Good Boy (2025)

Episode 506, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast

Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd. 

Craig: And I’m Craig. 

Todd: Well, this week we have decided to go with a pretty new movie, Craig’s choice. This is a dog of a film. Good Boy. Oh, was that bad? That was pretty bad. Sorry. This is Good Boy from 2025, last year, starring a dog. And I knew why you picked this from the very beginning.

You just wanted to see a dog for an hour and 15 minutes. 

Craig: Yep. 

Todd: And that’s basically what it is. We are looking up very, very up close and personal with a beautiful little dog named Indie. I believe this film premiered at South by Southwest, got a very good reception, went to theaters and stuff all over the world.

Eventually, I think it’s in streaming now. It was shot over the course of three years, I think about 400 days over the course of three years, just because the main actor, who’s a dog, wasn’t a trained dog. It was just the writer-director’s dog, but he insisted on using it because he liked its expressiveness.

It took a long time to shoot, but only cost about $70,000, and grossed to date, I think, over 8.7 million at the box office worldwide. Nice. So that’s pretty doggone good. Had you seen this before we watched it for this, uh, this, this episode? 

Craig: Yeah. I remember reading about this at some point before it came out, and I was…

You know, you’re right. I’m just, uh, I’m a dog person. I like dogs, and so I was just… The fact that it was, you know, about a dog was interesting to me. But what was more interesting was that it’s shot kind of… I don’t know. It’s not shot from the dog’s perspective. It’s not like POV most of the time. Right.

But the narrative is from the dog’s perspective, basically. I mean- Yeah … we’re riding along with the dog, and so I was, uh, intrigued by that. And so, yes, as soon as it became available to stream, I watched it, and I really liked it. And I talked to our friend Heather about it, and she saw it, and she liked it.

And I’ve had it on my list of movies for the podcast for a long time, but we’ve just never gotten around to it. And I, I just kind of picked it at random this week, and I’m interested to hear what you think of it. ‘Cause watching it again, the first time, all I really remember about it, you know, is, is kind of the basics of the plot and that it’s from the dog’s perspective, and that I liked it.

I remembered that. I didn’t remember a whole lot of the details, and watching it again, I kept wondering what your reaction to it would be- … ’cause though I know you are an animal lover in general, you’re not exactly a dog person. Like, and I wonder if you kind of have to be a… A- again, that’s why I prefaced it with I know you’re an animal lover in general.

You just tend to be more of, if, of a cat person, I guess if you, uh- Yeah. 

Todd: Yeah, if I have my choice, I’m more of a cat person. Right. And that’s purely selfish reasons. Like, uh, if I’m gonna have an animal, and I, I grew up with cats, so I’m a little biased that way too. Gosh, until we moved to China, I’ve always had a cat in the house or two from when I was a kid.

We had a cat named Taco who was a You know, lovely member of the family and had her own quirks, and then, you know, when I went off to college she passed away ’cause she was getting old and had a bacterial infection and that took her. And then, uh, yeah, later, you know, my parents got two other cats, and then when I got married, Vic and I had cats, and we had to give them away before we came to China.

I gave them away to my aunt. But I understand. You know, I’m an animal lover. I love animals, I love pets. But for me, selfishly, cats I can manage because cats don’t require a lot of attention. 

Craig: That’s right. 

Todd: And dogs require so much attention, they might as well be another child in the house. In fact, sometimes cats don’t want you to give them too much attention, and I kind of like that about them.

I like that they’re independent and- 

Craig: Yeah … 

Todd: you know, they’re, they’re quirky. 

Craig: They are independent and they’re… Yeah, and they’re far- They’re, like, they’re way more low-maintenance than dogs. Yeah. They’re just a lot… Uh, y- you know, I remember back in, you know, the days when I left the house, if you would need to leave for, like, a weekend or whatever, you could just leave a big huge bowl of food and a big huge bowl of water or, like, leave water in the bathtub or whatever, and cats are fine by themselves for a few days.

Dogs certainly not, which is one of, one of the only issues that I have with this movie. It’s about a dog, and he locks that dog up in the house and never takes it to the bathroom. 

Todd: That’s a very good point, right? We never see that. We never see him really taking him for a walk, to the bathroom, anything like that.

And 

Craig: that’s a, that’s a big, that’s a big part of your life if you have a dog in the house. Yeah. Like gotta be taking him to the bathroom on the regular. 

Todd: Managing some oth- some- something else or someone else’s pooping and peeing schedule all day long, that’s just a bridge too far for me. I had a kid. I have a kid, and thank God we’re past that phase where we have to do that.

He can go on his own now. It’s fantastic. 

Craig: Yeah. Yeah. 

Todd: And I figure… And I felt like as soon as, as soon as Kenji was potty trained, I’d almost felt like my, my work as a parent was half over. I don’t want to sound like a, a- You’ve 

Craig: given him the essentials. 

Todd: Yeah, that’s right. It’s, it’s important. The stuff that’s not gonna embarrass him on a first date.

Everything else, whatever. You know, I don’t want to sound like an i- like an, an asshole, but there’s little that is more off-putting… I shouldn’t say off-putting. Frustrating, not the right word either. Just kind of a bummer Whenever you’re hanging out with friends with dogs, at any given time they’re gonna chime in with, “Oh, you know what?

I gotta go ’cause I gotta take the dog out.” “Oh, this, this spontaneous thing that we came up s- with sounds like a lot of fun, but unfortunately we can’t do it because I gotta get home to the dog.” You know? You- y- that, that kind of thing is just such a part of a dog owner’s life that I just, I don’t… I can tell I couldn’t tolerate it.

It doesn’t, it doesn’t fit with my life, just like, uh, a lot of things don’t. Smoking- 

Craig: That’s one of the main reasons for having a dog is so that you can do that. 

Todd: Well, I, I can see where getting out of the situations is pretty, yeah, it’s pretty handy for that. Don’t, don’t get me wrong, having a kid works the same way.

Craig: Right. 

Todd: I’ve used that excuse many a time. But, uh, but it’s a real thing, you know? You’re, like you said, you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta do these things on a regular basis with the dog, which makes him more maintenance. But 

Craig: yeah. I get it, ’cause I was just gonna say you and I have, like, very different lifestyles.

Like, you’re always on the go. It would make a- a- and you live in the city, and it would make no sense really for you to have a dog. You’re not home enough. I’m home all the time, and so, like, I really appreciate the companionship, and it’s really nice to have a little creature that, like, loves you more than anything and just wants to be, like, super loyal to you.

Right. It’s, it’s, like, all the good parts of having a kid without all the bad parts. Like, I don’t know. I do still… My- I have to wipe my dog’s butt so- Yeah … I go even a step further than most dog owners. 

Todd: I 

Craig: see. So I, I, I get it, but I… That’s what I was saying. Like, I’m just curious if the movie hits the same way whether you’re, like, a dog lover or ambivalent about dogs.

Todd: I thought the concept was strong enough that I was entertained, and I was kind of glued to the screen to see how they were gonna pull it off. And I was also curious to see if the story would be a little different because it was from the dog’s perspective. I kind of wondered to a c- certain degree… I mean, to a certain degree we’re in this dog’s world, right?

Because we’re, we’re down to his level for most of it. 

Craig: Mm-hmm. 

Todd: This movie makes you highly aware that a dog’s life is really a lot of just standing around, nothingness, staring at nothing, being interested in tiny little things that happen because they’re not going to work, they’re not talking, they’re not watching TV, you know?

They’re, they’re just there in a place where there’s just not a lot going on for so much of the time. And so I wondered if it was gonna insert other things like, well, maybe the dog’s senses. Maybe it can hear better and, you know, we all know dogs can… Can’t they see, like, a different spectrum or is that not true?

I think 

Craig: so. 

Todd: So, you know, is, is that gonna be a part of it? Is this gonna truly be from the dog’s perspective? And in a way it was, and in a way it wasn’t. You know, it didn’t really go that far, which is fine. Honestly, when we did Wolf, they did that to a certain extent, and I thought that was fascinating. And we’ve seen other horror movies where you’ll get a, an animal’s perspective from time to time, and you’ll see through their eyes, and the different colors of the ultraviolet spectrum, or the heat sensing or something like that that they have, which adds flavor to the plot.

This plot didn’t need it, but also it made the movie a little boring, I thought. Pacing wise, I… A- And it was only an hour and 13 minutes, which thank you, by the way. We love short movies. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: But it was a long hour and 13 minutes. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: And that’s really because it is a lot of creepy atmosphere and not too much else for most of the running time.

Long, long shots of the dog staring at something, and so I don’t know if I would watch this a second time. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: But I actually did enjoy it the first time through, and by the end of it, I felt like the story was rather simple. 

Craig: Mm-hmm. 

Todd: And that’s, that’s okay. It’s fine that it’s that simple, but it felt a little long and slow for me.

I don’t always need an action-packed thing. I’m not, I’m not that guy, right? And I was in the mood enough to have the patience for it tonight, so I enjoyed watching the movie. I think Todd, in an- on another day, might have been checking his watch an awful lot during this. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: So depends on what mood you’re in, I guess, is what I’m saying.

Craig: Yeah. I, I, I totally get that, and you’re right. I mean, it, it feels like a solid hour and a half. It, it feels like a feature length. It, it doesn’t fly by. Um, and, and all the things that you said are correct. You know, because we’re, we’re really just with this dog and his owner for the vast majority of the movie.

Like, there’s a few other people, actors that pop in occasionally, but it’s mostly just the dog and his owner, whose face we almost never see- 

Todd: Yeah … 

Craig: throughout the whole film. I mean, it, it’s, it’s very… A- And the other adult people, we… I don’t recall if we ever see any of their faces, at least not before the end.

They’re either voices on telephones, or they’re… There’s the guy in the woods who’s, like, wearing a camouflage mask thing. Like, it’s very focused on the dog, and you’re right. Like, dogs don’t talk, so they can’t tell us what they’re thinking or feeling, and they’re also limited in what they can do. Like, you said that it just shows that dogs sit around and stare at nothing a lot.

Well, I think that that’s true. But I also think that it shows that they are observant and curious because – 

Todd: They have no choice? 

Craig: I mean, maybe it’s… It- Well, I was gonna say, maybe it’s by nature, but what else is there to do? 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: But, but I, I, I also j- I, I thought that that was- An interesting perspective, ’cause there were times when, like, the dog would see something sus, and I’d be like, “Don’t go in there.

Don’t go in there.” But I’m like, he’s a dog. He’s just curious. Um- Yeah, he’s gonna go in there … my dog’s a big scaredy-cat, I don’t think would ever do anything like that, but, but, but that, that perspective interested me, and I did not mind for one second watching that dog because it’s just the, like, the cutest- 

Todd: It is

Craig: dog. 

Todd: Yeah. It’s a very pleasant dog to watch. It really, really is. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: And you can tell, like, to be honest, the dog has one expression. 

Craig: Kind of. 

Todd: But they’re using music, and they’re using, you know, editing techniques and things that we, we all know. You know, you can say, you can show the same shot of a person staring off into space.

It’s what follows the shot or what comes before the shot that reads your interpretation of what they’re thinking, right? 

Craig: Right. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. Are they looking at a sandwich, or are they looking at a bomb? You could read the same thing off of someone’s face just by the mise en scene. You know, it’s, I think it’s what they call in French.

So yeah, y- I mean, ultimately you are watching this dog doing kind of the same expression, going around to things. And, and again, uh, probably this is also part of the filming, but maybe it could be argued that this is also part of looking at things from a dog’s perspective. The dog seems surprisingly not as rattled by some of the things that you would think, well, would certainly rattle a human.

Craig: Right. 

Todd: And I thought about that, and I thought, “Well, yeah, that kinda makes sense, though,” right? Because the dog doesn’t understand the world, so, you know, it doesn’t… No dog really knows all the rules of the human world and knows what should be amazing and what shouldn’t be. 

Craig: Uh-huh. 

Todd: If it saw a baby fly through the air, a human would be like, “Holy shit, why is that baby flying through the air?”

A dog might just be like, “Oh, I never saw that before. I guess babies fly through the air.” 

Craig: Right. 

Todd: There was that aspect, too, that, uh, as I was watching, I thought, “Oh, that’s, that’s actually kinda cool that we’re in this horror scene. There’s a dark, strange figure.” And instead of your typical horror movie where the protagonist is running away or hiding or screaming at their friends, it’s a dog who is going to be more apt to, depending on how it feels, bark at it as it’s, as though it’s a danger or, like, just investigate further.

And this dog is more of the investigative type, it seems, for a lot of stuff. And so that perspective was kinda nice, too, ’cause it allows us to linger, and it’s like, “What is that dark… What is it? Is it… It’s coming closer. What’s it gonna be?” You know, that kinda thing would, that often the camera’s gonna cut away before we get to, to figure that out.

And unfortunately, that wasn’t played with to the degree I thought it could’ve been played with. But yeah, I mean, it’s a solid… It’s a, it’s a very typical kind of ghost story about a haunted house, and it’s so simple- 

Craig: Yeah … 

Todd: that I wondered if I was missing something. I, I was very confused for a lot of it, to be honest with you.

How about you? 

Craig: There are things that are confusing about it, I think. I, I mean, but even the things that are confusing about it, some of the choices that make it confusing, I actually liked because I thought that they were unique and creative. I thought that it was creative that w- we’ll be seeing a scene with the dog in the same perspective as we have, but then the dog will wake up.

So apparently- It’s dreaming … we are privy to the dog’s dreams. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: The first time it happened, again, I’d seen it before but I, I re-watched it last night and Alan watched it with me, and I, I said, “Wait, was that a dream? Was that a dog dream?” Hmm. 

Todd: I had the same feeling. 

Craig: And then also, then later the dog, like, starts having visions, I, I think.

Right. And we’re privy to those also. A- and it was kind of confusing, but I also found it spooky and suspenseful and interesting. But y- I suppose that you’re right. To a degree it is a typical haunted house story. This guy, Todd, he’s moving into his late grandfather’s cabin, like, out in the woods because I think he’s really sick.

Did they ever say specifically in the movie what his illness was? 

Todd: No, 

Craig: they didn’t. I mean, it, it could’ve been… I mean, he’s coughing up blood and he’s in really bad shape, so. Could’ve 

Todd: been lung cancer. We’re not 

Craig: sure. He… Something- That was my guess … yeah, something like that … ‘

Todd: cause I think cancer’s referenced at some point, but- 

Craig: He’s really, really sick and at one point he leaves for a whole day, and when he comes back he’s got a bandage on his arm that looks like it was a port So I wondered if that was maybe chemo.

God. Um, like maybe, I- 

Todd: Right 

Craig: I don’t know. 

Todd: Doesn’t he come up from the basement or something too, just before that scene where we see the 

Craig: bandage? Well, he comes home. He, it, the dog is upstairs, so yeah, he’s coming up the stairs, but he’s been gone that whole day. 

Todd: I kid you not, I wondered at that point if he was on drugs.

Not that that was his whole problem, but that he was abusing drugs in order to deal with his illness or something, you know? 

Craig: Well, I think it’s… I don’t know. I, I suspect that it’s intentionally ambiguous. 

Todd: Yeah, I think so too. 

Craig: That makes a lot of sense because of course a dog would have no idea what’s going on.

Now, his, he would just, the dog would just notice s- strange behavior. They wouldn’t know necessarily that the person was sick, except for the fact that Todd’s sister, Vera, who we only hear over the phone until the, like, last few seconds of the movie, she’s worried about him for a couple of reasons, but one of those is she’s worried about his health.

She asks if Indy has been acting weird at all because she has read that dogs can detect, uh, in fact, early detect disease like cancer and stuff like that. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: So she’s worried about his health. So there’s obviously something wrong with him, but she’s also worried because their grandfather died in that house alone.

He also had a dog that we find out later went missing when he died, and I guess he was also sick and maybe kind of crazy. And so she is worried about him being in that house. I don’t know if she initially says that she’s worried that it might be haunted, but that’s kind of what seems to be implied. 

Todd: Yeah.

Was the uncle a fan of horror movies or was he a producer of horror films? 

Craig: I think he was just a fan because- Okay Todd says he finds a whole bunch of old videotapes, and some of them are just, like, self-recorded things, like the grandpa just talking into a camera. The grandpa, by the way, was the only actor I recognized.

His name’s Larry Fessenden. I recognized his picture on IMDb, and I looked him up, and he’s been in small roles in lots of things that you’ve probably seen. I couldn’t name one, but- … lots of things. 

Todd: He’s one of those guys. Yeah. 

Craig: Right. One of those guys. Some of them are those self-tape things, and the rest of them are just old horror movies, like either black and white, or he watches them on a black and white TV.

I… ‘Cause it’s always black and white. And then those horror movies are just kind of on in the background for most of the rest of the time. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: I- which I thought was kind of atmospheric and cool. But the stuff that the grandpa says on the tapes gets progressively weird, and weird stuff is happening around the house from the very beginning.

Yeah. I mean, Indy starts noticing weird stuff around the house from the beginning, and it seems like kind of typical haunting, and we should continue to explain, you know, what’s happening. But ultimately, I question the nature of the haunting. 

Todd: Right. 

Craig: So I wanna talk about that eventually. But yeah, initially it seems pretty typical, right?

Todd: Yeah, and, and I agree with you. I question the nature of the haunting, too. I think, I’m just gonna say this now, I think there could be an interpretation here that the house isn’t haunted, that all of this is just in the mind of the dog Ultimately. You already mentioned their neighbor who, oh, you know, when they went out and about warned them of f- fox traps- 

Craig: Right

Todd: that he had set up in the area. This is something that I thought was gonna be significant and really wasn’t, I don’t think, unless I’m mistaken. 

Craig: Well, I think the dog gets caught in one later. 

Todd: He… Oh, you’re right, he does. I- oh, was that what that was? Okay. Oh, now that makes sense. I think it’s around the same time that we hear over the phone about the previous owner’s dog missing that our dog is every now and then seeing glowing animal eyes, and you know animal eyes glow.

Mm-hmm. It could really be anything. Could be a fricking raccoon. 

Craig: Right. 

Todd: But I feel like because we’re starting to see these glowing animal eyes, I’m being led to believe that maybe there is a ghost dog out there somewhere. 

Craig: Uh-huh. 

Todd: And so that was something that I thought about, but then there’s a point later on in the movie where he sees these eyes and a fox comes running out, and I thought, “Oh, maybe this was just a fox the whole time,” ’cause, you know, it had been set up they were foxes in the area.

Craig: Right. 

Todd: It was interesting. You know, it’s, it’s like the movie does a lot of making dread and terror about something that could totally be explained away, like, that very moment, like the glowing animal eyes in the woods. 

Craig: Sure. 

Todd: There’s a lot of that happening when they go out to the woods and when they go around.

Craig: Well, and in the house, the dog is, like, seeing… And it’s really subtle. In fact, if you’re gonna watch this movie, I really recommend that you watch it in a dark room- Yeah … because some of these spooky things- They’re 

Todd: shadows … 

Craig: like, the dog just kind of sees… Yeah, the dog sees an odd shadow in the corner. 

Todd: Hmm.

Craig: And if you’re watching it in a bright room, it’s very difficult to tell what you’re supposed to be seeing. 

Todd: There’s a lot of this, and there… and a shadow will… a dark figure kind of shadow will appear behind the dog. 

Craig: Like a, a dark silhouette just kind of in the background. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. 

Craig: Sometimes blink and you miss it, but there’s definitely something spooky going on.

The dog is definitely… I, you know, I don’t know about, I don’t know about the eyes because though, yes, we do later see a fox and, and you’re right, in the wild, animals’ eyes glow like that when they reflect light. But you also said we also think, wonder is there, like, a ghost dog. Well, is there? Because- 

Todd: There could 

Craig: be

because I, I said the dog dreams at one point, and I d- it’s a scary dream. Like, it’s having nightmares. It’s having nightmares of, like, weird ghostly hands grabbing at it and stuff. But then there’s another part where this may be the part where the guy leaves and the dog’s home by himself all day and night and never goes out to the bathroom.

But it, it’s like sitting, looking out the window for the guy, I think, and out of the corner of its eye and, and we kind of see it out of the corner of ours as well. It seems like another dog runs past- Yes … uh, an entryway or something. Mm-hmm. And it almost looked like the same dog. Like, I, I- It did … I was like, “Is it, is it seeing itself?”

I was, I was confused. 

Todd: Me too. 

Craig: I guess he follows, uh, the dog or what he thought he saw up the stairs and kind of looks around and, and I don’t remember if he hears something, but he, or smells something. But he’s drawn under a particular bureau and, and, and pokes his nose under there, and sees or finds a bandana like the other dog was wearing around its neck.

Indy starts to reach for it, but like right before he gets to it, he has like a vision. 

Todd: Yes. I didn’t get this at all. 

Craig: And the vision, I don’t remember exactly what happens. I didn’t take notes. But it’s a violent vision with, I think the dog ends up dead. 

Todd: Yeah, and- 

Craig: Yeah, like maybe the dog rearing up against something.

Todd: But then there’s like a human in it as well. There’s like a, a hand That I thought was gripping the bandana, just the bandana, and did the dog disappear or something? And the bandana falls from that hand, but it’s not just a dry bandana, it’s like a bloody mess. 

Craig: It’s soaked in blood, yeah. Yeah. And the dog is scared and runs out.

Todd: Right. 

Craig: I don’t remember at which point it was. There was a point in the movie, because in addition to all these other things, scary things that are happening, Todd is getting worse. And not only is he getting more sick, but I… Again, it’s ambiguous. My interpretation is that his illness is making him lash out.

Todd: Yes, I think so. 

Craig: But I, I think that you could also interpret maybe that he’s being haunted or influenced or possessed supernaturally. Like, the influence… See, here’s the thing. Is the house making him sick, or is it just a coincidence that his grandfather also died of a sickness and people thought he was crazy in the house?

Todd: I think there’s a third interpretation. There’s more probably. But I think the genius of this movie is that it is so ambiguous. I think that’s actually what makes this movie work, that we’re never very clear on what’s going on. And I think because it’s being told from the perspective of this dog, it’s only more confusing because everything’s a little muddied by the confusion of this animal and its reactions.

Craig: Mm-hmm. 

Todd: These visions that the animal is having, and I don’t know if the, if the movie could also be positing that just animals have visions and daydreams and psychoses like we do as humans as well. And at the end of the day, I did kind of wonder if this muddy spirit was just a sort of personification of death coming for him.

Craig: Right. 

Todd: Just like it came for his grandfather. It’s not really about the house It’s not like it lives in the house or haunts the house, it just haunts the person as they’re dying. But the person himself, I don’t think, unless there is a moment at the… Th- there’s a moment at the very end, I suppose, where I feel like the p- person sees death for the first time, and that’s when we start to see the person’s face actually, right?

The owner’s face, Todd. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: I’m not sure that’s a coincidence- 

Craig: No … 

Todd: that when it sees the sp- specter or seems to see the specter finally, we finally start to see his face. Because I sort of feel like at this moment, I know I’m jumping way ahead, but I sort of feel like at this moment he sees death coming for him and this is the end.

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: Whereas the dog is seeing death lurking about this whole time. Yeah. But also maybe the remnants of the spirits of the previous dog and owner as well, right? So 

Craig: Right. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: Right. And I, I think that y- it could be interpreted in that way, that it’s just death personified, a grim reaper of sorts. It could just be the disease, like a, a metaphor or- 

Todd: Right

Craig: some kind of incarnation of the disease and, and maybe it’s a hereditary disease. Mm. It could be like a curse on the family. The only thing that we know is that we hear it several times, generations of that family have lived and died there. And when he goes to the graveyard, he’s like, “Oh yeah, here’s all my, uh, relatives.

Gee, they all died young. Head-scratcher.” Like 

Todd: Right. And they’re all buried here. 

Craig: But it could just… Right, it could just be a, a hereditary thing. Who knows? And a- again, I think it works that it’s ambiguous. The point I was trying to make is because of his illness or curse or whatever it is, he’s becoming increasingly unreliable.

Mm-hmm. For example, leaving the dog locked in the house all day and night without coming home, behaving strangely. That night after he comes home, you know, he creeps up the stairs like a big creeper. Th- that part was very suspenseful, but I also felt like it was cheap. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: Then again, I mean, I guess if we’re just looking at it from the g- dog’s perspective, he doesn’t know what that shadow is.

Todd: Right. 

Craig: So it’s very creepy as it’s slowly coming up the staircase, but it’s revealed to just be the owner. But he falls into bed and clearly is not well. Again, I don’t know if he had just received chemo or if he was out shooting up drugs- Yeah … which I think is just as likely, but he’s not well. And when the dog tries to comfort him, he scolds it and eventually yells at it violently and, and kinda throws it off the bed.

So he’s becoming increasingly unreliable. The dog seeing all this spooky shit around the house. There came a point where I was like, “Dog, you just need to, like cut loose. Like, get out of there. 

Todd: Leave the house. 

Craig: You gave it a good go, you know? Yeah. Uh, when he first moved in and he was talking to his sister on the phone and he was talking about those videos that he saw, she hears a bark and she’s like, “Oh, was that Indy?”

And he’s like, “No, I’m watching one of those videos, and it’s Grandpa and his dog, Bandit. Don’t you remember Grandpa had a dog?” And one of them says, “Yeah, he always had a bunch of dogs, but they always ran away.” No shit.

Todd: They were the smart ones. 

Craig: Yeah. But apparently Bandit is the only one who stayed, and is now a spirit guide or something. 

Todd: Right. 

Craig: I 

Todd: guess. 

Craig: Ugh. But yeah, it was, uh… There came a point where I was like, “Indy, you gave it your, your best go. Maybe it’s time to let it go.” 

Todd: Well, at this point, I mean, he does, uh, run out of the house probably around here, right?

I think at one point Todd is, like, banging his head against the wall. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: He’s being weird. 

Craig: Yeah, and then he gets… I don’t remember if he gets dragged into another room or if he just goes into another room, but the door slams and the dog can’t get in. So yeah, he runs out and goes for help. 

Todd: Okay, I didn’t get that, but you’re right, he was going for help, and that’s when he gets caught in the fox snare, right?

Craig: Uh-huh. 

Todd: Although, in my viewing of it, I didn’t see it that way. I thought he was being supernaturally chained or something from this thing that he kept seeing in that log, right? Wasn’t it, wasn’t it in that same log he’d been looking in? 

Craig: It might’ve been. I don’t remember. But yeah, and I can understand why you would be confused, especially on a first viewing, because we really only kind of get the dog’s perspective of it.

Like- something grabs him and, and drags him into the darkness, but then the next thing we see is he’s chained to a doghouse back in the yard at, at, at Todd’s house. 

Todd: Yeah, and he’s saying, “Stay.” 

Craig: Yeah. I think that we didn’t see that the guy who sets the traps, who’s not a bad guy, he just happens to also live there and is a hunter, I think he must have found the dog and brought him back, and Todd was chaining him up so that he couldn’t go back in the forest.

Hmm. But it’s also keeping him out of the house and, uh, you know- He’s freaking out … we’re approaching… Yeah, we’re approaching the, uh, the, the finale here. He- I guess he hears, you know, the- Todd is sick and coughing and kind of freaking out. The lights are flashing. It’s all very spooky, but he’s chained to his doghouse, and then all of a sudden that mud monster, which he’s already had to fight the mud monster once, now the mud monster comes for him again.

Todd: By pulling his chain. 

Craig: That was the scariest part of the movie for me. I am not a big fan of putting dogs on chains. I, you know, I understand different people have different circumstances, and as long as you care for your dog well and they’re not just living their life on a chain, that’s a different story.

But I have, I have negative feelings about chaining dogs like that, and this only reaffirmed that. Like Yeah, the mud monster could come … it was so scary to me. Yeah. Well, I, well, it was just so scary- … to me that, like, that monster grabbed a hold of his chain and was just slowly, slowly pulling it. A- and when a dog is on a chain s- like that, they’re just at the mercy of the chain- Yeah

basically, and that scares me. I don’t like it. 

Todd: In my other interpretation of this, I see this as the dog is just chained up, and he’s fighting against the chain, and in his vision, there’s something pulling on the other side. The reality is it’s just anchored to the ground But the dog sees it as a monster, some- something pulling against him, keeping him away.

Again, I don’t know if that, you know, you could say that, but I mean, v- visually on the screen we literally see, you know, the- Yeah … these mud 

Craig: monster hands pulling- Monstrous hands coming out of the dog house, pulling it, slowly pulling it, and we see the dog, you know, digging in its feet and, and trying to pull out of the collar and whatnot.

And eventually, I think what it does is it lunges at the house- 

Todd: Yeah … 

Craig: and kind of tussles with the monster inside until the house overturns and it’s able to break the chain free. And then it’s dragging that chain for the rest of the time, but it doesn’t matter ’cause it’s not very long. I think he makes it upstairs.

Well, first we see Todd laying on his back in his bed, and he is in bad shape. He can barely breathe, like he’s just wheezing and, and kind of trembling. But then he hears something, and he looks up, and it takes a while, but slowly he begins to notice footprints, muddy footprints coming towards him, and sees a flash of the mud demon.

Yeah. Which, by the way, is all CGI, right? I mean, that’s all- 

Todd: Yeah. Yeah, it is. 

Craig: But it looks okay. It’s, it’s dark enough that it… I, I thought that it actually looked pretty good. 

Todd: Yeah, it looked fine. The dog doesn’t get in the, the house from the front door, though. It goes into the cellar. 

Craig: Oh, that’s right. 

Todd: Right.

And as it’s passing down the cellar, w- we see the skeleton of Bandit. 

Craig: Yeah, and Bandit opened the door for him, right? 

Todd: I guess. Yeah. 

Craig: Because the cellar door, it- it’s one of those… Gosh, I don’t even know how to describe it. Only 

Todd: from the inside kinda. 

Craig: Well, I mean, you have to, you, you have to… You could open it from the outside, but you have to lift.

It’s one of those big double doors that you have to lift almost up off the ground. Yeah. Um, and he looks at it once and it’s closed, and he looks away and he looks back and it’s open. 

Todd: Right. 

Craig: And then when he goes, you know, down just a few steps, we see the skeleton of the dog, but we know that it’s Bandit ’cause it’s wearing the Bandana 

Todd: So did that bandana in the bedroom not exist?

Craig: I g- I don’t think it did. Oh. I mean, I guess a dog can have more than one bandana. 

Todd: That’s true. That’s the bandana that got lost, and they replaced it- Yeah. … with the other one. Yeah, that could be very well. Fair enough. 

Craig: You’re right, but Todd s- is seeing the thing coming towards him, but I don’t remember, it, it, it seems to be really close, but then it’s not there anymore, and instead, Indy, the dog, is there, and crawls up with him on the bed, and it’s like a friendly reunion, and he’s like, “Oh, Indy, hey, what’s wrong?

What’s wrong?” And in just a second there, I was thinking, “He sure is acting awfully healthy- 

Todd: Right … 

Craig: for as sick as we just saw him.” 

Todd: Right. 

Craig: And also it took me a s- and, and Alan, who’s watching it with me, also had to kind of point out to me, you realize this is the first time we’re ever seeing his face. 

Todd: Right.

Craig: And it is, and it’s because he asks Indy, I think, “What is wrong?” And then I think he sees in the reflection of Indy’s eyes himself behind him. There’s a lot of very intense close-ups on the dog’s eyes, where you see things reflected in them throughout the movie. Mm-hmm. But when he turns around, when Todd turns around, his dead body is laying there.

So yeah, you re- you, you, uh, suggested it earlier, but I think that we don’t see the owner’s face until he’s already dead. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: Which is an interesting choice, kinda cool 

Todd: And the figure now appears, right, and grabs him and pulls him through the house and all the way down into the basement. 

Craig: Yep. 

Todd: And Indy is chasing him and trying to save him, but he gets pulled into this giant cavernous tunnel that is down there.

It’s like the entrance to, I don’t know- Hell. … it’s, it’s weird. Yeah. It’s… doesn’t look like something that actually exists in this cellar. 

Craig: No, it looks ancient. Yeah. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. It 

Craig: looks like a, the entrance to a temple or, or something, all stone and- 

Todd: Which made me wonder if it did exist or if this again is just like a- 

Craig: Right

Todd: a vision. 

Craig: Or was it always there? Is it always there? I mean- 

Todd: Right … 

Craig: weird stuff. It… the dog has been hearing weird stuff from the cellar, but- 

Todd: Oh, is this an Amityville II? 

Craig: I don’t know. Disappearance thing. I don’t know what’s going on down there. Yeah. But yeah, he goes down there and he just, I mean, he just sees the big opening basically and he hesitates for a minute, but then he runs in, and he actually drags Todd back out.

Is he all covered in mud at this point already, I think? And- 

Todd: He gets covered in mud. Yeah, it’s kinda like mud covers over him, or maybe it did just before he got pulled away. I don’t remember exactly. But yeah, that’s when he looks at him and he says, “You’re a good boy, but, uh, you can’t save me.” And then he just, like, disintegrates into skeleton nothingness and maybe the skeleton gets pulled back into the tunnel.

I’m not sure. Definitely there’s a transformation here where he goes away. And so the dog’s just sitting there. And I’m thinking, you know, this is, this I guess explains Bandit’s death. 

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: That if this exact same thing happened to the owner, Bandit was just sitting there waiting for his master who’s never showing up, as dogs are known to do, right?

Dogs 

Craig: are- Yeah. Well, and also presumably he was trapped down there. 

Todd: That too, right? 

Craig: Because those doors were closed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and they didn’t find… The, the, the hunter guy, the neighbor, was the one who found the grandpa, but he said they never found the dog. Well, the dog was down in the basement.

Well, 

Todd: they didn’t look too hard, did they? I mean, that cellar- 

Craig: Yeah, no … 

Todd: is accessible. ‘

Craig: Cause it was right there by the door. Yeah, like you would s- you see it immediately as soon as you open the door. 

Todd: Yeah. And then, I mean, this basement’s accessible from the inside of the house as well, right? Or else he couldn’t have gotten dragged down there.

Craig: Right, 

Todd: right. So, you know, it’s- They didn’t look very hard. 

Craig: No. No, no. But then, yeah, so, so Indy’s down there by himself, and then in the mor- I think it’s the next morning- Yeah … Todd’s sister shows up. She was co- she was coming to visit. We knew that. But she shows up, and we hear her. W- we ca- we’re just looking up from, from kind of from Indy’s perspective, looking up at the cellar door, and we kind of hear her, and she’s distressed, and she opens the door.

And of course, when she opens the door, the first thing she sees is the dead dog. Now, There shouldn’t be any reason that if it had been Indy, that he would’ve decayed that much. But if I were looking for a dog and I found that skeleton, m- probably my first thought would be, “Oh, no,” too. And I think that was her first thought, too.

But then Indy kinda shows himself, like he kinda walks into the light or whatever, and she calls to him. I think at this point she probably already knows that her brother is dead. Mm-hmm. I think that she’s loo- I, I think that she’s looking for Indy. I don’t think there’s any other reason why she would be looking around- Yeah, I think she’s 

Todd: found-

outside … Todd. Yeah, for sure. 

Craig: Right. Yeah. So she’s relieved to have found him, and she calls him up, but he looks back several times and is very hesitant before finally going up, and then it cuts to black. And then as the credits roll, it just kind of shows Indy with his head out the door as they are driving down the road away.

A- and you mentioned before how, you know, there have been instances of, of dogs literally waiting for years and years, you know, for their, their owners or masters to return. And I don’t know, as a dog person, like, dogs are so, so loyal, and- … I felt sad. I felt bad for poor Indy. I, I do think ultimately that we’re meant to understand that one way or another, this was just death.

And as good a boy as Indy was, dogs may not understand it, but you just can’t fight that. Like- Right … y- you know, you, you can’t save everybody indefinitely. But it was kind of interesting to look at it through a, a, a dog’s perspective, somebody who wouldn’t understand, and it would be frightening and confusing and scary.

Now, the physical manifestation, I don’t know what to make of that. I don’t know if it was a real thing, if it was just the dog’s perception. There are little things like why was whatever it was messing with Indy at all when he was chained up to the doghouse? 

Todd: Right. 

Craig: I guess if I wanted to rationalize that, I would say, well, it was afraid that the dog was going to try to interfere, so it was trying to stop it, but that kind of seems like a stretch.

Regardless, you know, I really don’t mind the ambiguity. In fact, I think it’s probably wiser to leave it ambigu- ambiguous rather than to over-explain it. Yeah. But re- regardless of all of that- I don’t know. I, uh, I thought that it was quite different from anything else that we’ve seen in just in its … I hesitate to call it a gimmick because that makes it sound cheap, but the way that he ch- the director chose to approach it, I thought was, you know, interesting and- 

Todd: Yeah

Craig: fairly well executed. I think it was wise to keep it at, like, an, an hour 12. In fact, I think it probably could’ve been more like 50 minutes and- 

Todd: Yeah … 

Craig: I think it, it could’ve been tightened up a little. I understand. Alan was a little bored, too, and he kept saying, “How much of there is, is there left?” And I kept saying, “It’s only an hour long.

Calm down.” But yeah, I think it could’ve been trimmed down a little bit, but I really enjoyed watching it, and I think it’s … You know, you don’t have to be a dog lover to appreciate the technique or at least what he was going for. But I think especially if you’re a dog lover, it’s not gonna hurt- 

Todd: Yeah … ‘

Craig: cause you’re not gonna mind watching this really cute dog for an hour.

Todd: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, you don’t have to be a, a dog lover to, to enjoy this. Uh, and, and I’m just gonna repeat what I said earlier, you know, which I think is, dovetails nicely with what you said. I think the ambiguity of the movie is its strength. It’s not just a strength. I just think the movie wouldn’t have worked as well if it hadn’t been so ambiguous what’s going on.

And even the director has said that, he said that he got the idea initially for a horror movie around a dog’s point of view after seeing Poltergeist, where the, the dog in that movie is, like, the first to sense the presence of ghosts. 

Craig: Mm. 

Todd: And he realized it was kind of a trope across horror and other haunted house movies.

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: Apparently, he was also thinking of The Shining as well, in that, you know, there’s supernatural elements happening, but you’re … It’s still left kind of ambiguous whether or not this is a psychological thing in the characters’ minds or whether they’re genuine. You know, it’s just kind of- Yeah … open for interpretation.

So, um, yeah, it was, it was well conceived. It was different than anything else we’ve ever seen, I think. I don’t think there’s really another movie quite like this. 

Craig: Yeah. It’s different. 

Todd: Yeah. And I can see why it, it did well So yeah, go- I would also recommend you go check it out 

Craig: And the dog doesn’t die. I think we should have just said that from the very beginning.

Todd: Nah. 

Craig: I, I, I did read that, like, you know, like, when the movie was coming out, there was a huge influx of people googling, “Does the dog die?” Uh. 

Todd: Yeah, so many people would just, like you included, I think, would give this movie a hard pass if they had to watch the animal die. 

Craig: Oh, absolutely. I would be mad that I watched the whole thing if the dog died at the end.

It would break my heart. 

Todd: That is so funny to me. I just do not have the same… I have the same, uh, you know, if the dog dies or a human dies, it really just depends on the circumstance for me whether or not I’m gonna care a lot, you know? It just- 

Craig: Yeah, the humans- … I usually don’t care, but the dogs, it bothers me.

I- in fact, that’s the first thing that, like, w- without being prompted or without even saying, “No spoilers,” anybody that I told about this movie, I was like, “Oh, yeah, you should watch it. The dog doesn’t die.”

Todd: I’d have been so mad if you told me that, by the way. Oh, okay. 

Craig: I’d wanna know. Well, I’m glad I didn’t then. 

Todd: I don’t need such trigger warnings for animals. Well, thank you so much for recommending this, Craig. Thank you guys all for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend. Please write us a review everywhere that podcasts are can be reviewed.

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Craig: And I’m Craig. 

Todd: With Two Guys and a Chainsaw.