30 Minutes or Less? I Wish.
Every so often, a movie comes along that makes you question not only filmmaking but also your life choices leading up to pressing “play.” Slice (2018), directed by Austin Vesely and produced by A24—yes, that A24—is one of those films. It’s a horror-comedy about pizza delivery drivers being murdered in a ghost-infested town, featuring witches, werewolves, ghosts, corrupt politicians, and Chance the Rapper. On paper, that sounds like chaotic fun. On screen, it feels like the cinematic equivalent of ordering a pizza and getting a box full of disappointment and oregano.
A24 has built its reputation on artsy horror—Hereditary, The Witch, Midsommar. So when you see their logo before Slice, you brace yourself for dread and tension. What you actually get is a tone-deaf mix of bad jokes, limp scares, and plotlines tossed together like unwanted pizza toppings.
The Setup: Murder, Ghosts, and Delivery Fees
The movie takes place in Kingfisher, a small town where the living and the dead coexist in uneasy harmony. There are 40,000 ghosts, most of them confined to “Ghost Town,” a neighborhood that sounds like it should come with its own Scooby-Doo theme park. The story kicks off when Sean, a pizza delivery guy for Perfect Pizza Base, is murdered during a run to Ghost Town. His throat is slit by an unseen killer, which is unfortunate—but also the most exciting thing that happens for the next hour.
We meet Sadie (Rae Gray), a local reporter trying to make sense of the chaos, and Astrid (Zazie Beetz), Sean’s ex-girlfriend who decides to solve the murder herself because, apparently, journalists, detectives, and logic have all called in sick.
The plot thickens—or at least curdles—when it turns out Sean was running drugs for a dealer named Big Cheese (Y’lan Noel), who sounds less like a crime boss and more like a rejected Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles villain. From there, the story spirals into a tangle of ghosts, witches, werewolves, and political corruption. It’s less a coherent plot and more like someone dropped a pizza covered in random horror clichés and decided to film it.
The Characters: Half-Baked and Over-Topped
Zazie Beetz, fresh off Atlanta and full of charisma, does her best as Astrid, but the script gives her little to do beyond glaring stylishly and holding pizza boxes like emotional baggage. Her character’s arc could’ve been compelling—ex-girlfriend turned supernatural detective—but instead, it’s a series of scenes where she alternates between suspicion and confusion.
Chance the Rapper plays Dax Lycander, a werewolf and former pizza guy accused of the killings. He’s introduced as this mysterious, brooding figure… who then disappears for half the film like he had better things to do (which, honestly, he probably did). When he finally reappears, it’s as though the director remembered, “Oh yeah, this was supposed to be Chance the Rapper’s movie!” His performance is fine in the same way a microwaved slice of pizza is fine—technically edible but deeply disappointing.
The supporting cast is a who’s who of wasted talent. Chris Parnell plays the mayor with his trademark smarmy flair, Hannibal Buress stops by to deliver a few lines before vanishing like a ghost himself, and Joe Keery (Steve from Stranger Things) pops up long enough to remind us that he deserves better scripts. The movie has more cameos than character arcs, and by the end, everyone feels like they wandered in from different films looking for directions.
The Plot (Such As It Is): Paranormal Pizza Party
Slice wants to be a murder mystery, a horror spoof, a political satire, and a supernatural thriller all at once—but ends up being none of them.
After Sean’s death, more pizza delivery people start dying, and suspicions turn toward Dax, the werewolf. Meanwhile, an activist group called Justice 40,000 (because subtlety is dead) wants to demolish a shopping mall built over a mass grave, while the town’s mayor—corrupt, of course—tries to cover it all up. Oh, and there’s a coven of witches trying to open a portal to hell in the basement of Perfect Pizza.
If that sounds convoluted, it’s because it is. Watching Slice is like trying to read a takeout menu written by a drunk philosopher. Every few minutes, a new subplot gets introduced, abandoned, or exploded—literally exploded, in the case of the pizza place, which gets blown up in the finale.
By the end, ghosts are rioting, witches are summoning demons, and Dax is turning into a werewolf again because the film remembered it needed a climax. It’s less a story and more a fever dream in which someone keeps yelling “plot twist!” every five minutes.
The Tone: All Dressed Up, Nowhere to Go
The hardest thing to pull off in film is horror-comedy. When it works—think Shaun of the Dead or Tucker and Dale vs. Evil—it’s gold. When it doesn’t, you get Slice. The film has no sense of timing. The jokes land with a thud, the horror is toothless, and the satire is so toothless it should be on a liquid diet.
You can almost feel the movie straining to be quirky, with its neon lights, synth score, and ironic dialogue. But style can’t save a movie that has no idea what it’s parodying. It’s like watching a hipster Halloween party that forgot to bring any costumes.
Even the cinematography can’t decide what it wants to be. Some scenes look like an art film; others look like a local pizza commercial that got way out of hand.
The Horror: More Sauce Than Substance
Let’s be clear: this is a horror movie in the same way pineapple is a pizza topping—technically, yes, but you’ll regret it almost immediately.
There’s no tension, no scares, and no gore. The murders happen off-screen, the ghosts are basically extras in blue makeup, and the witches look like they got their costumes from a Spirit Halloween clearance rack. The werewolf transformation scene—supposed to be the big payoff—is so underwhelming that you’ll wish the movie had just turned him into a golden retriever and called it a day.
The only truly horrifying thing about Slice is its editing. Scenes end abruptly, dialogue overlaps, and transitions feel like they were made by a blender on “chaos” mode.
The Message (Maybe?): Late Capitalism, But Make It Ghosts
Buried somewhere beneath the bad jokes and pizza boxes, Slice is trying to say something about gentrification, exploitation, and the way marginalized groups (in this case, literal ghosts) are treated. It’s an intriguing idea—if only the film had the discipline to follow through. Instead, it waves vaguely at social commentary before wandering off to make another werewolf pun.
By the time the witches are chanting in a pizza basement and ghosts are unionizing, you’ve stopped trying to make sense of it.
The Ending: Closing Time at the Pizza from Hell
In the finale, all the threads converge in an explosion of nonsense. The pizza place literally blows up, the witches get killed, the portal to hell closes, and the heroes all die—or maybe don’t. Astrid becomes a ghost, Dax becomes a good guy, and everyone decides to open a new ghost-run pizza joint because, sure, why not.
It’s supposed to be a quirky, upbeat ending. Instead, it feels like an ad for a restaurant you’d never visit.
Final Verdict: Half-Baked, Extra Bland
Slice could’ve been the next cult classic—a clever, self-aware horror-comedy with heart. Instead, it’s an undercooked mess that’s neither scary nor funny, like a pizza that forgot both the cheese and the oven.
The only thing supernatural about it is how A24 managed to distribute it with a straight face.
Final Score: 1 out of 5 Soggy Slices
If you’re craving horror-comedy, skip Slice and order Evil Dead II instead. It’s cheaper, spicier, and doesn’t come with 40,000 ghosts wondering why they wasted 82 minutes of their afterlife on this movie.
