In every edgy modern movie and TV show ever

Someone snorts a huge line of ketamine believing it to be cocaine.

Split-second, grainy black-and-white flashback sequences.

One of those excruciating 'dramatic' covers of a famous pop song, a la the Gary Jules version of "Mad World."

Someone singing/saying a menacing version of a nursery rhyme.

Close up of a guy's face as he furiously masturbates.

the onion had a good one

https://theonion.com/cool-glitch-effect-on-movie-studio-logo-must-mean-shit-1825294743/

Huge reverby drums getting faster and faster in the trailer syncing with cuts from scene to scene until there is no time between each drum.

This was hard to describe in words, hope people know what I mean.

two people have a conversation while driving and suddenly they get t-boned by a car in slow motion

bland featureless "hot" people who, per credits, are mostly nepo babies.

Slowed down cover version or remix of a Classic Pop/Rock song

Oops, missed Crypto's post.

Earbleed

Giancarlo Esposito

Cold open followed by an elaborate title sequence showing abstract images of ticking timepieces, wire-frame map renders of cities rising and falling, a close up of a fetus floating in glowing amniotic fluid, and/or detached robotic arms silently constructing a representation of the main character

Bathing suit-area nudity from all sexes.

cryptic flashbacks triggered by innocuous items related to the protagonist's yet-unrevealed past trauma. the protagonist is often brought back to the present when an ally asks 'hey, you okay?'

A Restomoded vintage car

dumbass decontextualized pseudo-tautologies halfway up the rung of abstraction, gravelly intoned or displayed one line at a time during a strobing action sequence

in life we make choices
... but some choices make lives

true love is a life beyond death
and the dead can love beyond life

in theaters this may

Been trying for a month to get through the first season of Euphoria, where they're probably all collected in one place.

Instead of popular old music, they use a bunch of obscure tracks licensed from Numero Group, Light In The Attic etc.

A scene where someone's face gets splatters with blood, either from an exploding head or because they have to dismember a body

Been trying for a month to get through the first season of _Euphoria_, where they're probably all collected in one place.

you don’t HAVE to watch something you don’t like

None of the episodes are the same length, with a handful that are practically movie-length.

"one day previously..."

hero has a prescription drug/alcohol problem

bisexual villain

Parental character (who isn't an actual parent) with a weed farm. Gives advice similar to what remy was describing upthread

Neon lit nightclub with gangster and his posse surrounded by scantily clad women drinking champagne.

And protagonist drinking neat whisky in a strip bar recounting his woes to hard bitten but soft hearted stripper.

Gratuitous full frontal *male* nudity, for a change.

you don’t HAVE to watch something you don’t like

There's someone from network standing over me, forcing me to watch...The Sunken Cost Fallacy: if you don't bail early enough, you plow through.

every actor does the annoying loud quick inhale before each dramatic line read

A scene where someone picks their child up from school/daycare right after doing something utterly horrible or horrifying.

criminals talk openly in a Denny's about their crime plans

cold open where key character seemingly dies/gets murdered

Car accident, someone escapes from the trunk

dog latin re credits

WestWorld: ...Where nothing can possibly go worng!

Game of Wheel of Time of Dragons of the Crown of etc.

Character walks away from a massive fireball explosion without flinching or looking back.

indecipherable British accents

sex between two enemies who wake up the next morning battling each other

Mumbled dialogue

Poorly mixed dialogue

Villain to hero: "You and me? We're the same."

Philosophical villain who, despite their thoughtful nature, explains why they can't prevent or curtail an act of violence, torture, murder etc which they are perpetrating.

Directed by Noah Hawley

Frequent flashbacks to teen versions of the main characters, leading you to pause the show and ask "Who is that supposed to be?"

bookmarkflaglink (Darin) at 7:50 20 Jan 26

indecipherable British accents

indecipherable American accents

Slowed down cover version or remix of a Classic Pop/Rock song

― Lithium Just Madison (C. Grisso/McCain), Tuesday, January 20, 2026 2:00 AM (three months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Huge reverby drums getting faster and faster in the trailer syncing with cuts from scene to scene until there is no time between each drum.

― LocalGarda, Tuesday, January 20, 2026 12:34 AM (three months ago) bookmarkflaglink

... and also, a combination of these two, mostly in trailers. A single phrase from a well-known pop song (e.g. "another overload" from Wichita Lineman) gets filtered and repeated ad infinitum into abstraction, over some absurdly melodramatic drums

it's everywhere and v annoying imo

Philosophical villain who, despite their thoughtful nature, explains why they can't prevent or curtail an act of violence, torture, murder etc which they are perpetrating.

― Halfway there but for you, Sunday, May 17, 2026 7:45 PM (yesterday)

maybe the real villains are neoliberal politicians
makes you think

a complete and utter lack of convincing middle class american aesthetics. either “dirty” working-class realism, or bland, mostly monochromatic tacky set-dressed affluence. the newest malcolm in the middle made this really apparent

this does sound like a you problem
― sonic catterdales (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Sunday, May 17, 2026 11:39 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Was thinking specifically of this, tbh. Curious as to what the American equivalent of these characters are.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6p0W4ZsLXw

"She's a doting grandmother... Does regular readings at the local church... Runs a free petting zoo for disadvantaged kids... Oh yeah, and she just happens to be the biggest heroin supplier in the South West."

a complete and utter lack of convincing middle class american aesthetics. either “dirty” working-class realism, or bland, mostly monochromatic tacky set-dressed affluence. the newest malcolm in the middle made this really apparent

― the notorious r.e.m. (soda), Monday, May 18, 2026 6:38 AM (three hours ago)

wait is there an american middle class? genuine question, i'm a little out of touch and i just assumed it'd vanished

is malcolm in the middle edgy now?

this wasn’t a deep observation, and you could poke holes in it like a colander.

all i meant was that i’m perceiving in prestige media that there’s very little middle-classness

bob’s burgers, albeit not an edgy movie, is probably one of the exceptions that proves the rule

"visionary" director but everything that happens is repeated in dialogue so you don't need to move your eyes away from your phone

"visionary" director but everything that happens is repeated in dialogue so you don't need to move your eyes away from your phone

― adam t (dat), Wednesday, May 20, 2026 3:23 AM (thirty-one minutes ago)

ok this is an interesting topic to me, movies that also work just fine when engaged with as "radio dramas"

Is she going crazy? Is she possessed? Or is this a reflection of societal norms and expectations of ourselves therein?

Edgy modern movies like rosemarys baby and the turn of the screw

Was thinking specifically of this, tbh. Curious as to what the American equivalent of these characters are.

Doesn't answer your question, but related.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtNVT7JU_N4

Was thinking specifically of this, tbh.

It's cool. We have captions now to fix all the funny talking Brits. #lazyforever

(xp) Try having a Glaswegian accent in the south east of England.

I will admit that as a foreigner w/ no previous exposure to it I used to struggle hard with Limmy but after enough hours of watching him watch Cilla Black shows I no longer have this problem. Exposure is everything.

was specifically thinking of youtube clips of the limmy show, comments are always full of Americans saying they can't understand what he's saying, always want to reply "and I can't understand why you thought that was worth typing out and posting"

Limmy is so great at both American and English accents as well!

steam rising from a drain underneath the overhead railroad tracks, stray cat knocks over trash can lid

Bad things happen in alley in Manhattan even though there are no alleys in Manhattan

https://medium.com/@wcathy942/the-most-filmed-alley-in-nyc-never-heard-of-it-e3f93b472d5d

also art deco era dive bar with neon signage that somehow survives ungentrified to present day. Perhaps the sign has a letter out or blinking that changes the meaning to something ominous.

To be fair, that kind of British gangster dialogue was a joke even back in the day in Britain itself, viz The Fast Show's It's a Right Royal Cockney Barrel of Monkeys:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bb_Pfgu-wg

You know, I was going to say something about how Andie McDowell was dubbed in Greystoke. But I got frustrated because I have to Google her name so that I can spell it correctly. Every single fucking time I write down Andie McDowell's name I have to Google it, so that I can spell it correctly. It's one of those tricky names that's conceptually simple, but it can be spelled in a multitude of ways. McDowell. MacDowell. Literally two ways. And I always pick the wrong one, because even though I hop, I never got off the ground.

Joyless, uninteresting, fact: Andie MacDowell's middle name is Anderson. That's where Andie comes from. She isn't actually called Andrew.

So, if she ever married Gillian Anderson, and took her surname, she could conceivably call herself Rosalie Anderson Anderson. I learn from the internet that Andie MacDowell was born in 1958, and that she's ten years older than Gillian Anderson, who was born in 1968. So, if they did get married, Andie MacDowell could pretend to be Gillian Anderson's mother, and they could have tea together, and then they could pretend that Gillian had done something naughty, and then there would be spanking, and then tea again. Sometimes I am thankful that I don't write this stuff down. I only think it. In my mind. It doesn't leave my mind.

Thank God. What was the other thing? Andie MacDowell in Greystoke. I was going to illustrate how she was dubbed by embedding a video clip. But seemingly ninety per cent of her screen time is just reaction shots. She barely says anything. Apparently the problem wasn't that she had a US accent - the United States existed in 1912, when the film is set - but that it was a southern US accent. The producers were worried she might come across as rustic. Not so much in the UK, although we can detect differences between US accents, but because this was the 1980s, and Greystoke was one of those big prestige productions that was supposed to crack the US market, like The Mission and Revolution.

So, if she ever married Gillian Anderson, and took her surname, she could conceivably call herself Rosalie Anderson Anderson. I learn from the internet that Andie MacDowell was born in 1958, and that she's ten years older than Gillian Anderson, who was born in 1968. So, if they did get married, Andie MacDowell could pretend to be Gillian Anderson's mother, and they could have tea together, and then they could pretend that Gillian had done something naughty, and then there would be spanking, and then tea again. Sometimes I am thankful that I don't write this stuff down. I only think it. In my mind. It doesn't leave my mind.

― Ashley Pomeroy, Wednesday, May 20, 2026 11:22 AM (yesterday)

to my knowledge neither anderson nor macdowell were ever in the silver sisterhood of donegal, sorry to disappoint