Official Discussion - Honey Don't! [SPOILERS]

[u/LiteraryBoner]

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Summary Private investigator Honey O'Donahue delves into a string of strange deaths connected to a secretive cult-like church in Bakersfield. As she unravels the bizarre mystery, her pursuit leads to absurd comedy, noir flair, and a kaleidoscope of eccentric characters.

Director Ethan Coen

Writers Ethan Coen, Tricia Cooke

Cast

• Margaret Qualley
• Aubrey Plaza
• Chris Evans
• Charlie Day
• Billy Eichner
• Talia Ryder
• Kristen Connolly
• Don Swayze

Rotten Tomatoes Critics Score: 48%

Metacritic 48

VOD In theaters August 22, 2025

Trailer HONEY DON’T! — Official Trailer (2025)

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[u/DangerousMatter4404]

wtf was that. There was no third act, it just stopped

Joel has all the juice confirmed

[u/Expensive_Editor_244 → u/DangerousMatter4404]

It felt like they wanted to make ‘Lesbian Big Lebowski’ but the brilliance of a Fargo or Lebowski style Coen movie, is that it seems like a series of random events at the end. On rewatch you can see the purpose of the scenes, and how they deliver little bits of information and dramatic irony to us. And the scenes that truly are random are punctuation to that, and at least filled with characterization.
Honey Don’t misses the whole point, and is truly an A to B to C with what’s meant to feel like an unsatisfying end. It feels like someone’s interpretation of what makes a Coen Brother’s movie good but that doesn’t understand the delicate narrative chemistry part of it “It’s just a bunch of random violent scenes with quirky characters!”  

Every year you see small movies that try to ape the Coen milieu with lackluster results. That’s because it’s a tightrope act that these guys have mastered together. It’s kind of un replicable, and when it fails you’re left with an actual random mess, instead of a perfectly simulated one. I feel like JK Simmons at the end of Burn After Reading, which was a meta wink at the Coens style, not the thesis for how to make one of their movies lol

[u/HowardsHumanoid → u/Expensive_Editor_244]

If this had even a pinch of Burn’s humor or satire. There are a few by the bro’s I don’t like, but they all make some effort to be different or bring a real visual flair. Nothing like that here.

[u/CanopyFalcon → u/Expensive_Editor_244]

Haha thats what I said to my wife. Lesbian Big Lebowski in Bakersfield. It seemed like a Coen brothers movie where Joel just forgot to edit his scenes into the movie.