Patrick Fugit, the grown-up Almost Famous guy, is the first suggestion, though there are a handful of candidates; Missy Pyle, who plays the Nancy Grace type Ellen Abbott, is a that-lady in a lot of stuff; Boyd Holbrook is in the movie for one minute and has since transcended that-guy status, though seeing him here takes you back to when you would do meth with him.
The Nancy Grace lady wins one host over since he had no idea of her name; another had Kathleen Rose Perkins as Shauna Kelly, familiar from Episodes, Colony and You're the Worst, someone who should be a big comic actress and is great in her one minute; Casey Wilson is too famous as an SNL cast member.
The shock value of the big twist, which cannot be recaptured on rewatch; the internet outrage reaction to the movie; the brutality of the Desi murder; Neil Patrick Harris's performance; Wesley Morris's negative review; Bill Simmons saying Neil Patrick Harris was bad
The big twist has aged worst in one sense: in the theater, where a guy audibly went 'oh, shit', it was the best part if you had not read the book, and that shock cannot be recaptured on a tenth viewing, though you appreciate the details in a new way, like rereading Goblet of Fire knowing Voldemort rises from the cauldron, which is the whole point of the podcast; it belongs in both categories.
The internet reacting to the movie has aged badly: one of the first cases of people pulling other things into a piece of art and arguing outrage over it, as now with the new Tarantino movie, when to one host it is a movie about a crazy lady who framed her husband and came back; another counters that using criticism to understand society through art is reasonable and happens on this podcast, and it was the 'how dare you, this is irresponsible' tone that grated.
Gillian Flynn has engaged the criticism of the story's sexual politics and of Amy, as she did when the book came out; her boiled-down response is that women can be murderous and violent too, anyone can be a psycho, an inversion the hosts find compelling; neither Nick nor Amy is a good person, and Nick's cheating does not entitle her to frame him, kill Desi and frame him for rape, or bring a child into that household, the baby being perhaps the most fucked-up thing she does.
The Desi murder is brutal and has aged worst for one host from a rewatchability standpoint; in the book she drugs him with sleeping pills and kills him off the page with a knife grabbed in the kitchen rather than a box cutter, less premeditated and violent, and Patrick Fugit's line asking how she got her hands on a box cutter is relished.
Neil Patrick Harris sucks, capital S, for one host: a sitcom actor with no chemistry, out-acted in his scenes and not a Fincher actor, with the other How I Met Your Mother guy Josh Radner (as transcribed), Zach Braff or Tobey Maguire suggested instead; others argue the lack of chemistry is the point, that he evinces weak, privileged, waspy cornball well, and that Amy is supposed to outclass him.
Wesley Morris's Grantland review is nominated, with one host eager to make fun of him: brilliant, sophisticated criticism nominated for a National Magazine Award, with a bad opinion inside it, that the movie is not good; another plans to argue with him for an hour at Rembrandt's wedding after three drinks.
Nick's unshaven video-game swoon; Carrie Coon as the twin sister; the vigil selfie turning on Nick; the Nancy Grace character Ellen Abbott; the detective team of Kim Dickens and Patrick Fugit; the Mastermind board game and the other games; the Reznor and Ross spa-dread score; the meticulousness of Amy's plan; the side dick; Rosamund Pike's performance; the Twincest; Affleck's Mets hat; every small role perfectly cast; the twist
Affleck's unshaven video-game swoon has aged best for one host, a true-to-life moment that probably happened to him around 2006, bummed out in his living room with a laptop; Carrie Coon, in her first role, is believable as his twin, though ten years younger, and went on to star in The Leftovers.
The first gathering where the lady takes a selfie with them and then turns on them is really well done and has surely happened to Ben Affleck in real life; the Nancy Grace character Ellen Abbott and the detective team of Kim Dickens and grown-up Almost Famous star Patrick Fugit also hold up.
Fincher reportedly told press that the Mastermind board game Nick gives his sister was a red herring thrown in for his own amusement at critics scribbling it down; one host does not believe that for a second, arguing the games shown, Let's Make a Deal as they make their deal, Life with its meta line and a Ouija board as her talking from the dead, are all on purpose, and Mastermind is a game about entrapment and being smarter than your opponent; a confession of cheating at board games follows.
Fincher briefed Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (transcribed 'Tannicus') after a spa visit where music meant to relax him felt creepy, wanting passive music that instills dread, and the result feels like a spa where you might get stabbed in the aorta mid-massage; with Social Network it is an all-time two-for-two, Reznor's scores are argued to rival Nine Inch Nails in his legacy, with the ER episode that used Closer floated as his origin, and the Desi murder cue feels like it emanates from inside your chest, the hardest left turn the film takes.
The meticulousness of the plan has aged well, pouring wine on herself, untucking his shirt and knowing where every security camera is.
She disputes that: Amy's meticulous nature governs everything with Nick, plotted since she saw him with Andy in the snow replicating the lip wipe and sugar cloud from their own origin story, down to the 'kill self?' calendar entry, whereas the Desi material is purely reactive and instinctual, which is why she thinks the end of the movie does not work; Amy thought Desi would be another puppet, realized she was the prisoner in the dollhouse he built, and her way out is sloppy. — Mallory Rubin
The counter: she either went to Desi's knowing what she would do or decided once she lost her money, parked as an unanswerable question; Nick's woodshed line in the interview shows her he can keep up with her; anyone with eight weeks could fake a death, but she devised an instant exit without implicating herself, though she had already lost weight, cut and dyed her hair and built up rope marks on her wrists, so twenty-something days had passed.
One side holds that she got away with it only because the FBI agents should be jailed, not because she did a good job; the other sees an acid-dipped commentary from a female writer on believing women and survivors and the FBI's historical approach to trauma, something fraught and complicated inside an otherwise whirling thriller.
The side dick has aged best for one host, and nobody mentions that Desi's is visible too when she slides off him; Rosamund Pike's performance as Amy Dunn (as transcribed), which will live forever, is another host's answer to every category; the Twincest reference was followed by years of Twincest on Game of Thrones.
Affleck putting on a Mets hat in the airport, refusing the Yankees hat Fincher had in his head, has aged fantastically and the fight between them is great; the nitpick is that he should have worn a Cardinals hat given his Cardinals shirt, unless he bought it at the airport.
Also the musical score, awe-inspiring when it kicks in at Desi's murder; every single small role is perfectly cast, which everyone agrees has aged well; and the twist itself.
