Hulu’s Into the Dark
Season 1, Episode 7: “I’m Just Fucking With You”
Directed by Adam Mason
Written by Gregg Zehentner & Scott Barka

* For a recap & review of the previous episode, “Treehouse” – click here
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “All That We Destroy” – click here
Larry Adams (Keir O’Donnell) got an anonymous account to tweet nasty things at people. He’s a real dude-bro online. He’s got a serious problem with Cindy Hughes. He gets a call from his sister Rachel (Jessica McNamee). She mentions the Programming Flaw twitter account, not knowing her brother’s the owner. He’s headed to the Pink Motel and Lounge, yet the rest of his family are staying elsewhere.

At the motel, nobody’s at the front desk, so he wanders his way into the lounge, where the attendant, Chester (Hayes MacArthur) is hanging out with a biker. It’s a strange place. Then again, Larry’s a bit strange himself. Chester greets him and, gradually, gets to know him. Seems Larry’s there for a “family wedding.” The pieces are coming together, and obviously he’s got a problem with the bride-to-be.
When it’s time to check in, Larry gets punked on by Chester. He gave the guy cash for his room. Now, he’s being asked for a credit card. Things begin to get intense as Larry gets angrier. Finally, Chester reveals, again: “I‘m just fucking with you.”
The traveller heads for his room. He’s a germaphobe, cleaning everywhere around the room. He takes the time to post a terrible review online for the motel. A real smug piece of shit. He goes on Cindy’s FB account to stroke one out to her pictures. Cousin Mark is getting married to the girl he once loved. Larry beats off unaware he’s being watched from a tiny camera in the vent.
Later, he gets a friend request from Chester. On TV, Larry hears about a horrible accident that caused a pile-up. He worries and calls his sister: no answer. He calls to the front desk, asking if Chester got any messages— the attendant says she isn’t coming because “she found a big cock to suck on, then she died and went to Heaven.” A grim joke.

Outside the motel, Larry has a run-in with Jerry the biker, enough to really freak the dude out. When the biker’s gone Larry wipes off a few smudges of offending dirt. Back at the room there’s a message in an envelope waiting. Inside is a picture of a man’s cock and on the back of the Polaroid it says LOVE, YOUR SISTER XXX.
Larry takes a shower. When he gets out he’s locked in the bathroom. Someone bangs on the door and starts speaking Spanish. Chester reveals himself— the door has issues and sometimes accidentally locks. It’s all another joke to get Larry to hit the floor after trying to push the door open. Funny how he gets SOOOO UPSET over being fucked with while he’s simultaneously, anonymously, trolling online. Typical hypocrite.

Larry decides to check out. He’s seen off by Chester, apologising. He still can’t get Rachel on the phone, either. He wonders how the motel attendant knew his sister’s name when he never told him. He dials 911, frightened. A sheriff turns up shortly. Chester jokes about “kiddie porn” then casually passes off the situation. The sheriff chalks it up to a crazy guest. Larry finds a check-in form with Rachel’s name on it. Chester punches himself while the cop’s back is turned. This leads things into the kitchen where Larry nearly gets arrested. And Rachel walks in.
All’s well. For now.

“To be honest,
I’m not fucked up at all.”

Chester joins Rachel and Larry by the pool for drinks. The sister recounts their earlier lives, when her brother used to be more fun. Chester doesn’t say much about himself. He and Larry keep drinking. He asks about the wedding. Larry tells him about Cindy, wanting to marry her, and being dumped the day before he intended to propose. The motel attendant suggests he try to “have the last laugh.” Larry says he has a letter he intends to give Cindy prior to the wedding.

In the middle of the night, Larry’s woken up by screaming outside. The biker’s angry: there’s a dick spray painted on his bike. Chester has a chuckle and Jerry punches him in the face. The biker pulls a knife. But Chester fights back. He beats Jerry into the pavement. He pretends to check on the guy and stabs him through the ear: “You need to learn to take a joke.” Larry and Rachel watch on in horror as Chester reveals the man’s dead. He calls the police. At least that’s what he pretends to do. Rachel calls 911 instead. The operator says help’s already coming. The brother and sister end up stumbling onto the bodies of the motel owners, too.
The gig’s up.
Chester explains one of the owners was doing horrible shit, using the cameras everywhere for his own perverted pleasure. The attendant knew something “was rotten in the state of Denmark“— sure sign someone’s crazy if they’ve just murdered and subsequently start quoting Shakespeare. The owners killed each other. Sure, that’s the story. Do you believe Chester? Father Gore doesn’t. Rachel pretends to buy the story. She uses it as a distraction, whacking Chester with a bottle.

The sheriff returns. He orders the brother and sister to the ground. He’s been told Chester was attacked. Larry gets tasered. Not long and the sheriff’s choked to death with a zip tie. Rachel and her brother try to get away, but don’t get very far. Chester undoes Rachel’s ties. He lets her take her car. They only get a little ways down the road. The tailpipe’s full of party blowers and the engine backfires. Chester chases them down and filling them with laughing gas.
Wake up!
Larry comes to at a party by the pool. “Dancing in the Moonlight” is playing— a cover by Godzillionaire, not the original. Chester takes his new buddy back to the room. The attendant makes him confess on video to being an online troll. He’s been dosed with ayahuasca, so he lets the truth flow. He confesses to being a “prisoner” in his own mind, which turns him towards hating others. He talks about Programming Flaw’s Twitter account. The sad life of an angry, self-righteous white boy on the internet attempting to make others miserable to assuage the constant feelings of crushing disappointment over his own shit life.
Sound familiar? State of the internet in 2019.

And where exactly did Rachel go?
Her corpse is in the bathroom wearing a mask.
Chester’s posted the confession video and the letter to Cindy online. People are already ragging on him with comment after comment calling him pathetic, loser, and plenty more. Cindy herself calls him “a monster.” All Larry can do is lie on the floor and cackle. He wants to go to the wedding with his dead sister. One final laugh.
In the morning, they take Rachel’s corpse and get in the car. Larry gets the last laugh by distracting Chester with a joke. He uses the disabled passenger side airbag to hopefully kill the serial killer, driving into a dead end wall.
In the aftermath, Larry’s given credit for the Pink Motel Massacre.
And the trolling continues endlessly.

“You’re a breath of fresh air in a slaughterhouse”

Very Giallo-style lighting throughout this instalment, using the neon exteriors of the motel and lounge as an Argentoesque vibe. On top of that, the shot of the blade in the biker’s ear/sliding across the car towards Rachel feels ripped right out of Italian horror. The whole episode has slasher inspiration, too. Chester becomes the usually faceless or masked slasher, here with nothing concealing him, only masterful deceit and a penchant for various types of murder with all kinds of objects.
One of the best Into the Dark episodes so far.

Mother’s Day is coming up. “All That We Destroy” will arrive next month.