Concerns From A Loyal Customer

I just want things to be the best they can be

It’s no secret that I’m a Regal Unlimited member. I’ve made that quite well-known. I pay $24/month to be able to access any Regal Cinemas around the country and watch unlimited movies—that’s no secret, and I’m quite proud of this. It’s a core tenet of what I offer to the world.

And so it is with all that in mind that I, a humble servant of the Regal Cinemas Corporation, would like to put forth some gentle, constructive criticism: I would like to nuke this off the face of the earth.

I get it: we had to one-up the cretins over at Team AMC with their Nicole Kidman thing. We had to try, at least. But did that mean we had to write, direct, and produce the dumbest fucking shit ever?

I hate this ad. I hate it so much. It is so WOATed it’s unbelievable. I love going to the movies, I love watching trailers before movies, and when the music kicks in for this dogshit, instead of getting excited that my third showing of Mission: Impossible is about to start, I contemplate diving for the exits from my perfectly chosen back-center seat. It makes me question why I’ve decided to set up direct deposit for my paltry grad school stipend to funnel straight to the Regal Cinemas subscription services. I feel an unspeakable anger, a furious itching sensation across my skin. The world stops for an eternity. When I looked this up on YouTube, I couldn’t believe it was only one minute long; in the moment, it feels like you’re trapped in someone you hate’s worst anxieties. Every line reading, somehow, get subsequently more infuriating the more times you watch it. Their faces linger in my memory, their choices haunt me, like when someone you thought you liked has bad breath. I will never be able to look at Danny Trejo the same way, and I generally had no opinions about him before becoming a Regal Unlimited member. If you try to follow the logic of the lines being delivered, as in, a normal conversation that flows with one thing affecting the next thing being said, a causal relationship that everyone in the world knows to be instinctually true, you will not be able to make sense of it. The concept probably made sense in theory, but it’s unbearably sad to imagine multiple highly paid people signing off on this after watching it. Even worse, too, knowing what they took from us, helpfully preserved by YouTube channel Mister Mr. Virgin. My heart also breaks for this collection of actors—who all fucking suck here—because sometimes you sign up for something and it’s so clearly going to piss off the majority of the American public, but you just can’t see it right away. All you see is the shiny possibility of saying, “As if!” from Clueless on camera. You don’t stop to think about the consequences of what you’ve done.

Here are my personal worst offenders. These are the specific actor/line delivery combos that make my skin crawl. They make me want to fucking die. They make me want to spend my money elsewhere, to vote with my dollars for someone else. If Vivek Ramaswamy promises to end this, I’ll take a flier on him. I don’t give a shit. Just stop these people.

“She’s beauty and she’s grace!” Lady

I don’t know if I can articulate why this one fucks me up so much. I think it’s the lady’s smug face. It just sucks so hard. It’s honestly something about the way her mouth moves while she says it. Like, off to one side. God it’s infuriating. Research reveals that this line is from Miss Congeniality, but I don’t even remember Benjamin Bratt saying it. That’s the worst part. All these apparently “Famous Movie Lines” and I can’t even place some of them.

“Hey, you GUUUUYs!” Lady

Obviously, this one is horrible. It’s Sloth from The Goonies, if I remember correctly, and it should stay that way. The way says “guys” is burned into my consciousness, stamped into its deepest recesses. When I think of the movie line now, I think of her, and not Sloth. The reproduction has overtaken the original…Walter Benjamin shaking…

“It’s not a man purse, it’s a satchel” and “So you’re telling me there’s a chance?” Guy

This fucker has the rare distinction of delivering two exceptionally cringeworthy line deliveries. I hate him (I’m sure he’s a nice guy). “So you’re telling me there’s a chance?” is the hinge point of this ad, the moment where it truly breaks free from all tethers of reality. It divorces itself—and thus the Regal Cinemas Corporation—from all preëxisting (New Yorker mode!) logic, and the viewer is forced to descend further into madness than previously thought possible. Sorry to this man, but he is destined for the hellfires of jahannam.

Danny “I know it was you, Fredo—you broke my heart” Trejo

I don’t mean to end this on a despairing note, but maybe, actually, I do. To combat the star wattage of erstwhile-movie-star-and-now-prestige-TV-miniseries-mainstay Nicole Kidman, Regal decided to reach deep in the bag and cut the check for…Danny Trejo. I don’t know what this portends for the ultimate financial future of my beloved corporation, but it can’t be good. There are probably so many people around the country watching this ad, daily, not knowing that there is at least one (1!) professional actor amidst this motley crew of turds. And it doesn’t help that he didn’t do himself any favors here. The way he delivers this line fucking sucks.

It all fucking sucks, man. Bring back the rollercoaster.

Ritam’s Footnote

I’m going to recreate these in my backyard