Heathers



""Dear Diary, my teen-angst bullshit has a body count.""

- Veronica (Winona Ryder), Heathers

A 1989 High School movie starring Winona Ryder and Christian Slater. Also adapted into a 2010 stage musical with a limited run.

Heathers is an extremely dark Deconstruction of the then massively popular wave of teen movies. The protagonist, Veronica Sawyer, is an unhappy member of the most popular and powerful clique at Westerberg High -- the "Heathers", so named because the other three members all share the same first name. At least, until a mysterious new guy named Jason "J.D." Dean enters Veronica's life. They end up poisoning the Alpha Bitch and making it look like a suicide. Pretty soon the bodies start piling up as Veronica realizes that J.D. is a psychopath with ambitions tied into his nihilistic views of human behavior.

This was one of the most cynical (albeit funny) films of the era, and a cult favourite that's famous largely for reasons completely different from what the writer wanted. The film's writer conceived the film largely as a satire of how society sensationalizes teen suicide, but fans opted instead to focus on the plotpoint of how J.D. and Veronica killed off their school's bullies as the chief draw of the film.

The history of the film's release added to its cult status: the studio that produced Heathers went out of business within weeks of its release, ensuring that it only had a brief run in theaters. However, critics loved the film and it would become popular with its home video release (and countless airings on cable, granted in Bowdlerised form). That said, the film's influence can be seen in later Black Comedy high school movies, like Jawbreaker (1999) and Mean Girls (2004), the latter being considered to be a PG-13 Spiritual Successor to this film.

The sad fate of Kimberly Walker (who died of a brain tumour), who played the chief Heather, has also made it uncomfortable watching these days even for some fans (see Harsher in Hindsight). Also Jeremy Applegate ("I don't think I could handle suicide.") as Peter--the actor commited suicide in 2000.

"Big Bud Dean: Some damn tribe of whithered old bitches doesn't want us to terminate that fleabag hotel. All because Glen Miller and his band once took a shit there."
 * Action Survivor: Veronica.
 * Adults Are Useless: The parents are shown to be self-absorbed and oblivious to their children's problems until they are dead, and the teachers are cynical towards their handling of the dead kids (for instance, the Hippie Teacher who wants to exploit the deaths for group bonding rituals).
 * All of the Other Reindeer: Subverted and played with. Heather Chandler says to Veronica "No one at Westerberg's gonna play your reindeer games." Most of the goings-on, including Veronica's heroic save, happen without the rest of the school knowing who's behind it.
 * All Girls Want Bad Boys: Heavily deconstructed. In this case the bad boy is a complete psycho, murdering three of the popular kids and intending to . The girl who wants the bad boy soon realises the mess she's got herself into and realises how much better her life would have been without him.
 * Alpha Bitch: Three of them, actually.
 * Antagonist in Mourning: J.D. when.
 * Asshole Victim: The Alpha Bitch and two jocks who ruined Veronica's reputation by claiming she gave them blow jobs.
 * Ax Crazy: J.D.
 * Axes At School: J.D. brings a revolver (loaded with blanks) to school and "shoots" two kids in the cafeteria. It gets Played for Laughs. Yeah... kind of says something about when the film was made. Of course, it also says something about its genre.
 * Badass Longcoat: Used before it even became that popular... and also before the shooters in Columbine dressed the same way.
 * Big Fun: Poor, poor Martha Dumptruck.
 * "Big Fun" is coincidentally also the name of the in-universe band behind the song "Teenage Suicide (Don't Do It)," which is used at several points in the film. Martha is wearing a "Big Fun" tee shirt, and JD blackmails Heather Duke into helping him circulate a petition around the high school to have Big Fun perform at the Prom, which is.
 * Bilingual Bonus: J.D. tells Veronica that the bullets they intend to shoot Kurt and Ram with are German "ich lüge" bullets, which are supposedly non-fatal, so that she will go along with the shooting. "Ich lüge" means "I am lying" in German.
 * Black Comedy: Black as midnight on a moonless night.
 * Blue and Orange Morality: JD isn't evil per se, he just operates on a completely different set of morals from normal people - primarily because he's terrifyingly insane.
 * Bury Your Gays: Subverted. Everyone thinks the two football players killed themselves because they were gay lovers who were convinced that they would never be accepted. Everyone, that is, except Veronica and J.D., who forged the suicide note that led everyone to believe that the two heterosexual football players were secretly gay lovers.
 * Color Coded for Your Convenience: All three Heathers, Veronica, and J.D. wear their own color of clothing -- Chandler is red, McNamara is yellow, Duke is green, Veronica is blue and J.D. is black, though this isn't noticeable at first. Chandler's red hair bow becomes a symbol of power, as after her death, Duke claims it for herself, symbolizing her replacement of the original Heather.
 * The Coroner Doth Protest Too Much: Some of these suicides are a little too on the nose. Who brings gay porn with them on a suicide pact?
 * It's made pretty clear that the cops didn't give a shit.
 * Couldn't Find a Lighter: Veronica lights her cigarette off Also, when Veronica burns the palm of her hand with a car's cigarette lighter (intentionally), and JD lights a cigarette from the burn-scar's residual heat. This scene is also one of a few incidents of Veronica's Self-Harm (noted on the DVD commentary).
 * Crapsack World
 * Crucified Hero Shot: Subverted in the film's climax:
 * Dawson Casting: All the students were in Their early twenties. This is averted for Veronica and Heather Duke. Christian Slater just about gets by, being nineteen at the time. Most of the extras are in their late 30s (look close).
 * Deadpan Snarker: Veronica, Heather Duke, Heather Chandler, and J.D., mainly.
 * Driven to Suicide: Darkly subverted, in that all the deaths by "suicide" are actually murders, and all the attempted suicides.
 * : Martha Dunnstock.
 * : Heather
 * : Near the end of the movie,
 * The Eighties
 * Executive Meddling: The original ending had Veronica, followed by a surreal sequence where everyone . This was regarded as "too dark" by executives and it was changed to one where.
 * Fingore:.
 * Flipping the Bird:.
 * Genre Deconstruction: Of the popular John Hughes style teen movies at the time.
 * George Washington Slept Here: Big Bud Dean, J.D.'s father, laments that his construction company is having conflicts with a local organization:

"JD: You got power - power I didn't think you had."
 * Gilligan Cut - Veronica really hopes her date doesn't take her cow-tipping.
 * This was acknowledged on the DVD commentary track with a remark along the lines of "And this is our 'Gilligan's Island' cut here.."
 * Heel Face Turn:
 * Hell of a Heaven: The first Heather to die complains that Heaven is boring.
 * High School - It's named after Paul Westerberg, lead singer of Alternative Rock band The Replacements, who were Wynona Ryder's favorite band at the time.
 * Hippie Teacher : Played straight with Pauline Fleming.
 * Hollywood Nerd/Hollywood Homely - Subverted. The "geek squad" is actually really really dorky.
 * In with the In Crowd
 * Insult Backfire: "You're not a rebel, you're fucking psychotic." "You say tomato, I say toe-mato."
 * Jerk Jock: Ram and Kurt.
 * Laser-Guided Karma:
 * Leitmotif: JD has one. Although most of the score is technopop-inspired synths, there's a harmonica playing in any scene that scene features or is about him.
 * Lovable Alpha Bitch: About halfway through, Heather
 * Manipulative Bastard: J.D.
 * No Celebrities Were Harmed: No one knows why Christian Slater decided to play J.D. as a teenage Jack Nicholson (probably because Nicholson is famous for playing psychos...), but he did do Nicholson quite well (well enough that one viewer was convinced the two actors were related).
 * Christian Slater has said that it was because he is a big fan of Jack Nicholson and also that that was just the way he talked at the time.
 * Odd Name Out: Veronica is the only member of the title clique not named Heather.
 * One Steve Limit: Averted. There are three characters named "Heather" in all.
 * Popular Is Dumb
 * Precision F-Strike: Weirdly subverted, due to Executive Meddling, according to the DVD commentary. In the alley scene, when Heather calls out Veronica ("You stupid Fuck!" "You Goddamn Bitch!"), they were supposed to use the word "cunt," as "fuck" had already been used several times. But censors thought this was too much (!).
 * Romance On Set : Christian Slater and Kim Walker were dating at the time.
 * Shower of Angst: The day after Veronica kills Heather #1 and makes it look like a suicide, she hears other girls in the locker room buzzing about how her death has raised her status even higher. Veronica staggers, still clothed, into the shower. It may look to the others that she's stunned by the news, but it's more because her plan backfired.
 * "Shut Up" Kiss: J.D. employs this a lot. The creepy variety.
 * Shout Out : According to the DVD commentary, the first lunch room scene is an homage to Full Metal Jacket, in its lighting and framing. The writer originally wanted Kubrick to direct "the ultimate high school movie."
 * Shout-Out Theme Naming: Veronica Sawyer and Betty Finn are a playing on both Betty and Veronica and Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, symbolizing how close they used to be.
 * But Betty and Veronica are competitors...
 * Only when it comes to Archie. Otherwise they're best friends.
 * Also J.D. is obviously named after JD Salinger for obvious reasons. His surname is Dean, as a reference to James Dean.
 * His given name recalls another Jason notorious for killing stupid teenagers.
 * And of course, JD really is a JD . Heather McNamara refers to him as "Billy the Kid."
 * Westerberg High is named after The Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg.
 * The Snark Knight: Veronica.
 * The Sociopath: J.D is a tragic example.
 * Star-Crossed Lovers: Darkly subverted; see "Bury Your Gays", above.
 * Strange Minds Think Alike: J.D. creates a package to leave at the scene of the football players' "suicide," which includes a bottle of mineral water. Later, that bottle (along with the note) convinces the policemen that the two were, in fact, gay.
 * Strip Croquet: played by J.D. and Veronica.
 * Stylistic Suck: Teenage Suicide... don't do it!
 * Talking to the Dead: J.D. to ... which doubles as
 * "Take That!" Kiss: Veronica to Heather 3.
 * Teens Are Monsters
 * Troubled but Cute: Emphasis on the "troubled".
 * Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: Veronica (Blackadder-type)
 * Villain Protagonist: J.D.
 * Vitriolic Best Buds: Veronica and her dad
 * Vomit Discretion Shot: Veronica, the "drop under screen" variety
 * What Could Have Been: The leads were almost played by Jennifer Connelly and Brad Pitt. Connelly turned down the role to audition for Say Anything (which she lost out to Ione Skye) and Pitt lost out after Slater had a better audition. Heather Graham was also considered for one of the Heathers (McNamara?), until her mother vetoed the script due to the swearing.
 * Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: J.D. again. For starters, his father is a sociopathic bastard who doesn't care for him (when asked if he even likes his father he responds that he ("[hasn't] given the matter much thought"), and his mother killed herself in front of her son's eyes to get away from her husband. His entire life has been spent moving around from town to town and school to school wherever his father's demolition job took him, where it is implied he saw the same scenario of clique groups bullying other students at every high school he's attended. He starts out by murdering JerkJocks and Alpha Bitches and making their deaths appear as suicides (also implied as something he's done before), but he ultimately resorts
 * Worthy Opponent:


 * Would Hit a Girl: J.D. knees Veronica in the head while in the boiler room.