@withcindy I am the wretched one, a true swamp witch. My ugliness eclipses all others. I cause famine, I cause pestilence, I ravage the lands with war, and I manifest death. You two and no one else shall ever defeat ME. ALSO TYSM FOR THE PIN 😭 😭 😭 😭
@@DaraJill not necessarily. I have no Asian genes in my family as far back as 1500 and yet my eyes are so slim that I was asked on multiple occasions if I can still see anything when I laugh. And even among Asians there are people with rounder eyes and slimmer eyes so they could’ve just searched for someone with let’s say slimmer eyes than the actress for Shay to kinda give a comparison.
@rzuue I was pointing out if they were to catch heat for casting someone Asian, that meant they were casting an Asian lead which sadly is more rare than it should be.
A friend of mine worked on the set for this movie. Apparently the PA's would just be like "ALRIGHT UGLIES COME THIS WAY" to the extras and cast. Like what a gig.
In the “Who’s uglier?” Debate, I vote Cindy purely based on their video quality. Ellias showed up with the HD and blurred background and Cindy served Zoom meeting realness. Lol
Literally it’s hard to show the difference between the prettiest and uglies with actual actors- like the pretties should look like aliens (unreal beauty) not yassified versions of the uglies
what this movie got wrong is that in the original book, the uglies were just normal looking people (not conventionally attractive hollywood actors) and the pretty surgery made you so pretty it was inhuman... plastic, poreless skin, glossy eyes, unable to really emote other than smiling, long, thin features, etc. even your face structure and bones were altered so you were barely recognizable. the surgery made you look like a living barbie just like all the other pretties. but the movie just makes it look like you put on the bold glamour filter lol
read the book in the 5th grade and re-read it a few years ago, didn't think it was that bad. this movie loses the original point entirely, which already was a bit thin to begin with but still.
I was so confused by how the "uglies" were actually hot... That would have made more sense if they were just average. The only difference was that they were dressed all Fallout style.
That was the entire point, it was MEANT to be unhinged and weird and like a literal barbie doll. Like couldn't they have tried with some makeup or something?
You and everyone else keep missing the point of the movie. Theyre not supoosed to be ugly. They look fine but society calls them ugly because nothinf has been done to their faces.
@@serenitysubs933 I'm not talking about the movie I'm doing a joke about how like most ya mcs think they're ugly cindy and ellias also do , it seems pretty clear so calm yourself
@@serenitysubs933 Yes, it's clearly the message of the movie, it's incredibly on the nose everyone is making jokes because how bad the movie is. Scott Westerfeld isn't going to pick you btw.
@@trinaq sure but the aesthetic of the film is clearly more inspired by those movies more than the source material, so I think it can still be considered a bad rip off as well as a bad adaptation lol
I like how Cindy made fun of how weird getting gold eyes would be, meanwhile in the 2nd book one of them literally gets her irises turned into clocks with functional hands and everything.
The film didn't really convey the message of the book well, in my opinion. The "Uglies" were never really ugly, but constantly told that they were, which fed into their insecurities. They shot themselves in the foot by casting obviously attractive actors.
@trying2write69 Yeah I thought the same, and for me the point of the story its not really "oh everyone is beautiful in their own way" is more a critique to capitalism and how It sells the Idea of a perfect life that you only can accomplish by being of a certain way
@@Sofianunes12 right and how it pushes a certain idea of what should be viewed as beautiful and what should be viwed as ugly to literally control the masses. the uglies are just normal people and what is deemed pretty is only accessible via a brain altering surgery
@trying2write69 They could probably get around this with character actors. They tend to look more varied (like everyone else). That way they could have an "average" attractive person as opposed to familiar, "Hollywood" type. Especially if they were gonna do the uncanny valley glow up later.
@@cherstuff20 Yeah, they needed normal looking people, not people who are already good looking, OR make the actors, when they're Ugly, go without makeup. I've been told I look unwell when I'm not wearing make up (dark circles, spots, etc.)
I don't know if it's explained in the movie, but aside from the lesions in the brain, the surgery is meant to give everyone a similar (white western) idealized look: big eyes, symmetrical face, full but not too full lips, straight not too big nose. Make everyone look mostly the same so that there's no prejudice. The new pretties are supposed to have a look that makes you want to be with them and take care of them.
@halcyon63 I give it props for when it came out. This would have been a great thing for the movie adaptation and its sequels to expand on, though. The similarities between all of the Pretties, perhaps some skin lightening for people with darker skin, and Tally's commentary when she looks through old magazines. :\ a lot of missed opportunities for this movie.
The film adaptation could have delved deeper into the western beauty standards/classist standards of fair skinned equals not a peasant working in the fields, even if it wasn’t covered in the books
@@rosamariabest6069Don’t you mean Barbie dolls? Is that not what a book from the 2000s would go to? Barbie has always been white af, without any extreme features or thick lips.
Even when I read the Uglies series as a kid, I knew any kind of live action would fail because Hollywood is too cowardly to cast normal people as the “uglies”.
It’s a very bad adaptation, but the whole premise is that everyone that’s not surgeried Pretty is considered Ugly. Cindy and Elias would be Ugly, i would be Ugly, all those kpop idols with perfect skin and hair (and a lot of surgeries lmao) would be Ugly. The Kardashians would be Ugly. When the yassified tally is the standard, normal becomes ugly.
@@ShinSeulwhy? Because in the books, they even found something to critique about models. They said something about how these people could almost be Pretty, but weren’t
Well, I guess the K-pop idols and the Kardashians with their ample cosmetic surgeries and wealth would be our current society's version of Pretties that originally inspired Scott Westerfield. But yes, at the heart of this conceptualization, I agree 😊
@@gordon6052right, I remember her looking at old magazines and thinking the models were "Almost Pretty" and noticed that they had some old disease (anorexia)
@@ShinSeul In the books, becoming a pretty isn’t simply getting plastic surgery to have a nice face. It’s a high-tech full-body surgery that alters or replaces every inch of your body to be “perfect”, ie. getting a full-body skin graft just to prevent you from getting acne, or replacing all your teeth with aerospace ceramics.
Hear me out, but Alita's design (and the Martians in general) in Alita Battle Angel is pretty much how the Pretties were described in the books, I was hoping they'd go for a more uncanny feel to the Pretties because when Tally finds an old magazine, she considers literally all of the models Uglies.
She does not consider the models ugly, she only says that they're underweight! Why does everyone keep saying that Rusty supermodels were considered ugly, they weren't lol.
@@starcomet8312 I'm pretty sure she called them *rusties* and went on to describe the model as looking like a Pretty but being too skinny to be considered "Pretty" by their standards.
I mean in the Uglies books it literally did yeah. They gave people "reversible brain lesions" so the pretties were dumb and cheerful that then got reversed when they became "Crumblies" aka regular old adults with professions. Specials also had their brains messed with, basically to make them murder machines. It was a part of the books that was explained! Also, if I recall rightly, the city it's set in is the only one where they do the brain lesions, other cities don't or do different things? But that only comes up in Specials and it has been ... oh god more than a decade since I read these books, so I couldn't tell you more than that.
@@EssayOfThoughts I was actually reading them recently cause I wanted to refresh my memory before I watch the film and yeah, Tally's city is said to have been the one strictest about the surgeries, and pretty much the only one that wanted to completely eradicate the people of The Smoke! Although it was also said that Diego (the other city) had some infighting when they started taking in Uglies and people from The Smoke, cause it opened up this "new model" where people in the city felt freer to express themselves through their looks so they had teens with like, snakes for their pinkies. And Tally's city had just been waiting for the best chance to attack other cities and subjugate them basically.
God it sucks how bad that this movie was because the subject matter and themes of the book series have become more prevalent with beauty standards changing/evolving rapidly due to the rise of social media and accessibility of apps like photoshop making it easier to manipulate and make unattainable beauty standards. If the people in charge had adapted the books into a tv series and put more care and time into the subject matter, the adaptation could have had the potential to become a cultural phenomenon that would have helped start a public conversation about beauty standards and desirability politics. But instead, we have been given a film that’s just as fake and superficial as the antagonists.
Real. Every time something happens with TikTok filters or social media influencers, I'm like, "Dang, this is just like the Uglies series!" The social media stuff especially reminds me of Extras. I don't think vloggers were a thing when it was written, but that society is full of vloggers.
Hmm, I think a mini series would've been good for the book series. Like one season of a show and like 3-5 episodes per book. IDK maybe they can world build enough for a whole 4 season show though! I would love to see more romance because I am a sucker for that stuff.
Yeah, but consider: Hollywood WANTS to perpetrate beauty standards so billionaires can keep making money from insecurities. They dont WANT us to rebel against those.
lol fr, its like if u didn't have to take lorazepam or Xanax for anxiety or depression. you're just happy, hot, & u get to party. Lol who wouldn't want that? I also don't wanna be ugly living in a hippie commune. That commentary was the best.
Bruh if the book was made now, I bet this would be discussed. Life is too difficult and we all have attention issues. Let us be cute and dumb. Born to be cute and lazy, forced to work
@@NC-qm8dc You can tell this was made in the 2000s with the commentary. In 2020 we're all pressured to be smart and hard working when we all just wanna rest.
I be like “dang I kinda miss the old days when we were all over those ya dystopian books/movies.” But then this reminds us why it’s probably better that era is over.
Okay but Cindy, people being their weird 16 year old version of pretty was so common in the books, and I don't think anything was permanent, so you could have gold eyes this week and purple next, change your hair, your face...the structure of your feet...everything!
This book came out in an era where every single YA novel was lead by a tall, slender, athletic, flawless skinned, white girl who's looks "are actually unremarkable in fact, and kinda plain". Just as us ugly girls started pulling away from all these dystopian worlds being destroyed by supermodel teens, the book "Uglies" came out. And it was pandering shallow bullsht, but we ate that sht up. Every time a character reflected on how it genuinely felt like oppression being ugly surrounded by pretty people just existing being pretty it hit some kinda way. I won't say how many times I read this book. Also read/see "Fugly Best Friend" for the girls how didn't read fantasy, lol!
You want to look at ugly ppl? Go sit on a bus. Kristen Stewart, Shailene Woodley, and Jennifer Lawrence are not supermodel pretty. Theyre just girls next door.
It's funny you say that about the colonialism and western beauty standards, because i the book, part of the reason fir the surgery is to get rid of racism and they make everyone have "olive" skin. Its mentioned in other regions different skin colors are the norm. Wild.
Ironically the "pretty ones" are scary asf lmao (also c'mon people, I hate the kissing booth as anyone else but don't need to be cruel about Joey King's apearance)
@@greenthinggg oh no Its not them its the internet as a whole, many people saying How much she is ugly, that If she turns "pretty" in the end than they must change actress etc..
@@Sofianunes12 oh yeah that's not right it's unfortunate cause people have been saying that about her for year's now even though I find her very gorgeous😭
I feel for the fans of the book. Imagine waiting for 19 ish years for your favorite book to be adapted and this is the result. also JOEY KING DO YOU OR YOUR TEAM PURPOSELY PICK BAD MOVIES WITH BAD SCRIPTS? OMG QUEEN YOUR FILMOGRAPHY IS RADIOACTIVE. EDIT: 17:47 I'M FUCKING DEAD 💀💀💀
I think this would've been more effective had the "pretties" look like either aliens or complete clones of each other. Just something fully inhuman and unnerving. I think some people said it was closer to that in the books? But IDK in the film they only look like the more conventionally attractive version of themselves. Playing it safe like that makes the message of "strict beauty standards destroys individuality" less effective.
@@withcindy supposedly one of the ways pretties can clear their heads and feel better after they’ve been surgeried was to cut and feel “bubbly” 🥴 there was a whole group called the cutters straight up. probably misremembering some now as less pro-self harm, but as a kid I just went oh, that makes you feel better? whoa cool! lmao
True, literally in another comment reply I was talking about how the world puts too much pressure on use to be hard working and hustling for like 40k a year. People who I would call hustlers are having a hard time keeping up! I literally say to my boyfriend "Born to be cute and lazy, forced to find a job". Would totally sign up for this.
You could never cast this movie accurately because if you’re attractive, it’s considered ‘de-glam’ and ‘edgy’ but if you’re not conventionally attractive, it’s a “chance to give it back to the haters” and then overcompensate during the promotions and later in life.
the way ellias and cindy talked about the things they'd do to be hot reminded me of that scene from fleabag "please raise your hand if you would trade five years of your life for the so-called perfect body" and both fleabag and her sister's hands (and no one else's) shot up so fast 😭😭😭
The way I thought the Uglies movie was a joke some booktok girlie started after reading ~vintage~ YA until Joey King appeared on screen… she’s like the maker’s mark of Real Adaptations of Stories that Shouldn’t Have Happened 😬
I was trying to explain this book to my sister, we have like 5 years difference and so she got the Hunger Games … and I got this, lol. I used to love these books 😂
i had this running in the background. i literally thought it was a tv show and that this was just episode #1...and then was thinking it would be released weekly....and then realised it was a movie. possibly the worst i've seen in a long time. didn't even know it was a movie because the pacing was all over the place.
This movie was shelved for YEARS, and allegedly Netflix was on the brink of shelving it forever bc it was bad. If that is true I highly doubt there will be a sequel.
Someone who read the books said that the surgeries take away any flaw or anything that makes you different including what makes you look like your parents. So she is not used to seeing anyone, of any race look like their parents.
The title of this vid alone has me hollering 😭😭 the Uglies Trilogy + Extras are some of my favorite books of all time. I first read them at 15, and have been rereading them at 32 and they are still good. This movie tho…yeah they should’ve kept this locked up for good.
“I wish I spoke something other than English…so I can consume more media” LITERALLY!! So many shows on the back burner because I don’t have time to read subtitles 😭😭😭
Maybe its just me but i was obsessed with the books in middle school and i loved the movie. It was so camp it almost felt like they were leaning into the YA sterotypes of its time.
The worst part is that the book came out before Hunger Games so it's not like it was intentionally doing YA streotypes (well I guess it was since dystopian media and YA tropes existed before Hunger Games ofc), but people who don't know the book would think it's Divergent's dumber cousin.
@maddiemcnugget1076 I think there is no possible way to properly adapt uglies since a lot of its points easily criticize Hollywood. I like to imagine they knew this and just fully decided to lean into the cheese sci-fi
Literally having the most stressful three weeks of my life and seeing this upload made me REALLY smile 😭😭😭 I love you, Cindy and Ellias…. you always make my day 🤍
Why do they always pick conventionally attractive actors for roles that aren't conventionally attractive (no hate to the actors but picking people who are outside of the binary of what society deems beautiful would've been a smarter move)
Oh definitely! Like Edward Bluemel, he's got a distinctive look but not a conventional one. If you can't choose normal-looking people, at least choose those that aren't Hollywood Pretty.
I normally would agree but the ‘point’ of the books is that none of those people are actually ugly and the procedure only exist so they can brainwash them. In that world everyone has to get it no matter how they look so appearance isn't actually that important.
@@Honey511Bee we need more female actors in those roles. women aren't allowed to look as interestingly human as men are allowed to look on screen & off screen. that type of casting would be a smarter move. like... there aren't female versions of "willem dafoe" or "danny devito" actresses on screen
To be fair, in the books the point is that only the people who had the surgery could even BE pretty. Everyone was supposed to be "made equal" by having the surgery that made everyone look the same. They were all given mostly the same features, right down to your hair colour, like in the second book they comment that a character has dyed their hair to a shade of black that isn't allowed by the Pretty Committee who decide what the ideal Pretty look is. Tally even reads some old magazines in The Smoke and comments on how the models are "almost pretty" cause they all still look distinct and look different to what the Pretties are supposed to look like. So an Ugly could be considered beautiful by us but would still be considered an Ugly by them. Like, if you think back to the Battle Angel Alita movie, what Alita looks like is basically how the Uglies are described in the books
This is just the YA extrapolation of the Twilight Zone ep Number 12 Looks Just Like You, which predates the novel by 40 years and told a better story in like a 20 min run time.
i just love that I just recently listened to Cari explaining the whole plot, so I don't have to read it, and now you two react to the movie, so I don't have watch it
honestly when cindy said nose looked like oli london i was thinking the same thing they should have just let him be crazy and ask for the trying to become jimin race change surgery
They actually do this in the books lol. In another city somebody was described to have modded their skin to be coal black. But they also had people with clock eyes so they were just crazy
Cindy this is my new comfort video I've already watched it over five times 😭 the one liners and self deprecating jokes had me cackling 😭😭 now I can move on from my previous comfort video which was your Cait Corrain one lmao
I just watched this movie yesterday so this is perfect timing 😅😅 Edit: btw even people who read the books when they came out agreed that Tally and Shay made way more sense than Tally and either of her ‘love interests’. The vibes may have been accidental but they were definitely there.
i actually liked the third book, where she gets her teeth filed to points. Looking scary is better than pretty. And i don't think there is a beauty-related moral to this story since from this point on we never go back to uglies. She just gets the beauty for "free"
i read this book series a few times as a kid and one of the only things i retained from it is tally and her friend coming across gay as hell. so at least they got one thing right
Lol, this probably sounds very corny but ever since I saw Ellias in one of your videos, I have always thought that he was so cute and so handsome. Like someone who is very fun and beautiful in their own cool way. And now I will shut up because I don't wanna be too weird. Cindy I love your channel Peace *quickly runs out*
Anyone who says Joey King can’t act has not seen her in Ramona and Beezus or We Were the Lucky Ones. Those are her two best roles to date. She definitely needs to find projects with better writing that suit her talents more.
I'm uglier. Forck you both
LOL PLSSSSS 😭
@withcindy I am the wretched one, a true swamp witch. My ugliness eclipses all others. I cause famine, I cause pestilence, I ravage the lands with war, and I manifest death. You two and no one else shall ever defeat ME.
ALSO TYSM FOR THE PIN 😭 😭 😭 😭
Let's be ugly together 💜
NUH UH IM THE UGLISTEST
@@goodguyamr6996 N̴͉̝̮̞̫͍͈͈̆̊̀̚ȩ̸̢̥̲͉͉̤̟̗̄̓̐̇͑̓̏̚ͅv̵͍̯̖͌̈͛̾̿̓̔̈́͠e̴̢̹̘̲̥͙̫͍͒̒̃̒̓̋̆̆̈́͊̾̏r̵̢̫̬͈̺̳͍̦͛̃̓͊͒͆̈̒͘͝͝͝
Maybe the shitty audio is the real ugly all along 😔✊
Real 😭
This actually made me laugh.😂
@@withcindyyou’re my best friend I really like you Cindy ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
@@withcindyyou’re very pretty
@@JordanS-ww4eu Erm what the sigma?
“You’re so beautiful,” I whisper lovingly to the woman who deceived the revolution and got my father killed
LOLLLL
REAL
WHAT IS UP WITH THAT????
@@ScrubLordKyleWell they’re hormonal children so
I like how they cast someone with large, round eyes as "Squint" 💀
lol that's what I was thinking
They know they would've caught heat if they cast anyone who looked slightly Asian
@@withcindy that would have necessitated casting an Asian lead instead the side kick and heaven forbid...
@@DaraJill not necessarily. I have no Asian genes in my family as far back as 1500 and yet my eyes are so slim that I was asked on multiple occasions if I can still see anything when I laugh. And even among Asians there are people with rounder eyes and slimmer eyes so they could’ve just searched for someone with let’s say slimmer eyes than the actress for Shay to kinda give a comparison.
@rzuue I was pointing out if they were to catch heat for casting someone Asian, that meant they were casting an Asian lead which sadly is more rare than it should be.
A friend of mine worked on the set for this movie. Apparently the PA's would just be like "ALRIGHT UGLIES COME THIS WAY" to the extras and cast. Like what a gig.
Oh I know they had fun with that
Im cackling
Actually WHEEZING 💀😂😂
I genuinely imagined that and snorted like a pig
Joey King needs to FIRE her agent.
Her and Dakota Johnson
Agreed, she's a capable performer, she keeps choosing the wrong projects.
Fr I need to see her as a likable character so I can see if I dislike her or just her characters 😂
Joey King has been involved in this production since 2020 or something like that so...
well, she is the producer of the film so maybe she needs to fire herself
In the “Who’s uglier?” Debate, I vote Cindy purely based on their video quality. Ellias showed up with the HD and blurred background and Cindy served Zoom meeting realness. Lol
Ur so right
😂😂😂
@@miamigypsy Return to library, because you finished that read!
🤣🤣🤣
Not zoom meeting realness 😂😂😂
I feel like this concept would only work as an animated film
Everything would be better animated
Omg yes
And, in this case, maybe even full 3D animation
@@lostmymindinbooks nah 2D is much better.
Literally it’s hard to show the difference between the prettiest and uglies with actual actors- like the pretties should look like aliens (unreal beauty) not yassified versions of the uglies
@@lostmymindinbooksNO.
what this movie got wrong is that in the original book, the uglies were just normal looking people (not conventionally attractive hollywood actors) and the pretty surgery made you so pretty it was inhuman... plastic, poreless skin, glossy eyes, unable to really emote other than smiling, long, thin features, etc. even your face structure and bones were altered so you were barely recognizable. the surgery made you look like a living barbie just like all the other pretties. but the movie just makes it look like you put on the bold glamour filter lol
They could have made the pretties like Capitol people in THG
read the book in the 5th grade and re-read it a few years ago, didn't think it was that bad. this movie loses the original point entirely, which already was a bit thin to begin with but still.
I was so confused by how the "uglies" were actually hot... That would have made more sense if they were just average. The only difference was that they were dressed all Fallout style.
Yeah literally
That was the entire point, it was MEANT to be unhinged and weird and like a literal barbie doll. Like couldn't they have tried with some makeup or something?
"Diva down" while he plummets to his death 😭
my new fave phrase
Ellias and Cindy in their main character era trying make us think they're ugly.
We just need to take our glasses off and then voila!!
You and everyone else keep missing the point of the movie. Theyre not supoosed to be ugly. They look fine but society calls them ugly because nothinf has been done to their faces.
@@serenitysubs933 I'm not talking about the movie I'm doing a joke about how like most ya mcs think they're ugly cindy and ellias also do , it seems pretty clear so calm yourself
@@spreadhappiness3250 aight.
@@serenitysubs933 Yes, it's clearly the message of the movie, it's incredibly on the nose everyone is making jokes because how bad the movie is. Scott Westerfeld isn't going to pick you btw.
You could naturally assume that this is a rip off of "The Hunger Games" or "Divergent", only the novel predates those series by three to five years.
I thought the poster WAS divergent, but it wasnt
I mean this adaptation was definetly trying to be a Divergent movie rip-off like 10 years late lmao
That's sad cause the original idea isn't that bad
It came 2000 and late
@@trinaq sure but the aesthetic of the film is clearly more inspired by those movies more than the source material, so I think it can still be considered a bad rip off as well as a bad adaptation lol
yassified shay is just nikita dragun 😭
And she serves
"I bet people in Paris also thought we were two ugly lesbians together" made me CHORTLE LMAO CINDYYY PLS
gotta keep it real
Only half right 🤪
“It’s giving everything but acting” 😂😂
I support Laverne cox getting her check
I like how Cindy made fun of how weird getting gold eyes would be, meanwhile in the 2nd book one of them literally gets her irises turned into clocks with functional hands and everything.
HUHHHH
GIRL WHAT 😭😭😭
don't forget the wildly spinning "tribal" face tattoos!!!
Into What ?
That’s literally one of the only things I remember about these books lol
Clock eyes and hoverboards
9:25
"-Omg, you know what he kinda looks like? He looks like, um-
-Jeffree Star
-Oli London" LMAOOO
Close enough 💀
U know we're right
Both are accurate, tbh.
Basically the same
Both are correct
The long pause after, "They're gloves..." had me cackling
He looked so disgusted lmao
lmaooooo I HAD THE SAME FACE AS ELIOTTTTT like THEYRE GLOVES
The Shay transformation part was so funny. “They’re gonna make her straight!” “She kinda looks like you with a wolfcut” HELP
The film didn't really convey the message of the book well, in my opinion. The "Uglies" were never really ugly, but constantly told that they were, which fed into their insecurities. They shot themselves in the foot by casting obviously attractive actors.
@trying2write69 Yeah I thought the same, and for me the point of the story its not really "oh everyone is beautiful in their own way" is more a critique to capitalism and how It sells the Idea of a perfect life that you only can accomplish by being of a certain way
@trying2write69 Then hire people who look like just any other bitch instead of particularly conventionally attractive or 'ugly'.
@@Sofianunes12 right and how it pushes a certain idea of what should be viewed as beautiful and what should be viwed as ugly to literally control the masses. the uglies are just normal people and what is deemed pretty is only accessible via a brain altering surgery
@trying2write69 They could probably get around this with character actors. They tend to look more varied (like everyone else). That way they could have an "average" attractive person as opposed to familiar, "Hollywood" type. Especially if they were gonna do the uncanny valley glow up later.
@@cherstuff20 Yeah, they needed normal looking people, not people who are already good looking, OR make the actors, when they're Ugly, go without makeup. I've been told I look unwell when I'm not wearing make up (dark circles, spots, etc.)
"walmart katniss everdeen" made me spat out my porridge
U know it's true
Katniss from Temu or Wish.
Katpiss Evergreen
"Maybe the real uglies was the CGI along the way" 🤣Laughed out loud so many times during this vid. Thank you comedic duo for never disappointing.
Glad u enjoyed 😘
I don't know if it's explained in the movie, but aside from the lesions in the brain, the surgery is meant to give everyone a similar (white western) idealized look: big eyes, symmetrical face, full but not too full lips, straight not too big nose. Make everyone look mostly the same so that there's no prejudice. The new pretties are supposed to have a look that makes you want to be with them and take care of them.
i wish the book would've unpacked colonialism/Western beauty standards more, because that would've made it much more interesting!
@halcyon63 I give it props for when it came out. This would have been a great thing for the movie adaptation and its sequels to expand on, though. The similarities between all of the Pretties, perhaps some skin lightening for people with darker skin, and Tally's commentary when she looks through old magazines. :\ a lot of missed opportunities for this movie.
Basically, they all look like Bratz dolls.
The film adaptation could have delved deeper into the western beauty standards/classist standards of fair skinned equals not a peasant working in the fields, even if it wasn’t covered in the books
@@rosamariabest6069Don’t you mean Barbie dolls? Is that not what a book from the 2000s would go to? Barbie has always been white af, without any extreme features or thick lips.
Even when I read the Uglies series as a kid, I knew any kind of live action would fail because Hollywood is too cowardly to cast normal people as the “uglies”.
Neverrrrr
It’s a very bad adaptation, but the whole premise is that everyone that’s not surgeried Pretty is considered Ugly. Cindy and Elias would be Ugly, i would be Ugly, all those kpop idols with perfect skin and hair (and a lot of surgeries lmao) would be Ugly. The Kardashians would be Ugly.
When the yassified tally is the standard, normal becomes ugly.
Technically,, the Kardashians and said kpop idols are pretty.
@@ShinSeulwhy? Because in the books, they even found something to critique about models. They said something about how these people could almost be Pretty, but weren’t
Well, I guess the K-pop idols and the Kardashians with their ample cosmetic surgeries and wealth would be our current society's version of Pretties that originally inspired Scott Westerfield.
But yes, at the heart of this conceptualization, I agree 😊
@@gordon6052right, I remember her looking at old magazines and thinking the models were "Almost Pretty" and noticed that they had some old disease (anorexia)
@@ShinSeul In the books, becoming a pretty isn’t simply getting plastic surgery to have a nice face. It’s a high-tech full-body surgery that alters or replaces every inch of your body to be “perfect”, ie. getting a full-body skin graft just to prevent you from getting acne, or replacing all your teeth with aerospace ceramics.
Hear me out, but Alita's design (and the Martians in general) in Alita Battle Angel is pretty much how the Pretties were described in the books, I was hoping they'd go for a more uncanny feel to the Pretties because when Tally finds an old magazine, she considers literally all of the models Uglies.
She does not consider the models ugly, she only says that they're underweight! Why does everyone keep saying that Rusty supermodels were considered ugly, they weren't lol.
@skyesaxon6423 no, Tally didn't think they were ugly, she categorized them as Uglies
@@starcomet8312 I'm pretty sure she called them *rusties* and went on to describe the model as looking like a Pretty but being too skinny to be considered "Pretty" by their standards.
What’s the point of being a nepobaby if your connection only gets you into bad movies??? Like I think her relative is her opp
Joey King isn't a nepo baby. The closest her parents got to fame was her dad being an arm wrestler in the 80s and consulting Sylvester Stallone.
Her acting matches her projects tho
@@withcindyI don’t believe you’ve seen her in any good movie then. Watch Family Weekend
@@withcindyconjuring??
"Not one single person looks awkward or left out" Does the surgery also change your personality because that's usually what makes me get left out
I mean in the Uglies books it literally did yeah. They gave people "reversible brain lesions" so the pretties were dumb and cheerful that then got reversed when they became "Crumblies" aka regular old adults with professions. Specials also had their brains messed with, basically to make them murder machines. It was a part of the books that was explained! Also, if I recall rightly, the city it's set in is the only one where they do the brain lesions, other cities don't or do different things? But that only comes up in Specials and it has been ... oh god more than a decade since I read these books, so I couldn't tell you more than that.
Yes, that's what the brain lesions do. The brain lesions that David's parents tell Tally about.
it does in the book actually! they basically like lobotomized everyone
@@EssayOfThoughts I was actually reading them recently cause I wanted to refresh my memory before I watch the film and yeah, Tally's city is said to have been the one strictest about the surgeries, and pretty much the only one that wanted to completely eradicate the people of The Smoke! Although it was also said that Diego (the other city) had some infighting when they started taking in Uglies and people from The Smoke, cause it opened up this "new model" where people in the city felt freer to express themselves through their looks so they had teens with like, snakes for their pinkies. And Tally's city had just been waiting for the best chance to attack other cities and subjugate them basically.
It did, yes.
God it sucks how bad that this movie was because the subject matter and themes of the book series have become more prevalent with beauty standards changing/evolving rapidly due to the rise of social media and accessibility of apps like photoshop making it easier to manipulate and make unattainable beauty standards. If the people in charge had adapted the books into a tv series and put more care and time into the subject matter, the adaptation could have had the potential to become a cultural phenomenon that would have helped start a public conversation about beauty standards and desirability politics. But instead, we have been given a film that’s just as fake and superficial as the antagonists.
Real. Every time something happens with TikTok filters or social media influencers, I'm like, "Dang, this is just like the Uglies series!" The social media stuff especially reminds me of Extras. I don't think vloggers were a thing when it was written, but that society is full of vloggers.
U know they ain't capable of that level of depth
Hmm, I think a mini series would've been good for the book series. Like one season of a show and like 3-5 episodes per book. IDK maybe they can world build enough for a whole 4 season show though! I would love to see more romance because I am a sucker for that stuff.
Yeah, but consider: Hollywood WANTS to perpetrate beauty standards so billionaires can keep making money from insecurities. They dont WANT us to rebel against those.
getting a lobotomy and a plastic surgery for yassification sounds like a great package deal tbh
REAL!! Like it’s pissing me off that this is fiction, cuz where do I sign damn 🗿 I wanted both of those anyway lol
Ideal scenario fr
lol fr, its like if u didn't have to take lorazepam or Xanax for anxiety or depression. you're just happy, hot, & u get to party. Lol who wouldn't want that? I also don't wanna be ugly living in a hippie commune. That commentary was the best.
Bruh if the book was made now, I bet this would be discussed. Life is too difficult and we all have attention issues. Let us be cute and dumb. Born to be cute and lazy, forced to work
@@NC-qm8dc You can tell this was made in the 2000s with the commentary. In 2020 we're all pressured to be smart and hard working when we all just wanna rest.
What I love about this movie is so much of it was like, line for line from the book. “This seemed rly cool when I was twelve” I kept saying 😭
HAHAHAHA
I genuinely dont think any of you look ugly 😭 everyone just looks like normal humans to me. And your humour and charm makes yall even more attractive
Thank u bb ❤️
Joey kings CV is more diverse than my medicine cabinet. Like booked and busy but at what cost
She's gotta just be doing this for fun
tbh good for her for making money. Her reputation is gonna be "weird book to movie adaptation lady"
@@maddiemcnugget1076 y'know what youre right, I bet in like 20 years she'll be iconic for defining this era
I be like “dang I kinda miss the old days when we were all over those ya dystopian books/movies.” But then this reminds us why it’s probably better that era is over.
Okay but Cindy, people being their weird 16 year old version of pretty was so common in the books, and I don't think anything was permanent, so you could have gold eyes this week and purple next, change your hair, your face...the structure of your feet...everything!
Ok good bc imagine being locked in to ur choices as a 16 yr old 💀
Nope they had gaps between surgery for safety reasons
Ellias reaction to the movie abruptly ending had me dead omg
He was so extra
Cindy calling herself ugly when she's one of the cutest people I know
🥺🥺🥺
no bc when she called herself ugly, i was like damn what does that make me lol
@@randomperson-pt3lv dude we are like, advanced ugly then
“What if I’m ugly and stupid?”
These are the deep philosophical questions we should be asking.
Lol
Ugly and stupid!!
You guys talking about me??
This book came out in an era where every single YA novel was lead by a tall, slender, athletic, flawless skinned, white girl who's looks "are actually unremarkable in fact, and kinda plain". Just as us ugly girls started pulling away from all these dystopian worlds being destroyed by supermodel teens, the book "Uglies" came out. And it was pandering shallow bullsht, but we ate that sht up. Every time a character reflected on how it genuinely felt like oppression being ugly surrounded by pretty people just existing being pretty it hit some kinda way. I won't say how many times I read this book. Also read/see "Fugly Best Friend" for the girls how didn't read fantasy, lol!
Oooh good point about the reading climate back then!
You want to look at ugly ppl? Go sit on a bus. Kristen Stewart, Shailene Woodley, and Jennifer Lawrence are not supermodel pretty. Theyre just girls next door.
The shitty audio is a paid character. And she does the heavy lifting.
It's funny you say that about the colonialism and western beauty standards, because i the book, part of the reason fir the surgery is to get rid of racism and they make everyone have "olive" skin. Its mentioned in other regions different skin colors are the norm. Wild.
I liked the books as a teen but I highly hesitated to watch the movie, good thing Cindy is here
And btw the title Uglies fit the books cause (personally) those covers are trash
It's what I'm here for
Cindy does it so we don't have to! Or I guess we only have to watch a shorter video on it to see if we still wanna watch it
@@Sofianunes12someone said they liked the book and you had to comment on how bad it was? Nobody asked stfu
Ironically the "pretty ones" are scary asf lmao (also c'mon people, I hate the kissing booth as anyone else but don't need to be cruel about Joey King's apearance)
Idk if you're talking about Cindy but they were complementing her at the end of the video😭
@@greenthinggg oh no Its not them its the internet as a whole, many people saying How much she is ugly, that If she turns "pretty" in the end than they must change actress etc..
@@Sofianunes12 oh yeah that's not right it's unfortunate cause people have been saying that about her for year's now even though I find her very gorgeous😭
No but that was the point. The Prettys are scary and not real, the Uglies are normal people
Conventionally attractive people looking scary is pretty realistic tho
I’m definitely that BFF who’s like “No, you’re not ugly! You’re a powerful diva who rules the world.”
Ur a good friend ❤️
I feel for the fans of the book. Imagine waiting for 19 ish years for your favorite book to be adapted and this is the result.
also
JOEY KING DO YOU OR YOUR TEAM PURPOSELY PICK BAD MOVIES WITH BAD SCRIPTS? OMG QUEEN YOUR FILMOGRAPHY IS RADIOACTIVE.
EDIT: 17:47 I'M FUCKING DEAD 💀💀💀
Ellias saying she looks like me was the nicest thing he's ever said to me
Cindy calling herself ugly while having all of us fawning over her is peak YA protagonist energy
I think this would've been more effective had the "pretties" look like either aliens or complete clones of each other. Just something fully inhuman and unnerving.
I think some people said it was closer to that in the books? But IDK in the film they only look like the more conventionally attractive version of themselves. Playing it safe like that makes the message of "strict beauty standards destroys individuality" less effective.
when me and my roomie were watching this and shay came out pretty we were like WAIIIIT SHE KINDA SLAYYYY
WHY SHE KINDA SERVING THO
I read this whole book series as a child and it did untold amounts of damage to my psyche bc of the romanticization of self harm. ANYWAYS.
I didn’t like how they made the “ugly characters” hot
RIGHT lol I can’t believe they’re adapting it now with all that
Omg there's self harm in it ???
@@withcindy supposedly one of the ways pretties can clear their heads and feel better after they’ve been surgeried was to cut and feel “bubbly” 🥴 there was a whole group called the cutters straight up. probably misremembering some now as less pro-self harm, but as a kid I just went oh, that makes you feel better? whoa cool! lmao
@@withcindyyeah they start harming themself to cut through the “pretty” brainwashing and feel like themself or smth 💀
i havent read the book myself but i’m told the whole point was the “pretties” were like SCARY uncanny valley kind of sculptured
PFFT!
If y'all are ugly, I'm Quasimodo 😂
Not cindy calling herself ugly while looking the cutest
Aw thank u 🥺
I feel like some of these old YA books from early 2000s, can't be adapted to films today unless they get a complete overhaul.
Might as well just have original movies then
True, literally in another comment reply I was talking about how the world puts too much pressure on use to be hard working and hustling for like 40k a year. People who I would call hustlers are having a hard time keeping up! I literally say to my boyfriend "Born to be cute and lazy, forced to find a job". Would totally sign up for this.
You could never cast this movie accurately because if you’re attractive, it’s considered ‘de-glam’ and ‘edgy’ but if you’re not conventionally attractive, it’s a “chance to give it back to the haters” and then overcompensate during the promotions and later in life.
the way ellias and cindy talked about the things they'd do to be hot reminded me of that scene from fleabag "please raise your hand if you would trade five years of your life for the so-called perfect body" and both fleabag and her sister's hands (and no one else's) shot up so fast 😭😭😭
bro ur so right
sounds like a win-win!!
The way I thought the Uglies movie was a joke some booktok girlie started after reading ~vintage~ YA until Joey King appeared on screen… she’s like the maker’s mark of Real Adaptations of Stories that Shouldn’t Have Happened 😬
Oh no it was an OG YA dystopia. Like before Hunger Games, even. It was not great but it was bad before it was even a multibillion dollar genre
"vintage YA" my flesh and bones are going to crumble into dust from old age 💀
This is the only commentary I ever want over my movies. Amazing.
Hehe thank u
I was trying to explain this book to my sister, we have like 5 years difference and so she got the Hunger Games … and I got this, lol. I used to love these books 😂
My condolences
I guess I was the perfect age because I got both 😅
Zane was literally the first bad boy I obssesed over lmao I was cringe but I was free
The audio somehow makes this better
thank u for looking at the positive
Not them turning my girl Shay into Nikita Dragun whaaa?
Aside from her being problematic Nikita is quite pretty so technically she did upgrade
Elias and his Giant Peach have entered the chat. My favourite straight baiting enemies to lovers pair is back 😂
(You two choose THE BEST movies)
This was fun and hopefully we can react to more!
i had this running in the background. i literally thought it was a tv show and that this was just episode #1...and then was thinking it would be released weekly....and then realised it was a movie. possibly the worst i've seen in a long time. didn't even know it was a movie because the pacing was all over the place.
I'm glad this isn't being released weekly lol
this was the worst way to make a dystopian world seem unappealing bc why would I not want to be pretty, happy, and party for free until im 30??
That sounds like a GREAT time
This movie was shelved for YEARS, and allegedly Netflix was on the brink of shelving it forever bc it was bad.
If that is true I highly doubt there will be a sequel.
I was gonna say, the fact that it took _this long_ for an Uglies movie to happen means it was in some kind of Production Hell
Huh what made them decide to release it after all?
They took the conventionally attractive actors as the main focus. Then switched to child actors to act out a trauma and call themselves ugly.
Cindy and Elias reacting to any movie that has a romance in it is basically Elias saying how he would fall for the li, and Cindy scoffing at him 😅
Same dynamic every time
Someone who read the books said that the surgeries take away any flaw or anything that makes you different including what makes you look like your parents.
So she is not used to seeing anyone, of any race look like their parents.
The title of this vid alone has me hollering 😭😭 the Uglies Trilogy + Extras are some of my favorite books of all time. I first read them at 15, and have been rereading them at 32 and they are still good. This movie tho…yeah they should’ve kept this locked up for good.
Keep it in the vault!
this is how I find out they made this into a movie. I read this as a teenager. Took them long enough
But at what cost
THE TITLE MADE ME CACKLE PLEASE IT'S LIKE SO LATE IN HERE 😹
Ty it was quite easy
“I wish I spoke something other than English…so I can consume more media” LITERALLY!! So many shows on the back burner because I don’t have time to read subtitles 😭😭😭
Give subtitles a try! I promise it’s not that bad
@@erinkatrina4201 I love subtitles! I just can’t watch when I’m doing work unfortunately
Cindy's mic quality being so bad that she and only she needs subtitles has me in tears. She was attending that Zoom call from space
Maybe its just me but i was obsessed with the books in middle school and i loved the movie. It was so camp it almost felt like they were leaning into the YA sterotypes of its time.
Gotta embrace it!
Same here!
The worst part is that the book came out before Hunger Games so it's not like it was intentionally doing YA streotypes (well I guess it was since dystopian media and YA tropes existed before Hunger Games ofc), but people who don't know the book would think it's Divergent's dumber cousin.
@maddiemcnugget1076 I think there is no possible way to properly adapt uglies since a lot of its points easily criticize Hollywood. I like to imagine they knew this and just fully decided to lean into the cheese sci-fi
It was such a nice watch, i read them so many times as a teen and David in the movie was cuter than the dude i imagined 😊
perfect timing! I was looking for something to watch while eating!! hopefully i will not choke from laughter.
Whatcha eating, I'm about to head to dinnerrrr
"They're gonna yassify Shay! They're gonna turn her straight!" Lmaoooo you two are too funny 🤣
“they’re gloves” and that face from Elias? DEAD.
Literally having the most stressful three weeks of my life and seeing this upload made me REALLY smile 😭😭😭 I love you, Cindy and Ellias…. you always make my day 🤍
Notice how ur 3 stressful weeks coincided with the 3 weeks I didn't upload 🤔
@@withcindy AWWW HAHA
Why do they always pick conventionally attractive actors for roles that aren't conventionally attractive (no hate to the actors but picking people who are outside of the binary of what society deems beautiful would've been a smarter move)
Oh definitely! Like Edward Bluemel, he's got a distinctive look but not a conventional one. If you can't choose normal-looking people, at least choose those that aren't Hollywood Pretty.
I normally would agree but the ‘point’ of the books is that none of those people are actually ugly and the procedure only exist so they can brainwash them. In that world everyone has to get it no matter how they look so appearance isn't actually that important.
@@Honey511Bee we need more female actors in those roles. women aren't allowed to look as interestingly human as men are allowed to look on screen & off screen. that type of casting would be a smarter move.
like... there aren't female versions of "willem dafoe" or "danny devito" actresses on screen
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder because I don't think Joey king is attractive.
To be fair, in the books the point is that only the people who had the surgery could even BE pretty. Everyone was supposed to be "made equal" by having the surgery that made everyone look the same. They were all given mostly the same features, right down to your hair colour, like in the second book they comment that a character has dyed their hair to a shade of black that isn't allowed by the Pretty Committee who decide what the ideal Pretty look is. Tally even reads some old magazines in The Smoke and comments on how the models are "almost pretty" cause they all still look distinct and look different to what the Pretties are supposed to look like. So an Ugly could be considered beautiful by us but would still be considered an Ugly by them. Like, if you think back to the Battle Angel Alita movie, what Alita looks like is basically how the Uglies are described in the books
This is just the YA extrapolation of the Twilight Zone ep Number 12 Looks Just Like You, which predates the novel by 40 years and told a better story in like a 20 min run time.
That and the movie Logan’s Run. Both of which I highly suggest.
@LaFlor718 Everything old is new again. I just wish that things were improvements on the original concepts, not backtracks.
"Lets not lie" IM CRYINGGG
i just love that I just recently listened to Cari explaining the whole plot, so I don't have to read it, and now you two react to the movie, so I don't have watch it
The awkward moment when David, the "Ugly" is cuter than Paris. lmfao.
Since they have people changing eye color I was so afraid someone would choose to change skin color 🤦♀️
That’s TOO far for them
honestly when cindy said nose looked like oli london i was thinking the same thing they should have just let him be crazy and ask for the trying to become jimin race change surgery
That would have been really interesting if they pulled it off well
They actually do this in the books lol. In another city somebody was described to have modded their skin to be coal black. But they also had people with clock eyes so they were just crazy
Joey King's agent has a kink for making her acting look bad 😭
But what if it actually is ....
EVERYTIME it switches between you guys talking I get whiplash cuz it sounds SO different 😭😭
HAHAHA I know I'm sorry
In the book david has a thing with shay and then says f u when tally shows up 🤦♀️
Wtf
I'm only 6 minutes in and I'm already crying laughing 😭😭 you guys seem SO fun to hang out with
Cindy this is my new comfort video I've already watched it over five times 😭 the one liners and self deprecating jokes had me cackling 😭😭 now I can move on from my previous comfort video which was your Cait Corrain one lmao
Aww I'm glad it can bring comfort despite the bad audio
I just watched this movie yesterday so this is perfect timing 😅😅
Edit: btw even people who read the books when they came out agreed that Tally and Shay made way more sense than Tally and either of her ‘love interests’. The vibes may have been accidental but they were definitely there.
Everything's better sapphic
@@withcindy I absolutely agree
i actually liked the third book, where she gets her teeth filed to points. Looking scary is better than pretty. And i don't think there is a beauty-related moral to this story since from this point on we never go back to uglies. She just gets the beauty for "free"
Omg that's a serve
LITERALLY THE AUTHOR JUST FORGETS 😭😭😭
1:33 y'all are both gorgeous, stop it😭
i read this book series a few times as a kid and one of the only things i retained from it is tally and her friend coming across gay as hell. so at least they got one thing right
the ass audio with cindy's jokes, i'm just busy laughing my ugly ass off I CANT
im glad the ass audio enhanced the comedy
@@withcindy it fr did 😭😭😭 it sounds like an ingame match LOL
i love these two together. gimme 14 of these collabs
More to come!!
The way that Cindy literally is not ugly lol
I wanna be hot but I know the real tea is that I gotta practice body neutrality 😭
Team Cindy because Elyas's video and audio quality are so much better.
Lol, this probably sounds very corny but ever since I saw Ellias in one of your videos, I have always thought that he was so cute and so handsome. Like someone who is very fun and beautiful in their own cool way. And now I will shut up because I don't wanna be too weird. Cindy I love your channel Peace *quickly runs out*
Aww I'll share this comment with him
the reactions to shay's yassification had me cackling hysterically. she ATE!!!
Anyone who says Joey King can’t act has not seen her in Ramona and Beezus or We Were the Lucky Ones.
Those are her two best roles to date.
She definitely needs to find projects with better writing that suit her talents more.
None of you guys are ugly. You are both beautiful!!!