"The Dead Don't Die": By-the-numbers Zombie Apocalypse, with some gay subtexts and Josh O'Connor's dick

  

The problem with Movie Night is, I'm asked to choose something from the "new selections" on Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime,  and MAX, with no research, just a cover blurb.  Then, if it turns out to be awful, I get blamed: "You picked this!"  

Last night I selected The Dead Don't Die on Hulu, because it starred Bill Murry and it was about zombies in a small town.  I was wondering if anything new could be said about zombies after so many years of being blasted by Zombie Apocalypses.  

No. Other than a few absurdist touches, like characters being aware that they're in a movie and an alien spaceship that appears out of nowhere, picks up Tilda Swinton, and vanishes, it's the standard. Due to..um...fracking?,,, day and night get mixed up, cell phones don't work, and the dead re-animate.  

They crawl out of their graves, fully corporeal,  even though some have been dead for centuries -- and eat the living in a small Pennsylvania town.  Maybe everywhere in the world. The only suspense is wondering who will get eaten next.

This movie needs an editor.  Cop #1 enters the diner to look at the two zombie-eaten waitresses. We see one, then the other, with their innards turned into spaghetti.  Cop #2 enters to look.  We see one, then the other again.  Cop #3 enters to look.  We see one, then the other a third time!  

But on the bright side, there is no hetero-romance, and we see many gay subtexts.  Probably unintentional.

The main zombies and zombie-dinners are:

1.-3. Three big city hipsters:Austin Butler, top photo; Luka Sabbat; and Selena Gomez.  They stop for gas and for some reason decide to stay overnight in the town's decrepit hotel instead of continuing on to Pittsburgh. Selena flirts with every guy in sight, even when she doesn't want to get something from him, but there's no indication that she's dating either of her companions.

4-7. Police officers Bill Murray and Adam Driver, second photo.  Adam asks the female police officer at the station for a date, and Bill had an affair with town drunk Carol Kane.  But the two end up together, with a sort of buddy-bonding going on before they are killed.

8-9. Neither racist farmer Steve Buscemi nor cat-loving hotel manager Larry Fessenden, left, have wives at home, mention dead wives, or flirt with the gals at the diner.

10-12. Caleb Landry Jones, who played a gay guy in Stonewall, runs the gas station/horror movie memorabilia shop, seems to have a crush on delivery  driver RZA.  He almost asks him for a date, but loses his nerve. Later he is trapped in a hardware store with Danny Glover, and almost grabs his hand before they are eaten.

Bonus: Caleb Landry's butt

More after the break

Gemstones Episode 3.9, Continued: Five plot resolutions and a funeral. With collegiate jock cocks

 

Previous: Episode 3.9: Baby Billy is bi, Peter plots revenge, and Kelvin and Keefe cuddle. With a Josh O'Connor bonus

A swarm of locusts!

Locusts are not unheard-of in South Carolina. In fact, every 13 years, a swarm of the similar cicadas emerges. Ecologists consider them beneficial, since many animals and birds eat them.  And they do not sting or bite.

But these are not ordinary locusts.  The swarm flies directly through the service entrance and into the tv studio, crashing and smashing everything.  They may not sting or bite, but having dozens of buzzing, crawling things splat into your body, hitting your hair and face, must be  disorienting and painful.  People stumble in every direction, crashing into each other. Some are hit by falling lights and sound equipment.  A round image of Baby Billy smashes someone's head.

Why locusts?  In Exodus 10, God sends a plague of locusts to convince Pharaoh to let the Jews leave Egypt.  The prophets Joel, Amos, and Nahum use them as symbols of Divine Judgement.  They appear as one of the end time tribulations in the Book of Revelation, rising from the Abyss to torment unbelievers.  None of those seem relevant here. Maybe God is trying to get everyone out of the church before it blows up?

You can tell who actually cares about their family by who runs away (the Simpkins) and who looks for them (the Gemstones). Jesse saves not only his family, but Eli and Dusty.  The Montgomerys and BJ/Judy save each other.   

The Kelvin/Keefe rescue is the most dramatic:  Looking for Kelvin backstage, Keefe is overcome by the locusts and collapses, coincidentally just behind a girl who has been killed by a falling spotlight.  When Kelvin finds him, he yells "Leave!",  as in "Save yourself!", but Kelvin spreads his heavy woolen coat over the two of them and yells "I got you!"

Intimacy alert: Keefe holds on to Kelvin's hand and thigh.

Green is Kelvin's preferred color, but the Attico with the long green fringes was chosen deliberately to look like grass.  The guys are dead and buried.  Keefe has a symbolic death and resurrection in every season, but this is the first for Kelvin.  Maybe this is his final expiation, burning away the last of his guilt and shame over being gay.

The family stumbles out onto the loading dock.  Everyone else has scattered.  

Intimacy alert: Kelvin keeps his arm on Keefe's back to guide him out of the studio.  

Femme alert: look at Keefe.  Hour glass figure, large pearl necklace. past-shoulder length hair: with a different face, you would mistake him for a lady. This is the second time that he has dressed as a minister's wife. So, Mrs. Lincoln, other than that, how did you like the show?

Resolution 1: Uncle Peter. Uh-oh, one of the locusts has crashed into Peter's fitbit trigger, destroying it, so the van will blow up in one minute.  Run away!  

Peter jumps into the van and drives it to safety. 

Everyone gasps as they see the explosion.  He has sacrificed his life to save them, thus earning his redemption.  

Intimacy alert: Keefe now has his arm around Kelvin, a parallel to BJ with his arm around Judy. 

Left: Since some of the Gemstone kids are off to college in this episode, I'm including some college jock cocks.

More plot resolutions after the break

Gemstones Episode 3.9 : Baby Billy is bi, Peter plots revenge, and Kelvin and Keefe cuddle. With a Josh O'Connor bonus

Previous: Episode 3.8, Continued: Kelvin's tender bits, Chuck's butt, Peter's van, and coming out to the world

 Episode 3.9 seems rushed -- it could easily be three hours long.  The marital-problem and sibling-problem plots have been resolved, but we still have Uncle Peter, The Simkins, Dusty Daniels, and Bible Bonkers, and the writers have to find some way to tie them all together!

Title: "Wonders that Cannot be Fathomed, Miracles that Cannot be Counted." From Job 5,9, NIV.  Many terrible things have happened to Job, including physical ailments and the deaths of his children, but Eliphaz assures him that God can perform "wonders and miracles," and rescue him. We'll see what wonders and miracles God performs here.

Baby Billy is Bi:  Still trying to sell the siblings on his Bible Bonkers game show, Baby Billy (Walton Goggins, top photo), reveals he is friends with Dusty Daniels, the racing champ.  We cut to a scene of the two, plus famous actor Gene Hackman  (played by Kevin Murray) in Monte Carlo on New Years' Eve, 1999.  They're awaiting the Y2K bug, hugging, dancing, and dropping acid as if it's the end of the world.  

We cut to a bisexual after-party, with Dusty, Baby Billy, and Gene Hackman screwing and getting blow jobs, maybe from men, maybe from women -- hard to tell.  There's a male full frontal, but it morphs into a naked lady so fast that I can't get a screen shot, so I'll substitute Josh O'Connor's cock, left and below.

The theme song by Traci Lords is about finding a new love, or at least a new sex partner, implying that Baby Billy and Dusty Daniels are in this together:

You said you're lonely, you said you're blue

You lost your lover -- let me console you

If you surrender, you'll feel no pain

‘Cause I'm the master of this game

We zero in on the guys facing each other as they get blow jobs.  Baby Billy's partner is a woman, but Dusty's may be a man -- remember that he was established as bisexual back in Episode 3.2.

"Wait, " Jesse asks, "Did did you fuck Dusty Daniels?"

"I doubt it,  but you never know...we might have touched dicks. That's not the important part of the story."  The important part: he can talk Dusty Daniels into leaving his fortune to whoever wins at Bible Bonkers, the Gemstones or the Simpkins. 

So Kelvin came out to the family yesterday after years anguish, angst, self-doubt, backing-and-forthing, and annoyed viewers, and he still hasn't said the word.  Now Baby Billy comes out as bi with utter nonchalance.  Why couldn't he have said something to his nephew during Cousins' Night, or back in Season 1?

El Molino: We cut to a locust splatting on a windshield.  It's Uncle Peter and Chuck, driving the U-Haul full of explosives.  Peter has finally come up with a plan,  He doesn't specify what it is, but since it involves the Gemstones and explosives, it's not hard to figure out.  They're nearly out of gas, and the militia took all of their money, so they stop at El Molino, a real Hispanic supermarket with two locations in Charleston, to use the cash-counting machine.  

While Peter is inside, the U-Haul explodes!  He thinks that Chuck has been killed.

Out to the Family: The family gathers in Eli's parlor to watch a tv news report about Chuck's death.

Wait --when did the siblings stop hating their father?  Was a reconciliation moment cut?

 Notice that the guys are sitting on the right side of the room.  In four shots, Keefe moves from sitting a few inches away to leaning against the chair, his shoulder touching or almost touching Kelvin's thigh. They are so close that Kelvin can't move his hand or foot without bumping into him.

  They used to be very careful to avoid public displays of affection, holding hands under the table and forehead-pressing instead of kissing.  Now they casually cuddle in front of everyone, even family members who did not see the kiss.

They discuss the Bible Bonkers Family Feud-style game show.  The siblings will compete, but they need two more.  They were going to ask Chuck, a big Bible nerd, but he's dead, so it will have to be Karl and May-May.  

More Bible Bonkers after the break

Gemstones Episode 3.8, Continued: Kelvin's tender bits, Peter's van, Chuck's butt, and coming out to the world.

Previous: Episode 3.8: Is Peter a woman?  Are Kelvin and Keefe lovers?  Does Jesse dye his sideburns?

More Militia Squabbles: Under the highway overpass, the militia men get more chicken, this time from Fancy Nancy's, but the portions are still too small.  Plus they've accomplished none of their goals due to Peter's mismanagement.  Instead of Brotherhood of Tomorrow's Fires, referring to an Apocalypse that isn't happening, they're going to call themselves the Keepers of Yesterday's Monuments, to key into their interest in (Confederate) monuments.  

They kick Uncle Peter and Chuck out of the group, taking all of their money, but letting them keep the truck full of explosives.  

Top photo: The tender bits of Steve Zahn, who plays Uncle Peter.

Left: The tender bits of Lukas Haas, who plays Chuck Montgomery. 

Hating on Eli:  In the Executive Board Room, the siblings speak to Eli only through Baby Billy, expressing anger that he refused to pay the ransom.  

Judy: "You left us to die! Uncle Peter would have killed any one of us, or all three, or he'd just mutilate us and send you our body parts."

Kelvin specifies: "Nipples, penis, butthole shavings -- all our tender bits."  Interesting --the three body parts he finds erotic. We can also divide it up by sibling: Judy's nipples, Jesse's penis, Kelvin's butthole.  We all know that Kelvin is a bottom, so he's concerned about that.

Left: The tender bits of Adam Devine

Jesse states that he's always known that Eli doesn't love him, but he figured that it was all about the church.  But he was wrong -- it's all about the money.

Eli protests: it's not about the money.  It's always been about his children.  

Hah!  They're not buying it. 

Suddenly Eli is happy because the siblings are working together, cooperating, not competing.  If it takes hating on him for them to work as a team, fine.   

Showtime:  The Sunday of the siblings' return to the church.  Crowds waiting to greet them.  A woman holds a sign: "The Gemstone 3 -- we missed you."  The ticket booth announces: "The return of the Gemstone children -- praise be!"  At the ministers' meeting earlier in the season, the siblings tried the "We Three and Thee" catchphrase, with disastrous results.  Now the congregation is embracing The Three. 

In the hallway outside their dressing rooms, the siblings say goodbye to their partners.  Jesse/Amber and BJ/Judy kiss.  Keefe moves in for a kiss, but Kelvin blocks him with a forehead press.  Keefe looks very amorous, as if still caught up in the afterglow from whatever they did last night.  Kelvin looks apologetic: "Sorry, dude, not in front of my family and the gossipy church staff."  

This scene received a lot of misdirection in the trailers.  First you didn't see who Kelvin was saying goodbye to, so you would think it might be Taryn.  Then the lighting makes a square white patch appear on Keefe's face, as if he was injured during the rescue attempt.

Jesse signals "Showtime!", and the siblings join him to walk down the hall to the stage.  Amber at the other end of the hallway, waiting for the partners to join her in the sanctuary. Keefe and BJ stand there, watching.

Suddenly Kelvin backs up, then turns around and walks quickly back to Keefe.  What's going on?  He's holding his dressing room key -- maybe he forgot something?  He wraps his arm around Kelvin's shoulders, slams him forcefully against the wall, and kisses him.  We cut to BJ grinning, and Judy grabbing at Jesse's arm in surprise. 

 In the second take, or maybe a second kiss, the dressing room key is gone, and Kelvin has moved his hand to Keefe's face. 

They break, and Kelvin walks back to the siblings, grinning, pleased with himself.  Keefe looks proud of him, too.   Jesse and Judy give him congratulatory grins.  He adjusts his glasses, as if to say "Well, that's that."  

More after the break