Halle and Alison go over the do’s and don’ts of AirBnBs while they ruin The Rental.

 

 

TRANSCRIPT

 

[theme music]: If scary movies give you dread. Keep you up late night in bed, here’s a podcast that will help you ease your mind. We’ll explain the plot real nicely then we’ll talk about what’s frightening, so you never have to have a spooky time. It’s Ruined.

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh, hello. Welcome to Ruined. I’m Halle. 

 

Alison Leiby: And I’m Alison. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And this is a podcast. Where we ruin a horror movie just for you. 

 

Alison Leiby: Just for all of you. Halle, how you doing? 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’m good, Alison. I don’t know why every single week, I’m, like, shocked when you asked me that, and I’m like, oh, my God, how am I doing? 

 

Alison Leiby: I know. I panic. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I hadn’t thought about it. 

 

Alison Leiby: [laughs] When we start talking about ourselves, I’m like, oh, no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, what else is there to say? I’m good. I don’t. I only read the news and sleep and I’m going to go to some more Outfest screenings. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, nice. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’m very excited. Thrilled to live in beautiful Los Angeles, California. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Where you watch everyone’s films. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And I don’t think I have anything else. I my my world is very small, but I find it very satisfying. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s okay. Small will still fit rats if you get those pets.

 

Halle Kiefer: I do have to improve my life before I can have rats in them, I want rats in it for sure.

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah that seems antithetical to like what rats are. But yeah, you have to get like things together before you can invite rats into the mix. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s an important thing, similarly, it’s like, yeah, cats shits in a box, but you can’t just have a bunch of boxes to catch it lying around. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right, right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Cats deserve better, even if, as a human, you might not think you do. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. It’s true.

 

Halle Kiefer: Speaking of how, how’s your boy doing? 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, he’s good. He was just laying on the counter before we started, but we missed the window for you guys to see him. But I’ve got a bug news. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh, lay it on me. 

 

Alison Leiby: So, are you familiar and our listeners familiar with the spotted lanternfly? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. Yes. Beautiful.

 

Alison Leiby: They are the bugs. Gorgeous. They honestly are like fashion. [both speaking] They are an invasive species in New York. And like last summer they showed up and the city was like, if you see one kill one like kill them, kill as many as you can. So I’ve noticed a bunch of them, like I wake up and they’re like on the outside of my glass door. They’re like, hang. They’re. They’re hanging around near like my outside space in a way that I’m like, oh, boy. So my friend who lives upstairs was like, I was on my patio and I had like ten dead ones on there. And I was like, what the fuck is happening? She looked up and in the eve on like the top of our building. She was like, there were like 500 of them. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Jeez. 

 

Alison Leiby: They’re like living there. And so she wrote to our building and was like, hey, there is a bunch of those invasive bugs, like living in the top of our building. Like, can you guys get an exterminator? And they were like, okay, so like because of the way they need to be exterminated, it’s so toxic. We can’t actually do it and have everybody be safe. And I’m like, what kills these bugs? Like, I mean, I don’t under—

 

Halle Kiefer: That’s why they did say that you have to squish them like they were—

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: —encouraging people to stomp on them with their boots. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. Yeah. You have to stomp on them and you have to stop it. And they, they crunch when you do. It’s disgusting. So yeah. So they’re like. Like, I, like, stepped on my patio to water some plants and I, like, looked up and you could see a bunch of them just like on the side of the building, like up towards the top. And I was like, well, this is a nightmare. I wasn’t really expecting [laughs] out of this part of the year. Like. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: If anybody knows other methods of dealing with large populations of spotted lanternflies like, please let us know because I’m willing to like, tell my building anything to kill them. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I want you to get like a big Looney Tunes level mallet. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes, yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Like a big cartoon hammer. And just start squishing them.

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. Whac-A-Mole style. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Is that wrong to say? Is that wrong to put in the world?

 

Alison Leiby: No not at all. We’re supposed to kill them. They’re bad for the environment in New York City. They like hurt the species. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. 

 

Alison Leiby: We need as our ecosystems. So. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Well, I’ll tell you, I speaking of—

 

Alison Leiby: That’s what’s happening here. 

 

Halle Kiefer: There’s been nothing but bad climate change news [laughs] this week. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I don’t know. I guess maybe just being on Twitter or whatever, but like, it does feel like the last couple weeks, it’s like, well, the fantasy that this is going to be a couple decades out, I think is sort of like—

 

Alison Leiby: It’s here. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Well it’s like, oh, sure, maybe there’s total collapse in 40 years, but it’s going to start now. Like. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: The idea won’t come out of nowhere. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And I think, you know, is people born in the eighties and raised in the nineties, that was sort of the. I don’t know. People talked about us like we would have to worry about that. This in 50 years. It’s like, yeah, that’s it’s coming up, it’s coming up. 

 

Alison Leiby: Now that’s happening. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Suppose to be a lot more bugs. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. Air quality, garbage, diseases unlocked from ancient ice, you know, just all kinds of cool stuff for us to look forward to as fossil fuel companies and our government work together to do nothing. [laughs]

 

Halle Kiefer: Which is why this month our theme is vacation horror. 

 

Alison Leiby: Vacation. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You need a vacation from this vacation is what we’re telling you. 

 

Alison Leiby: [laughs] Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We want you to need a getaway, even though we we all cannot get away because wherever you are there, you’re there. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: First of all. 

 

Alison Leiby: Nowhere is good. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I was like the other place, I guess you could go to is space. But Elon Musk is up there. He’s trying to get out there and who wants to hang out with that guy. 

 

Alison Leiby: Not me, not me. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So we are kicking things off with a little film that came out during the pandemic, which I believe I rented during the long, long months of the uncertainty. And that is, of course, The Rental. And yeah it came out in 2020 and it was written, co-written, produced, directed by Mr. Dave Franco. 

 

Alison Leiby: Such a fan of him. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You know, I feel bad. I don’t know if I’ve seen him in anything? 

 

Alison Leiby: He’s he’s he was in Neighbors and like he’s been in [both speaking] like a couple of big studio comedy is playing like a small role. He was on Scrubs in their final weird season where it was like no more—

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh interesting, okay. 

 

Alison Leiby: —main character people anymore. He’s just kind of like, always, like pretty funny. He was on 21 Jump Street, the reboot they did with Channing Tatum, and yeah and Jonah Hill.

 

Halle Kiefer: I didn’t see that either. Jonah Hill. By the way. Also I would while we are talking about Jonah Hill, huge was a huge fan of his too bad. 

 

Alison Leiby: I know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Really really unfortunate stuff. 

 

Alison Leiby: Too bad it’s yeah, don’t read your hero’s text messages. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: Who but like Dave Franco is somebody who like when he shows up in comedies he’s like, really good and is never a lead. And I haven’t seen him direct, anything he’s directed. But like, I love Alison Brie and him, and their cats and their like, nice little life that they’ve got going on. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. Again, not to project on the celebrities, but you do hope they’re happy. And she’s— 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. The snapshot I see, looks lovely. [laughs] 

 

Halle Kiefer: She is in this film. She is one of the leads along with Dan Stevens, Sheila Vand and Jeremy Allen White, who I don’t know because I don’t watch The Bear, but I know that he is the lead in The Bear. Carmy.

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Carmy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he is great in this movie as well. And a perfect little weekend getaway that’s going to be incredibly complicated. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh boy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We always like to have Alison watch the trailer. Alison, what were your thoughts about The Rental trailer? 

 

Alison Leiby: I can’t get a good grip on what’s going on in the movie, but it is like a perfect setup of like there’s a few of us at a house. Someone else seems to be here. Trying to kill us. Like.

 

Halle Kiefer: That’s pretty much what we’re looking at here. 

 

Alison Leiby: Pretty straightforward. I’m excited for that. I am. Are you a big like, let’s go get a house for a weekend person? 

 

Halle Kiefer: You know, not really, but it did—

 

Alison Leiby: I am not either. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I will say watching this made me want to do it. [laughter] Especially in L.A.. I feel like people do it a lot. 

 

Alison Leiby: This made you want to do it?

 

Halle Kiefer: Well, up until the part where things get really go south. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. First half of Act one.

 

Halle Kiefer: Everyone’s going. I will say there is something as someone who is single, that that to me is like not the main job being in a relationship, but it is much more fun when you’re with someone else. And also like Dave and I went to Palm Springs. That was really fun. 

 

Alison Leiby: But I feel like Palm Springs—

 

Halle Kiefer: But not cabins.

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, not like. I don’t know. I have friends who like love, like, let’s go get to like, a lake house for and I’m just like—

 

Halle Kiefer: Not for you. 

 

Alison Leiby: I don’t really love like, I love being at a lake. I don’t love like, let’s all, we’ll, collectively decide on our food and we’ll all cook everything. Like, I just don’t know if I love being in a house with other people I think is what it really breaks down to. As someone who lives alone and has for many, many, many years and was an only child like I just don’t like the appeal of like we’re all in this house together is fun for about 4 hours for me. And then I start to internally panic. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I will say there’s something about bringing food to somewhere else and cooking it. That to me is very appealing. I don’t know why. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: The idea of cooking in my own kitchen not that thrilling to me, but the idea of bringing a bunch of food and cooking in different kitchen. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Now that’s that’s vacation. 

 

Alison Leiby: Well, the odds that you’re you’re never bringing it to a worse kitchen. 

 

Halle Kiefer: [laughs] No, no. 

 

Alison Leiby: Like, I’m not going to, like, from my place to, like, a studio apartment where we’re going to have to figure it out. Like. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: It is like you are like if you’re doing like, the concept is like, we’ll go from our apartments to the big house we’re sharing with a kitchen island and a grill. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: And all that like that is, that is appealing. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And this movie does have a hot tub and again, it also made me want to go somewhere with a hot tub. 

 

Alison Leiby: I love hot tubs. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Maybe I should just go away for a weekend by myself. I could do that. 

 

Alison Leiby: Honestly, I’ve been debating doing it to get some writing. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I know. Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: Approved by the union, not TV, some writing done. So. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: I might do it, but it might be like a hotel. [laughs]

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, that’s also seems easier. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: All right. We also also like to take a baseline scary, baseline scary for where Alison’s at with the sort of opening theme of the film. Alison. How scary do you find the concept of your partner having a very close and seemingly intimate relationship that is ostensibly platonic with their business partner? 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Are you a jealous person? Like, would you consider yourself jealous? 

 

Alison Leiby: I actually don’t. I can’t tell. I don’t think I am because I’m someone who needs such an intense and outrageous amount of alone time and privacy and, like, doing my own thing and, like. Like. So I. I think I understand that with other people. I think like, I don’t know, but I do think that there is something when it’s like when you’re somebody like romantic partner or even like just like best friend, like like just life partner. And then there’s this business. I think that like business, it will always pull people away from you because money is ultimately the only real reason to be alive in capitalism.

 

Halle Kiefer: So yeah, so it’s like they’re spending hours with this person. 

 

Alison Leiby: It’s hard to fight against. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. It’s and it’s hard to be like, come to dinner. It’s like I have to finish this whatever with my partner, this deck for a presentation so we can sell the company to have money because we need the. Like.

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: You’re never going to win that argument as the partner. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, I feel like when I was dating men, I was jealous. But a lot of that jealousy came from like, a insecurity that was like, because I didn’t know myself and now I. I don’t think I will be as jealous dating women, but it hasn’t really come up as such. But there is something where, boy, you know, it’s one thing to be jealous it’s another thing to be right, you know? And that’s sort of what this movie is like. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: If it looks like a duck and it sounds like a duck and walks like a duck. Your partner may be fucking their business partner. So.

 

Alison Leiby: Oh no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But, you know, that’s not the worst thing that happens it’s just sort of what kicks off the events in the film. And based on the trailer, which again, doesn’t really give much away. Would you like to guess the twist, Alison? 

 

[voice over]: Guess the twist.

 

Alison Leiby: Now I’m going to guess that. The partner and the business partner are the ones who set up the weekend and that the business partner chose this place because he wanted to murder Alison Brie or whoever is our lead who is fighting against the the partnership that is business. [laughter]

 

Halle Kiefer: Wonderful. The partnership that is business. 

 

Alison Leiby: The partnership that is business. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Excellent guess Alison. So let’s begin ruining 2020’s The Rental. We open on the beautiful Oregonian coast. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We’re perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean. It’s a fucking beautiful mansion, tasteful with a hot tub on the patio. Unobstructed views. It smells like money. It looks like money. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We see Charlie and Mina, who are friends and business partners. They’re in their office. They don’t say what they do. I’m assuming it’s a tech startup. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. I mean, on the West Coast. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Like, I don’t know who else is making money over there. 

 

Alison Leiby: What else is there? Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And they’re ogling and toggling the Airbnb post for this house. And Charlie’s like, oh, my God, it’s available all weekend. Mina is draped over Charlie’s shoulders. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm mm. Mm mm. You don’t need to touch people you work with. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s like, well, this. This is a business partner. I guess the business is funny. Okay, cause we’re going to be up to some funny business. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. There’s some funny business afoot. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And the price is insane. But basically, Mina tells Charlie, you know what? You’ve earned it. Just then there’s a knock on the door. It’s Josh who again is played by the guy from The Bear. It turns out Josh is Charlie’s brother and Mina’s boyfriend. So we’re setting it up. Right.

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. Small world. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Small world. 

 

Alison Leiby: Keeping things tight. [laughs]

 

Halle Kiefer: And he comes in and says am I interrupting something? Yeah, of course you are. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Absolutely they’re in a glass office draped over each other. And Josh, says to them hey I was dropping something off in the neighborhood, and I thought I’d see if you wanted a ride home. Mina, Charlie says to Josh, so does she need to request you on the app, or can you go rogue? And it’s like that is already rude. Also, that implies his brother is working for Lyft or Uber. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Which is also a tech startup. So why are you acting so fucked up about it? But of course. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: This is our dynamic that Charlie is like the successful one and Josh is the fuck up, so we’ll find out more about that in a minute. And Josh see’s this mansion on the coast and Charlie says, you know, we’re about to start looking for seed funding. I don’t know what that is. I didn’t look it up. 

 

Alison Leiby: I think you buy seeds and feed birds with them.

 

Halle Kiefer: You get birds to come to your house. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And then you catch them and you sell them. And that’s and that’s the business— 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s business friends. 

 

Halle Kiefer: This is like we’re about to do a crazy amount of work. What if the four of us took a trip before we kick things off, and we can’t get everywhere for months. Alison it’s a rental. They’re going to do it. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We see Mina and Josh, they head home, and then Charlie heads home to his wife, Michelle, played by Alison Brie, and she’s thrilled about the weekend. And she says I’m honestly kind of surprised, I’m excited to hang out with your brother. But Josh says he’s been with Mina, like he’s went back to school. He’s gotten his life together. He really it seems like he’s really turning over a new leaf. And that’s kind of exciting. But of course, Charlie, because as we’ve seen, Charlie and Mina have some sort of unprofessional dynamic. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Charlie says, I don’t know if I’d call going to two night classes back to school. That’s literally—

 

Alison Leiby: Okay, fuck off. 

 

Halle Kiefer: —the definition of going back to school. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. What would you call it? 

 

Halle Kiefer: That’s being back in school. What do you. He’s taking two night classes. That’s a school that you go back to. What do you talking about? 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, that seems like a solid course load for someone who is also working. What are we talking about? Fuck off. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. And Charlie is like. I’m just saying, Mina is the full package and Josh is a barely employed played Lyft driver. And we’ve right now that Josh served time for nearly beating a guy to death outside of his frat house in college, which according to frat law I think is just a misdemeanor. But then you have the law of the land, you know, and as a result. 

 

Alison Leiby: Sure. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Josh did go to prison for a time. Michelle says. I’m just saying Josh seems really happy. He seems like he’s really doing well. This seems like it’s been really great for him and I’m excited. Over at Josh and Mina’s they do something that honest to God is more disgusting than anything that happened in Terrifier or Terrifier 2. This shit. And I’m not a like I’m a gross person. I have my own shit that I do that—

 

Alison Leiby: Sure. Everybody does gross things. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Will again, puke if they saw. Mina like pops a zit on Josh’s shoulder and they start kissing and rolling around and he starts to be, like, demanding to know if she wiped the zit juice on him and she’s laughing and she says, no, it’s still in my fingers. I didn’t wipe it on you. It’s on my fingers. I was like, I will kill myself. 

 

Alison Leiby: I, this is worse than Terrifier. This is like the worst thing I’ve ever heard. 

 

Halle Kiefer: This is this is less dignified that I would rather be murdered by Art the clown. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Then have someone pop a zit on my back. And then while we’re making out, be like it’s still on my hands. I will jump—

 

Alison Leiby: I might throw up now. That’s disgusting.

 

Halle Kiefer: I had to pause it while watching it and look away because that shit. I don’t know what that is. 

 

Alison Leiby: I don’t. I don’t know what that is. I don’t want to know—

 

Halle Kiefer: I rather she ripped the top of his skull off and spit into his brain. Okay, that shit is just unacceptable. 

 

Alison Leiby: Wait. She was the one with it on her finger? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: Like LOLOL. Like, would he have preferred her to wipe it on him? 

 

Halle Kiefer: I don’t know. I think he’s saying don’t wipe it on my shirt and she’s like, I didn’t. It’s on my hand. I was like, this is not cute. I don’t know who this is for. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. This is. I’m not like I wish I was in a relationship after seeing that. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Have you ever had a have you ever had a partner like, pop a pimple on your body? 

 

Alison Leiby: No, I have friends. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I don’t like that.

 

Alison Leiby: Like. Like I’ve had, like, girlfriends who, like, in a crisis. 

 

Halle Kiefer: In a pinch. 

 

Alison Leiby: Like, I need your help. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes, sure. You’re out and about, things have gone awry. 

 

Alison Leiby: But not like for fun before messing around. [laughter]

 

Halle Kiefer: Right? Like this is their foreplay is just finding a zit on each other’s body, and popping them, and smearing it on their fucking hands? Anyways, I’m excited to watch these people die in the morning. [laughter] Charlie and Michelle pick up Josh and Mina, and Charlie is immediately on his brother’s case. Like, that’s their dynamic. He’s like, oh, my God, he’s such a fuck up. 

 

Alison Leiby: He doesn’t even know the truth. [laughs]

 

Halle Kiefer: And Charlie shows up and is basically like, are you really going to bring your dog like, Reggie, who’s this adorable, fat French bulldog? 

 

Alison Leiby: No, Reggie. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Those dogs barely look like dogs. It’s like having Danny DeVito on a leash. [laughs] Like it has such personality. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Which that’s my idea of a weekend, you know? 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. Just with a fat French bulldog. 

 

Halle Kiefer: As they drive up the coast. This is like. This is like this 3 hours away. Like it’s far enough away that they are like, this is a trip that we’re taking. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Mina attempted to book The Rental and she gets denied. And then Charlie was able to book it an hour later. The name of the character is Mina [?] and the name the actress is Sheila Vand. She’s Iranian American. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She’s the only person of color. Everyone else in the foursome is white. And so Josh, on her behalf is mad, is basically like, why would that if it was open? He’s concerned. The owner saw her name. 

 

Alison Leiby: Her name. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And was like, oh, I’m not going to read to a person of color or because of her name. And Charlie’s like, oh my God, like, we really think it’s racism? Which is what white people do. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Where it’s like, bitch, how would you have any way of knowing? And also—

 

Alison Leiby: You don’t know. It definitely happens.

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. And basically then it’s like, how could it be racism if I a white person don’t think it is? And that’s what I wrote down. Charlie is dead meat. We’ve seen him be too mean too early. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, good. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Especially to his brother. He’s dead. I’m sorry. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, it’s not this doesn’t work. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Unless he has a character arc. But at the time when I saw this. 

 

Alison Leiby: We’ll see. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’m like this motherfucker’s dead. And Josh says, oh, sure, let’s give the white guy we’ve never met the benefit of a doubt. And Charlie tells him, let’s give everyone the benefit of a doubt, which is again, is how white people sidestep. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Having to ever deal with racism. 

 

Alison Leiby: Ever talk about racism and really think about it critically. Ugh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Again, Charlie is absolutely going to be hurled off that cliff. That’s what I wrote down. 

 

Alison Leiby: Great. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They arrive and Charlie warns, Josh, you better hide that dog, because ostensibly he’s concerned that whoever is giving them the keys will see the dog and say, you can’t stay here. They get out of the car. It’s fucking sickening. We see a pickup truck parked in front and the door is open so they let themselves in and they meet the person who’s going to give them the keys and show them around the house. An older white man named Taylor. He’s also immediately very prickly, says you just let yourself in? You know I was expecting you an hour ago and Mina looks at him and he is sort of. He looks like a handyman. And Mina says, you own this place. And there’s just like all these little moments that are going to build towards what happens. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he blanches. He says, excuse me, it’s my brother’s place. And she says, well, no, I didn’t. I didn’t mean anything like that. And Charlie says, let’s introduce everybody. And Taylor turns to Mina again, the only person of color, and says, so how did you get mixed up with this little family? And she says, what do you mean. 

 

Alison Leiby: What? 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he said, her parrots back to her, what she said about clocking his, you know, his handyman, ware, he says, oh, I didn’t mean anything by it. So now Taylor and Nina have this antagonism between them. That’s like sort of it feels already volatile. 

 

Alison Leiby: Is this the older guy who’s, like, balding, slimmer? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: Who’s playing? Is it the actor who’s also in Glow and— 

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh, that’s a good question. Let’s see. 

 

Alison Leiby: He was I think he was in if it’s the same guy I’m thinking and then—

 

Halle Kiefer: Toby Huss.

 

Alison Leiby:  And no, it’s not. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He was already in the Adventures of Pete and Pete. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh. Is that the same guy?

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh my God. He also plays Cotton Hill. He voices Cotton Hill on King of the Hill. 

 

Alison Leiby: Toby Huss? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh he’s on Carnivàle.

 

Alison Leiby: Yes, yes, yes, it is him. Yes. Because he’s also in great role in Halt and Catch Fire and much under viewed AMC original, that is, I believe, on Netflix that everybody should go watch. It’s about computers in the eighties. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He stays working. He’s been in everything. 

 

Alison Leiby: He work’s and he’s good. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he does voice acting, too. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He’s great in this movie. He’s like a perfect—

 

Alison Leiby: Okay, just wanted to like, place who that was. Okay, got it. Now I know the whole, like, whole deal. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He’s a perfect like, either he’s just like a regular guy or there is a simmering rage inside him that will explode. And he’s doing he’s playing it to the hilt. So he’s fabulous. Taylor goes to show Charlie and Michelle around the house, Mina and Josh sidebar, and he’s like, now we got to give this dumb racist motherfucker our money, just like I know, but he’s just going to give us the keys. Were already here. We’ll never see him again. 

 

Alison Leiby: Sure. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Of course we will see him later. Taylor shows them around again. Beautiful deck. And Michelle says I should have brought the telescope to look at all the stars. And Taylor says, you know, I live right down the road. I’ll bring it by later you could use it. Michelle kind of begs off. He’s like, No, no, it’s fine. I’ll just I’ll leave it for you. And as he goes to leave, Mina cannot help herself. I think I think it’s like Mina, it’s like I’m sensing the racism. I’m going to put my finger in the wound because I’m not going to not say something. And Mina says, hey, do you do the bookings for this place? Taylor says, I do. And she says. 

 

[clip of Sheila Vand]: It’s just a little strange because my request was denied. But then Charlie, a white man put in an identical request an hour later and his was accepted. 

 

[clip of Dan Stevens]: We really don’t have to get into this right now. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mina Mohammadi. Do you remember now? 

 

Halle Kiefer: And Charlie is like, humiliated because, like, as a white man, you can’t bring up race. And he’s like, oh, don’t bring up race, don’t bring up race.

 

Alison Leiby: Too scared. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. And Taylor kind of doesn’t answer and says, you know, if you have any problem staying here. The cancellation policy is clearly listed. If you want to leave, that’s your choice. Other than that, I have nothing to discuss with you. And as he turns to leaving the door is closing, Mina says out loud, asshole, probably loud enough for him to hear. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, I would imagine. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But he leaves, we they get the groceries and put them away. And as they turn, they hear Taylor leaving. But he’s gunning it out of the driveway like he’s driving really fast and angry. Which you wouldn’t do. Getting out our driveway. And by the way, they’re in the middle of nowhere, like they [both speaking] drive through the forest. Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It wouldn’t be safe to really drive like that. Where they’re at anyway. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes, exactly. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But everyone’s having fun. They’re making plans to take a walk along the beach. Michelle finds in the bedroom there’s sort of dirt on top of the comforter. Just a little bit. And she brushes it off. Charlie gets on the Wi-Fi. Mina’s going through the medicine cabinet. And. 

 

Alison Leiby: Obviously. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Finds a photo of Taylor framed, drinking a beer. She flips it over. Josh is playing with Reggie outside, and it’s so cute. I want a dog so bad. 

 

Alison Leiby: I know they are fun little buddies. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And as they explore the house under the porch, Josh and Mina find a door with an electronic code lock. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Which they are not able to open. Yes, like a doorknob with like a keypad over it. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: That requires a code to open again—

 

Alison Leiby: It’s like I understand that if you rent a house that is like a rental or is like somebody is like, part time home. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: That there are going to be rooms that need to just be, like, inaccessible to strangers because you need to put—

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah it makes sense. 

 

Alison Leiby: —personal. But, like, there’s no way you’re not scared when you see that, even though, like, the logic is very clear. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Oh, you should be scared. At least in this case.

 

Alison Leiby: In this case, you should be scared. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They all walk on the beach and Charlie and Mina are walking ahead laughing, whatever. And Josh confides with Michelle, who again, is married to Charlie, sort of knows about Mina and Charlie’s like intense, platonic, but clearly have a relationship that’s like really powerful. And Josh tells Michelle, I’m constantly terrified that Mina is going to leave me. She’s so smart, She’s so accomplished. I went to jail like I’m just afraid, like I want to encourage her and inspire her and make her better too. But she doesn’t really need that. And Michelle is like, I know what you’re saying, but she needs a romantic partner. She already has a work partner. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Like you don’t have to like, think like, oh, I have to get in there and be your mentor. That’s not what she wants anyways. As a woman, it’s like, that’s not what I want, you know, and Josh, Josh says to her, do you ever feel jealous of Mina, you know, and her relationship with Charlie? And Michelle says, well, fuck her. Yeah, sometimes. But I think that this is just their partnership is professional. They’ve known each other for years, and you kind of get used to it. Like at first when met her, I was like, oh, okay, but. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Nothing’s going on. And I trust Charlie. They go back to the house as the sun sets over the ocean and they find out that Taylor has set up a huge telescope looking out the patio doors in the living room. And everyone’s like, oh, cool. We can look at the stars, Mina, however, which is how I would feel about it says So. We aren’t weirded out by the fact that he just came in the house when we weren’t here and they’re like eh—

 

Alison Leiby: I would be right. It’s like. It’s like. Yeah. Is this rental—

 

Halle Kiefer:  It is an Airbnb. Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: He said he was going to bring it by. Like, what would you rather him have like, bothered us? Like, it’s kind of nice that it’s just that. But it like then it opens the door up like, well, he comes here when he can come here. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: And come in whenever. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And it does think questions like yeah. When you go to Airbnb you don’t know who has keys to that place. You don’t know how people could get in and out. You know?

 

Alison Leiby: I don’t love kind of Airbnb in general.

 

Halle Kiefer: Well, I’ve only done it when I’ve had to do it for a wedding or something where there really weren’t hotels. But overall, like I want a hotel where like they want the sheets. 

 

Alison Leiby: I want a hotel. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I want like the towels, I want the robe.

 

Alison Leiby: Right fresh towels every day I want yeah, I want to know that like, if something happens in the room, there’s like a million maintenance people around that can easily, like, address a problem. I don’t know. 

 

Halle Kiefer:  Right. Yeah. When I break the toilet, I need somebody to be there immediately. 

 

Alison Leiby: Exactly. Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They kind of brush it off and Mina accepts that maybe she’s, you know, kind of blowing it out of proportion. And they get to drinking, which is what you do when you go away for two for a weekend. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s the point of going away. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You get to fucking drinking. Mina shows them or Michelle shows in this waterfall she wants to go hike to in the morning and Mina says, Michelle, I heard you brought something as a surprise. We should maybe bring it out. And Michelle says, oh, well, maybe we could do it tomorrow night by. And it turns out she has ecstasy, so she brings it out. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh fun. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But Michelle says, I don’t want to take it tonight because I’m really tired. I had a long week. If you guys want to, please do we, I brought plenty for both nights, but I’m going to turn in and I really, really want to get up early to go out hiking in the morning. So I just want to say that you guys could take it. But please, I really want us to all go. Which again, I. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Don’t want if I’m on vacation, I don’t want to have to do anything—

 

Alison Leiby: I shouldn’t be setting an alarm, that’s for sure. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Please don’t make me do anything. I’m begging you. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. I don’t want to do jack shit. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So they all take ecstasy and we see that Josh is dancing around with his dog in his arms, like, having a good time. He and Charlie get into a wrestling match. We could see that, like there’s this underlying aggression within them. Michelle conks out is asleep and we see dirt falling on her face like a sprinkle of dirt. And we look up Alison, and it’s coming out of an air duct in the ceiling. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And then we reverse that. We see the P.O.V. shot from inside the duct. Somebody is watching from inside the duct Alison. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. In the duct?

 

Halle Kiefer: In the duct. 

 

Alison Leiby: In the duct. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Even. Even in the duct. 

 

Alison Leiby: Even in the duct. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Josh, Charlie, and Mina. They take the telescope out to the patio. They’re like, oh, my God, this is beautiful. And again, Charlie has to be dominating his younger brother. And Josh says something about, like, do you ever think that it’s something to the effects of, like cavemen? Were they worried about meteorites? Meteors? Like that killed the dinosaur? And Charles was like, how much time do you think there was before dinosaurs and humans? And it’s like, that is, first of all, who cares just look it up and then to there is nothing to like lord over a family member. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Like what are we 12? And the answer, at least in the movie, is 65 million years, which is a long time. 

 

Alison Leiby: Sure. Yeah, that’s a long time. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Josh is throwing a stick for Reggie. Reggie is running all around. He’s a very good, well-trained dog because, like, he’ll run off the deck and come right back. So they trust him to sort of—

 

Alison Leiby: You know, roam around and come back. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And at one point they sort of tie him up. So he’s on a long lead and he can just kind of walk around, but he’s outside with them. And as Josh gets a little bit sleepier and drunker, Mina and Charlie are just flirting like no platonic work friends ever do. This is clearly—

 

Alison Leiby: There is a clear line when things you’re just like, well, this is now an entirely other thing. This isn’t just like, yeah, we’re so close and we’re close all the time and, you know, things kind of like it’s like, No, no, no. Now you’re just flirting. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And look, if monogamy is important to you, here’s something that you don’t do, which is Josh goes to fall asleep on the couch. So Mina and Charlie decide, hey, why not get into our swimsuits and get into the hot tub? 

 

Alison Leiby: No, no, no. I don’t care how close of a business partner you are. If your partners are asleep, the two of you don’t go then, like hot tubbing. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I almost feel like it would be okay. Except not okay, obviously. But it’s just like that’s your brother’s girlfriend’s. Like, at that point, it’s like. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: What you doing? 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, it’s too messy. [both speaking]

 

Halle Kiefer: Too messy. But of course, that’s obviously what the thrill is so they both get their suits on. And basically on one side were Charlie sitting, there’s jets on his back and she says, oh, switch with me I want to feel the jets. And you know, they’re vibing in the hot tub. And Charlie says, can I tell you something? 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh boy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And I wrote down, uh oh.

 

Alison Leiby: Uh oh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Well, now what he has to say is it’s like, I think you’re brilliant. You make me so much better at what I do. You’re funny. You’re kind. I’m just so happy to know you and to work with, you know? And she’s like, I feel the exact same way. I didn’t think it was possible to have, like, a real partnership, but that’s what this feels like. And they sort of cheers their water glasses and then they decide, you know what? We should both enjoy the jets so that they’re sitting side by side in the hot tub.

 

Alison Leiby: No. One at a time on the jets. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison, you’re not going be shocked. They kiss. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s happening. The thing they they’ve clearly been dancing around probably for years. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They start making out and they only stop when Reggie starts barking and runs back up on the patio whimpering. And Mina says, you know what? Maybe Reggie has the right idea. It’s time for bed. And she makes the executive decision, gets out of the hot tub. We then see a P.O.V. of someone watching from a distance, breathing heavily. So they were really amped about what was about to happen. 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean, I get it. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And you never want to give a serial killer blue balls, but here we go. 

 

Alison Leiby: Here we go. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Mina goes to the bathroom. She’s kind of you could see she’s freaking out, you know? Then she gets in the shower, Alison she hears the door open and Charlie joins her. 

 

Alison Leiby: Come on, like guys. They’re in the house.

 

Halle Kiefer: And they fuck in the rental shower. They fuck in the rental. 

 

Alison Leiby: I hate them. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And it just sort of it’s couldn’t be more ill advised. But.

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: These things happen Alison. 

 

Alison Leiby: Across the board. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And things are going go from bad to worse here in a minute. 

 

Alison Leiby: I bet. 

 

Halle Kiefer: In the morning Reggie is still tied up outside but looks and I was like, what kind of people are these? They leave a dog outside, but he seems fine. He found a football in the grass and he’s kind to playing with it, which is cute. 

 

Alison Leiby: I love Reggie. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Obviously in the morning Mina and Charlie are extremely awkward around one another. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And they can barely make eye contact. I’m also like every time I see like a movie sex scene, I’m like, is she on birth control. Like is she just raw, raw dogging. 

 

Alison Leiby: Raw dogging it like, did he have a condom on him? Like, what did they like? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Listen, and maybe we’re just people who like to make a plan, but this just seems like I have a lot of questions. Michelle, however, much like she said, she went to bed early. She is bright eyed, bushy tailed and wants to go hike to this fucking waterfall. Mina tries to bail out Josh tries to convince her, but eventually it’s like, okay, that’s fine, You know, she said, I’m really tired. I have a really hard legal work. That’s okay, because Mina is Josh’s girlfriend. However, Charlie also tries to bail. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And Michelle—

 

Alison Leiby: You guys can’t. You can’t.

 

Halle Kiefer: She’s not having it. They get into an argument and finally Michelle says, fine, you don’t have to come, but you’re cooking tonight and I’m getting fucked up. What is your opinion on bailing on something like this, Alison? 

 

Alison Leiby: Look, I would want to I have learned I am now, you know, almost 40 years old. I will just say no from the jump now in a way that like that will be hurtful. But like, when the planning is happening, I’m like, I’m not doing that. Like, I’m not doing that. And because I know I’m going to cancel on it. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I would say, yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: If I was planning it and someone canceled. I like you just got it. Like, I just respect canceling so much. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: I’d be like, yeah, yeah, I get it. It’s a hike. Like.

 

Halle Kiefer: I would say if we’re if we’re taking we’re taking any kind of drug. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We’re not going hiking in the morning. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So either wouldn’t have taken drugs or I would have bailed, then I would have said, hey, just, you know, if we’re doing this, I’m not gonna be able to hike in the morning. I know that myself. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. Yes.

 

Halle Kiefer: But if it was my partner and I did take drugs and they still want to go hiking, I fucking suck it up like—

 

Alison Leiby: You suck it up. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’d fucking suck it up. Grow up. 

 

Alison Leiby: Especially after what you did last night, like you have to. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Have some decency. 

 

Alison Leiby: You have to, like show up.

 

Halle Kiefer: Also like wouldn’t you want to put some space between you? Like, I’d be like, I don’t want to be in the house. Both of us freaking out. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right, no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’d rather go on the hike just so one of, like, we could have some distance. 

 

Alison Leiby: Distance because otherwise, like, everybody’s just, like, in close quarters in a house. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. Before they go, Josh says, hey, Reggie’s still outside? Would you grab him and bring him in? And they say, yeah, no problem. So Josh and Michelle, they go on the hike. Michelle is mad. And Charlie and Mina of course immediately talk about what happened. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mina says—

 

Halle Kiefer: I mean, narratively we did need them to have a one on one. So. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. Mina says we’re smarter than this. This can never happen again. And I genuinely really do love Josh. That was a huge mistake and we shouldn’t have done that. And Charlie is kind of seems more noncommittal. I think he’s genuinely interested in her and he’s like, you’re right, it was a mistake. Meanwhile, on the hike, Josh tells Michelle about meeting Mina and this cute little meet cute they had where she got his number to text him the the punchline of a joke that she couldn’t remember. So then they started talking and Michelle talks about actually like the night when she, me and Charlie met, we actually were doing molly. And she’s like, I don’t want to admit it, but he was actually still with his ex, Jen, when we first met. 

 

Alison Leiby: So it’s a pattern. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And Josh has actually now that you mention it when he met Jen. He was with this girl, Zoe. And I’m not someone who was ever relationship hopped. I mean, probably because I was closeted, it was kind of easier to be single. But there are people who do that. I always think that’s so bizarre. 

 

Alison Leiby: I have I have friends who it’s never it’s never been like the person they cheated with becomes the partner. But it is always like, oh, you were I was single for like a week and a half. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: And I, you know, it’s just not me and but, you know, it’s other people. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. There’s something about it. I do. I really do admire people who get in relationships easily and fall in love very easily. I do. I think that’s a very admirable quality. But this particular thing where, like, you will stay in a relationship that you’re not happy with and you find that someone else. 

 

Alison Leiby: And then cheat or like emotionally carry on enough that, you know, you could just like lily pad over like, no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. So, of course, hearing this, Michelle’s really distressed because he’s like, oh, fuck, is he going to do that with me and with Mina? She didn’t know about Zoe, so she didn’t know she thought okay—

 

Alison Leiby: Oh boy. She doesn’t know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Meanwhile, we see, of course, the P.O.V. of someone watching them in the woods. Back in the house, Mina, presumably out of guilt, which is what I would be doing. She’s like cleaning up and straightening up, like covering the hot tub. Moving the telescope back in while Charlie’s just asleep on the couch. Alison. Mina goes into the other shower, so the shower off of her and Josh’s room. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: To have, like, you know, sort of her anxiety shower. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You’ve got to, like, kind of just, like, put your head down. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. 

 

Alison Leiby: And, like, let the water beat on you and that kind of a moment— [laughter]

 

Halle Kiefer: Come to Jesus. 

 

Alison Leiby: Emerge refreshed. 

 

Halle Kiefer: When when she’s done, she shuts off the water and she looks up into the shower head and sees that there’s a camera mounted in the shower head. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm mm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She screams for Charlie. He runs in, and they’re both tech people, so they immediately like that is what this is. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

 

Halle Kiefer: So they run over to check the other showers is where they had heterosexual intercourse. 

 

Alison Leiby: S, E, X. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Unfortunately Alison there’s a camera in there as well. And not only was it when filming her showering, but they also filmed her and Charlie making the beast with two backs. Alison in this case. What would you do? 

 

[voice over]: What would you do? 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean, I. I’d rip out one of the showerheads and and like, have the camera in my possession. Like— 

 

Halle Kiefer: Do you think that’s how it works? 

 

Alison Leiby: Well, you need evidence. And I feel like if you because, like, my instinct is we pack all of our shit up and leave, go to the police and also contact Airbnb and be like, this guy or someone is watching. And like, you don’t want to like, do that and give somebody time to like, take all the cameras out. So they go back and they’re like, there’s nothing here. So.

 

Halle Kiefer: The question is, if you did that, Alison, your affair would be revealed. Knowing that, is that what you would do? 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean, things are already really bad. I think you just kind of like, keep going down that road to at least make sure that, like, your sex tape doesn’t get sold on the black market. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. Like, we don’t know what their company is like. It’s sort of like, yeah, if Mark Zuckerberg, suck, suck tape. Mark Zuckerberg suck tape. 

 

Alison Leiby: I bet he’s. Yeah, I can just see him. Just like going down on a VHS tape. [laughter]

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. Yeah. It’s not with another human being. He’s just sucking and fucking a VHS. VHS cassette. He’s putting his dick in a VCR. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. For sure.

 

Halle Kiefer: I do. I would see how that would be released or someone would potentially blackmail him. So now this video exists. They are. It becomes an untenable situation. And from here on out, they’re going to make terrible decisions based on how they want to try to manage its. Ah, the existence of the tape. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Again, I just think if, if people were able to have a conversation saying, hey, I think this relationship’s over, hey, monogamy is not for me. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: There’s a lot of conversations that could have prevented what’s about to happen. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, absolutely. Here, we are. 

 

[AD BREAK]

 

Halle Kiefer: Mina says, of course, right away. Let’s just fucking call the police. But Charlie refuses. Their affair will be revealed. Michelle and Josh would find out. His brother would hate him, his wife would hate him, and he says—

 

Alison Leiby: Kind of made that choice already, bro. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, exactly. Also, like come on like you guys aren’t going to fuck again. Grow up. We both know you are. 

 

Alison Leiby: It’s happening. You absolutely are going to. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But Mina’s upset, she’s like, we’re just gonna let some racist pervert jack off to this. It’s like, well, yeah, he probably already did. Probably was this whole time. Pretend it doesn’t happen. And Mina says I want to go over to that guy’s motherfucking house. I want to threaten him and demand to get the footage. But again, Charlie is like that will just escalate things. He’s going to tell them, Charlie’s trying to control what’s happening. But of course, he doesn’t know what we know, which is that someone’s looking at them through the duct. You mean they have this information? We have more of that information. 

 

Alison Leiby: They don’t know that there’s duct eyes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: [laughs] Yeah, exactly. Mina says we cannot stay the night here. We’ll say that Taylor came by. Maybe he said something racist again. We’ll just say we have to leave. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Charlie says no. The more lies we add, the more out of control this is going to spiral. 

 

Alison Leiby: He is correct. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. It’s like we’ll just get through the night and we will leave first thing in the morning and pretend this never happened. 

 

Alison Leiby: That part’s wrong. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. Just then, Josh and Michelle arrive home. Josh comes in and smooches Mina and is like, I’m gonna take a shower. She’s like, no, I like it when you stink. Which we do think would be true. Because again, she loves popping zits. 

 

Alison Leiby: Disgusting. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So it’s like, oh, I love you. I like the smell of your, like, sweaty dick—

 

Alison Leiby: Grossness. 

 

Halle Kiefer: That seems to appease. Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s very—

 

Halle Kiefer: Believable. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s in line with everything we know about her so far. 

 

Halle Kiefer: However, you know, Charlie goes to Michelle Michelle ices him out because she’s now obsessed about the Zoe Jen. Reveal in the room. Charlie follows Michelle and she confronts him about like I didn’t know that you were seeing this woman. Like, this seems like a pattern. And he’s like, yes, sure. I guess I was with Zoe when I met Jen. Did Josh bring this up? So now he’s. He’s switching tack. He’s now mad at Josh, okay. And Michelle says, I just feel like you have lied to me and it makes me concerned about our relationship. 

 

Alison Leiby: Well, you don’t know the half of it, girl. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, and it’s like he says, well, I mean, I’m sure he says, I’m sure whatever he said at the time was probably true, which is like, not the kind of thing you want to say during a fight with a partner. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So Michelle now just had Michelle’s like this manic, angry energy that where she, like, both wants she wants like take it out on all of them and also party. And so she comes out and was like everyone’s doing molly again. We’re getting fucked up again. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Josh and Mina try to beg off like we did that last night, but Michelle is too on edge and furious. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, and you got to, like, go with what she wants at this point because you’ve now, one, cheated on her, too, did drugs without her, and three didn’t go hiking with her like you like it is her show now. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison, everyone else refuses to take it, so she basically takes all the Molly that’s left. 

 

Alison Leiby: Good for her. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Just then Josh goes, so where did guys put Reggie? Alison. They just left the dog out there all day. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, my God, Reggie. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Michelle’s rolling. We see her with a glass of wine, just sort of dancing alone in the living room and watches them all rushing to the backyard. She says, oh, fuck, they lost the dog. Which is a very funny Alison Brie delivery. 

 

Alison Leiby: She’s so great. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Mina and Charlie. Mina and Charlie and Josh call for Reggie. It’s nightfall, right? So he’s a little guy who knows where he is. They can’t find him. 

 

Alison Leiby: He is a little guy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She tells Charlie. Did you leave that hot tub on all night? Because it’s not working? So I called Taylor. He’s coming by. So of course, Mina and Charlie are immediately panicked, but they can’t say why. 

 

Alison Leiby: No, they can’t. 

 

Halle Kiefer: In the meantime, Josh becomes convinced that Taylor took his dog. I don’t know why the dog could have easily just wandered away. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You’re in the middle of nowhere. That seems plausible. 

 

Alison Leiby: It’s more likely that, like, something else happened. But sure. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, and I’m like, like he fell off the cliff because you’re right near a fucking cliff. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh Reggie. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Listen, I hate to wish that on a dog, but it’s like, yeah, you can’t leave a dog alone in a strange place for 12 hours. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s what happens. 

 

Halle Kiefer: When Taylor arrives to fix the hot tub. Josh immediately confronts him the second he walks in and says, did you take my dog? Taylor says, I didn’t take anyone’s dog. And by the way, you shouldn’t have a dog here. It’s in the policy. 

 

Alison Leiby: Mm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Michelle and Charlie go out to watch Taylor fix a hot tub. And Mina and Josh keep looking for Reggie, and we’re looking in front of the house where Taylor’s parked his pickup truck. And once Taylor’s done, he goes in and stops Mina and says, hey, that whole dog, no dog policy is my brother’s policy. I have two myself. Don’t worry about it. And then before he leaves, he says to Mina, I know how to keep a secret. So of course, Mina is like, you motherfucker. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So she says to him, I’m actually I have to show you something else before you leave and starts taking him to the shower and in the bathroom she points to the camera and says. 

 

[clip of Sheila Vand]: I just want you to know that if you ever do anything with the footage we go right to the cops. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison, he tells her, I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. I didn’t install that. You people are trying to scam me. You put this in here. Now you’re trying to shake me down and saying I put fucking cameras. I’m going to call the cops on you. He takes out his phone, starts to call the cops. Mina panics again at Charlie, having told her, if the cops are involved, our lives are over. Whatever. She tries to grab it and they end up shouting at each other and wrestling over Taylor’s phone. Josh hears their raised voices and runs into the bathroom, just as Taylor is pushing Nina off of him. And she kind of flies again across the room. Josh leaps on Taylor and just starts beating the hell out of him. 

 

Alison Leiby: And it’s like, oh, no, Josh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Because we know that he did that one other time. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So he’s got that animal rage in him, and he’s got Taylor in the bathtub just beating his skull in, Michelle and Charlie rush in. They’re able to pull Josh off of Taylor. Michelle checks, checks Taylor’s pulse. He’s alive. He’s passed out, but he’s alive. Everyone sort of rushes out and they’re meeting in front of the house. And Mina tells them sort of the edited version, which is, I just I found the camera in the shower when you guys were out, and I wasn’t going to mention it cause I didn’t want to freak out and I wasn’t sure if it was real. But then when Taylor stopped by I was like, I couldn’t hold it in. I just confronted him and he went off on me, which is plausible enough. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And the security cameras are I mean, the cameras are there. So Michelle and Josh are saying like, oh, this guy’s a pervert.

 

Alison Leiby: Right, they don’t know what the camera has seen. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. Meanwhile, we see someone obviously, who’s not Taylor because he’s passed out in the bathtub watching them on a security camera aimed at the house. So now we know there’s somebody else that is not Taylor.

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison as they talk, a man dressed in black comes into the bathroom and puts a gloved hand over Taylor’s mouth. 

 

Alison Leiby: Comes into the bathroom from where? 

 

Halle Kiefer: The ducts. 

 

Alison Leiby: Of course, duct tales.

 

Halle Kiefer: Duct, we’re telling you one of our famous duct tales. Josh and Michelle obviously, because again, they don’t know that these two have fucked on camera say, okay, let’s call the police. We’ve done nothing wrong. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes, we beat him up, but there are cameras there. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He attacked you. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Charlie again is trying to get control over there, says Josh is on probation. He’ll get in trouble. But Josh is like look, I don’t care. It’s also on camera. If that was recording, they’ll see that I didn’t start that fight. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He had his hands on Mina, whatever we’ll call the police. Michelle goes inside to find her phone and Charlie checks on Taylor. Alison Taylor is dead in the bathtub. 

 

Alison Leiby: [gasps] Taylor, R.I.P. Taylor.

 

Halle Kiefer: R.I.P. Probably a racist, but R.I.P. 

 

Alison Leiby: For sure. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They adjourn to the living room and they say, what the fuck are we going to do? Michelle says there’s no what are we gonna do? We have to call the police. There’s a dead guy in the bathtub. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, there’s not like. Hmm. 

 

Halle Kiefer: What are we talking about? 

 

Alison Leiby: Let’s. Let’s discuss. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But Charlie says no. If we call, Josh goes back to jail. Michelle says, listen, I’m sorry. But again, thinking also she does know about the guy who came into the bathroom and asphyxiated Taylor. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She says Josh killed a man. There’s no other options. I feel horrible. You know, I love you, Josh. There’s no other way out of this, Charlie says. Or what if Taylor drunkenly stumbled off the cliff at night? 

 

Alison Leiby: So now they’re going to dump a body?

 

Halle Kiefer: And Michelle’s like, I refuse to do this. Mina points out, even if we do dump the body, it’s all on tape and we don’t know where it’s being recorded too. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. That tape could be viewed by the police for all they know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Charlie says, look, we’re tech people. Mina and Charlie realized that the camera receiver, as it’s wireless, must be in the house. It can’t be that far away. So they were able to find the camera receiver and destroy that. And the cameras, hypothetically. There will be no footage. Alison, is that how it works? I don’t know. 

 

Alison Leiby: I don’t know. We’ll never know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And Michelle says, I’m not fucking living the rest of my life knowing that we killed some guy and then covered it up. 

 

Alison Leiby: You can’t. We know this from movies. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And she looks at Charlie’s face and that’s exactly what they’re going to fucking do. But Michelle refuses to be physically involved, so she goes to storm off into a room and the other three get to work. They take Taylor’s toolbox, put it back in his car. They’re going to move his car. Obviously, they pick up Taylor’s body and they start carrying it to the back. 

 

Alison Leiby: Their fingerprints would be on everything. 

 

Halle Kiefer: There’s so many like, oh, did you see that? That Long Island, the Gilgo Beach killer? They found his and his wife’s hair. On at least the bodies that they’ve been identified and he’s been charged with. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And they kept it. And because of the time they were degraded to the point that you couldn’t test them. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But in the last ten years or whatever—

 

Alison Leiby: The technology has caught up with. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Technology’s caught up. So whatever they’re doing, they’re touching tools. They’re picking up a body. I’m sure his blood spattered— 

 

Alison Leiby: You’re all over this. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You beat a man to death in a bathtub or beat a man nearly to death, then some guys suffocated him. Come on. But they carry his body to the back of the house. Charlie goes into the bedroom and Michelle is sort of lying on her side, motionless. He says, I’m not going to tell you anything else. We’re going to handle it. We’ll be outside. She says, even if I don’t physically do what you’re about to do, I’m already an accomplice. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, correct. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We’re all accomplices to what Josh did. And Charlie says this will be over soon. Michelle replies, this will never be over. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. For the rest of your life. Maybe that’s short, we don’t know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And I think you hit the nail on the head there, Alison. They cart Taylor’s corpse down the cliff, and they hurl him over. And of course, when they look down, he is lying on a ledge about 20 feet down. 

 

Alison Leiby: No, of course

 

Halle Kiefer: He didn’t make it to the water.

 

Alison Leiby: It’s, like, so goofy. [laughs] 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Charlie starts freaking out, screaming fuck, and he tries to heave a big rock at him to knock the body, but he misses completely. It’s like, even if you hit the body, how would that knock it off the ledge? That makes like no sense. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah no, it’s just gonna kind of like. Obliterate it. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison. Inside as Michelle starts to pack up their stuff. She hears the shower turn on. And now I ask you, Alison, who? Will survive this film?

 

[voice over]: Who will survive?

 

Alison Leiby: I mean, Charlie and Mina have got to go. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They’ve committed the cardinal sin of fornication. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They have betrayed the heterosexual program of monogamy. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And as such, they must be punished for it. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. I think also, Josh, unfortunately, he’s too tied up in, Josh is Mina’s boyfriend right? Charlie’s brother. I think Josh will also I think that Michelle will be the lone. She’ll be a final girl. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Our final girl. Okay, great. Outside. Josh and Charlie pick up an even bigger rock and they throw it. It doesn’t knock the body off. It just smashes into Taylor’s head before it just falls off the cliff. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh God. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So I’m like, you’re you’re just desecrating a corpse at this point. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You know. Josh decides he has to climb down on the ledge and Charlie and Mina say, don’t do it. It’s the middle of the fucking night. It’s a sheer cliff. This is not worth it. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: We’ll figure something out in the morning.  

 

Alison Leiby: It is not worth it. Nothing is going to happen between now and like, daylight that—

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. No one’s going to come by. But he tells them I did this. Let me go. Alison He slips immediately. 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean—

 

Halle Kiefer: He falls directly face first onto the corpse. But luckily the corpse provides a cushion so he doesn’t plummet into the ocean. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay, well, that’s good. I guess.

 

Halle Kiefer: Instead, he’s just face to mutilated face with Taylor on this ledge. At night. 

 

Alison Leiby: How’s he gonna get back up? 

 

Halle Kiefer: I don’t know and they’re also above a raging sea. And he tells Taylor, see you in hell and he flips his body off into the water successfully. Alison. Michelle goes, looks in the bathroom, but the shower sound is not from the actual water. It is from the upstairs television, which is playing video of Charlie and Mina having sex. Again, the original sin that caused all this. 

 

Alison Leiby: Ooh boy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Outside, Josh is able to climb back up the cliff face. I would be dead. 

 

Alison Leiby: I would be dead. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Like I would just. Or I’d have to live on that ledge. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And build a nest. 

 

Alison Leiby: Forever. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And be an eagle. Yeah. Grow wings. Josh comes back up, Mina and Charlie grab him. And as they walk back inside, they don’t see what we see, which is the man all in black. And you see his face, which is an old man mask. So he is the mask of an old white man. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It didn’t look like anyone in particular. It wasn’t like, oh, an iconic mask they’re referring to. 

 

Alison Leiby: Just like old white guy. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, but they don’t have time to notice nor see that because they see Michelle peeling away in the car. They all drove her in the car. I mean, I guess Taylor’s pickup truck is still there, but they can’t drive that home. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. No. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Michelle’s peeling away in the car. Charlie runs and is able to stop her in the driveway and says like, don’t freak out, It’s okay. We got rid of the body. And she tells him, I saw the fucking video of you and Mina fucking in the shower. And he starts to panic. But then he makes, he says things like I’m so sorry. Let me, you know, like he just doing anything. The first thing he says is, where did you find that footage? And she says, who are you? And peels off into the night. 

 

Alison Leiby: Good for her. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Stranding them there. And the two, again, they have Taylor’s car. So I guess they could drive somewhere else. 

 

Alison Leiby: They could at least like get somewhere if they needed to. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: But it is pretty incriminating. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Josh doesn’t know about any of this. So Josh is like, what the fuck are we going to do? What is she doing? And Charlie says she freaked out. She had to go. She’s not going to tell anyone, she’s not gonna go to the police. And of course, everyone’s freaking out. And Charlie’s like, it’s fine. Everything’s under control. I have control. We’ll, find the footage, then get out of there. Which I don’t get because I’m like, I don’t like. In my mind, the the footage, the issue of the footage is Michelle and Josh see. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So Michelle saw it. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Like the cat’s out of the bag. 

 

Alison Leiby: The public knowing like—

 

Halle Kiefer: Right. 

 

Alison Leiby: Like is just so far down on the list in comparison to, like, the people close to you who you’ve personally hurt like I don’t know that anyone cares anymore that like. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes I agree. And also if anything that makes it look not like understandable why you’d kill this guy, but it’s definitely it muddies in a way that in a courtroom. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I don’t know. 

 

Alison Leiby: There’s a lot of narratives happening to keep track of and be like, who is really getting hurt? In yes, there it becomes a little bit of like a plausible like, well, you know, they were in a touch spot.

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. And so so at that point I’m like, whatever. But we see Michelle driving in the dark again. It’s very dark. It’s dangerous driving through the forest. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Hit something and skids off the road, slamming into a tree. 

 

Alison Leiby: Jesus Christ. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison Brie is a great actress. She’s screaming, she’s sobbing. 

 

Alison Leiby: She is a great actress. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She gets out, she checks out the damage. And when she goes up to the road to see what she hit, she sees a metal strip covered in nails. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Someone deliberately put that there in case they tried to leave in their car. And as she she gets back in the driver’s seat and texts Charlie, should have called him. That’s a call. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s a call. That’s like, don’t be afraid to call your friends. In this kind of emergency. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And look. Maybe you’re mad, but just call.

 

Alison Leiby: Just call. 

 

Halle Kiefer: She says car ran off road. Please help. We see through the driver’s side window. The man in the white mask running out of the dark towards her, and she looks up and gasps. Cut to Charlie back at the house, saying, getting the texts and saying, I’m going to go find Michelle. She couldn’t have gotten very far. Mina and Josh, meanwhile, deduce reasonably enough, okay, if we can’t find this receiver anywhere, it’s probably in that locked room under the porch. 

 

Alison Leiby: Logically. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Charlie makes it to the car to find Michelle gone. He calls her phone in the dark, just like 20 feet away, sees a figure holding it, and then the cameras, the phone screen light up and he hears her ringtone and he goes to walk towards the figure and says, oh, thank God, you scared me. Alison. He trips over something again. It’s his wife’s dead body. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, no. 

 

Halle Kiefer: With a bleeding head wound. And unfortunately, the person holding the phone is, of course, the man in the white man mask attacks Charlie with a hammer. Beats him to death. Over and over again beats his skull in murders him just like he murdered Michelle. Back at the house, Josh and Mina don’t know about any of this. 

 

Alison Leiby: They’re dropping like flies. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And we’re. We’re rushing towards the last 15 minutes here. Eventually, Josh, they can’t figure out the code, obviously. So Josh is like, fuck this. He kicks the doorknob off the door because this is a regular wooden door. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So he’s able to shear the doorknob with kicking it with enough force. They get into the locker room. It’s full of junk. It’s just old antiques. 

 

Alison Leiby: Crap. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Josh finds a bunch of Polaroids. And he doesn’t show Mina what they are. And she says, what are those and he says, you don’t want to know. We never find out where they are. So I’m assuming it’s somebody fucking or the past guest asleep or something. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Something off putting, but we don’t actually see it. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Obviously there’s something tech related there. Josh breaks down. He’s like, I’m so sorry. This is my fault. I dragged you into it. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I don’t know why I beat that guy up. I’m such a piece of shit. 

 

Alison Leiby: Referring, to—

 

Halle Kiefer: To Taylor. 

 

Alison Leiby: To Taylor. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Because again, he assumes that he killed Taylor. 

 

Alison Leiby: He doesn’t know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: No, none of them know that this guy killed him. Yeah, And Mina, even in that moment doesn’t. She should have just said. I think she should have confessed what was going on like that, I fucked your brother. 

 

Alison Leiby: This is it.

 

Halle Kiefer: But I understand. Maybe this is not the time. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I get that. And Mina tells Josh, we are going to get through this. He says, I just need a minute. Mina goes up into the house. And when he does, he hears a lock unlock. And a door sort of swings open. And there’s another room. Just then Alison, Josh gets a text from Charlie. 

 

Alison Leiby: Well. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It is audio of Mina and Charlie talking in the morning about their indiscretion. So they’re saying it can never happen again? He goes to find Mina. And of course, now we’re getting bogged down in the infidelity. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: When you should be just running through—

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: The fucking forest to get out of here. 

 

Alison Leiby: People are disappearing and dying and. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: That’s priority one and you can deal with that sex later. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He plays her the message and she does a horrible job of being like that that sounds like us, that’s crazy. It’s like, why are you lying still? Get over it, you know? And he says— 

 

[clip of Jeremy Allen White]: What can never happen again? 

 

[clip of Sheila Vand]: What? 

 

[clip of Jeremy Allen White]: In the recording. You said, that can never happen again. What were you talking about? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Of course, Alison, he gets another text. It’s the video of them in the shower. Josh flies off the handle because he’s thinking Charlie’s texting him this. He’s doing this to provoke me. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: He he must be in the house. He’s trying to get me. Charlie, he runs downstairs screaming, I will fucking kill you, Charlie. You send me this shit, and now you’re going to hide. He’s just ripping open doors. And finally Josh opens the door of a closet. Who leaps out? It’s the man in the white mask. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Mina runs downstairs and we finally this is when we see the mask in full. That it’s an old white man. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he start. He hits Josh with his signature hammer.

 

Alison Leiby: He loves the hammer, huh? 

 

Halle Kiefer: And when the killer turns to go the stairs for Mina, Josh grabs his leg and the killer turns and just buries his hammer in Josh’s skull. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh, my God. Hammer death’s an underratedly gruesome way to die in these movies. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s just. There’s no other way around it. Even a stab wound. It’s like you could probably hold that closed for a little bit. Just a big old hammer smashing your skull. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. It’s like. Oh, God. Dark. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So now there is one. The killer runs upstairs and doesn’t find Mina. So he assumes that she. He looks and the door is open, assuming that she shimmied down off the patio. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he runs back out. She was hiding under the papasan chair Alison. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes, of course. 

 

Halle Kiefer: You haven’t. I haven’t thought of a papasan chair in forever. 

 

Alison Leiby: Wait, define a papasan chair again. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They are those chairs where they’re basically like a circle. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. On top of another circle. That’s upside down. Half circles?

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: They’re like, usually like bamboo with a cushion on it. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. I know exactly what you mean. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Which I think is like, they’re adorable, but I don’t I’ve never sat in one and thought this was comfortable. 

 

Alison Leiby: No. They’re wildly uncomfortable and they take up so much room. [laughs]

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah, like they’re good in theory, but they’re uncomfortable. 

 

Alison Leiby: They look great. 

 

Halle Kiefer: They look adorable. Yeah. Luckily, she was hiding under the papasan, and Mina tries to make a run for it. But, of course, she gets to the patio. The killer assaults her. She’s able to get out of his grip. 

 

Alison Leiby: Uh huh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Runs into the fog. Alison. 

 

Alison Leiby: There’s fog? 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s as thick as a papasan cushion. Okay? She can barely see six inches in front of her. Alison, she runs straight off the fucking cliff. [gasps] The killer cleans up, throws everything in Taylor’s truck, which he’s obviously going to move, removes the cameras, and we see the camera receiver. It wasn’t in that room, it was hidden in the duct. 

 

Alison Leiby: Okay. Up in the. Well, of course, everything’s everything’s about the duct. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And we see him looking in the bathroom mirror and he takes off his mask, but we never see his face. But we do see from behind. And he looks like a younger like a man in his thirties. He doesn’t look like Taylor’s brother. 

 

Alison Leiby: Right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But then I’m like, oh, is he the owner? Like, this is Taylor’s brother?

 

Alison Leiby: Right. Yeah, but then why—

 

Halle Kiefer: And things got out of hand? 

 

Alison Leiby: But why would he kill Taylor? 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s just some guy Alison. [gasps] I think we’re to think it’s just some serial killer. Also, we see Reggie wander back into the house at dawn, and this dog is a great actor, and he kind of, like, looks up at this guy, like, well, where all my people go? 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh my God. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But the killer, leaves the dog there with the door open. 

 

Alison Leiby: All right. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So, I mean, he’ll probably die out there eventually, but because no one’s— 

 

Alison Leiby: He’s he’s not going to kill him. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. So he leaves him there. Next thing you know, we see a man again from only from behind, showing a different Airbnb. This time it’s a gorgeous loft in the city. And the owner, hands the man, the keys. And we see him, the killer, making a copy of the keys and then basically installing his cameras. So we’re to think  he goes to different Airbnb’s and sort of sets them up for a murder? 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Whenever the next people book it. We see him sitting in his mask on the couch, sort of staring out the window. Then we cut to the people who rent after. 

 

Alison Leiby: His next property.

 

Halle Kiefer: Reserve the Airbnb. So we see a straight couple doing yoga. We see a lesbian couple making dinner. We see someone on the toilet on their laptop. And what was great about that is I was watching the movie on the toilet on my laptop at that very moment. 

 

Alison Leiby: Wow. Art really does imitate life. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Representation matters. We see a couple with their daughter and finally we see a couple asleep and on the security camera ostensibly set up by the killer, we see the masked killer emerge from this gorgeous walk in closet into the bedroom and look down at the sleeping couple. The end. The end. Alison. 

 

Alison Leiby: Wow. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Alison, what are some fatal mistakes you think people may have made in The Rental? 

 

[voice over]: Fatal mistakes. 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean, there are several, I would say just, you know, sleeping with your business partner when you both have I mean, like, I think that’s bad usually even if you are both single, just like don’t mix those things. But like. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: You both have partners. Those partners know each. Like, it’s all so, like. Yeah, that was probably problem one. All going on a you know, even the four of them going away together also seems like a bad idea from the jump. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I agree—

 

Alison Leiby: Just like with the dynamics like

 

Halle Kiefer: Who’s getting this out, who’s enjoying this? 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. And then once things got going, I mean, not calling the police, like. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. 

 

Alison Leiby: Not calling the police when you realize the cameras, like they could have avoided all of this. 

 

Halle Kiefer: At a certain point, they could have just left. Yeah. Like, just leave, go walk, walk through the forest, like there. It’s not highly populated, but you could walk to the road, right? You’re able bodied people like, just tell your story walking rather than being so convinced or concerned. But again, it’s like the idea of control. Like I can control. Charlie wanted to control everything that was his down, his fatal flaw being a control freak. 

 

Alison Leiby: But like, what would have happened if they hadn’t had sex? Like, what was the killer’s like? Was he just going to murder some people in their sleep like he was at the next place? Like, he just. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I think so. 

 

Alison Leiby: They just happened to give him a great kind of. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: Reason for everybody to kind of be at odds. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. I think I think that he just lucked into this psycho psychosexual drama. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he would’ve just killed them all with the hammer. 

 

Alison Leiby: Hitting the jackpot. If you’re a serial killer and it’s like, oh, these people are all fucked up. Perfect. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Exactly. Also, I just want to say that Reggie the dog is played by a dog named Chunk. 

 

Alison Leiby: Chunk? 

 

Halle Kiefer: And he has an IMDb. 

 

Alison Leiby: Has he been than anything else that we would know? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Let me see. He has. He was in a movie named called Closet Monster. 

 

Alison Leiby: Oh. 

 

Halle Kiefer: From 2015. Okay. So he’s a little bit he’s up there. I’m not sure what the connection was. I’m not. There aren’t any immediate. I’m saying, it didn’t look like it belongs to like Dave Franco or Dave Franco was in this or anything. 

 

Alison Leiby: Sometimes it’s like, oh, it’s just that’s just our dog. Like it wasn’t that in a Star is Born. Wasn’t that just Bradley Cooper’s dog? 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. Yeah. Oh what a sweetie. 

 

Alison Leiby: I know. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. I don’t know. But I will say [both speaking] this dog was great. 

 

Alison Leiby: I mean. 

 

Halle Kiefer: This dog was a perfect dog actor. 

 

Alison Leiby: We love an animal actor who knows how to kind of, like, hit those marks. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. And then finally, where would you rank The Rental on the spooky scale, Alison? 

 

[voice over]: A spooky scale. 

 

Alison Leiby: I think the realism of this and also the randomness of this, I’m going to say six and a half. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I’m going to give this a six. I agree. You know I love a realistic horror movie. And they play this very realistically. Once things start to get going it’s a little less scary. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Just kind of mayhem. But all the moments like the dirt falling out of the air ducts. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Seeing the recording I it really got me, and I agree. I’m going to go with the six. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. And that ending of just like this is just what this guy does. And they just happened to pick a rental that like was set up for a murder. Like, it’s just like that. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yes. 

 

Alison Leiby: Could be you, quote unquote, like it. I will say this is turning me off to Airbnb’s just across the board, as if I wasn’t already out on them. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. I mean, just go to a hotel. 

 

Alison Leiby: Just go to a hotel. If you can’t go to a hotel, I get it. But like. If you could go to a hotel, I feel like maybe go to a hotel. Not that those don’t have plenty of horrific experiences awaiting, you too.

 

Halle Kiefer: I know. Yeah, didn’t they? I’m trying to think like I feel like Airbnb either. I was reading something about how, like, they were kind of cratering. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes, they are. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s like, yeah, I mean, not every. The economy cannot run on luxury—

 

Alison Leiby: Rental properties. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Rich people going out. Yeah, like everything, like Uber. It’s like these are not things that regular. I know the word for, like, regular people use all the time. It’s like—

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah. Most people. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Yeah. Yeah. If people don’t have money, the first thing they’re not going to do is rent an Airbnb.

 

Alison Leiby: Yeah, right. Or like, take extra, like, car rides when they don’t have to. Like, it’s just. 

 

Halle Kiefer: But at least according to Fortune, the 41 year, this is two days ago, the 41 year old co-founder of Airbnb has gotten nearly $3 billion richer this year. So great. I’m really glad that as people who potentially use this aren’t able to use it anymore, at least the co-founder has gotten $3 billion. 

 

Alison Leiby: $3 billion. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I will eat—

 

Alison Leiby: Fuck him. 

 

Halle Kiefer: This. Yeah. Joe Gebbia of Airbnb Inc. I will suck the eyeballs out of this guy’s head and we will eat his brain. That’s what I, how I feel about things.

 

Alison Leiby: And it’s destroying the housing market and it’s, you know, all of the things. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Of course. 

 

Alison Leiby: So fuck Airbnb and let this movie be a lesson to all those who work there. [laughs] That you’re an ass.

 

Halle Kiefer: I mean, they know. I guess they just don’t give a fuck. 

 

Alison Leiby: They don’t. They really don’t know. No one does, it’s terrible. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Well, all right, everybody, thank you so much for listening. We hope that was a fun vacation. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: From your life and from the world at large. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes it’s really just [both speaking] go back to the nightmare that is our economic system being built. 

 

Halle Kiefer: I know. 

 

Alison Leiby: On tech oligarchs. 

 

Halle Kiefer: It’s inescapable. But, you know, I guess we hope these hours provide you a little a tiny reprieve. 

 

Alison Leiby: An escape. 

 

Halle Kiefer: A little bit of escape. And they certainly do for us. 

 

Alison Leiby: Yes. 

 

Halle Kiefer: So thank you. And we will see you next week for more of our vacation horror. 

 

Alison Leiby: More vacation. And please. 

 

Halle Kiefer: Please. 

 

Alison Leiby: Keep it spooky. [music plays] Don’t forget to follow us at Ruined podcasts and Crooked Media for show updates. And if you’re as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us a review. Ruined is a Radio Point and Crooked Media production, we’re your writers and hosts Halle Kiefer and Alison Leiby. The show is executive produced by Alex Bach, Sabrina Fonfeder and Houston Snyder, and recorded and edited by Kat Iossa. From Crooked Media our executive producer is Kendra James with production and promotional support from Ari Schwartz, Kyle Seglin, Julia Beach, Caroline Dunphy, and Ewa Okulate.