Hidey-Ho, Horror Nuts! And welcome to another WTFHM!
First of all, let me apologize for committing the mortal sin of not posting last week. Sorry. With everything going on outside and inside my personal life, I just forgot.
Yeah, it happens.
As promised, however, this week we’ll be taking on a tech horror movie. Now, I can’t say offhand if I’ve reviewed any tech horror on this blog before (I mean, I might’ve), but I’m just going to go ahead and make this very bold statement:
No one does tech horror better than Asian horror movies.
Specifically, any of them involving cursed technology. Sorry, but if this were a race, Hollywood wouldn’t even have shown up yet.
And if you think that's not true, PLEASE SHOW ME A GOOD HOLLYWOOD TECH HORROR MOVIE! Seriously. This is not a dare. I'm always, ALWAYS down for a good horror movie.
That being said, let’s go into this week’s movie.
Countdown starring Elizabeth Lail, Jordan Calloway, Peter Facinelli, Talitha Eliana Bateman, Dillon Lane, Tichina Arnold, Tom Segura, Lana McKissack, Anne Winters, Matt Letscher, P.J. Byrne, and Valente Rodriguez.
So, basically, this one is about a phone app that tells you exactly when you’re going to die. Sounds like a cool plot for a movie, right? Like, sure we’ve got movies about videos that kill you and phone calls and cameras and video games and actual electric impulses, but not an actual phone app! I mean, wow. Great twist! 10 out of 10.
All right, so it’s not the most original setup. In truth, I’m not entirely mad at the lack of originality at the base of this. After all, there really is nothing new under the sun.
But…well…okay, let me tell you what happens.
So, this whole thing starts at a party where somebody says the inevitable beginning of every cursed tech horror story.
“Hey, did you hear about this new (insert cursed tech here)?” And of course, in this case, it’s an app that counts down the hours and minutes and seconds until your very timely death.
Countdown starring Elizabeth Lail, Jordan Calloway, Peter Facinelli, Talitha Eliana Bateman, Dillon Lane, Tichina Arnold, Tom Segura, Lana McKissack, Anne Winters, Matt Letscher, P.J. Byrne, and Valente Rodriguez.
So, basically, this one is about a phone app that tells you exactly when you’re going to die. Sounds like a cool plot for a movie, right? Like, sure we’ve got movies about videos that kill you and phone calls and cameras and video games and actual electric impulses, but not an actual phone app! I mean, wow. Great twist! 10 out of 10.
All right, so it’s not the most original setup. In truth, I’m not entirely mad at the lack of originality at the base of this. After all, there really is nothing new under the sun.
But…well…okay, let me tell you what happens.
So, this whole thing starts at a party where somebody says the inevitable beginning of every cursed tech horror story.
“Hey, did you hear about this new (insert cursed tech here)?” And of course, in this case, it’s an app that counts down the hours and minutes and seconds until your very timely death.
Bunch of friends downloads it and everybody except one girl finds out that they will live until their eighty. Expectantly, that girl is freaked out. Her drunk boyfriend wants to drive her home, but she refuses because she’s freaked out.
After she refuses, she gets a message on her phone that she’s broken the terms of agreement contract. Which sucks because now she’s going to drop dead right now.
No, that doesn’t really happen silly! What really happens is that she starts seeing things that scare the crap out of her until she makes it home and something kills her in her bathroom at the appointed time she was going to die anyway.
So, right about here, you might be thinking, “Hold up. So, what agreement did she break if the time of the death doesn’t actually change then?”
Big plot hole problem there.
Sometime later, our protagonist Quinn (Lail) downloads the app as a lark and sees she has, like, I don’t know, seven days to live or something. Which is all fine and good until she starts seeing things in the first couple of days. Freaked out, she cancels a planned trip she was going to take with her family. Her phone tells her she’s broken the terms of the agreement contract.
So, now, we as the audience know that she’s going to suffer the same fate as the original girl – especially since the girl's boyfriend (who ends up in the hospital Quinn works at because he crashed his car because he was drunk and that’s how his girlfriend was supposed to die in the first place) also downloaded the app, too and ends up dying at the appointed time as well.
Quinn freaks out and goes on a mad dash to find a way to stop the countdown. She tries deleting the app, then she breaks her phone, then she tries asking a cell phone nerd to help her…and in this mad dash, she meets Matt (Calloway) who is also having the same issue and they decide to solve this mess together.
Oh yeah, and while all that is happening, her little sister Jordan (Bateman) downloads the app and her doctor boss sexually harasses her and tells everyone that she harassed him. Moving on.
Quinn and Matt go to Father John (Byrne) who happens to specialize in demonology. The three of them figure out that there must be something in the user agreement that might help them. But, see, they can’t access it again. So, they go to computer nerd guy, Derek (Segura) that Quinn saw earlier for help.
Derek hacks the code and finds out that not only does the terms of the agreement state that everything’s all good unless you change your own fate—
Yeah, I know, I know. Just follow along with me. Derek also discovers that he can change the countdown times. So, he does. Giving everybody lots and lots of years to die. Yay. Problem solved.
Nope, not quite. Later that night, Quinn gets attacked by an unseen force and the times revert back to their original states.
Okay, so, in an effort to fix the truck size plot hole in this story, Quinn and Matt go to the priest who tells them that this is all a part of an ancient demon curse – a demon called Ozhin. Father John tells them that the curse can be broken if you cheat Ozhin out of your rightful time of death by dying or after the clock runs out.
No, that doesn’t really happen silly! What really happens is that she starts seeing things that scare the crap out of her until she makes it home and something kills her in her bathroom at the appointed time she was going to die anyway.
So, right about here, you might be thinking, “Hold up. So, what agreement did she break if the time of the death doesn’t actually change then?”
Big plot hole problem there.
Sometime later, our protagonist Quinn (Lail) downloads the app as a lark and sees she has, like, I don’t know, seven days to live or something. Which is all fine and good until she starts seeing things in the first couple of days. Freaked out, she cancels a planned trip she was going to take with her family. Her phone tells her she’s broken the terms of the agreement contract.
So, now, we as the audience know that she’s going to suffer the same fate as the original girl – especially since the girl's boyfriend (who ends up in the hospital Quinn works at because he crashed his car because he was drunk and that’s how his girlfriend was supposed to die in the first place) also downloaded the app, too and ends up dying at the appointed time as well.
Quinn freaks out and goes on a mad dash to find a way to stop the countdown. She tries deleting the app, then she breaks her phone, then she tries asking a cell phone nerd to help her…and in this mad dash, she meets Matt (Calloway) who is also having the same issue and they decide to solve this mess together.
Oh yeah, and while all that is happening, her little sister Jordan (Bateman) downloads the app and her doctor boss sexually harasses her and tells everyone that she harassed him. Moving on.
Quinn and Matt go to Father John (Byrne) who happens to specialize in demonology. The three of them figure out that there must be something in the user agreement that might help them. But, see, they can’t access it again. So, they go to computer nerd guy, Derek (Segura) that Quinn saw earlier for help.
Derek hacks the code and finds out that not only does the terms of the agreement state that everything’s all good unless you change your own fate—
Yeah, I know, I know. Just follow along with me. Derek also discovers that he can change the countdown times. So, he does. Giving everybody lots and lots of years to die. Yay. Problem solved.
Nope, not quite. Later that night, Quinn gets attacked by an unseen force and the times revert back to their original states.
Okay, so, in an effort to fix the truck size plot hole in this story, Quinn and Matt go to the priest who tells them that this is all a part of an ancient demon curse – a demon called Ozhin. Father John tells them that the curse can be broken if you cheat Ozhin out of your rightful time of death by dying or after the clock runs out.
So, all they have to do is outlast the countdown.
Yeah, whatever. So, they try to do that by casting a circle around them to protect them until the countdown runs out.
Only it doesn’t work because suddenly dumb as hell Matt sees a toy that he stole from his little brother and decides NOW is the best time to reach out of the circle and grab it.
He’s, of course, pulled out of the circle. And Quinn goes after him. And Jordan goes after her. And Matt ends up getting hit by a car and dying right on time. Jordan, unfortunately, is injured in all the hubbub.
Now. Quinn takes Jordan to the hospital. In a further attempt to make this plot work, she suddenly realizes that if she murders the doctor that sexually harassed her, then she can get the 57 years that he would have lived EVEN THOUGH NOBODY SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THAT BEING A FRICKIN OPTION.
So, she lures him to an unfinished part of the hospital and through a series of scooby doo chase scenes, Ozhin saves the skeezy doctor and starts actively going after Jordan.
All right, so Ozhin tries killing Jordan, but at the last second Quinn overdoses on drugs that were lying around in the hospital, thus, cheating Ozhin and ending the curse (for her, but try not to think about that too hard).
Her sister goes to her body and sees that she’s written Narcan on her arm and, lo and behold, she had Narcan in her hand. This 14-year-old, having no experience at all in injecting anybody, correctly injects her sister with the Narcan and they all live happily ever after.
Oh. My. Lordt. This movie was so bad. You know what time it is, y’all.
So, next week! Since we’re all still under quarantine, I’ll be dipping into my funds to check out a new theater release (at home, of course). The Invisible Man. I’m pretty stoked about it! See you next time!
O~
*
He’s, of course, pulled out of the circle. And Quinn goes after him. And Jordan goes after her. And Matt ends up getting hit by a car and dying right on time. Jordan, unfortunately, is injured in all the hubbub.
Now. Quinn takes Jordan to the hospital. In a further attempt to make this plot work, she suddenly realizes that if she murders the doctor that sexually harassed her, then she can get the 57 years that he would have lived EVEN THOUGH NOBODY SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THAT BEING A FRICKIN OPTION.
So, she lures him to an unfinished part of the hospital and through a series of scooby doo chase scenes, Ozhin saves the skeezy doctor and starts actively going after Jordan.
All right, so Ozhin tries killing Jordan, but at the last second Quinn overdoses on drugs that were lying around in the hospital, thus, cheating Ozhin and ending the curse (for her, but try not to think about that too hard).
Her sister goes to her body and sees that she’s written Narcan on her arm and, lo and behold, she had Narcan in her hand. This 14-year-old, having no experience at all in injecting anybody, correctly injects her sister with the Narcan and they all live happily ever after.
Oh. My. Lordt. This movie was so bad. You know what time it is, y’all.
So, next week! Since we’re all still under quarantine, I’ll be dipping into my funds to check out a new theater release (at home, of course). The Invisible Man. I’m pretty stoked about it! See you next time!
O~
*
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