The Nerdery Movie Night #268: The Blackening and Rosemary Garlic Popcorn

Rosemary Garlic Popcorn

Dave: What The Blackening lacked in original plot it made up for in one-liners and hilarious social commentary. The tired, albeit creepy plot twist was hard not to see coming and the villains were straight out of older B-rated horror films. The humor buoyed the otherwise stilted and hackneyed script, and the villain being a Trumper definitely got a laugh in our house. (️️️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

We’ve done homemade popcorn so often for the past ten years (ten years!?) that we might have forgotten the salty, fatty deliciousness that is commercially made popcorn. These bricks of popcorn were courtesy our brother-in-law, and while the rosemary one was cooking, we both said multiple times: “wow, that really smells like rosemary!” Even if there were also probably a few unwanted chemicals to boot,  these pre-made popcorn packets were pretty good, all things considered. (️️️️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

Joe: Everyone knows the trope: in a horror film, the Black character seems to always die early in the plot. So what if the entire cast is Black? I appreciated this set-up: it's clever, and the film does a fine job of capitalizing on the "Who bites it first?" conceit. Folding in the insidious board game was a nice twist, too. Unfortunately, it's pretty clear early on who the killer is, which strips the movie of a lot of tension. Still, it's a pretty damn funny movie, ripe with one-liners that hit well and plenty of Missy Misdemeanor in the soundtrack. A solid comedy, a less successful horror film. (⭐️⭐️⭐️)

We cheated a bit this week. Our brother-in-law sent us a gift pack of "prepared" popcorn, and though it bucks against our mission of making popcorn, I was far too tired to actually whip up anything that required more than a brain cell or two. Although I popped the "rosemary garlic" flavor, it yielded far too little for our appetites. I popped the "butter" flavor and added it to the mix. Frankly, the butter flavor was tasty. The rosemary garlic? Not so much. It had a slightly metallic taste with a heavy leaning toward the "rosemary". I'll split the difference. (⭐️⭐️⭐️)

Popcorn: Cheerie Lane (way overpriced, now that I see the price point)

The Blackening on IMDb