frootflicks | tick, tick... BOOM! (2021) 🎬
— 🍎 the bite size review:
andrew garfield learned to sing for this role. you can't tell me that man isn't perfect.
tick, tick... BOOM! is a musical that feels like both a love letter to art and the process of creation and a gut check about time, ambition, and the pressure to "make it."
watch if you want some banger songs, chaotic creative energy, and an existential crisis disguised as a broadway musical.
at its core this musical isn't just about jonathan larson. i's about anyone who's ever stared down the clock and wondered if they're wasting their life chasing an impossible dream. this movie weaponizes time: every scene, every lyric reminds the audience that creative ambition doesn't pause (even when rent is due ;)), friends move on with life, and the world feels like it's leaving you behind.
the real genius, i think, lies in andrew garfield's performance. he is jonathan larson. he captures the manic and unstoppable drive while also letting us see the cracks that begin to form — the fear, the loneliness, the near-obsessive need to matter. it's exhausting. we live and watch with the same urgency that larson lived with every day.
psychologically it hits hard because it isn't just about "following your dreams." it's about what gets sacrificed in the process — relationships, stability, sanity, even health. the film walks a fine line between celebration and a cautionary tale, and that's why it lingers forever. even beyond the credits as they roll.
and yes, the songs are fucking phenomenal.
