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Last week, TNMN community members from all around the world submitted their favorite horror flicks. Now you can see every submission, and decide whose is the best.

A man from the future recruits people from a Los Angeles diner for a mission to stop a rogue AI from ending the world.

→ Sam Rockwell. Every role he touches is elevated. Here you’ll find the actor being silly, erratic, sarcastic, and also sometimes sad. He elevates the script that, admittedly, borders on doing too much preaching.

→ Wacky sci-fi. The costumes are silly. The action is zany. The rules don’t always make sense. You root for thinly drawn peripheral characters, even if they only exist in service to more fleshed-out, interesting lead characters.

→ Slapstick violence, politically incorrect humor. Watch someone utter “I just wanted pie” before dozens of bullets pierce through them. Chuckle as parents proudly declare they tricked their kid into practicing a separate religion from them, just for laughs.

→ Black Mirror, more lighthearted. The film is separated into vignettes. Not all of them work. Some are too preachy. But so it goes. Each vignette is a well-made little Black Mirror episode, though often more lighthearted.

Gore Verbinski’s Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is an aptly-titled film. It’s a goofy, twisted good time of a sci-fi flick that works best when you let go and enjoy the damned ride.

Matthew Robinson’s script stumbles through some preachy moments, but has enough irreverent humor, heart, and imagination to overcome whatever issues you might have with that. And let’s just acknowledge this: it’s probably hard to make a movie about artificial intelligence, right this very moment, without getting a little preachy.

Sam Rockwell is wonderfully cast in a zany leading role that requires comedy chops, heroic charisma, and darkly dramatic turns in equal parts. Haley Lu Richardson brings emotional heft to a role that may have felt hollow in the wrong hands.

Most importantly, if you watch it with friends or family, you’ll likely find yourself in a room full of people laughing audibly or gasping in shock, depending on where you are in the film’s two hour run-time.

So: Good luck. Have fun. Don’t die.

A fact or two about the production that makes you say "oh, neat."

→ It's Gore Verbinski's first movie in nearly a decade. Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die is his first feature since A Cure for Wellness. Though, he’s most well known for directing the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy and The Ring.

→ He’s spent most of the last decade developing Cattywampus, an animated sci-fi musical about “funky cats in space.” He put the development of that project on hold to get Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die out the door, given the cultural relevance of the film’s subject matter.

Every other edition, we conclude with a special feature — an original work of fiction completely unrelated to this week’s film.

By Blake Levy

By the time she’d be through with it, the last telling, it’d be perfect. Little details, interesting ones that never really happened, would help slow the pace of the story. They’d make the punchline hit harder. These little quirks she’d add in, they’d heighten the comedy of an already very outlandish situation. Yes, by the time she was through telling this story, it wouldn’t just be a rock. It’d be a polished gemstone, shiny and bright and smooth like Irish butter. The good kind of butter that Jamie’s mom always used.

Her friends, they’d say: “Jamie, Jamie. Tell your Independence Day story.” The one where you were visiting your buddy from college. It’s unbelievable. Demented. Shocking. Hysterical. You can’t make this shit up.

They’d egg her on. It’d be irresistible. A classic college-night-gone-wrong story. Jamie imagined herself in the future. A forty-something-year-old mother. She’d smirk through the round of a red wine glass. She’d play coy, feign reluctance. But eventually, she’d cave and share the story, in return for the right amount of pleading. She’d share her little party tale with friends or family or her college-aged kids and their friends over dinner and drinks on the screened-in porch surrounded by woods. Her kids’ friends chuckling, wishing their parents were so down-to-Earth and pretty and freckly like Jamie. Jamie imagined it and it felt glorious.

You only get a few stories like this in your life. The ones that really stick. Like the one Jamie’s dad used to tell. The time she almost drowned in Ocean City and Jamie’s dad went out with the lifeguard to save her.

The lifeguard, up on his big white outpost. His zinced nose and aviator tinted sunglasses.

Dad looked at the lifeguard. His shiny aluminum abs, carved out like a turtle shell. His tanned-golden skin and blonde-frosted hair. The lifeguard looked out into the ocean. He noticed Jamie struggling in the water. He saw right around the time Dad did. For a split second, Dad paused. Jamie’s father assumed that the lifeguard, he would do what he was there to do. He would save Jamie.

He, the lifeguard, was going to, but he needed to take his shoes off first. Wipe the zinc from his nose. Slowly climb down the ladder. Pose for a picture. Smile and wave.

Dad had never seen anything like it. So, he took the matter into his own hands. Jamie’s father sprinted toward the shoreline. The lifeguard would never make it in time.

That’s when Dad remembered he were a prematurely-rounded, tubby young father. A cute little middle-aged doughboy. He could barely swim when he was in shape, let alone now. Running was something he used to do, but not anymore. The beach was for drinking light beer until his bladder ached. Until he needed to wade into the water to pee and let a few waves rinse him off as he sighed uncontrollably in relief. 

Odds against him, no doubt, Dad started running like he were in high school. Something primal took over. A fatherly reflex. His cerebral cortex, all four lobes within, ablaze with undecipherable activity. An MRI would have been a marvel of modern science. He became an animal. A majestic creature, quick on land and even quicker in the sea. His daughter was in danger, after all.

Dad looked to his left just as his feet began kicking water up into the air and there was the lifeguard. That beautiful, brawny, sun-kissed, hairless lifeguard. One giant muscle, breaking water alongside Jamie’s father. Seen from afar, the only answer was that this was some kind of make-a-wish experience. A pudgy man’s dying wish to star in an episode of Baywatch.

Dad dove through a crashing wave and the lifeguard followed closely behind. He was certain the lifeguard would out-swim him and save his daughter. 

But somehow he kept pace with the lifeguard. Dad out-swam him all the way to his daughter. Swam like hell against the rip-tide, like a hundred wet hands clawing him back into the ocean. Dad brought his daughter back to shore.

The kid was fine. Maybe a bit frightened, but she’d be fine. The lifeguard, he was aghast. Beside himself. He stood there like a lamppost in an already lit room. Useless. Confused. Scratching his bleach blonde hair.

The story of the time Jamie’s father out-swam the lifeguard. Told and retold until it was a set-piece. A gemstone. You only get a few of these stories in one lifetime.

The Independence Day story was supposed to be one of those stories for Jamie. It had all the makings of a lifelong tale. A lead character you could see yourself in. A totally normal situation with an ending no one could predict. The right balance of horror and humor. Just enough to keep butts on the edge of their seat cushions.

Jamie, she’s only a few years shy of legal drinking age. Her first year in university comes and goes without a hitch. As she’d planned, Jamie makes four close friends that first year. This is the friend group she’ll grow old together with. The friend group that, after graduation, moves into a too-small apartment together in the city. The friend group she crafts online dating profiles with after college. The bridesmaids who appear and reappear in each other’s weddings. The friend group she goes on girls’ trips with and leaves the husbands behind to watch the kids. She’s found them. The smart one. The shy one. The sassy one.  The silly one. Like a perfectly matched acapella quartet, humming together in harmony from baritone to tenor.

On the last day of freshman year, Jamie and her girl gang, they make plans to party together on Independence Day. And they have a most wild, rambunctious evening together. Cheap beer. Red cups. Ping pong balls. Funnels and clear tubes hanging beneath them. Foam and beer flowing through the tubes into open mouths. Music all bass, rumbling the furniture.

Jamie and the friend group get back after the party and sit outside. They watch the fireworks, backs on the ground from Norma’s backyard, Norma’s parents' backyard, that is. The last firework goes off and it is fucking beautiful. Red, white, blue, green, yellow, and squealing sounds as it rises through the darkened sky, a trail of smoke beneath it.

The last firework goes off with a loud snare and finishes with the high pitched squeal. The sort that peters out to a yelp the way teapots stop screaming. The sky is deep black and the squeal goes and goes and goes. Far longer than the final firework.

Because it isn’t a squeal from the fireworks any longer. It’s a scream. A shriek. It’s Norma’s mother, with the thick New Jersey accent.

“NAW-MUH!” she yells. “NAW-MUH. OUT FRONT!”

All four of the friend group, and Jamie, lying in the grass, they pop up like puppets on suddenly taut strings. They run to the front yard and there she is. Norma’s mother, standing directly over their family dog. Gracie the brownish dog. With the cute smooshed up nose that must make it hard to breathe. Her paws too big for her body.

Gracie the brownish dog is dead and stiff. Tumbled over in the front yard like a fallen for-sale sign. No bites, no signs of struggle, no known illness. The family dog is dead and there was no good reason for it.

The next morning, Jamie and her friends eat a silent breakfast. Runny scrambled eggs, prepared by Norma’s weeping mother. Cardboard bacon, microwaved by Norma’s stone-faced father. Mushy potatoes, roasted by Norma herself. The air is thick and off-putting and uncomfortable. One of the girls says, “I’m so sorry for your loss.” The others sit in silence until it’s time to leave.

To be clear, Jamie didn’t immediately think of it. That this would be her story, or that it was even remotely funny. Because it wasn’t funny, at least not at the time. Her best friend’s dog died in the middle of the night and no one knew why.

The leaves began turning and Jamie and her friend group returned to school. Over fall break that year, Jamie went home and told the story to a few high school friends and noticed they were laughing. She chuckled along with them uncomfortably, suddenly realizing the comedy of the situation. And once she really thought hard about it, the situation was the sort of awkward funny she’d often admired in British comedies. The shows her brother always made her watch when she was in high school. Cringe comedy, he called it.

She kept telling the story. Over and over to different audiences. Embellishing it with little details that reminded her of cringe comedy. Seeing what got the best reactions until she found a keeper: Norma is Jewish just like Jamie. The morning after Gracie dies, Jamie rolls over and hears whispering. In front of her: eight Jewish men, muttering prayers under their breath. Jamie’s assigned bed was the couch in the living room, and Norma’s mom decided to sit shiva for the poor puppy. Totally normal (pause for laughter). She instructs the men to do it quietly because she didn’t want to wake Norma’s friend, Janie. Janie?! Considerate not to wake her, especially given she didn’t even know Jamie’s actual name! (again, pause for laughter).

By the time she’d perfected the tale, her version with the embellishing, it was winter break. Norma’s family had a ski trip planned in Colorado, and so the friend group was down to three. It was really the only chance they’d had to debrief on the situation without Norma, and Jamie couldn’t wait.

Finally.

Jamie walked up to Alyssa’s childhood home. Ready with her rehearsed lines to endear herself to Alyssa’s family.

“Mrs. Pennington, you have such a lovely home,” she’d say. “And you did a wonderful job with Alyssa. I’m so lucky to have a friend like her.”

Jamie rang the doorbell and the shrill bark of a ten-pound dog pierced her ears immediately and continued. The door didn’t open. Jamie glanced down at her wristwatch and, after twenty or thirty ticks, rang again. The dog continued yapping and no one answered. 

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Her stomach started to feel empty and hollow. The back of her neck wet with cold sweat, like any second now she’d faint. She gave one more ring, and this time, the doorbell kept ringing. And ringing. And ringing.

But it wasn’t a ring from the doorbell any longer. It was a scream. A shriek. The door swung inward and Alyssa stood in the doorframe. She was drooling and sobbing and her young face was twisted and shriveled like an elementary school clay project, nearly unrecognizable.

“What happened?” Jamie asked.

“It’s Walter,” Alyssa answered.

“Walter?” Jamie replied. “Ah, your dad, right?”

Alyssa slammed the door. Right in Jamie’s face. 

Fuck. 

She remembered. The joke Alyssa always told. About how her dad’s name is Bart, and her dog’s name is Walter. And you’d think they’d be the opposite.

Walter the dog had died suddenly. No explanation. He was inside, healthy as can be, and then Jamie turned up. Alyssa, muffled by the aluminum door between them, shouted at Jamie to go home.

“What the fuck is wrong with you, Jamie?” Alyssa yelled. “Stay away from me. Stay away from my family.”

Jamie sobbed all the way home in her Toyota Camry, polluted with gum wrappers and tear-soaked tissues. A four hour drive from Alyssa’s parents back to Jamie’s childhood home.

She couldn’t explain it. The first time was shocking. Little Gracie, the brownish dog. The second time, an eerie coincidence. But how many times can a thing happen before it isn’t a coincidence anymore?

For Jamie, it was six. Six friends. Six family dogs. She’d visit for Passover instead of trekking all the way home. Stay a weekend over spring break. Drive in for a birthday party.

Always a gracious guest. Always complimentary. But every time she turned up to a friend’s house, the family dog died mysteriously.

Oh, thank you for having me this weekend. Lovely home, Mr. Chanwick! This town is really something, I appreciate you showing me around. Oh, and sorry about your dead dog!

Compliments can only go so far. Eventually, Jamie realized phone calls were dangerous, too. A few rings on the other end of the line, an answer, a shriek and a dead pet. Always the same. 

Word got around and not much of anyone was willing to talk to Jamie. And Jamie, a dog person, was less willing to talk to people. She didn’t want to hurt any more pets, no matter if it was always an accident.

Guilt became her only companion as the pet body count grew. Jamie considered endearing herself to people without pets. But she wasn’t much of a risk-taker, and the last thing she wanted to find out was what would happen if there wasn’t a family pet in the picture.

Jamie hasn’t made many friends since her college days. Any friends, actually. Zero. None. She’s too good a person to risk it. She makes no home visits or phone calls. For years, she could only be found in her childhood bedroom until her parents passed away. 

Her brother, the one who loved cringe comedies, he refused to take her in. Nobody blamed him, since he had two Golden doodles and a couple of boogered toddlers. He did volunteer some cash to hang onto their childhood home, where Jamie could remain.

She gets no visitors and hasn’t left the house for years. Decades, now.

It’s there, up in her childhood bedroom, adorned with faded Spice Girls posters and peeling floral wallpaper, that Jamie sits with her back against the door. Her hair frazzled and stiff like frayed wire.

It’s there that she tells a story to an audience of worn stuffed animals. Plush and white fuzz bursting from holes all over. The stuffed animals stare blankly and Jamie stares right back.

She tells the story about Independence Day. It always starts the same way. This was one of those shocking situations, always destined to be a story. A tale to be told and told and told again. A tale that never gets old. You won’t believe it, really.

And wait until you hear the part about the eight Jewish men. You’re going to shit yourself laughing.

The jagged rock, tumbled and tumbled over, certainly now a gemstone.