's like predictive in a way like it shows you where the person's going and he starts to see it come out of his own chest so he gets up and he starts following it and he goes upstairs into a closet finds a opens the box. There's a gun in it. Then October 18th, 12 days remain. Donnie tries to kiss Gretchen and she hesitates. She wants it to be at a time when it reminds her of how beautiful the world can be. And she says, and right now there's some fat guy over there staring at us and it just pans over and there is a fat guy in a red tracksuit just staring at them. And it's like, okay. They're in like the woods. It's very weird that he's there.

So then we see the parents at dinner and the mom is like, I don't think telling any woman to forcibly insert an object up her anus should go without consequence. And the dad says, I think we should buy him a moped. And then she says, I think we should get a divorce. And then they look at each other and they both start laughing. And I was like, this is a very funny relationship. Interesting. They have a very funny marriage. We see Donnie and Maggie carving some pumpkins. He's clearly sharing with her some of the

experiences he's been going through. He makes her promise that she won't tell mom. And she says she won't. And then Donnie shows his pumpkin. And it's legit, actually the scariest pumpkin I've ever seen. It looks like he carved the pumpkin in such a terrifying way. You just have to see it to understand. It's so unsettling. And Maggie's like, oh, that's really scary. And he looks at it and he's like, huh, you think? And anyway, this pumpkin really spooked me. It stayed with me. Maybe the scariest part of the whole film. Then Donnie's parents meet with his therapist, and she's very serious. She's upset. She's worried about him. She says that he has aggressive behavior. He's increasingly detached to reality. He's not able to cope with the forces in the world that he perceives to be threatening. And she's like, has he ever told you about his friend Frank, the giant bunny rabbit?

And the parents are like, no, not at all. And she says that Donnie's experiencing a daylight hallucination and cut between Donnie taking more pills, hitting more walls between reality and himself. And the mom is like, what can we do? And the therapist is like, let's increase medication. And the mom just has this really sad scene where she's like, whatever, we'll do whatever we can. We just would like him to experience some relief. And she says that while she's trying not to burst into tears. It's just very sad. Then we see Donnie and Gretchen at a video game arcade, and he's telling her, I just keep waking up someplace farther and farther from my house. And then we get Patrick Swayze at the school. He is a motivational speaker. He's there to do a presentation. He starts out by saying,

good morning, you mongrels. Too many young women and men are paralyzed by fear, Too many young women and men are paralyzed by fear, drugs, alcohol, and premarital sex. And then he says, I'm going to tell you about a disturbed young man searching for love in all the wrong places. His name is Frank. And Donnie is like, what the fuck? And then suddenly the assembly starts speeding through time. And it just goes really fast. It just speeds through the entire assembly and it cuts to the Q&A section. And Donnie goes up and asks him, he says, good morning, how much are they paying you to be here? And this kind of shocks Patrick Swayze. And he says, my friends here, we have an anger prisoner. Son, it breaks my heart to say this, but I think you're troubled and confused. And Donnie's like, I am troubled and confused, but I think you're the antichrist. And then he gets pulled out of the assembly. And he later is just trying to, he's ranting about Patrick Swayze to Gretchen.

She's telling him to sit down, calm down. Jenna Malone just has this affect to her that's so, at least in this film, and I feel like sometimes in other films too, but not in Pride and Prejudice, but certainly in this film, she's so good at like this weird one note thing that's very calm. And it's almost like unsettling how calm she is. She has like a baseline kind of scary vibe. Yeah. It's interesting. I saw her once.

I'm just now remembering. During the pandemic, picking up pastries from the same bakery that me and Jewel were picking up pastries wow yeah that's not scary at all it wasn't scary and she was really lovely oh yeah so they and while they're chatting while gretchen and donnie are chatting they are in their kind of like hangout spot which is kind of near where Roberta Sparrow lives and where she's outside her house, like shuffling around her mailbox. And you hear Frank say to Donnie, send her a letter. Send her a letter. Send her a letter. Donnie tries to talk to a science teacher again about what's happening to him. But the science teacher is like, I don't think I can continue this conversation because if I do, I'll lose my job.

Because it's just getting too intense, basically. Because he's asking him too many questions about the world ending and about time travel. And it's clear that Donnie is convinced this is really happening. While Donnie is walking to school one day, he finds Patrick Swayze's wallet. And Frank says, now you know where he lives. Then Donnie and Gretchen go see Evil Dead together. Evil Dead. The Evil Dead.

The Evil Dead. And shockingly, within the first few few minutes Gretchen falls asleep completely asleep completely asleep and evil dead a movie you would not fall asleep to but sure I mean I've fallen asleep during Mad Max Fury Road so I really can't sometimes the not my first viewing of it but on a repeat

watch I yeah I'll write a gen always falls asleep in any superhero movie which is I don't know sometimes like the louder and crazier things are. It all just becomes noise. It's like a white noise machine. Yeah, it's like being on an airplane. Puts you right to sleep.

Well, she is very asleep, very asleep, because Donnie starts to have some visions. Suddenly, Frank is sitting next to them in the theater. And he says to him, why do you wear that stupid bunny suit? And Frank says, why are you wearing that stupid man suit? suit. It's a young guy with long hair and his eye is gone. It's like just a red socket. It's all mangled and gross and disgusting. He's like, Frank, when is this going to stop? And Frank is like, you should already know that. And then he says, I want you to watch the movie screen. There's something I want to show you. Have you ever a portal i thought you said i want i thought he said i want you to watch the movie scream and it's like man we're really just going through a lot of someone hasn't even come out yet okay no and have you ever seen a portal i can't do the voice at all. And we see a portal going through the movie screen. And then you hear Frank go, burn it to the ground. And then we see intercut between there's a talent show at the high school where Donnie's little sister Swayze's house and literally covering it in gasoline.

Uh-oh. Lighting a match and just fucking burning that shit to the ground. Uh-oh. Donnie comes back, sits down. Gretchen, still asleep, completely asleep in the movie theater. She wakes up. She goes, how long was I asleep for? And then they look at each other and they make out.

The next day, Maggie Gyllenhaal, she's watching a new segment on the fire at Jim Cunningham's house. That's Patrick Swayze's character. And guess what? They found a kiddie porn dungeon. That's Patrick Swayze's character. And guess what? They found a kiddie porn dungeon. That's what they call it. On the news, that's what they call it? On the news, that is what they call it. So I don't want to think too deeply about exactly why they use the term dungeon. Dungeon, yeah. Implies being underground. Yeah, don't love that. Don't love that.

Don't love that. And implies prisoners. Yeah. Don't love any of that. Don't love any of that. So they, obviously, Jim Cunningham is going to prison and is actually the Antichrist. Meanwhile, the principal tells Drewberry more that she's failed as an english teacher and that she can't keep continue on at the school and she has she

can finish out the week but she's gotta go she goes out to the sports field and screams fuck very loudly um while sharita watches her and looks sad. Poor Sherita is having like the worst fucking time, I gotta say. Yeah. Then they find out that Donnie's little sister has been chosen to go on Star Search in LA. And the teachers are cheering. They're so excited. But then they see the news of Jim Cunningham, Kitty Farmer, pretty devastated.

She was huge Jim Cunningham, kitty farmer, pretty devastated. She was huge Jim Cunningham stan. Tough. So she goes to see Donnie's mom, Beth Grant. She shows up at Donnie Darko's house, knocks on the door. She's wearing a shirt that just says, God is awesome, with several exclamation points, which I love and I want that shirt. You could definitely pull it off as the priest's wife. I think so. People will be confused.

So she's saying that she can't go to the Star Search. She was going to be the chaperone for the Star Search in LA, but she can't go because she's spearheading the Jim Cunningham defense campaign. And that he really needs all the help that he can get. Wait. No.

She says clearly he's been... So she thinks somebody planted a kiddie porn dungeon in his home? His personal home? Yep. That's the implication. Kitty, kitty. So she says you have to take our daughters too, because their daughters are in the same dance group. She has a daughter who's also the same age as Donnie's little sister.

So the mom, her husband's also gone for work. And the mom is like, okay, I guess I'll just leave the older sister in charge. And if anything goes wrong, just call Donnie's therapist. That's what she tells Maggie. She's like, if anything happens with Donnie, just call his therapist. Before she leaves, Donnie's like, how does it feel to have a wacko for a son? And she says, it feels wonderful. And she's crying. And then they go to the airport. Then back at school, Drew Barrymore is packing up.

Donnie walks in. Behind her on the board, it just says cellar door. And but she's packing up and he goes, what's going on? And she's like, they fired me. And he's like, that's bullshit. You're the only good teacher here. And then what's cellar door? And she says, of all the endless combinations in human history, a famous linguist once said that cellar door is the most beautiful. And she leaves and Sherita's there yet again.

And Donnie takes, she wears earmuffs a lot. And he takes them off of her head. And he says, I promise that one day everything is going to be better for you. And she screams, shut up and drops a book. And it has Donnie Darko written all over it with hearts all over it. And then Donnie wears her earmuffs, which is very cute. So he wears her earmuffs to therapy. He's hypnotized and he tells his therapist everything. He's like, I flooded the school. I burned that pervert's house down.

I have to obey Frank or else I'll be left all alone. And then I won't be able to figure out what this is all about. I have the power to build a time machine. She says, when is this going to happen? And he says, soon. And then he's like, I can see him right now. And Frank appears in the room with them. And she says, and the therapist says to him, if the world were to end now, there would only be you and him and no one else. And then he cries and hugs her.

And then she claps and he snaps out of it. And then she tells him, you can stop taking your medication. They're just placebos anyway. And she's like, clearly just, yeah, she's like very, as a therapist, whole dynamic. I want to read other people's take on it because I can't tell if she's a terrible therapist or just like a fine therapist. Do you know what I mean? Like, I can't tell what's going on with her. So then it's October 29th and Maggie says she got in, she's going to Harvard. She was taking a year off after high school. She gets into Harvard. She was taking a year off after high school. She gets into Harvard. Donnie's like, we should throw a party. Cut to Halloween night. Everyone's in costumes.

Is this supposed to be the 28th day? Yeah. Well, almost. It's like the day before. Okay. Huge party at Donnie's house. And he's wearing goddamn Phoebe Bridgers outfit. I guess this is where Phoebe Bridgers gets it from.

Full skeleton costume, gray sweatshirt. And Gretchen arrives at the party, and she's really upset because her mom left. Her mom just abandoned her, I guess. And they go upstairs. Oh, well, no, no. She's worried something bad happened to her mom. And they go upstairs and she's worried her stepdad has like done something to her mom. And then they start to make out.

And it's implied they have sex, but they don't show any of that. Meanwhile, we get a voicemail from the mom saying that she's taking the red eye back that night and will arrive the next morning. October 30th comes on the screen. Donnie wakes up back in the room where he's with Gretchen and they're still at the party. He's still in his Phoebe Bridgers outfit. And he starts to look upset. And that thing comes out of his chest again, like predictive little motion. And he gets up and he follows it down the stairs, holding Gretchen's hand. And on the whiteboard, now it says, Frank was here, went to get beer. And Donnie and Gretchen and his two friends are there. And

Donnie's like, time is running out. We got to go. We got to go. He's just starts like kind of freaking out. And Gretchen and his friends are like, what's wrong with you? Like, what are you talking about? We don't know what you're talking about. But he's like, we got to go, you guys. We got to go go and so they get on their bikes and they bike over to roberta sparrow's house and they knock on her door she's not answering and then he turns and he sees a cellar door so he goes over and he's like like starts to open up the cellar door when suddenly seth rogan and the bully, like come out of nowhere and attack them. Oh, God.

And they're kind of like fighting them off when suddenly a car like veers around the corner and they try to get out of the way, but they, and most of them do, except Jennana malone and the car just runs right over her oh oh my god just fucking runs over her and a guy in a bunny suit with a metal mask gets out of the driver's seat and he's like what the fuck happened like this is frank this is the full frank outfit and but this dude is not frank this dude is just like a regular guy who's like freaked out he's like is she okay what's what were you guys doing in the middle of the road what's wrong driving in that outfit yeah he's clearly wasted but it it's like Halloween night, party night. Yes, exactly.

And he was in his Halloween costume, which is the Frank bunny suit. And Donnie looks at him and he takes the gun out of his pocket. He has the gun and just raises it and shoots him right in the eye shoots him right in the eye oh no he goes down and then roberta appears and she says a storm is coming you have to hurry oh my god what the fuck is happening? I know. So then the sun starts coming up. Does everyone see him shoot a man? Yeah, definitely. And is Jenna Malone dead?

Jenna Malone is dead. Jesus Christ. Donnie carries Gretchen's... Do we get a look at this Frank's face? Is it the same guy? It's the same guy. It's the same guy. Yes, it's the same guy. And also i think that there's also there's been this thing throughout pepper throughout the movie where

maggie gyllenhaal is talking to a guy on the phone and you never see who she's talking to but i think it's this guy and i think that this is just a guy that like she's been hooking up with and um that's just who this person is so he carries Gretchen's dead body back home and he puts it in his

family's car then he walks into the house and the party's over at this point everyone's gone and his sister's asleep downstairs. He kisses her on the forehead. He takes the car keys. He goes back outside. He's starting to keel over. He's feeling really sick. He looks up over his house and he sees a black hole starting to form over his house. And he gets in the car and he drives away with Gretchen's body just as police arrive at his house, clearly there to arrest him because he's shot someone in the head.

So he drives back up to where the movie started, back up to the top of the San Gabriel Mountains, and he sits on the top of the car with Gretchen's just dead body in there. And he looks out into the distance and he sees this like crazy vortex appearing far away, clearly like over top of his house. And he could see it. And he just laughs to himself and he says, I'm going home. And he seems like that he's accepted whatever this fate is. Meanwhile, we see that his mom and little sister are in an airplane crash. Their airplane starts like shaking. And he gets into the car and he looks at Gretchen and he smiles and then suddenly the movie starts rewinding and the movie the whole movie rewinds so you see everything happen but like in reverse and meanwhile with shots of like fireworks going off kind of like other weird an Irish wish effect

yeah exactly it was just like it reminded me so much of Irish wish I was just thinking about that yeah Irish wishes actually actually inspired by Donnie Darko. We get a voiceover from Donnie while it's rewinding. It's his letter that he wrote to Roberta Sparrow. And he says a lot of things. But one of them is, I hope that when the world comes to an end, I can breathe a sigh of relief because there will be so much to look forward to. And then we're back at that first night, back on when his dad, you know, gets up out of bed, turns on the news, back on, you know, Maggie coming home, walking through the front door. And this time Donnie's in his bed

laughing, just like hysterically laughing. And he falls asleep in his bed. And the plane engine crashes into his room, this time right onto Donnie. And then we get chapter 12 from Roberta's book. And then we get chapter 12 from Roberta's book. And it says, When the manipulated awaken from their journey into the tangent universe, they are haunted by the experience in their dreams. Many of them will not remember. But those who do remember part of the journey are often overcome with profound remorse for their regretful actions buried deep in their psyche.

And then we see the therapist wake up looking terrified. Mad world is playing in the background. Very important. It is a very, very mad world. The science teacher wakes up, is upset. We see Patrick Swayze, he's crying. Kitty Farmer is crying. Sherita, she's smiling to herself because Sherita is innocent in this whole situation. She's done nothing wrong. We see images of sketches of the bunny head and Frank sitting by himself, looking really upset and touching his eye. And then we see paramedics wheeling Donnie's body out of the house. The family is in tears outside. The mom is chain smoking.

And a huge truck cranes out the plane engine, drives away with it. Jenna Malone rides up on her bike, asks the neighbor kid. She's like, hey, what's going on? And the neighbor kid is like, my neighbor got killed. He was smushed by a jet engine. She goes, what was his name? She goes, he goes, Donnie Darko. I feel bad for his family. And then he goes, did you know him? She goes, no. And then she looks at the mom and the mom looks at her and they have this like a long moment of looking at each other and she waves and then the mom waves back and then the little kid neighbor kid waves to the mom and then the movie's over

okay i'm really proud of myself i did it oh dude that's so tri. That movie is so trippy. Whoa, dude. Isn't it? It really makes you think. It really makes you think. What the? What do you guys think happened?

What the heck? His alternate reality collapsed back in on itself that was just like what is the movie trying to say i'm pretty sure the music movie has no message i don't think it's about anything actually real i think that i don't i don't know I think that I don't know. I think that it's just a time travel movie where basically like Donnie it's almost like a Final Destination movie in a way. He like

averts death So death comes back for him. Yeah, averting death. It causes like the world to potentially collapse in on itself. So in order to right that wrong wrong he has to go back and die go back and die yeah rather than create this like weird portal right this like black hole where the whole world which started because he created an alternate dimension or he

like opened up that by a new timeline by not being in his bed when he should have been yeah i mean i guess it is exactly like final destination yeah it was making me want to watch re-watch all these other like existential dread type movies like melancholia and take shelter i want to see melancholia again i love this i love this shit i don't know what take shelter. I want to see Melancholia again. I love this. I love this shit. I don't know what take shelter is though. What is take shelter? Take shelters with Michael Shannon, where he becomes convinced the world is ending and he has to build a bomb

shelter for his family. Jessica Chastain plays his wife and basically, yeah, everybody thinks he's losing his marbles. And I'll say no more. Things get weird. Say no more. Say no more. Say less.

This movie is not scary. It's honestly funny. The soundtrack is great. I love the soundtrack. And it's just a perfect film no notes no notes no notes i'm i'm i want to watch it as well i feel like maybe i'll have a triple feature day with those two that i just listed and then listen maybe top it off with Irish Wish. I made Tim watch the beginning of it last night with me and I was just like

I was just like isn't this so good the whole time? Isn't this so good? And then I was like do you want to just watch the rest of it with me? As like, I mean I know you're going to. Being like obviously you're going to want to. Obviously you're going to want to. Obviously you're going to want. And Tim was like, no. He was like, no, I've got other stuff I have to do.

And I was so mad. I said, my love language is watching things. How dare you? I'm going to say my love language is watching Donnie Darko. I'm a very specific love language and you're rejecting it I just want one thing to feel loved

um yeah I was devastated wow wow we did it I gotta say I love Jake Gyllenhaal and Ambulance I also loved Jake Gyllenhaal in Ambulance. I also loved Jake Gyllenhaal in Ambulance.

I'll be real about that as well. That was an incredible performance. I think he's a good actor. And, you know. He is a good actor. If he's yelling at Rebecca Ferguson, we don't love that. We don't love that. I heard the rumor that it was someone else. Hugh Grant was the other grant is another big contender yeah yeah which is a little more

upsetting but i can picture that one as well i can picture it too i mean these i just think these are men who've been famous for a long time who aren't used to being made to check anything that they want to do or say. And I think probably feel entitled. To express themselves however they see fit. And that's not. Acceptable. Although I do feel like the whole.

All the Swifties like went hard. Against Jake Gyllenhaal. I feel like they like. Swifties are insane. Really. Swifties will go hard. Swifties go too hard Swifties go too hard. They go too hard.

Yeah. They go too hard. They go too hard. Yeah. Yeah. That's just the truth. Wow. Henley, you did an amazing job.

Yes. Thank you, Henley. That was really something. I was really worried about timing and I am so proud of myself. But I'm also sorry if I went too fast i just was like no it was worried that i was gonna do it for three hours i wasn't sure it's hard to tell sometimes you never you never know what's gonna happen no i do feel uh like i should mention that our bonus recap this month is Irish Wish since we mentioned it a few times

and that recap did go for over two hours without any introductory check-in. We just got right into it and talked about Irish Wish for two hours and 15 minutes. And I could talk about it for two hours and 15 minutes more. Someday I probably

will. Yeah. If you I probably will. Uh, yeah, you, if you want to check out that episode, go to our Patreon this Friday because we have a lot to say about it. Oh, yeah, that's crazy.

I didn't realize it was that long. It didn't feel that long. Went by like a blink. Flew by. Two seconds. Actually flew by. Flew by. Two seconds. It actually flew by. You're going to want to check it out. Well, thanks, you guys. I'm so

glad we got to do Donnie Darko on the pod. I'm so glad. Thank you for this. Thank you, Henley. I feel like I love imagining little 15 year old Henley absolutely losing her mind over this movie. I think this Like, I love imagining little 15 year old Henley. Love it. Absolutely losing her mind over this movie.

I think this is like David Lynch for teenagers. Oh, yes. I think so. Yeah. Yes. I was just feeling so cool about myself. I was like, I like this movie. It's a vibe.

It's such a vibe. It's a vibe. It's really trippy what a trippy vibe I loved it thank you hun love you guys so much loved you guys so much love you

love you guys you gotta do the voice oh right right right do the voice use the voice from all of us here a too scary didn't watch Oh, right, right, right. Do the voice. Use the voice. From all of us here at Too Scary, Didn't Watch. Goodbye.

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