The Machine isn’t done sprinting yet. For this 5-For transmission, Truman and Landen are handed five studio comedies that orbit Tag (2018)—movies where grown adults, respectable jobs be damned, are dragged into escalating games, schemes, and misadventures that test friendship, masculinity, and the limits of insurance coverage.

The Machine’s Five Selected Films

According to the Machine, these films share a common DNA: high-concept premises, ensemble casts, and the quiet fear that adulthood might already be over.

• Game Night (2018) – Murder-mystery stakes collide with suburban friendship dynamics
• Date Night (2010) – Marriage, mistaken identity, and chaos after bedtime
• Horrible Bosses (2011) – Workplace rage filtered through cartoonish criminal logic
• Hot Tub Time Machine (2010) – Male nostalgia weaponized into a sci-fi party comedy
• The Hangover (2009) – The modern blueprint for friendship-based disaster comedies

Why These Five?

Together, these movies map out the late-2000s and 2010s studio comedy boom—where adult responsibility was repeatedly smashed into genre frameworks like action thrillers, crime capers, and sci-fi romps. Seen alongside Tag, they reveal a moment when Hollywood tried to keep the R-rated comedy alive by turning friendship itself into the central stunt.

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Truman and Landen sweep up the leftover chaos from Tag (2018)—a movie that asked, “What if your friends never emotionally matured past recess, but in a kind of inspiring way?” They revisit dangling threads from the Main episode, dig into the real-life tag squad behind the film, and, as always, play The Trailer Game, trying to guess which slow-motion tackles and Jeremy Renner smirks the marketing department used before watching the trailer for the first time.

Next week, the Machine sends them to April 7, 1989 with the clue: "This morning they were playing ping-pong in the hospital rec room. Now they're lost in New York and framed for murder. This was never covered in group therapy." Neither host is prepared for what that implies about their insurance deductibles.

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Tag, Tag 2018, Jeff Tomsic, Ed Helms, Jon Hamm, Jake Johnson, Hannibal Buress, Jeremy Renner, Isla Fisher, action comedy, buddy comedy, based on a true story, 2010s comedies, movie podcast, trailer reaction, vintage trailers, Movie Memory Machine, film discussion, forgotten movies, cult films, cinematic analysis

The Machine hurls Truman and Landen back to 2018, where a perfectly normal adult world briefly stopped to witness a group of grown men sprinting, tackling, and emotionally spiraling through the most intense game of tag ever put to film. As the Machine reminds them, this bromantic stunt-comedy immortalized a real-life tradition—and maybe also proved that your thirties are just gym class with taxes.

Synopsis

Tag is a high-energy buddy comedy starring Hogan Malloy (Ed Helms, The Hangover), Bob Callahan (Jon Hamm, Mad Men), Randy Cilliano (Jake Johnson, New Girl), Kevin Sable (Hannibal Buress, Spider-Man: Homecoming), and Jerry Pierce (Jeremy Renner, The Avengers). Directed by Jeff Tomsic, the film follows a tight-knit group of friends who have spent nearly 30 years locked in a hyper-competitive, anything-goes game of tag—one that threatens to unravel when the ever-untouchable Jerry announces he’s retiring after his wedding.

Blending exaggerated action choreography with a sincere look at male friendship, Tag channels the late-2010s trend of “based on a true story, but played like a cartoon” studio comedies.

Why This Film?

Though it earned modest attention on release, Tag quickly slipped between genres—too heartfelt for pure slapstick, too absurd for straightforward sentiment. It’s a fascinating example of a studio trying to reinvigorate the R-rated comedy market while packaging a very real human-interest story inside blockbuster-style action beats.

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Join Truman Capps and Landen Celano every week as the Machine flings them through cinematic history to rediscover the forgotten, the flopped, and the strangely fascinating films of decades past.

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• Official Website: https://www.moviememorymachine.com
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