[intro music] Welcome to the Kill Count, where we tally up the victims in all our favorite horror movies! I'm James A. Janisse and today we're looking at The First Purge, released in 2018 as a prequel to the first three Purge films. The Purge series, of course, centers around the annual holiday in a fictional timeline of the United States where crime is made legal for 12 hours, resulting in lots and lots of murder. The trilogy became increasingly political as it went on, with franchise creator and writer/director of the original trilogy, James DeMonaco, exploring how such a lawless holiday would affect the disenfranchised of America. The First Purge - by which I mean this movie, not the original Purge film. Damn that's confusing - is no exception. It shows how this whole experiment, right from the get-go, was used by the privileged in power to take advantage of those less fortunate. I covered the original Purge trilogy last summer and the experience still gives me nightmares. Kill Counting those bastards took days of frame-by-framing and looking for bodies in the background, and when it was all said and done, Election Year, the 3rd Purge film, unseated The Belko Experiment as the new Kill Count record holder with 116 victims! It's held that title for the past 8 months, because in the 50-plus movies I've covered since then, not a single one of them has had a higher kill count. Pretty damn impressive. But does that all change today? Well, there's only one way to find out. Let's get to the Kills. [The Kills music] The movie begins with a scary scarry dude tellin' us what he does in his spare time. "I pipe up!" This insane mutha fucka is named Skeletor and he's being interviewed by a government stooge about the best way to release all the hatred and anger he has inside. "Just to...fuckin' PURGE all this shit that eats me up!" "Purge..." "Interesting term." Yeah, interesting enough for a TITLE CAAARD! Red white and Purge, baby! A news montage shows us the present condition of the US of A, and it's not very good. There's high unemployment, another housing crisis, an opioid epidemic... Sucks that that last one's real in our timeline, too. All this turmoil has led to a Third Party having some unrealistic success. It's The New Founding Fathers of America, who, the movie notes, gets most of their funding from the NRA. That gun money and a healthy dose of "both sides"-ism wins the NFFA the White House, and milquetoast President Bracken promises America that he'll make everything okay. Bump on over to Staten Island, two days before "The Experiment", as the Purge is currently being called. Instead of the nationwide purge we know from the other films, this first iteration will be restricted to Staten Island, as a sort of laboratory of Purgocracy. The government has set up trailers here to conduct more close-up bright white interviews, and these give us all the exposition we need to know. Participants in the experiment will get $5000 just to stay on Staten Island with a tracking device in their arm, and could make additional money if they engage in "further participation." "You mean kill someone?" "If you feel compelled." All these poor people are lined up to partake in what they see as easy money. They don't need to kill anyone or commit any crimes, they can just stay home and make 5 grand. But some people think this experiment is messed up - which, you know, it is - so there are some lively protests outside the trailers led by activist Nya. Nya is played by Lex Scott Davis, who was Toni Braxton in that one Lifetime movie, and she lives in the nearby Park Hill Towers, a low-income housing project based on the actual Park Hill apartments of Staten Island which had high crime in the '80s and '90s and which is where the Wu Tang Clan comes from. And I hear they're nothin' to fuck with! Nya lives with her brother Isaiah, who is not very happy about the leaky condition of their low-rent apartment. As the protestors chant "Do Not Purge", CNN's Van Jones, playing himself, interviews NFFA Chief of Staff Arlo Sabian, a kind of Sean-Spicer-lookin' dude who defends the Purge alongside behavioral scientist Dr. May Updale, played by Aunt May Parker Marisa Tomei. I still can't believe they made Aunt May so hot. Dr. Updale came up with the experiment but promises that it isn't political, it's just a way to help people vent their emotions. The protests are observed by local drug kingpin Dmitri, a cool, calm, and collected Stringer Bell type whose allies include three loyal lieutenants and a trio of retired OGs. "We The Three Stooges on our best day: Moe, Larry, Jehri Curl." D calls a business meeting and tells his crew they're not allowed to participate in the Purge because it's too much of a liability for him and his drug trade. One dude, Capital A, whines that Dmitri should allow them to observe the holiday as they please, but this chick Blaise shuts down that insubordination in a jiffy. Dmitri's drug trade includes corners like this one, which one chess board short of being straight out The Wire. Isaiah is secretly working here in order to afford better living conditions, and it's an unenviable entry-level position since it means having to deal with crazy customers like Skeletor. You know what, I'm sorry, maybe I shouldn't be saying such mean things about this dude, I might just be judging a book by its cov- ohpe he's got a razor in his mouth. After slashing Isaiah in the neck with it, he runs off tee-heeing as the corner crew unsuccessfully shoots after him. Nya comes home and sees her brother's neck wound, so she heads to D's office to yell at and hit him. Turns out these two used to date before he got into the whole drug dealing business. D says he had no idea that Isaiah was working his corners, and invites both of the siblings to stay with him during the Purge so he can keep them safe. Nya appears to consider it until D also says that he'll "take care" of Skeletor, and that drives her away from him again because she ain't down with this gangsta life he leads. "We gon' have to make choices in life to heal or to hurt and you chose the latter." Damn, D. Looks like it's gonna take a lot to unbreak her heart. Placed on leave from his corner job, Isaiah turns to Purge participation for income, and his orientation includes a Purger starter kit that contains the blue batisia flowers that have been a symbol of Purge support since that very first movie with Ethan Hawke and Queen Lena Heady. "And don't forget to buy your blue batisias. Show your support for this important evening." Although I think they forgot about them entirely in Anarchy and Election Year. Oh well! Isaiah's starter kit also includes some contact lenses that serve a dual function. They're recording devices, and they look fuckin awesome. It's like Minority Report on yo eyeballs, son! An hour before the First Purge begins, the bridges to and from the island are closed, and people are out with their Armageddon signs. Some Staten Islanders, like this lady Luisa, played by Dexter's Lauren Velez, and her daughter Selina, take refuge inside a church. These people aren't sticking around to commit crimes, they just want that government money. "$5000 to stay? It's life-changing for us." Nya is staying to help out around the church, and Isaiah lies to her that he's safe off the island, even though in reality, he's stickin' around to go all He-Man on Skeletor. "What'd you say, Skeletor?" Everyone from the sinners to the saints watches on TV as President Bracken counts down to that classic Purge Emergency Broadcast, which concludes with the by-now iconic Purge sirens. [sirens] Damn I love that scary-ass noise. Oh, also, fun fact: this movie doesn't have Edwin Hodge, who played The Stranger slash Dwayne, Dante Bishop in the first three movies. Because he's not around, Cindy Robinson, voice of the Purge announcement, is now the only actor to be in every Purge movie so far. "May God be with you all." Isiah heads out to look for Skeletor and witnesses a bevy of sights, including glowy-eyed people creepily staring at him through their windows, and my personal favorite of this movie's side characters, these two women listening to Dazz Band pushing around a shopping cart full of baby dolls. Damn, these ladies are lovin' it. Turns out their baby dolls are explosives that they lined the street with, and they nearly end up purging Isaiah just for kicks. Sadly, that's all we get of these gals, but they are a hoot. Other, more consequential antagonists, are also prepped for Purgin'. Capital A, that Purge-hungry dealer in Dmitri's crew, gives a perspiring speech and pumps his crew up with rhetoric and recreational drugs. Meanwhile Skeletor, who's a huge Dream Warriors fan, doesn't need a crew and instead psychs himself up all on his own. "Skeletor's purge is on!" He heads out to where this one dude is trying to rob an ATM with impunity, and secures the first kill of the Purge and The Kill Count by stabbing the guy with his knife. "You see me, NFFA?!" Yeah, you're, uh, kinda hard to miss man. You're 6'2 with head scars and glowing eyes. But so far, Skeletor is the only person interested in murder. A pawn shop does get robbed, but besides that, most people are just chillin' and not killin'. They're even having raves, as the NFFA discovers. Isaiah runs into his friend/corner manager Kels and the two of them go to one of these Purge Parties, which looks like a block party I would have gone to in college, erroneously thinking I was cool enough to be there. You can't hang with no cheetah ladies, college James, whatchu thinkin'? This party's vibe is 'bout to get harshed though, cause here comes Skeletor pretending to be Fred Krueger some more. [whistling] A Mermaid lady just can't help herself from dockin' against Skeletor. Not sure what the appeal is there, especially since all he gives her in return is a stab to the stomach. It's the first of three kills here that he dances his way to in the crowd. The next is this tune-yards-lookin' woman he stabs in the back - can't even say "sorry to bother you" to her, Skelly? -and the last is this super normal-lookin' dude who just loves block parties, I guess. He gets stabbed in the stomach a whole bunch of times, and it's his murder that gets noticed by the other party goers. They all run off as Skeletor yells after them, except for Isaiah, who steps out to enact his revenge. But the young blood doesn't have the mettle to go through with it and Skeletor knocks the gun out of his hands, scaring the kid away and taunting after him. "I'm the night, Isaiah! I'm gonna find you!" He takes refuge inside a building that's full of more glowy-eyed ghouls, but he manages to hide from them in a back room. Yeah dude, maybe close your ring light eyes when you're hiding from people in the dark. Or, yeah, just take those contacts out. News of Skeletor's killing spree spreads to Sabian and Dr. Updale. She gets excited about psychological releases or some shit but Sabian ain't ready to call it a success until the Park Hill Towers get involved, and right now, they're still quiet. Skeletor's kill cam is also aired on the news and seen by the Staten Islanders taking sanctuary, including Nya's friend Dolores, who just a little bit ago was having fun sneaking swigs at the sermon. "It tastes like old man ass. Don't ask me how I know." Way to ruin a good time, Skeletor. Isaiah calls up Nya and confesses that he's still on Staten Island, so she heads out to help him, into the Purge night that's starting to get rowdier with stuff like street arson and sewer snares. THAT trap leads Nya to getting sexually assaulted by a nasty-lookin; dude with a baby face mask. [baby doll crying] But thankfully, she pepper sprays him and runs away, shouting overt but accurate political references while she does. "Pussy-grabbin' motherfucka!" She arrives at where Isaiah is hiding but gets attacked by Skeletor, who begins to slice into her neck before Isaiah runs out and stabs Skelly in the back, messing him up enough to allow the siblings to escape. Throughout all this, Dmitri has been lying low, but still can't escape danger since he almost gets assassinated by a pair of call girls who are named Elsa and Anna in an apparent reference to Arendelle royalty. Wait, who's Arendelle? They try their darndest to kill him but after they fail, D learns that they were sent there by Capital A, so later, when the rebellious underling meets with the ladies and tries to claim his crown, he and his cronies get surrounded by Dmitri and his loyalists. "You can't purge me, man. I purge you." Dmitri puts the insurrection down quickly by putting the "Cap" into "Capital A." He also has his crew shoot down the lowercase letters who were with A, giving us a total of 3 new kills for the count. As for Anna and Elsa, he lets them live but banishes them from island. Ya know, snuff out their torches, not their lives. Sabian is still all whiny about how people aren't purging at predicted levels, even though Dr. Updale tells him, tough titties, that's science, bitch! "The NFFA put a lot of faith into this evening. If it's deemed ineffective the entire regime could be judged as a failure." "I told you that science does not obey the laws of politics." He goes off and makes a phone call, which might just have something to do with the people Nya and Isaiah see on their way back to the church, riding around flying nationalist flags. This is when The First Purge really becomes a Purge movie, and you know what that means - FRAME BY FRAME KILL COUNTING! While Updale watches a news report about how purgers are starting to wear masks, we get 6 kills to add. There are three people lying on the street back there and a fourth person hung up and getting beaten to death. I'm assuming these four are all dead, anyway - while the fifth victim is DEFINITELY dead, having bled out on the sidewalk, and a sixth one is seen being dragged down the street, also probably dead. Dmitri is on his way home with his lieutenant 7 & 7 when they're hit by a flaming ice cream truck. Hope all the grenadine didn't burn up, I need that! For my ice cream treats! D watches as armed men shoot down some dude at the back of an SUV, giving us another kill for the count, but the real increase in numbers here will come at the hands of Dmitri himself. First he breaks one of these dude's necks, and after grabbing the guy's gun, he quickly disposes of the other three guys there with some downright John Wickian efficiency. As he calls for back up, Nya and Isaiah get back to the church, only to find a very difficult-to-watch scene - one that's sadly reminiscent of the real-life Charleston church shooting of 2015. Very evocative imagery here by Gerard McMurray, who took over directing duties from James DeMonaco for this fourth Purge film. Looks like the only survivors here are Luisa and Selina, and although they say there are more dead inside the church, I can't count what I can't see, so I'll leave it at the three we see clearly on the steps. Don't worry, though, I can add 18 kills more from some monitor footage. There's one person on fire in that bottom left screen, one dude who runs into a bullet bottom center, eight people run over by an SUV in the upper right monitor there, one person being dragged to their death in the lower left here, another person falling victim to a drive-by, upper right monitor here, and finally 6 people being executed against a brick wall there. I can't discern enough from the other images to know if there are any more kills in them, but, I'm doin' the best I can here, people, okay? Dr. Updale is confused about the sudden influx of violence from these late arrival gangs, so she uses security cameras to track where they came from. She finds their spawn point and realizes that they're not local residents, they're mercenaries, who are now on their way to crowded low-income areas. And they know where those are because Sabian has been feeding them tracking device info. "You're making it look like people are participating because there wasn't enough purging." Sabian reluctantly fesses up and says that there are just too many people to take care of in the country, so the NFFA is trying to save Social Security through legalized murder. I guess it was either that or taxes, and boy do people hate taxes. Updale expresses regret over the experiment and tells Sabian not to do this, but he says it's too late for that, and leaves her in the custody of his goons. Dmitri and his crew also figure out that the dudes he killed were mercenaries. "Like Blackwater back in the days." On Merc Radio, WKLL, they hear about a corner that's been hit, and it turns out that 8 of D's dudes were gunned down there, as we see in this long shot that makes my job counting bodies much easier. Among the 8 victims there is Kels, D's sergeant on the corner that Isaiah worked. I think he was probably at, like, a Bodie-esque level? You know, like season 4 Bodie. Nya and co are hiding from colorful Klansman and trying to run back to the Towers as we get a montage that gives us more kills. First there's a dude doin a cool fire stunt who I'm just assuming didn't survive the flames. Man, I love fire stunts. And then another nearly dozen kills when we see a bunch of cops on a baseball diamond killing one dude before a wide shot shows us 10 other victims on the field. Play ball! They make it back to Nya and Isaiah's apartment, where Luisa makes Nya promise that she'll protect Selina no matter what. OBVIOUSLY, Luisa - anything for Selenas! Their party gets more festive after Dolores shows up, unharmed but in need of Pepto Bismol. "Then I get the Bubble Guts, tried to run home. Oh, but it gets better. 'Cause I shit on myself a little bit when I was on my way home." Hey, that's how Bubble Guts be some time. Dmitri and his crew raid their armory of guns and explosives, figuring that they have no choice but to fight back against the government's mercenaries hired to kill them. "Our neighborhood is under seige, gentlemen, from a government who doesn't give a shit about any of us." They head out to re-claim their neighborhood from evil fucks like Sabian, who's currently making sure that Dr. Updale is taken care of. Kind of a nice thematic parallel to how Dmitri the criminal talked about doing the same thing earlier. Dmitri intercepts a merc report about an armed resistance, so they head to the site where Klansmen are attacking Those Three OGs we met earlier. During the shootout, the Klansmen shoot and kill 2 women and then 2 dudes who are in there fighting with the Three Kings. A fifth body, a dude, is also seen on the floor as the guys try to take cover. After the Kings run out of ammo, their approaching attackers are stopped by a.... oh no, a smoke grenade? How am I supposed to count these kills if I can't even see 'em? Guess I'll do my best and forget the rest, and my best counting determines that 13 evil klansmen bastards get killed by Dmitri and his gang here. It happens through a variety of means - mostly shooting in stylized smoky shots, but there's also a fair amount of throat slitting, stabbing, torso slitting, I mean, honestly, it's kind of a grab bag of kills. And it all happens in only 30 seconds. Hot damn! D and his crew come out of the fog like ghost pirates and re-arm the old timers before hearing on the radio that the mercenary teams are headed to the Park Hill towers. [pirate voice]
"Back to the ghost pirate ship we go!" They get there and see armored trucks headed to the towers, but they DON'T see the drones approaching them overhead and targetting them all as armed enemies. The only one who does notice is Lorenzo, one of D's lieutenants, who shoves his boss underneath an SUV for safety and then is promptly killed by a hale of bullets. D watches from beneath the vehicle as the rest of his crew is put down, including Blaise and five nameless members of the entourage. 7 & 7 survives long enough to encourage D onward and give him a deathbed fist bump, but I'm assuming he dies shortly after Dmitri heads out. Nya and the others see the militia storming their towers, and decide to bunker down while Dmitri calls her up with some intel from the ground. "They're gonna move from floor to floor killing as many as they can, okay? You're on the 14th floor so you've got time." Wait, floor-to-floor killing? Ohh nooooo. Yeah, these racistly-clad soldiers called the Smileys and their leather gimp pimp daddy General Smiley are about to make my job miserable as they tactically murder everybody they see. Dmitri gets in on the first floor and finds immediate evidence of their efficiency when he sees 9 people murdered in the hallway - some dudes, some ladies, some unknowns - while the Smileys kill another three on a higher floor, putting an end to this resistance in residence. Yo, Purge movies are fucked up, dude. I don't know how I'd count offscreen kills, where the only thing we see see is the mercenaries shooting, so our next additions to the list are 3 Smileys themselves after they come across Dmitri in a stairwell. He shoots one in a doorway and kicks off a fantastic action sequence with some awesome fight choreography by stunt coordinator Hank Amos. I love the long takes following this crazy fight. D kills a second mercenary by shooting him in the chest with a rifle, and he finishes off the last dude, who's wearing a blackface-inspired face mask, by choking him to death with his bare hands. "Get the fuck out my neighborhood." Haha this fucker looks like he'd be a member of The Brood. As the mercenaries move throughout the tower, we see another 9 bodies in another hallway. I wish they'd make it clear what floor these dudes were on because it would add to the dramatic tension as they go higher and higher in the tower. All we know is that Dmitri is lower than them- wait, hold up, go back? Pause? God dammit, there a buncha blurry bodies back there! What is that, 6? Six, I think. Could I get a rack focus here? Come the fuck on! Oh, and even though I see 3 more bodies in the background by a bicycle here, turns out, those are the same 3 victims we saw get gunned down earlier. Continuity error? I don't know! But I won't put them on the count again since they'd be duplicates. Gotta love Kill Countin the Purge! D finds a powerbox and shuts that shit down, which allows him to get the jump on a group of Smileys and kill 6 of them. The first 2 by slitting their throats with a knife between flashes of an alarm light, and the remaining four by stealing a gun and shooting them down with it. After he takes off, though, we see that the Leather Daddy has survived. "We've got a problem." Yeah someone's in for a paddlin'! We finally get that tension building I wanted earlier when flashes show that the merc squad is getting closer and closer to the 14th floor, while Dmitri is...what, is he ahead of them now? I'm actually not sure. Nya and the people in her apartment have barricaded themselves in the bedroom with only a single gun between them. So when the mercs come a NO-knockin, they have to take them down by shooting them in the legs and then stabbing them to death with kitchen knives, which Isaiah and Delores do with vigor! Damn I bet she ain't even thinkin' of her Bubble Guts now. Another merc hears the commotion and heads back towards their room, but after he gets inside he's killed with a HEADSHOT by an offscreen Dmitri. Comin' in clutch there, D! Dolores delivers a painfully bad line about the reunited ex-lovers... "Little Miss Nya and Dmitri Cimber, the big fuckin' dog of Park Hill." ...and then they prepare for a final stand - a daddy stand! Daddy and his boys show up and shoot into the bedroom for a little while before breaking out the big guns - a freakin rocket launcher! Before they can use it, though, they're interrupted by Skeletor, who's here out of nowhere with a Skello Hello. "MOTHERFUCKERS!" After that first guy, Skeletor SEEMS to kill 3 more Smileys with his knife, but I think they double filmed the action here, because all three of the dudes he stabs appear to be alive again when they turn around and shoot him. So I won't count them as dead right now, we'll only count the first Smiley and Skeletor himself at this point. But don't worry, those other mercs get their just desserts after Nya throws an explosive at their feet. D takes a gutshot from General Smiley, but still hits the explosive with a bullet, so NOW I'll count the remaining mercs in that room as dead. There's General Smiley Leather Dad for sure, and then I think he had 5 Smiley Boys with him. We can count them in that shot from Skeletor's perspective a second ago. D and Nya survive the explosion thanks to a...fireproof mattress? And the others are okay because they were inside a...fireproof closet, okay. Surviving explosions is easy, I guess. D is injured but not critically, and although Nya and Isaiah's apartment is now even shittier than before, a blaring siren confirms that the Staten Island Experiment has concluded. "It's over?" [siren blaring] "For now." They all go outside where there are other survivors being helped, and Dmitri makes a promise to fight for their rights, even though some of these people are already getting back to every day life. The movie ends with that dope-ass Kendrick Lamar song and a mid-credits press conference from Sabian singing praises of The Purge. "We're considering a nationwide Purge, as the people are now calling it, as early as next year." Will the birth of the Purge take the crown for most kills? Let's find out at the numbers! Right after I read about "The Staten Island Experiment" because it offers "a solution to the pain in my lower back and the never ending late fees." So, that sounds pretty good. It's an "investment in my future," yeah! I think, uh- This sounds pretty good. "Paid for by the NFFA." I think I might do this so I'm gonna look this up online real fast, then we'll count those numbers. [The Numbers music] A HUNDRED AND THIRTY THREE people died in The First Purge, meaning yes, my friends, Election Year's reign is over, because The First Purge is the deepest. Baby, I know! The victims included, I think, 60 men, 12 women, and 61 of unknown gender, thanks to all those background bodies. And with a runtime of 97 minutes, that left us with a kill on average every... 43.76 SECONDS?! Holy shit! I'll give the Golden Chainsaw for Coolest Kill to the three Mercs who Dmitri killed in the stairwell, simply because of the awesome way that whole scene was filmed. Props to D's actor Y'Lan Noel, he really brought it in this movie. Dull Machete for Lamest Kill could be literally anyone else, so uh, here. Hallway victim #12. Yeah, those legs right there, I guess. And that's it! The First Purge came out in 2018 and was followed by a ten-episode season of television on USA. I haven't seen that yet, but it got renewed for a 2nd season so, that's good? I dunno, let me know what you think about it. I'll have another episode for you next week but until then I'm James A. Janisse, this has been the Kill Count. Thanks a lot for watching The First Purge Kill Count. I wanna thank a couple of patrons like Mitchell Link, Liam Stewart, Jenneev Vanmeter, and Michael Baldwin. Kinda hopin' they never make another Purge movie just so I don't have to Kill Count all the fuckin' bodies in the background, man. But now I'm done with that and I don't have to do that again. Also that First Purge brochure came from Hollywood Horror Nights at Universal Studios. All right thanks, everybody. Be good people.
Because of course this movie takes place on Staten Island, lol. (Kind of a coincidence really because this weekend is my first year anniversary of moving up here)
Thanks for uploading this, I'm currently working on figuring out why the Bot has been failing lately
[removed]
I legit forgot about this movie
Who else watches any clip made by dead meat? (or at least most of them)
Places to Stream a rental/purchase of The First Purge. I don't believe it's up on any normal streaming platforms.
This movie wasn’t that good I seen it in theaters hope next week really blows me away
James references The Fog
Oh boy, here come the comments...
This movie actually seems really good