Podcasts
‘Heathers’ Exposes the Dark Heart of High School [The Lady Killers]
“Are we going to prom or to hell?”
What’s the most important decision a teenager can make? Is it what to do with 5 million dollars two days before aliens blow up the planet? Is it what kind of corn nuts make the best pre-fraternity party snack? According to Michael Lehmann’s dark cult comedy Heathers, the most important decision a teenager can make is whether or not to die by suicide. But what if it’s not a decision at all? What if a hot killer couple blasts through the halls of their suburban high school dressing up their murders as altruistic revenge? The Lady Killers conclude Bad Romance month by putting on their red power scrunchies and fucking each other gently with chainsaws on a very special episode covering one of the hottest killer couples of all time.
Veronica Sawyer (Winona Ryder) may be so “very,” but she’s also very much over her bitchy friends. Heather Chandler (Kim Walker), Heather McNamara (Lisanne Falk), and Heather Duke (Shannen Doherty) are worshiped at Westerburg High School and they’re only juniors. Unfortunately Veronica’s new boyfriend, a troubled outcast nicknamed J.D. (Christian Slater) doesn’t like her mean girl friends and pulls Veronica into a war with the Heathers in hopes of sewing chaos and putting the popular kids in their place. But can murder disguised as suicide ever lead to a greater good? Does JD actually want to make the world a better place or has this new power couple become another head of the poisonous snake?
Hosts Jenn Adams, Mae Shults, Rocco T. Thompson, and Sammie Kuykendall will tackle these questions while chatting about Heather Chandler’s frat party delusions, Heather MacNamara’s ridiculous pseudonyms, and Heather Duke’s questionable motives while crushing on a dreamy bad boy with a problematic plan. The conversation takes a serious turn as the group discusses teenage suicide (don’t do it!), bullying, absentee parents, and their own experiences with adolescent death. Would Veronica kill without JD? Would JD kill without Veronica? Is mineral water making a comeback and has there ever been a hotter game of croquet? So call us when the spaceship lands and join them on the road to prom or hell. After all …
Chaos is what killed the dinosaurs, darling.
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Aaliyah Innocent.
May was a busy subgenre-switching month. After kicking things off with disaster “slasher” The Poseidon Adventure (listen), we watched American Giallo The Fan (listen), then wrapped things up with Vincent Price’s horror comedy Theater of Blood (listen).
Now, in honor of Pride Month and the return of AMC’s Interview with the Vampire (renamed The Vampire Lestat for S03), Trace and I had to check out the straight-washed second attempt to bring Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles to life.
Back in 2002, director Michael Rymer pitched Hollywood on his vision for Rice’s second Chronicle book, The Vampire Lestat. Instead, the suits opted to adapt the third book, Queen of the Damned (likely due to the ancillary opportunities of the soundtrack, written entirely by Korn frontman Jonathan Davis).
In the film, Lestat (Stuart Townsend) awakens from slumber to reinvent himself as a leather-pant-wearing rocker. Lestat’s very public vampire persona attracts the attention of Talamasca novice Jesse (Marguerite Moreau), as well as the vampire’s maker Marius (Vincent Perez). But the nu-metal has the greatest impact on Akasha (Aaliyah), who awakens and promises to take over the world if her old foe Maharet (Lena Olin) doesn’t stop her.
Whose side will Lestat join? Will Marius help his fledgling or abandon him to public sacrifice? And does anyone actually care about Jesse? (Please note: that last question is rhetorical.)
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Episode 389: Queen of the Damned (2002)
Practice your Egyptian accent and bare that midriff because we are talking the troubled “adaptation” of Anne Rice’s Queen of the Damned (2002).
Directed by Australian Michael Rymer, this one was doomed by the suits before it was even greenlit (which happened AFTER all of the songs were written by Korn frontman Jonathan Davis). It’s a bit of a clusterfuck.
Plus: praising everything Aaliyah (RIP); critiquing everything Stuart Townsend (aside from his abs and leather pants); a soft queer reading of Marius; and bemoaning boring protagonist/audience surrogate JESSE.
Cross out Queen of the Damned!
Coming Up Next: We’re tackling Ben Stiller’s horror-adjacent dark comedy The Cable Guy (1996), in anticipation of its 30th anniversary!
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for over 495 hours of Patreon content including this month’s new episodes on Hannibal Season 3 Episodes 5 & 6, Backrooms, Passenger, Leviticus, an audio commentary on the original Scary Movie (2000), and the return of our Requel Tier as we begin our episode coverage of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat.