Jordan Peele's 'Us': Our Third & Final Spoiler Discussion Including Your Observations in Listener Mail

On the March 29, 2019 episode of /Film Daily, /Film editor in chief Peter Sciretta is joined by /Film senior writer Ben Pearson and writers Hoai-Tran Bui and Chris Evangelista to have our final discussion about Jordan Peele’s Us spoilers, including getting to all your emails in the Mail Bag. You can subscribe to /Film Daily on iTunes , Google Podcasts , Overcast , Spotify and all the popular podcast apps (here is the RSS URL if you need it). Opening Banter: Reminder that Ben and Peter will be at CinemaCon in Las Vegas next week. Listen to the previous discussions: Jordan Peele's 'Us' Spoiler Discussion Jordan Peele’s ‘Us’ Spoiler Discussion Part 2 In Our Feature Presentation: We continue with our third and final installment of our Jordan Peele Us spoiler discussion. HT gives her spoiler-filled interpretation of Us. What Chris learned from Jordan Peele’s Empire interview . "This movie is sort of a Dark Easter; it is a rising of a messiah after a metaphorical death of sorts." Jordan Peele also says the official underworld/underground name is "the underpass" he also stresses that the big explanation red gives about where the tethered came from might not actually be true, but just something she believes, which is something i said on the other show, so now i feel smart Ben gives any new observations. Mentions Jen Yamato’s LA Times piece on Peele: Peele says “Us” was inspired by the division and xenophobia he observed in post-election America and the notion that “the feeling that we all feel we are the good guy in our own story prevents us from facing our demons.” “As far as the location where they come from, which is called the Underpass, I don’t tell you how large and how expansive it is — and in my mind it is quite large and expansive,” “I won’t give the borders, but there are … means down there.” “The realization that our villains in this are a cult, are fanatics, and violent fanatics who are on a day to day level engaged in sort of unimaginably crazy-seeming behavior was about the realization that you could say the same about the other world — about us,” said Peele. “That we as Americans, as the United States, we are fanatics as well, and we are violent.” In The Mailbag: Brian T writes in “Something I noticed on a Reddit thread that I felt was a brilliant observation (but didn’t hear come up in the podcast) was the symbolism of the extended video for “Thriller.” The “Thriller” music video plot kicks off with the dead rising from underground and attacking MJ and his date. In the end, MJ and her date think they’re safe but we get a look right at the camera with a creepy smile from MJ revealing he’s secretly one of the monsters – much like what we get from Adelaide. You mentioned the single glove piece, but not the overall plot synchronization with the “Thriller” video, which I believe is an added layer of symbolism above and beyond just the MJ costume matching. The doppelgängers bore the scars from the actions of the people up above them. This refers to the way we pass down our problems from the upper-class to lower-classes, such as with climate changing mostly impacting poorer communities while richer people can afford to avoid the climate impacts of it – even though it’s something they are causing to get worse., the burns on the little boy doppelgänger, are because of him mirroring the “our world” version of him playing with that lighter toy on his finger. Because the doppelgängers have shoddy imitations of what the above-world has, he was playing with matches up close to his face. The lighter didn’t work but the matches did, sonhis face got burned and he couldn’t help it. Elisabeth Moss’s doppelgänger character had a similar effect where she had cuts on her face as a shoddy version of the plastic surgery that “above” Elisabeth Moss bragged about to Adelaide. Amazing, right? I wish I could remember how I found the thread so I could give them credit.” Casey N from Utah writes in “Hi, I'm a HUGE fan of the podcast. I have a clarification about the theory of Jason actually being tethered. I don't necessarily subscribe to this theory, but there's an explanation that makes more sense than Jason and Pluto switching when he goes to the bathroom. The time of the switching happens the year before, the last time they were at the beach house. Gabe mentions offhandedly that Jason has been acting differently since his grandma died. The grandma's death doesn't necessarily have anything to do with it, but him acting strange could be an indication. If I remember correctly, Jason says the magic trick with the lighter was left at the house and he didn't have it for an entire year. I don't really have a good explanation about this, but it seems like something weird happened the year prior, and considering the layers upon layers of detail that Jordan Peele puts into this movie, it seems more than coincidence. There are some other things that we could retroactively fit into