Film / Metal Lords

Play something heavy, man.

Things are going to happen for us. Someday, all of these people are going to be like, "Holy shit, Kevin Schlieb and Hunter Sylvester? I went to high school with these guys. I could've even hung out with them, maybe!" But it's going to be too late, because we're gonna be too busy hanging out with the guys from Iron Maiden.

—Hunter

Metal Lords is a 2022 Netflix dramedy directed by Peter Sollett and written by D.B. Weiss (Game of Thrones).

Kevin Schlieb (Jaeden Martell) and Hunter Sylvester (Adrian Greensmith) are best friends in a post-death doom metal band called Skullfucker. One night, at a party, Hunter clashes with the band Mollycoddle, where he declares his intent to beat them in the Battle of the Bands. While searching for a bass player, Kevin falls for unhinged cellist Emily Spector (Isis Hainsworth), who Hunter doesn't want in the band. However, their newfound relationship drives a wedge between the two friends, and when Kevin is invited to join Mollycoddle, he is forced to decide where his loyalties lie.

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Tropes featured in this movie include:

• 11th-Hour Ranger: Emily only accepts to join the band right before the concert - and even then, after an initial refusal to stick up to Hunter.
• Abusive Parents: Hunter's dad Alan is a Rich Bastard who regularly puts his son down for his girly-named Dungeons & Dragons character, guilt-trips him for his money paying for his "incel action figures" and "devil worship T-shirts", and sends him to rehab for using his credit card to buy a bunch of gear from Guitar Center. Though he does seem to become a bit nicer at the end, even if he's still antagonistic and tried to subtly minimize their achievements.
  • Hunter's mother is also implied to be so, or at least neglectful, if the lyrics to "Machinery of Torment" are anything to gawk at.
    Mother leaves me bleeding
    Exsanguinates my dreaming
    Father, father, deaf to children's call
• Alcohol-Induced Idiocy:
  • During the opening party, Kevin makes an ass of himself while being hammered. However, he also manages to find courage to talk to a girl and, more importantly, promises Hunter to take the drum playing seriously and train heavily from that moment on - a promise he does keep up.
  • Much later, after the wedding party is over, Kevin gets drunk and ends up making out with Kendell. He's still sober enough to ponder his act, and ultimately excuses her and himself, explaining he already has a girlfriend.
  • Parodied during the Battle of the Bands. Skip, the bully abusing Hunter, drinks up some liquor with his friends in his truck. After returning to the concert room, at first it appears he is about to start a fight in the crowd, but it ends up just turning into a pogo-like crowd frenzy.
• Atomic F-Bomb: Part of Emily's behaviour when she snaps. And that's the least awful part of it, because alternatively, she just straight-out assaults people.
• Auto Erotica: As soon as Emily offers to end her and Kevin's virginity, he rushes to get there, and they do the deed in the back of her van.
• Badass Driver: Kevin proves himself to be a capable driver when he drives like a bat out of hell after Hunter flicks Skip on the nose.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Emily is, for the most part, a shy, sweet girl. At the same time, when she snaps under stress, whatever disorder she has, it makes her extremely aggressive and violent, as Hunter found the hard way, getting his skull almost cracked and his guitar destroyed.
• Bigger Is Better in Bed: Kevin has a "double-bass dick," according to Emily.
• Bowdlerise: An in-universe example. Skullfucker isn't allowed to go on stage, and the name is painted into the drum heads. Emily makes a quick alteration and the band is now called Skullflower.
• Book Ends: The first and last scene take place in Hunter's basement; first, with Hunter standing up and in command of Kevin sitting at the drums, and last with Kevin, Hunter, and Emily all sitting down together as equals.
• Break-Up/Make-Up Scenario: Kevin could probably still take all the personal abuse from Hunter, but the moment he deliberately triggers Emily's unhinged reaction in the middle of the class, they have an angry argument and Kevin delivers the long-awaited "The Reason You Suck" Speech, breaking all ties with Hunter after that. However, as the time goes on, Kevin comes to terms that Hunter is still his friend and springs him out of a rehab facility.
• Brick Joke: Early on, Hunter fantasises about their future fame and how all the kids from their high school will be reminiscing that yeah, they could be in the awesome band that's Skullfucker, but the train left the station long ago. During the Battle of the Bands, the bass player that Hunter scared off repeats word for word how he could be in the band with those guys.
• The Cameo: Rob Halford, Tom Morello, Scott Ian, and Kirk Hammett all show up in an Imagine Spot to give Kevin a What the Hell, Hero? when he allows Kendall to start making out with him.
• Can't Hold His Liquor: Kevin is a minor, so he easily gets drunk after a couple of shots and, on another occasion, on a single bottle of champagne. He's well aware of his light head.
• Champions on the Inside: Their assessment of the Battle of the Bands, where they finished second, but the entire crowd loved them and sang the chorus of their original song, and Hunter's injury landed them on the front page of the newspaper. Not to mention that as the last band, they were technically headliners.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Troy Nix is introduced through a high school yearbook as an example of a metal band that fell. He turns out to be the doctor at Hunter's rehab facility, teaching him that a band has to be a unit in order to function.
• Country Matters: Lampshaded when Emily, who is Scottish, calls the marching band leader a cunt.
  Marching Band Leader: You can't say that in America!
  • Skip also writes "Suck it Cunt" on Hunter's car—which Hunter said to him before flicking him in the nose and indirectly totaling his pickup truck.
• Cute and Psycho: Downplayed with Emily. She is a sweet and caring person, but she also has some sort of neurological disorder that sends her into absolutely ballistic behaviour when angered (physical violence included) - and this is how Kevin notices her for the first time - which she is treated for and at the same time ashamed of. Her mental state is an integral part of their relationship, as Kevin managed to make her feel comfortable with herself, despite being a mess.
• Description Cut: More like Description Montage. After Hunter tells Emily that a female cellist in a metal band would be "totally gay," Emily looks around and sees posters of bands such as Judas Priest and even Goblin Cock.
• Dreadful Musician:
  • The one bassist who tries to audition for Skullfucker midway through the movie clearly has more... stage presence than musical prowess, to put it lightly.
  • Likewise, Emily is horrible at clarinet. Justified, as she only took it to get out of PE.
• Drugs Are Bad: The film constantly takes jabs at Ray, The Stoner drummer of the Mollycoddle, and how disfunctional his addiction is making him. It is many things, but subtle is not one of them.
• Female Rockers Play Bass: Although Emily plays an "erudite" bass, the cello.
• Fly-at-the-Camera Ending: During the Battle of the Bands, Hunter is flying to the camera like he's finally about to join the metal pantheon... Then Subverted when Skip moshes into the stage, showing it was in his head as Hunter falls against the speaker, then onto the floor.
• Foreshadowing: The first time Hunter is pushed, he ends up breaking a keyboard. The last time onstage, the amp stack falls on him and breaks his leg.
• Friend Versus Lover: How Hunter sees Kevin's increasing interest and then blossoming relationship with Emily. Given what sort of tool Hunter is and how much abuse Kevin has to face, it's hard to blame the latter for preferring to spend time with Emily.
• Freudian Excuse:
  • Discussed and deconstructed by Emily. She lists a variety of things that usually go with this trope, while pointing out that none of them applies to her and her mental state, giving her no excuses and making her even more depressed, because if she neglects her "happy pills", she quickly descends into aggression and physical violence.
  • At the same time, it's all but stated outright that Hunter's obnoxious behaviour and all the teen rebel antics are fueled by his Missing Mom and incredibly strained relationship with his father. If they can't show him any affection, why should he even bother to be anything else than a tool... or at least that's what he thinks.
• Gilligan Cut:
  Kevin: [In his inner monologue] This party was a great idea. I don't care what Hunter says. Even he must be having fun right now.
  [Cut to Hunter being attacked by Skip, the school bully]
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Whatever is wrong with Emily's neurological system, she can be easily agitated and goes into raging rants at best and physical violence at her worst. She is deeply ashamed of it and the lack of self-control when off her medication.
• He-Man Woman Hater: While he never explicitly says he hates the opposite sex, Hunter clearly has a few issues with them. He mentions in his "metal" speech in class that Ulysses was weighed down by his wife and that when he let go of her, he was better off^note complete with using a Scottish accent for the wife!. His dad also calls him an incel—although this may just be abuse—and his mother was torn out of a family photo in the introductory montage.
  • His father also shows shades of this, considering how he puts down Hunter for his D&D character having a girly name and, at least according to Hunter, screws his nurses and/or patients a lot.
• Humble Pie: Hunter's character arc is about him first baking a huge one and then being forced to eat it, finally admitting all his countless faults and making amends for them.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Emily. She is perfectly aware of her mental condition, which hits her back due to the fact she's a "weirdo" and can't function properly without a steady intake of her meds. And she would very much prefer to be just a regular person than have random outbursts of aggression and violence at the slightest provocation.
• I Just Want to Be Special: On the other side is Hunter, who desperately wants to be special and unique, trying to achieve it through his over-the-top actions and "hardcore" personality. The film also obviously implies that his interest in metal comes entirely from dreams of achieving stardom and fame, so people would admire him. Most of the time, however, he's just an abusive Jerkass and a rich kid with a lot of pent-up parental issues.
• Inner Monologue: The story is narrated by Kevin, who often comments on things happening around him in such a fashion.
• Jerkass:
  • While he's the target of much unjustified bullying at school and home, Hunter is, for the most part, a terrible excuse for a friend, let alone a best friend. He treats almost everybody around him like shit, and tries to force Kevin into a metal lifestyle that he doesn't exactly understand that much. But his crowning moment of assholism is when he gives a speech (with more than a few misogynistic undertones) in class chiding Emily for distracting Kevin from Skullfucker. Eventually, after most of the movie, he gets a bit better.
  • Skip and his gang are pretty nasty, too. They beat up Hunter with seemingly no provocation (until later, when he becomes indirectly responsible for totaling their car) and don't have any redeeming qualities. At the end, Skip indirectly causes an amp to fall and break Hunter's leg.
• Jerkass Has a Point: All the criticism Hunter has towards Mollycoddle - aside from the direct insults - is spot on. They can barely play, but make up for that by barely playing popular party songs and having the "cool Boy Band" image. Hell, they themselves openly tell Kevin that he should be able to learn their entire repertoire within 10 minutes.
  Hunter: This is like three chords and they still can't get it right.
• Karma Houdini: Kevin never gets in trouble for helping Hunter escape from rehab, unless you count Skullflower losing the Battle of the Bands and Hunter getting his leg broken during the set.
• The Last Straw: Hunter being arrested is considered the last straw to his father, but then considered even worse since the real last straw was Hunter stealing his American Express card to pay for Kevin's $13,500 drum kit.
• Leitmotif: For Hunter, it's "Machinery of Torment." For Kevin, it's "War Pigs." For Emily, Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Prelude in G. Skip even gets an instrumental of Mastodon's "Blood and Thunder" as a leitmotif.
• Liquid Courage: Kevin gets completely plastered during the party in the opening. While wasted, he starts gawking at a girl alone in the crowd and when asked why he's starting, instead of running tails, he starts a conversation with her, probably the first time he casually talked with a girl.
  Kevin: [in his inner monologue] Beer is amazing.
• Meet Cute: Kevin is in a marching band to avoid PE. So is Emily, who, in his presence, has an angry outburst full of profanity towards their coach.
• Metal Head: Hunter, and a particularly snobbish one.
• Nice Guy: Taken to near parody levels with Clay, the lead of the Mollycoddle. Notably, his nice and easy-going personality is perfectly genuine, and he never tries to do anything insidious nor has a dramatic reveal of it all being just an act or similar.
• Nice Mean And In Between: Kevin is the nice one, Hunter is the asshole, and Emily is in-between, depending on her current levels of serotonin.
• Never Trust a Trailer: The trailer makes it look like a standard metal-themed teen comedy in the vein of Deathgasm. Instead, it's a dramedy Coming of Age Story where the characters are generally portrayed more realistically.
• The One Thing I Don't Hate About You: When Hunter tries to apologise to Emily, it starts out looking like yet another attack on her, until he sums up that all the things she did made her "metal beyond reproach" and that he was an asshole for not seeing that from the start.
• Parental Issues: Hunter's mom left, and he has a very shaky, destructive relationship with his father. In turn, his father constantly snaps back, creating a very toxic environment for both of them. They might care for each other deep down, but they can't properly communicate that and end up just further antagonising each other. Kevin even calls out Hunter during his "The Reason You Suck" Speech about all his pent-up daddy issues.
• Parents as People: Hunter's father might appear to be a jerk himself, but he provides for all of Hunter's desires - even if he calls him out on all of them - and as the events unfold, he is seen struggling with still supporting Hunter as his son and finally putting his foot down to rein in his ever-increasing self-destructing tendencies. And as the story goes, they have all the ups and downs of a shaky relationship, only slightly mending the divide in the end. However, the story makes sure to always present Dr. Silvester's resentment and simple exhaustion with another stunt of his son as justified, rather than random abuse.
• The Power of Friendship: Invoked in-universe by Dr. Nix as what makes any band last and work well together - either you enjoy the company of the people you are playing with, or things spiral down the drain in zero time.
• Precision F-Strike:
  • Dean Swanson, out of all people, drops one when chewing Hunter for deliberately triggering Emily's outburst and being assaulted by her in front of an entire class.
  Hunter: Look, I've got some personal issues with her...
  Dean Swanson: [sternly] I could give a shit about your personal issues with that poor girl.
  • "Machinery of Torment" has a prominent example of this, especially for a school battle of the bands!
  Your prom king crown's the first thing struck
  Turned into a bucket of fuck
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Despite it being a teen comedy, Dean Swanson is shown both as a no-nonsense and competent bureaucrat, and as one of the most compassionate people in the whole story who definitely knows how to handle high-schoolers.
• Recovered Addict: Dr. Nix was an alcoholic until he went to rehab, then got his doctorate.
• Rock Trio: Hunter frequently acknowledges Skullfucker needs a bassist, and only accepts that Emily is what they need right before their concert.
• The Runner-Up Takes It All: The ending makes sure to note Skullflower has gathered the brunt of attention in spite of finishing second, to the point Mollycoddle's win gets less attention on the newspaper's front page compared to their concert.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Somewhat justified, as during the Battle of the Bands, a full Marshall stack falls on Hunter's leg and gives him an open fracture. His following screams of agony are of a more regular register.
• Seen It All: Dr. Nix has seen enough kinds of drugged-out messes in Safe Haven Clinic to know Hunter doesn't belong in there. It helps that he went through the same cycle as well.
• Sickening "Crunch!": At the Battle of the Bands, a crunch is heard when the speakers fall on Hunter's leg. When it's pulled off, the bone is sticking out.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Hunter's brash attitude is backed by copious cursing.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Hunter takes Kevin out to Guitar Center to get him a giant $13,000 drum kit. Kevin ends up finding it too difficult to maneuver in his tiny room and ends up moving it to school instead.
  • Hunter arrives unannounced at the wedding reception in full metal makeup demanding to see Kevin, even making a Badass Boast. The security guard hits him in the crotch with his nightstick and he goes down. The next scene he's in shows he was arrested. Even when the owners don't press charges, his gear is considered to be weapons, confiscated and forfeited to the township, since he's a minor.
  • Dr. Nix knows Hunter doesn't belong in rehab because he's sober and recommends him for immediate discharge, though he does go down every possible addiction on the list first. The only problem is the Board of Directors won't be back until Monday.
  • Hunter eventually comes to apologise Emily... and she turns his apologies down, since a simple apology isn't going to instantly make all the abuse she suffered from Hunter - including deliberately triggering a mental breakdown from her - to just disappear.
• The Stoner: Ray, the drummer of Mollycoddle, is perpetually high on weed. Clay tells him he can either get high or play drums, but not both. Even in rehab, he sneaks in a joint.
• This Means Warpaint: Hunter paints himself up in facepaint and eyeliner, intent on talking to Kevin^note this makeup is shown on the poster. His father calls him "Krusty the Clown" over it.
• Their First Time: On two different levels - Emily asks Kevin to lose their virginity together at the very start of their relationship, something they are both very eager to do.
• Tomboyness Upgrade: Emily gives herself a goth makeover before finally joining Skullfucker, complete with electric cello!
• Training Montage: There are a few of those, but the most important is the one when Kevin slowly figures out how to both use the drum set and the basic rhythm of the songs Hunter has listed for him. He slipped the list to Emily, who is trying to figure out metal music in general around the same time.
• Traumatic Haircut: Skip and the gang hold Hunter down and snip off some of his hair. Hunter finishes the job by shaving the side of his head to look like Jason Newsted, the former bassist of Metallica.
• Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Kevin drunkenly pukes all over himself while leaving the homecoming after-party.
• What You Are in the Dark: After the wedding party he worked on as a drummer is over, Kevin meets again with Kendell, the blonde from the opening party, with whom he is clearly still smitten. Being drunk, he goes into a pool with her and they start making out... until he gets called out by his conscience in the form of Scott Ian, Kirk Hammett, Tom Morello and Rob Halford. He eventually decides to explain to her that he has a girlfriend and leaves.
• Wild Teen Party: Clay Moss throws a homecoming after-party at his house while his parents are in Geneva.
• Yoko Oh No: Hunter invokes the trope, believing Emily's relation with Kevin, as well as being a classical cellist instead of a metal bassist, is ruining the band. He even says "No Yokos."

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Fuck, we rip.