History Film / Us2019

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Has [[Foreshadowing/{{Us}} its own page]].

* TheEighties: The prologue of the film is set in 1986.

* TheAllegedCar: Gabe's boat is older and prone to stalling out, far less impressive than he thinks it is. Its unreliability comes into play when Gabe is fighting Abraham.

* AmbiguousSituation: Just how many of the Tethered are there. The ending reveals it is a lot, but as they are [[spoiler:a government experiment, the scope is unlikely to have involved everyone]]. Then again...
* AmazinglyEmbarrassingParents: Gabe shows shades of this when he gleefully shows off his new boat to the (unimpressed) family.

* ArchetypalCharacter: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gB1aA1iAsYA Jordan Peele intended for all of the Wilsons to be a different archetype;]] Adelaide is the Leader (takes charge and has the most knowledge about what's going on) Zora is the Warrior (acts before she thinks and kicks ass) Gabe is the Fool (doesn't really know what's happening and is more comic relief, albeit he does kill two Tethered) and Jason is the Wizard (very observant and intelligent, [[spoiler:closely watches his mother and potentially figures out that she's actually a Tethered.]])

* BadassFamily: The Wilsons, who [[spoiler:manage to kill their Tethered counterparts]].

* BeardOfEvil: Gabe's Tethered counterpart has a much larger beard than Gabe himself does.

* ChainOfPeople: The Tethered symbolically revive Hands Across America from the 1980s as a means of a protest toward the United States government for their cruel treatment and incarceration of them.

* CreepyShadowedUndereyes: Umbrae has them, which she accentuates by turning toward the camera while sporting these. Her mother, Red, and [[spoiler:Kitty's Tethered, Dahlia]] have them too, but to a much lesser extent.
* CreateYourOwnVillain: Red says that the above-ground people did this by living happy lives. But it's much more literal in that [[spoiler:this is literally what Adelaide did: she kidnapped her original and imprisoned her below-ground, thus leaving her a DarkMessiah.]]

* GoMadFromTheIsolation: [[spoiler: After over 30 years of being trapped underground and forced to mimic the movements of her double with no one to talk to, the original Adelaide has lost much of her sanity.]] It's unclear if the Tethered ''have'' gone mad from the isolation, if they were born wrong, or if [[spoiler:they were actually happy before Red intervened. Or if they're even able to feel happy.]]

* InspiredBy: The central concept bears similarities to the popular works of Creator/{{Edgar Allan Poe}}, Creator/{{H G Wells}}, Creator/{{Bertolt Brecht}}, and Creator/{{Rod Serling}}:

** In interviews, Peele has stated that ''Us'' is partly inspired by the TwilightZone episode "Mirror Image", in which a young woman encounters her doppelganger at a bus station and becomes convinced that it is trying to replace her.

* KeyUnderTheDoormat: [[spoiler: Abraham gains entry into the Wilsons' house by finding a spare key hidden in a fake rock. That he knows where to find it is a clue that the Tethered and their counterparts have a kind of mental link.]]
* KillingYourAlternateSelf: The Tethered's whole plan. [[spoiler:And the Wilsons end up killing their copies: Gabe turns on a boat engine on his, Zora brakes a car and throws her copy -- who was hanging onto the windshield -- into a tree, Jason makes his walk into a fire, and Adelaide impales Red. [[TomatoInTheMirror Or is it the other way around...]]]]

* MadeOfIron

*** In turn Kitty's name might be a reference to Kitty Genovese, a famous stabbing victim (like many of the victims in the movie) who's tragic murder is often used as a textbook example of BystanderEffect.

* RedIsViolent: The Tethered's combination of red clothes and golden scissors makes that pretty clear.

* AnimalMotifs: Rabbits. There’s one on Zora’s shirt when Gabe is showing off his new boat, her green sweatshirt has the Vietnamese word for rabbit on it ("thỏ"), and [[spoiler:they're a staple food of the Tethered]]. ''WebVideo/HonestTrailers'' suggests that it might be a reference to the African folktales of the trickster Br'er Rabbit.