Prime Video's 93-Minute Sci-Fi Thriller Has a Killer Y2K Soundtrack

Published Aug 27, 2026, 6:17 AM EDT Erik Hawkins is an award-winning writer and editor who's been obsessed with cinema since he was old enough to hold Roger Ebert's Video Home Companion in his hands. He lives in NYC, where he rabidly watches everything from the newest releases to the more odd and obscure, and regularly shares his thoughts on Letterboxd. From ghost-writing fiction and webisodes in South America to local news, trial coverage, and politics in NYC, he's rarely put down his laptop over the past 15 years. While it's arguable whether we, as a society, need another COVID-infused thriller, films like Eddington proved there's still plenty to be said about the recent period when culture war met biological reality. And idiosyncratic former music video director Joseph Kahn's colorful sci-fi/thriller Ick is another worthy entry in the genre, though it's a far more optimistic and less skin-crawling take on the most skin-crawling period in modern American history. And it's loaded with early 2000s needle drops that may make viewers of a certain age positively levitate. Kahn's films are relatively unknown, but beloved by thousands on platforms like Letterboxd. His signature hyperactive, metatextual, go-for-broke style has earned him the reputation of an indie Michael Bay with films like Detention and Torque, and Ick applies it to what's essentially an early-aughts period remake of The Blob. In a perfect world, a film like Ick would have been a box office smash, given a serious marketing budget. It's packed with goofy, gory action and surprisingly heartfelt character moments alongside the wall-to-wall alternative rock soundtrack, and leaves viewers with a lasting impression about the way we tend to ignore the world around us when it's going to shit. It's the definition of a hidden treasure. What Is 'Ick' About? Image Via Fathom Entertainment Ick begins as a Friday Night Lights-style high school movie, with a breakneck Bay-esque pace and about as many gags as a Naked Gun picture. Hank (Superman Returns star Brandon Routh) is the star quarterback, but he suffers an injury on-field caused by the titular ick — which is a constant presence in the small town, oozing eerie tentacles from the ground, yet completely ignored by the population. Kahn then rockets forward several years, with Hank's girlfriend (Mena Suvari) married to the class nerd (Peter Wong) and Hank still nursing his high-school wounds. While Hank begins a new job as a high school science teacher, the ick starts to show more signs of sentience. As it becomes clear that the whole nation is now under attack by the ick, Hank determines a potential weakness (which is a set-up for a wonderful joke later in the film) and sets out to rescue his ex-girlfriend's daughter (Malina Weissman) — whom he also believes is biologically his child — as partying teens are slaughtered left and right by the ick and its zombifying tentacles. 'Ick' Is The Heartfelt COVID Satire/'Blob' Remake We Didn't Know We Needed Any description of Ick's plot falls to capture the film in its entirety, however, because it doesn't account for the film's wall-to-wall Y2K soundtrack. Initially reading as ironic, its deployment of the All-American Rejects, Blink 182, Hoobastank, and eventually (and to great effect) Creed becomes a surprisingly heartfelt sonic pulse to the ick-battling set pieces. Kahn even goes so far as to have an ancient iPod loaded with a period playlist become a plot point. And when Routh's Hank is sitting on a hillside contemplating giving up until he hears Creed's "One Last Breath," if you're under the film's spell, you may also realize you’ve always loved Creed. There's an understated yet powerful current running through the film, as it depicts the town's disinterest in the growing ick for years and refusal to act until they or their creature comforts are directly affected. Kahn's film, likewise, is so breathless that even the most disturbing, zombifying effects of the ick may barely even register, except for when Grace is menaced by her mutated boyfriend. It's an ambient menace made flesh and eventually battled by pure love and community. And when the closing credits scroll to another, well-known, Creed song, it'll be a challenge for even the most hardened viewer to not walk out with a silly grin. Ick is easily Kahn's most commercially-palatable film, and deserved to be a massive hit. Its comedic depiction of a community and country in denial as everything burns is an evergreen pleasure that hits hard even post-COVID, and its unabashed use of some of the most saccharine and overplayed rock of the 2000s works a downright magical charm. It's streaming now on Prime Video. Release Date July 27, 2025 Runtime 104 minutes Director Joseph Kahn Writers Dan Koontz, Joseph Kahn, Samuel Laskey Producers Steven Schneider, Adi Shankar, Joe Heath, David Kang