Milk & Serial (USA, 2024)

I almost saved Curry Barker’s recent feature Obsession for this year’s October Horror Movie Challenge, but I have poor impulse control. While that may end up being my favourite horror film of 2026, who knows what else the month holds? But I did at least save Curry’s first feature, Milk & Serial, for the OHMC. Given the phenomenal success of Obsession, it’s hard not to compare the two films, but I’ll try to review Milk & Serial on its own merits.

Milk & Serial is currently streaming on YouTube in the UK.

Synopsis

Milk and Seven are the co-hosts of the Prank Bros YouTube Channel, where they play often extreme practical jokes on each other. Happily, for a found-footage film, this gives them good reason to record everything they do. When Milk’s birthday comes around, Seven hires an improviser friend to start a fight at the party and apparently shoot their friend Naomi. When this is revealed to be a prank, complete with blanks and blood squibs, Milk is delighted. He had been in danger of ruining the party when he admitted, during a game of Never Have I Ever, to having killed a cat when he was young. Luckily, the shooting proves a great distraction.

Events take a turn when Greg, their sixty-something neighbour, complains about the noise and then starts stalking Seven and Milk. After a few tense and weird incidents, Greg apparently wants to make peace with the friends, inviting them to dinner at his apartment. After some rambling, deranged conversation, however, Greg drugs Seven and Milk and drives them out to the desert. When they wake up, Greg announces that he’s going to kill one of them and the other needs to kill him. And then things get weird.

As the situation unravels, we learn that not everything that’s happening is just a prank, and some of the violence may be sickeningly real. But how much can we really believe when everyone is constantly playing mind games with each other?

General Thoughts

Writer/director Curry Barker and his co-star Cooper Tomlinson have a long-running and successful sketch comedy channel on YouTube called “that’s a bad idea”. They clearly drew on the skills this taught them when making Milk & Serial. While it might seem obvious to use a YouTube channel as the pretext for a found-footage film, having one made by experienced YouTubers makes it all feel so much more real. Some found-footage horror leaves us wondering why the protagonists never stop filming, but there is never any such doubt here. Every limitation of lighting and audio only adds to the verisimilitude, and Barker’s skill as an editor keeps us engaged all the way through.

Even before Milk & Serial, Curry and Tomlinson had both been making short horror films on their channel. This was simply their first feature. But Curry has now fully entered the pipeline of sketch comedians moving into horror cinema. This may not be a new phenomenon in the UK, but more and more of their American counterparts, such as Jordan Peele and Zach Cregger, have taken the same path over the last decade. At this stage, I just assume every comedian would rather be scaring us instead.

I really need to stop telling myself I don’t like found-footage horror. While a lot of the early examples I saw did nothing for me, I’ve enjoyed a lot of more recent uses of the format. It’s still a good mechanism for fledgling filmmakers or those on a minuscule budget, but there have been an increasing number of more polished, professional productions in recent years. Milk & Serial falls somewhere in the middle — skilful, but obviously made on a shoestring. The budget was reportedly $800, which isn’t difficult to believe.

Verdict

While Milk & Serial is a tense, gripping horror film, I can see why Barker’s breakthrough success didn’t come until Obsession. The way it is shot and edited simply makes it feel more at home on YouTube. More importantly, however, it never quite reaches the craft or creativity of Obsession. This is no slight on Milk & Serial, as Obsession is simply exceptional. Most horror films I’ve seen recently would suffer in comparison.

Also, Milk & Serial barely qualifies as a feature, with its one-hour runtime. The short length really works in the film’s favour, however. While there are plenty of twists and reveals, this is the kind of short, intense story that benefits from a sense of urgency. The ending is abrupt but visceral, feeling like the punchline to a sick joke.

For what is a low-budget amateur film, the acting is much stronger than I might have expected, with not a single wooden or unnatural performance. Barker is especially creepy as Milk. While he had a small cameo in Obsession, as the unseen customer service rep for One Wish Willow, I hope we get to see him in front of the camera again soon.

I was also surprised at how dark and violent Milk & Serial is, especially given that it’s on YouTube. The premise could have been played as comedy horror, and there are some moments of black humour, but at its heart this is a grim, nihilistic horror film about terrible people.

All in all, Milk & Serial is definitely worth an hour of your time, especially as it is free to watch. This is a superior found-footage horror with some genuine shocks, and it doesn’t waste a second of its runtime. Just don’t expect another Obsession.

The October Horror Movie Challenge

Please do join in and share your own thoughts with us about this or any other films as the month goes on. You can usually find us on BlueSky, Reddit, Discord, or on the other side of the mirror.

If you would like to play along at home, my provisional selections are:

Messiah of Evil (USA, 1974)
Milk & Serial (USA, 2024)
Why Don’t You Just Die! (Russia, 2018)
The Visitor (Italy, 1979)
Lake Michigan Monster (USA, 2018)
Save the Green Planet (Korea, 2003)
Daniel Isn’t Real (USA, 2020)
New Religion (Japan, 2022)
The Driller Killer (USA, 1979)
Saccharine (Australia, 2026)
Evil Cat (Hong Kong, 1987)
Stéphane (France, 2023)
Send Help (USA, 2026)
Vampire Clay (Japan, 2017)
Hokum (Ireland, 2026)
Jack Be Nimble (New Zealand, 1993)
Carved: The Slit-Mouthed Woman (Japan, 2007)
The Appointment (UK, 1982)
Vampyr (German, 1932)
A Desert (USA, 2024)
The Fake Ghost Catchers (Hong Kong, 1982)
The Last Horror Film (USA, 1982)
Rampo Noir (Japan, 2005)
Fréwaka (Ireland, 2024)
Angst (Germany, 1983)
Toys Are Not For Children (USA, 1972)
The Cycle (USA, 2026)
The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (Italy, 1971)
Meanwhile on Earth (France, 2024)
The Ambulance (USA, 1990)
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma (USA, 2026)

A Final Note

If you have been enticed here by these posts, please do look around at some of our other film reviews. We also have a podcast, called The Good Friends of Jackson Elias, which occasionally covers horror films. If this appeals, you might want to check out some of the following episodes.